Forsaking All Others (34 page)

“She’s nowhere near the rebel you are, my dear. She knows better than to trust a Lamanite concoction.”

The harshness of his words startled me from my fond reverie of the wise woman who’d taught me so much about how to be a wife and mother, but this did not seem the proper time to defend her. “I’ve never considered myself a rebel.”

“Really? Not when you left your father? When you left me? When you left the church?”

“I wasn’t rebelling, Nathan. I was . . . escaping. I ran away with you to escape my father. I ran away from you to escape the church.”

“And now?”

I didn’t know how to answer. I pictured my cozy little home, my son—
our
son—sleeping in my arms. An entire life he knew nothing about. And by the same token, here I’d walked into a tableau I never knew existed. Here was a new sister wife and a child. Somewhere was another. And my own children scattered to the wind—by my hand and his—like so much chaff. But I would not blame him, not now, not yet. Nor would I beg his forgiveness. Instead, I settled in and forced my own face into what I hoped was an impassive mask. “I could ask you the same thing. Is Evangeline your escape?”

He seemed truly amused for a moment, as if this cramped, dull house and the dour woman who came with it could be anyone’s haven. But then his expression turned serious, and he focused his attention on his work-worn hands—the only part of him that failed to exude youthfulness after all these years.

“After you left—”

“Do you mean after you left me? Without even letting me say good-bye to my daughters?”

He remained unfazed. “After I heard that you’d been . . . taken away—”

“To shed blood for my supposed sin.”

“Will you stop!” He’d raised his voice and then lifted his eyes to the ceiling. I think we both noticed for the first time the new quiet coming from upstairs. He collected himself and continued in a hushed tone that I’d always found far more disturbing than any volume. “I came back for you, and you were gone. I waited and waited. . . .”

“What did you think had happened?”

“I didn’t know. So I went to Brigham himself. Because we hear stories and rumors, but I don’t think I ever believed—” He stopped, as if catching himself on the brink of doubt, and set his jaw to continue. “Brigham claimed to know nothing. Only that we were living in precarious times and we had to do all we could to defend the unity of our faith.”

“So you thought they’d carried out their threats?”

He wouldn’t meet my eyes.

“You knew I wouldn’t be rebaptized. Did it give you pleasure to think I’d been restored by my own blood?”

“Don’t.” Everything in his voice and demeanor made the word a threat. “You can’t imagine the pain we’ve—
I’ve
—been through. I went to Brigham hoping he’d give me an answer—a different one. One that didn’t include apostates being disciplined so . . .”

“Harshly?”

“When Brigham didn’t have an answer for me, and I knew he was hiding the truth, I wept. Like a baby, right there in his office.”

“Over my supposed death or your supposed faith? Nathan, what more could it take for you to see that this—
man
—” I spat the word—“is not the infallible prophet you set him up to be?”

I’d rarely seen him exhibit any weakness, but he seemed close to tears at that very moment. So I watched, waiting to see if any would be shed in my presence. Was there any hope at all that I might still reach him with the truth?

I took his hand. “This is hardly the dream we imagined when we set off together.”

He looked at me, and I saw a bit of the youthful spark in his eyes, the dashing young man who spirited me away all those years ago.

“It’s not too late, Nathan. I know you still love me, and together we can make a home for our children. A home where we can teach them to know the true God, to love and serve Jesus Christ. He has sustained me through these months, and he can give our family a new start.”

His eyes brightened, and for a brief moment, I allowed myself to imagine it was a real possibility.

Finally he blinked under my gaze. “So Brigham was right. You were—and are—a heretic of the worst sort. You would have been better off if you’d been restored by blood, rather than dying outside the faith. He said you were waiting for me. And that we would have more children throughout eternity.”

“And that was enough to comfort you? That you’d call me from my grave? Can you not see what an empty promise that is?”

But he couldn’t. His eyes were darkened, and he refused to open them to the truth. I, however, was beginning to understand more truth than I had bargained for.

