Innocent Deceptions by Gwyneth Atlee

Author:Gwyneth Atlee
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: historical romance, Civil War romance, civil war, Romance, historical fiction, Southern fiction
Published: 2010-02-08T16:00:00+00:00

Friday, June 27, 1862

“If you could wait an hour, I could drive you,” Delaney McMahon offered. The lieutenant led the chestnut mare a few steps and stopped to make a small adjustment to the horse’s harness.

Alexander scrambled into the phaeton that rolled behind the Randolph’s mare, a bouquet of flowers in his hands.

Charlotte waved off the lieutenant’s suggestion. “I’ve been driving old Zephyr on my own for years now. There’s no need to worry.”

She tried to keep the tension from her voice, but she was worried. She’d seen Ben Chandler leave an hour before, and she was anxious about the possibility that he might return before she left.

The mastiff puppy burst out of the stable and crawled into the phaeton at Alexander’s feet. Charlotte feigned surprise, though she had deliberately loosened the rope that tied the animal.

“Can Honeybee come with us?” Alexander asked.

Charlotte laughed. “It may get a bit crowded, but I suppose we can manage for a short trip.”

She allowed Delaney to help her into the light carriage. His touch lingered, and she could see the longing in his eyes. And the love, too, God forgive her. Delaney did love her.

“There are a lot of soldiers here now,” he told her. “And some of them don’t know how a lady should be treated. I could assign someone.”

She smiled and stacked yet another lie against her conscience. “The cemetery isn’t far, and it’s been so long see we’ve left Mama flowers.”

He still looked uneasy. “Does the general know you’re leaving?”

She laughed. “It’s not as if we’re prisoners here.”

Her fingertips fluttered along his jawline, a butterfly touch that lasted but a moment. “We’ll be back before you’re finished with your duties, and later on this evening, perhaps we might slip outside . . . to talk.”

As Charlotte drove away, she felt sick to think that later, Delaney would blame himself for their disappearance. For a while, he’d worry that they had come to harm. Ben would understand first, for he would realize that their confrontation yesterday had deeply frightened her. But that was only part of it. The close call had also convinced Charlotte that she was not only hurting faceless enemies, but people she had come to know and . . . feel for. Worst of all, she was risking Alexander – and for what? To prove that, despite her sins, she still had value? To make her family proud of her at last?

She could accomplish neither by destroying her last shreds of self-respect. And if she lost her son, she would lose herself as well, to a darkness so vast and empty that she knew she would die.

The phaeton rolled past the cemetery gates to the sound of Zephyr’s trotting hooves.

“Where are we really going, Charlotte?” Alexander asked.

When she glanced at him, she noticed he was looking at the valise she had packed earlier and hidden in the back.

She gave the driving lines a flick to hurry the mare’s pace. “We’re going where we should have from the start – as far away from this mess as we can.

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