Siege of the Heart (Southern Romance 2)

“And you know where we weren’t?” Knox asked him bitterly. “Where they needed us. He’d taken our troops and scattered them to the wind, and some big offensive, some... Well, it didn’t happen. A few of our spies got caught for it, I heard. We must have given him the information, and no one knows how.”

The mood in the camp was grim, almost eerie. Jasper tried to see such a man in his mind’s eye. He would not look sly and shifty, oh, no. He would look trustworthy, open. And his smile was meaningless. Who was he? A wraith, a ghost. He looked around at the men and saw their fear, and as if entertaining the same thoughts, Cecelia shivered and looked over her shoulder involuntarily.

“And now he’s working with Horace Delancy,” Knox mused. “Which makes me wonder...”

Jasper’s blood turned to ice. How could he refute this? He had thought the same about Solomon when he learned the truth, and there had not even been a Union spy to damn him by association. How could he possibly convince them that this man and Horace were acquaintances at best, perhaps connected by some coincidence but nothing more? They would never believe him, not after he’d lied about Solomon being dead in the first place. Now they would think he was a spy, and what they would do to him would be far, far worse than what they would do to Jasper.

He opened his mouth in a desperate appeal and stopped.

Could he say, truly, for certain, that Solomon wasn’t a spy?

This was what war did, he thought bitterly. It turned man against man and made enemies from friends. It sowed discord and mistrust where there should be none. He had rescued Solomon. He had defected. Surely if Solomon had been passing intelligence after...

...but now Solomon rode with a man who had come to their troop after Solomon and Jasper left.

Jasper squeezed his eyes shut. It was too much. He could not tell truth from fiction any longer.

“So why’s Horace come for this one, then?” Knox asked, breaking the tortured whirl of thoughts in Jasper’s mind. He jerked his head at Cecelia. “Heard him call her name.”

Jasper pushed himself up, hoping the spasms of pain on his face would block any other emotion that dared show itself. He had to think quickly, had to come up with something. Any association with Solomon would do Cecelia more harm than good.

“He knows her, aye,” Jasper said wearily. “He’s still alive, he visited the farm before.”

“So he’s come to rescue her?”

“I don’t know why he’s here,” Jasper lied with as much alacrity as he could manage.

“You called out for him.”

“He wasn’t doing you any favors, and you did kidnap us,” Jasper pointed out.

“I see.” Knox did not seem to believe him. “Well, it won’t be a mystery for long. They have ways to get things out of people.”

“They?” Jasper felt fear skitter down his spine. At his side, Cecelia was suddenly very still.

“Command. They’ll want to talk to Horace before we get him back, and they’ll want Ambrose too. Think what that man knows.”

“Knox...” The thought of Solomon being tortured made Jasper want to be ill. He could not allow it to happen. He had promised Clara he’d get Solomon back, not lose him to a fate worse than death.

But what if he was a—

No. Don’t even think it.

Then why was he in the company of a spy?

“Don’t tell me you pity the spies,” Knox said, clearly enjoying himself. “That would suggest you had some lingering attachment to them.”

“I pity men about to be tortured, and you know I was Horace’s friend! Still am. Was. I don’t know. Knox, if he’s a spy, I swear I knew nothing of it, but it doesn’t matter. They’re hardly going to come back again.”

“Oh, you think so? So they aren’t circling around us right now?” Knox’s face broke into a smile, and the men started laughing.

“And you’re happy about that?” Jasper retorted before he could stop himself. “They killed how many of your men?”

Knox’s face closed down in a moment, and Jasper regretted is words.

“Doesn’t matter,” Knox said, through gritted teeth. “Last time, we underestimated them. That won’t happen again.”

“That’s why we’ve been going so slowly,” Jasper said suddenly. His heart sank.