As if to confirm the direction my thoughts had taken, Nathan continued to explain. “Brigham asked me about my trade, and when I told him I was a carpenter, he offered me work in the temple.”

As he spoke the word
temple
, the light in his face outshone the softness coming from the lamp. How well I remembered all those years, his sincere, frustrated attempts to capture the prophet’s eye with his handiwork, only to be rebuffed time and time again. He’d hewn stone from the quarry and given the same tithe of labor as any other Saint, but his longing to be an artisan . . .

“That must have felt like a dream coming true.”
And your so-called prophet knew just the right time to dangle it before you,
I thought but did not say.

“In a sense, yes. He—”

“And was Evangeline a part of Brigham’s compensation for my life?”

He gave me a wary look, as if he, too, realized he’d lost his foothold. “One day, about a year ago, Evangeline came out to the house. She was riding my horse. The one you’d taken.”

“Honey.” The horse that had saved my very life.

“She said the horse had shown up here one morning, the reins tied to her porch. Said she thought it was a word from Heavenly Father himself, bringing us your blessing from the grave.”

He went on, but it was Evangeline’s voice I heard in all its familiar religious rambling. Hers, at least, was a faith fervent enough to match his own.

“And,” I said, interrupting, “you get the added benefit of a house in town, close to your work at the temple, when so many others have fled the city.”

“Heavenly Father has blessed me in many ways.”

Suddenly I felt like I’d invaded a private little joke. Only rather than being amused, I was feeling increasingly empty. Everything I’d ever loved about this man had fallen to ruin, and I now despaired of keeping even the smallest affection in my memories. His boyishness, immaturity. His impulsivity, thoughtlessness. And the last—that I’d trusted him to be a devoted parent to my daughters, that they would, indeed, be better for a time in his care—tore at me. When opportunity called, he’d abandoned them without a second thought.

“Why don’t you have the girls here with you, Nathan?”

He squirmed, the way all men do when faced with the peculiarities of women. “There were, shall we say, difficulties between Amanda and Evangeline.”

“Ah yes. Amanda. My
other
sister wife. I take it she wasn’t as complacent at being replaced as I was?”

“You were never replaced, Camilla. Never meant to be, at least. Heavenly Father’s plan—”

“It is God’s plan that a man loves his wife—”

“I loved you, Camilla.”

“—and cares for his children. You abandoned my heart, Nathan, giving yourself to another. And now you’ve abandoned her. And our children. And—” a memory, one I hadn’t considered until now— “
her
child. What did she have?”

His face lit up. “A boy. We have a son.”

The sentence hung heavy between us, while I carried more than my share of its burden. Did he know? Could he possibly? My mind raced behind the eyes I fought so hard to hold steady. Master that he was, not even Nathan Fox would be able to control his anger at what he would see as an ultimate betrayal. Truth be told, in my darkest moments, I cloak that night—our final night together—in shame, even as I rejoice in the child that came from it.

I fought to swallow this last, great lie. “What did you name him?”

“Nathan, of course.”

“Of course. You must be so pleased.”

“He’s an answer to prayer.”

“I’m surprised you were able to leave him behind.”

“Apparently we both have a knack for abandoning our children.”

“Don’t say that.” But the truth of his words burned like a slap across my face.

In that moment, all my noble intentions crumbled, as did any pretense of strength. Evangeline’s parlor and all its shabby shadows warped behind a wash of tears, each one holding the days and hours since that first moment of recklessness when I closed the door on the little family Nathan and I had created. He said nothing in reply, only now both of my hands were in his, and I glanced down to see them nestled in his grip. I could not fully recognize the intent behind his touch. His thumb—coarse with labor—moved purposefully across my skin, which was pleasantly smooth due to a newfound luxury of hand cream and leather gloves. Still, we could not ignore the awful spot of amputation. Nathan turned my hands palm up and touched his finger along that ghostly spot in a curious, almost-investigative caress.

“Last summer,” he said, speaking like a man gathering a half-forgotten memory, “we had the privilege of attending a lecture given by two of our finest missionaries, newly back from England.”

I stared at the top of his head, swallowing my first taste of fear.

