When Hope Sank by Denise Weimer

Author:Denise Weimer [Weimer, Denise]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781636098302
Publisher: Barbour Publishing, Inc.
Published: 2024-09-15T00:00:00+00:00

It was quite a quandary—invent an excuse to keep Jacob with them to delay being alone with Cecil or send her brother on his way so Lily could ask Cecil about Frenchie. As Cecil outlined the improvements he meant to make on his farm, her assessment swung back and forth between her brother and her suitor while they ate their pie in the private dining room. Memory of the scene in this very location when she’d overheard the saboteur plotting—and endured his groping hands—made up her mind. She had no need to hurry Jacob along, though. He’d inhaled his dessert before she’d taken two bites of hers.

“Bye.” Leaving his dirty plate on the table, he bolted up from his chair, apparently having had his fill of their company as well as the pie. The gleam in Cecil’s eye said he felt similarly.

Lily raised her index finger. “Plate!” When he turned back around, she nodded toward the door. “Take it to the kitchen.”

Jacob returned to do as bid—thankfully, without a sigh this time.

When the door swung shut behind him, Cecil sat up straight, pushing his own plate away. He reached across the table to take her hand. “Finally … the moment I’ve been waitin’ for. To be alone with you.”

A protective shield clamped down on her chest—a response to not only his words but the gleam in his eyes. There was a new hunger there, a desperation. But she wanted him to state his intentions, didn’t she? No, not wanted. Needed. So she didn’t remove her hand from his.

“You do realize, all the things I’m talkin’ about, the future I’m envisionin’ … I can’t see it without you.”

“Cecil … you know what you’ve always meant to me. But a lot has changed.” It wouldn’t be fair to either of them to pretend she worshipped his wartime exploits as Beth did. “We might need some time … both of us.”

“What has changed? If you feel the same …”

“I don’t know how I feel. I’m still fond of you, of course. Always will be.” They had too much shared history for that to not be true. Cecil would always be a golden memory of her girlhood, no matter what the future held. “But I haven’t supported the same things you have. You hate all the Yankees stand for, and I agree that some of the soldiers have done awful things to our people here. But I can see where the military government has tried to help us retain order and justice and set up farming communities so we wouldn’t starve. And they’ve done a lot for the black people.”

“I don’t care if the slaves are free. They aren’t takin’ my job, and I never relied on any to work my land. We took care of ourselves before the war, and we will again.” Cecil spoke with the conviction of the independent man he was. It was that spirit that had kept the South fighting so long, against inconceivable odds.

“And I appreciate that about you, but there’s more.

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