Flesh And Blood. Caroline Burnes

commit myself to an institution. Each time Frank visited, the pain was more unbearable. Each time his accusations were the same, and my ability to understand them no better.

      Hugging my pillow, I cried until I had no more tears. Then I washed my face and went downstairs. I put on a pot of very strong coffee and thought about my options. I’d promised myself two weeks at Ravenwood. I would give myself that much time and no more. What I needed was a plan to find Mary Quinn. Walking to the oak hadn’t worked. Perhaps by sitting in Mary’s own room I might encourage contact with her. I had the coffee dripping when I ran back upstairs to change into a pair of stirrup pants and a long-sleeve blouse. God bless the creator of heavy knit. It didn’t wrinkle, held its shape and was as comfortable as a second skin. I crowded my mind with these trivialities, grasping desperately at the ordinary. Beneath everything I did, the question remained: was I losing my mind?

      My fingers were working the last button when I heard the knock on the door. No one had a key to the gates, and I couldn’t imagine who might be on the premises. I ran down the stairs and peeked through the curtains in the kitchen door.

      Nathan Cates was standing on the doorstep with a bulging grocery bag. Frisco stood patiently tied to a tree beside a buckskin mare. My mind blanked at the sight. I didn’t know what to do. Nathan was dressed in his uniform, undoubtedly on the way to work at the reenactment. He’d taken me up on my request for a ride.

      He knocked again, and I couldn’t hesitate any longer. I’d thank him and tell him I didn’t feel like riding. I didn’t feel like living, if the truth were known. I opened the door. “Nathan.”

      “Good morning, Emma Devlin.” He brushed through the door and took the grocery bag to the kitchen table. “I wasn’t sure if you’d brought provisions, so I picked up a few things for you. Then I thought I couldn’t take you out for a morning ride without breakfast. I hear that Southern girls are given to fits of fainting, and I suspect it might be because they don’t start the day with a healthy meal. So I brought some bacon, eggs, grits and the makings of biscuits.”

      “Biscuits?” I was overwhelmed. In the morning light his eyes were sky blue against the gray of his uniform. The mustache I’d seen hints of the night before was full and blond, and there was a curved scar on his right cheek.

      “Don’t you like biscuits?” he asked.

      “I like biscuits from the breakfast buffet at a number of places. But I don’t make them.” I didn’t feel like company. I couldn’t eat if my life depended on it. Yet there was something about Nathan that soothed me. I needed to be alone, to think. But I didn’t want him to go.

      “I make excellent biscuits. My grandmother taught me.” With a quickness and skill I’d never seen in a man before, Nathan made breakfast. As he worked, he talked about Ravenwood and the peculiarities of the house. He knew much more about it than I did. His voice was deep, reliable. It seemed only a few minutes before he put a plate of bacon, eggs, grits and biscuits before me. He took a seat opposite.

      Although I thought food would choke me, I ate with surprising appetite. Nathan kept up the conversation with cheerful ease. It wasn’t until he’d cleared the table and poured us both another cup of coffee that he stopped talking for a long moment.

      “Would you like to tell me why you’ve been crying this morning?” he asked finally.

      I did not want to tell him. I had no intention of doing so, but the words poured out. I told him everything. Every single detail of my madness. And he listened. He didn’t interrupt. He didn’t question me. At some point, he reached across the table and picked up my hand. When I finished, he gave it a long squeeze.

      “I know the first thing that’s crossed your mind is that you’re going insane. Well, you aren’t.”

      For the first time that morning, I smiled. “How can you be so certain?”

      “As a historian, I guess you could say that I believe in ghosts, or at least messages and inspirations from the spirit world. And having known you for all of two hours, at the maximum, I get the impression that you aren’t the least bit unhinged.”

      I suppose it was his confidence—in himself and in me—that was so comforting. I needed a vote of confidence, even from a stranger. “Thanks, Nathan. Thanks for listening, and thanks for not treating me like a budding lunatic.”

      “Since you came to Ravenwood to see Mary Quinn, have you seen her?”

      I shook my head. “I was hoping today might be the day.”

      For the first time worry crossed Nathan’s face. “It’s none of my business, you know.” He stood and paced the kitchen. “I probably shouldn’t say this at all.”

      “Say what?”

      “Emma, is it possible that your husband’s death wasn’t completely accidental?”

      The idea shocked any response from me. Frank, deliberately murdered? “Absolutely not. Frank didn’t have any real enemies. He was a man of integrity, of honor. People respected him. They looked up to him.”

      Nathan crossed the room and stood behind me, his hands on my shoulders in a gentling motion. “Easy, Emma, easy. I didn’t mean to imply that he was murdered because he was a bad man. Don’t you know that sometimes people are killed because they’re good? Especially men of integrity and honor. They can gum up the works for dishonest people.”

      “Who would want Frank dead?”

      He squeezed my tense shoulders and then released me. “I’m afraid that’s a question only you can answer. But the way I’m looking at this is that Frank feels wronged. He’s defied the odds and returned to tell you, the woman he trusts, that he’s been betrayed. If he isn’t accusing you…”

      “Then he’s looking to me to help him.” A distinct chill touched my back and rolled down my entire body.

      “If not to help him, then at least to understand.”

      I was captured by the idea. I had not betrayed Frank. Not in any word or gesture during our marriage or since his death. Was it possible that he was seeking my help to find someone who had?

      “What should I do?” I looked across the room to the sink where Nathan had begun to wash the dishes. He wiped his hands on a dish towel as he took my measure.

      “It depends. Remember, this is just a theory.”

      “It makes more sense than anything I’ve thought up. Unless, of course, I want to believe I’m going crazy.”

      “Did you examine the police report of Frank’s death?”

      I shook my head. “There didn’t seem to be a reason to. I mean, it was a robbery attempt and Frank tried to help a woman they were abusing. The robbers were crazy, and when Frank gave them trouble, they killed him.”

      “It sounds logical, but it may not be. If there’s anything to my theory, then the police reports are the place to start. Did they identify the killers?”

      “No.” I sighed. “I don’t even know that they tried all that hard. After the first few weeks, I didn’t push it. Frank was dead and there was nothing that would bring him back. Revenge, or justice, if that’s a better word, was my last thought. I guess I just wanted to survive.”

      “Enough time has passed now, Emma. Maybe justice is necessary. For Frank.”

      I looked up into the blue eyes of a man who was virtually a stranger. “I loved him so much. I still do.”

      Nathan smiled. “I know. And I’ll bet Frank knows that, too.” Dropping the dish towel on the table, he took his seat opposite me again. “Promise me that you’ll heed this warning, Emma. If we’re on to something here, if there’s something to be found about Frank’s death, it could be very dangerous. If someone had good enough reason to kill your husband, they wouldn’t hesitate to kill you.”

      Chapter