“They were concerned—” he looked up and offered one of those sideways, winking smiles—“we all were, about the strength of the church, the dedication of the faithful, and the threat of war. They told about one strange encounter with an Army general.”

Colonel. Colonel Charles Brandon.
I didn’t blink.

“He was with a woman—a Mormon woman, from what they could tell. And they were quite distraught to see one of our own married to the enemy.” Nathan broke off his gaze and looked down again. “Even more disturbing was the fact that this woman seemed not to care about the risk such a journey could pose to a woman in her condition.”

Stone still, I fought the instinct to snatch my hands away and hold them as a shield over my long-empty womb. Rather, a stronger, more protective intuition rose up, and like the doe in the brush whose slightest movement would call the attention of the hunter, I willed my very breath to match Nathan’s own.

“You see,” he said, looking up again, “she was with child.”

I nearly gasped at what I saw. There, before me, in the brightness of his eyes and the very angle of his head, I saw my son—our son—and the man he would grow to be, handsome and strong. I could feel the confession on the tip of my tongue. The words repeated over and over inside my head.
She was carrying your son.

But a force stronger than my guilt kept them silent. I thought of the words written on the pages in Mr. Bostwick’s portfolio. He would find out soon enough, but not from me. Not until I had my daughters safely in my arms. I remembered the promises I made to create a home for my children that would protect them from the lies of my husband’s faith. If God could forgive all I’d done, he could forgive a lie—even one I fought not to tell.

“If being pregnant forbade women from such a journey,” I said, hoping the lightness in my tone didn’t sound too forced, “there would be far fewer children in Zion.”

I could tell by the set of his jaw that he was straining not to speak. Whatever battle raged in his mind remained hidden from me. He awarded victory to silence. The few inches between us were bridged by the touch of our hands, our eyes fixed on my particular disfigurement—the one that would surely set me apart from any other woman in Zion. Certainly that detail had made its way into the elders’ report, though its relevance would be lost on all but Nathan. And Evangeline. That’s when I realized I would not have to lie, nor would I have to confess.

“You’ve known all along that I’m alive.”

Chapter 29

Nathan changed his grip, pressing his fingers against my wrist, at my pulse, but remained silent.

“You knew I was fearful for my life, carrying your child, and you did nothing.”

“What was I supposed to do?”

“You knew—you had to have known that I’d gone back home.”

“Of course I knew,” he said, his words tinged with contempt. “But my home is here. I wasn’t about to abandon it to chase you across the country.”

“Comforting words, indeed.” They pierced like a knife in my back. I needed little effort to extricate myself from his grip. Indeed I began to feel, for the first time, that I was on the way to becoming truly free from him.

It would be years before I realized that with this final, twisting pain came a release for which I should have been praying all along. It was not enough that I longed to love a godly man; I needed to be liberated from desire for this one. But now, any bit of love I’d hidden in the darkest crevices of my heart skittered out into the light of this final betrayal. My heart became a lifeless mass within me. Not stone, for that would subject me to a permanent, cold death. No, more like the stump of a hollow tree that for so long holds all the appearance and grandeur of health and life and possibility, masking its fragility. One touch, and it crumbles. My destruction, however, brought peaceful, detached freedom.

I was no longer his wife in any sense that mattered. And soon enough, I would no longer be his wife even in name. “I’ve traveled with my attorney, Mr. Michael Bostwick. He’ll be here first thing in the morning with all the paperwork necessary to proceed with our divorce.”

He stood and found me, gripping my arms and pulling me close. “You can’t—”

“I can,” I said, feeling an odd sense of pride in the fact that it was my own feet holding me up. “I have legal grounds. Adultery. You’ve taken two wives while married to me, and your prophet is no longer the law of the land. Polygamy is illegal, whether he wants to admit it or not. You know as well as I do that I’m a complication he would rather not face. In fact, why don’t you discuss it with him? I dare you. Tell him the wife he wanted you to believe was dead is alive and well and ready to fight for her children. All of them—including the secret son she stole away.”