But Elsbeth was no longer intimidated by her. "Everything else. You have to learn to talk and to walk, what to say and, even more important, what not to say. You'll have to learn everything the Academy teaches. You're lucky that Mr. Cain provided you with such a generous clothing allowance."
"Which I don't need. What I need is a horse."
"Horses won't help you get a husband. But the Academy will."
"I don't know how. I haven't exactly made a success of it so far."
"No, you haven't." Elsbeth's sweet smile grew impish. "But then, you haven't had me helping you, either."
The idea was silly, but Kit felt her first spark of hope.
As the weeks passed, Elsbeth was as good as her word. She trimmed Kit's hair with manicure scissors and tutored her in the subjects in which she'd fallen behind. Eventually Kit stopped knocking over vases in dancing class and discovered she had a flair for needlework-not embroidering fancy samplers, which she detested, but adding flamboyant touches to garments such as school uniforms. (Ten demerits.) She was a whiz at French, and before long, she was tutoring the girls who had once mocked her.
By Easter, Elsbeth's plan for her to find a husband no longer seemed so ridiculous, and Kit began to fall asleep dreaming that Risen Glory was hers forever.
Just imagine.
Sophronia was no longer the cook at Risen Glory, but the plantation's housekeeper. She tucked Kit's letter away in the inlaid mahogany desk where she kept the household records and pulled her shawl more tightly around her shoulders to ward off the February chill. Kit had been at the Templeton Academy for seven months now, and she finally seemed resigned to her fate.
Sophronia missed her. Kit was blind in a lot of ways, but she also understood things other people didn't. Besides, Kit was the only person in the world who loved her. Still, they somehow always managed to quarrel, even in letters, and this was the first correspondence Sophronia had received from her in a month.
Sophronia thought about sitting down to answer it right away, but she knew she'd put it off, especially after the last time. Her letters only seemed to make Kit mad. You'd think she'd be glad to hear how well Risen Glory was doing now that Cain was running the place,, but she accused Sophronia of siding with the enemy.
Sophronia gazed around the comfortable rear sitting room. She took in the new rose damask upholstery on the settee and the way the delft tiles bordering the fireplace sparkled in the sunlight. Everything shone with beeswax, fresh paint, and care.
Sometimes she hated herself for working so hard to make this house beautiful again. Working her fingers to the bone for the man, just as if there'd never been a war and she was still a slave. But now she was getting paid. Good wages, too, better than any other housekeeper in the county. Still, Sophronia wasn't satisfied.
She moved toward her reflection in the gilt pier glass that hung between the windows. She'd never looked better. Regular meals had softened the chiseled bones in her face and rounded out the sharp angles of her body. She wore her long hair smoothly coiled and piled high on the back of her head. The sophisticated style added to her already considerable height of nearly six feet, and that pleased her. With her exotically slanted golden eyes and her pale caramel skin, she looked like one of the Amazon women pictured in a book she'd found in the library.
She frowned as she studied her simple dress. She wanted dressmaker gowns. She wanted perfumes and silks, champagne and crystal. But most of all, she wanted her own place, one of those pretty pastel houses in Charleston where she'd have a maid and feel safe and protected. She knew exactly how to go about getting that place in Charleston, too. She had to do what terrified her the most. Instead of being a white man's housekeeper, she had to become his mistress.
Every night when she served Cain his dinner, she let her hips sway seductively, and she forced her breasts against his arm when she set food before him. Sometimes she forgot her fear of white men long enough to notice how handsome he was, and she'd recall that he'd been kind to her. But he was too big, too powerful, too much a man for her to feel easy with him. Regardless, she made her lips moist and her eyes inviting, practicing all the tricks she'd forced herself to learn.
An image of Magnus Owen appeared in her mind. Damn that man! She hated the way he looked at her out of those dark eyes, as if he felt sorry for her. Sweet, blessed Jesus, if that wasn't enough to make a body laugh. Magnus Owen, who wanted her so bad he couldn't stand it, had the gall to feel sorry for her.
An involuntary shudder swept through her as she though of pale white limbs wrapping themselves around her golden brown ones. She pushed the image aside and gnawed on her resentment.
Did Magnus Owen really think she'd let him touch her? Him or any other black man? Did Magnus think she'd been studying hard, grooming herself, listening to the white ladies in Rutherford until she could sound exactly like them, just so she'd end up with a black man who couldn't protect her? Not likely. Especially a black man whose eyes seemed to pierce into the farthest reaches of her soul.
She made her way to the kitchen. Soon, now, she'd have everything she wanted-a house, silk gowns, safety-and she was going to earn it in the only way she knew how, satisfying a white man's lust. A white man who was powerful enough to protect her.
That night it turned rainy. Howling February winds swept down the chimneys and rattled the shutters as Sophronia paused outside the library. In one hand she held a silver tray bearing a bottle of brandy and a single glass. With her other hand she unfastened the top buttons of her dress to reveal the swells of her breasts. It was time to make her next move. She took a deep breath and entered the room.
Cain glanced up from the ledgers on the desk. "You must have been reading my mind."
He uncoiled his rugged, long-limbed frame from the leather chair, rose, and stretched. She didn't let herself step back as he came out from behind the desk, moving like a great golden lion. He'd been working from dawn to dusk for months, and he looked tired.
"It's a cold night," she said, setting the tray on the desk. "I thought you might need something to keep you warm." She forced her hand to the open V of her dress so he couldn't mistake her meaning.
He gazed at her, and she felt the familiar stirrings of panic. Once again she reminded herself how kind he'd been, but she also knew there was something dangerous about him that frightened her.
His eyes flicked over her, then lingered on her breasts. "Sophronia…"
She thought of silk gowns and a pastel house. A house with a sturdy lock.
"Shh…" She stepped up to him and splayed her fingers over his chest. Then she let her shawl drop on her bare arm.
For the past seven months, his life had been filled with hard work and little pleasure. Now his lids dropped and he closed his long, tapered fingers around her arm. His hand, bronzed by the Carolina sun, was darker than her own flesh.
He cupped her chin. "Are you sure about this?"
She forced herself to nod.
His head dipped, but in the instant before their lips met, there was a noise behind them. They turned together and saw Magnus Owen standing in the open doorway.
His gentle features twisted as he saw her ready to submit to Cain's embrace. She heard a rumble deep in his throat. He charged into the room and threw himself at the man he considered his closest friend, the man who had once saved his life.
The suddenness of the attack took Cain by surprise. He staggered backward and barely managed to keep his balance. Then he braced himself for Magnus's assault.
Horrified, she watched as Magnus came at him. He swung, but Cain sidestepped and lifted his arm to block the blow.
Magnus swung again. This time he found Cain's jaw and sent him sprawling. Cain got back up, but he refused to retaliate.
Gradually Magnus regained some semblance of sanity. When he saw Cain wasn't going to fight, his arms sagged to his sides.