“You’re as beautiful now as you were then.”
More memories rose: the late night dinners after the bar closed, the walks in the moonlight, the love they’d made. To escape them and the feelings they spawned, she turned to the window and looked out over the overgrown acreage surrounding her home. “You haven’t lost your gift of gab. Does your son have it, too?”
“Pretty sure he does. Was quite the cock of the walk in his younger days.” He paused. “I’m having trouble believing he and your Raven will really marry though.”
“Dorrie’s never wrong, so it’s going to be interesting to see the outcome. Raven’s tough, focused, and has had her heart broken. She’s determined, too. At the age of nine, she took it upon herself to get a job to help me put food on the table. Every time I made her employer let her go because I wanted her to attend school, she’d find a new one. A cock of the walk isn’t going to impress her.”
“There isn’t a man alive who doesn’t enjoy a challenging woman, even if it takes him a while to figure it out. If a marriage between them ismeant to be, she’ll be good for him. With all the wealth on my wife’s side of the family, he’s wanted for nothing in life, and women have always come easily for him.”
Hazel looked back over her shoulder at him. “Your wife was wealthy?”
“Very. Her father owned a small fleet of merchant ships. Brax is the only grandchild, so he’s inherited it all after Jane’s death.”
“He had the life privileges I wanted my children to have.” She left unsaid that he’d been the reason that hadn’t come to pass, but she didn’t need to remind him of that. She could tell by the tender regret in his eyes that he knew. “Did you love your wife?”
“It was an arranged marriage. Her father was a tyrant. She couldn’t abide the man he’d handpicked for her to marry, so she offered me a business proposal that allowed her to escape her father’s clutches and me a life away from the docks so I could pursue my drawings. I admired her, respected her, and never brought her shame. But I never loved her. Not the way I loved you.”
That went straight to her heart, too. “Let’s get started on the portrait,” she urged softly.
He nodded.
The moment Braxton stepped outside with Raven, he was assaulted by the late afternoon’sthick heat and humidity, and was soon perspiring like he’d just waded out of the Mississippi River. The narrow dirt path she was leading him down cut through an area thick with towering trees and raised roots that made him watch his step. There was also an abundance of overgrown shrubbery that snagged his trousers, while other tall, spindly foliage had to be pushed aside to keep him from losing an eye. As she walked, skirt swaying, she offered no clues as to their destination.
“Where are you from?” she asked without looking back.
He pulled his attention away from the distracting rhythm of her skirt. “Boston.”
“It doesn’t get this warm, I take it.”
“No. There’s heat during the summer months, but nothing like this.” He slapped at a mosquito feasting on his cheek. During the war he’d been stationed in South Carolina with the Massachusetts Fifty-Fourth. The biting insects had been unbearable. New Orleans seemed nearly as bad.
In a small clearing up ahead, he spotted a vine-shrouded gazebo. The weathered wood and stone structure showed its age. Two battered wooden steps led them up and inside, where a pair of stone benches green with moss and mold offered seating. He chose to remain standing.
She finally turned to face him. Arms folded across her chest, she assessed him silently. He assumed she was weighing how to approach this. She’d voiced her misgivings about partnering with him. However, the Pinkerton hadn’t left them a choice. They were in this madness together.
“So,” he said. “Here we are.”
“I’d rather be elsewhere, or at least tied to someone who isn’t a novice at this. So many things could go wrong.”
“If we’re being honest, I’d rather be elsewhere as well, or at least with someone who lives within the law.”
“Have you expressed that opinion to your father, seeing as how he lived a similar life?”
“Touché. Do you always give as good as you get?”
“I don’t suffer fools.”
“Just the ones you cheat?”
“Are you always so judgmental?”
“Generally, no. I save that for the quality of the fabrics I choose and the patterns I make.”
“Lord,” she whispered.
“Now that we’ve broken the ice, what do you need to know about me?”
“Are you married?”