She shrugged carelessly. “So you wrestled a big alligator and won. Am I supposed to be impressed?” Actually, she was, but had no intention of letting him know it.
Solemnly he said, “I didn’t ask you to be and don’t care whether you are. It suited me fine when folks started calling me Gator, because it gave me an excuse to forget who I really was. I didn’t like myself very much back then. So I became someone else.”
“Ah, if life were only that simple,” she said airily, “everyone would just change his name.”
“Have you ever thought about changing yours?”
Later, she would wonder why she had shared such an intimacy when she confided, “My father calls me Angel sometimes. I rather like it.”
With a wry grin, he said, “That’s not a sobriquet. It’s wishful thinking. Anyone with the devil in her eyes is no angel, and you, Miss Sinclair”—he cocked his head and insolently winked—“sure have the devil in yours when you’re riled.”
She couldn’t help laughing because somehow she sensed he really meant no insult. And she was glad she was not sitting any closer to him, for there was something about his nearness that unnerved, but pleasantly so. “What was it about yourself you didn’t like?” she asked boldly.
“I did such a good job of putting it all behind me that it’s hard to remember. But you’ve been asking all the questions, and now it’s my turn. Tell me. Why did you want to go into the bayou, anyway?”
“I like it there.” And it was so. Always she had yearned to experience what it was like deep within the mysterious realm of the swamps but had never ventured there. Perhaps now she dared to find out, knowing in a few months she’d be married and might never have another opportunity. For some reason, however, she wasn’t about to divulge that logic.
“Well, I meant what I said.” His demeanor became serious once more. “You could’ve got the girls in trouble. I don’t know how much you know about the Acadians’ jobs on the plantation, Miss Sinclair, but good ones aren’t that easy to come by. BelleClair happens to be one of the best places to work. If your father found out Simona and Emalee took you into the Bayou Perot at night, he’d probably ban them from the fields. They’d be hard-pressed to find work elsewhere, and like the rest of us, they need the money to keep from starving this winter.
“Some of us,” he couldn’t resist reminding her, “weren’t born into a life of wealth and the security that goes with it.”
Despite his charm when he wished to display it, she realized he could switch moods without warning. She countered, “You obviously hold that against me.”
“When you jeopardize the livelihood of others to satisfy a whim, yes. We won’t go into the matter of actually endangering lives, because I have to be getting back to the field now.”
He stood, and Anjele was right behind him. “It wasn’t that way at all. I’ve always envied the way Simona and Emalee live such carefree lives. They’ve told me about the singing and dancing, and I’ve always wanted to be a part of it.”
He raised a mocking brow. “Maybe I’m just a field worker, but I do know a bit about social life among the planters, how some of them keep houses in New Orleans for the opera season, how a few even have steamboats for entertaining on the river. And then there’s the horse races and all the fancy parties that go along with them. So don’t expect me to believe you actually have a yen to go into a mosquito-infested swamp to feast on turtle stew and stomp dance to a fiddle,” he finished with a sneering chuckle.
Even though he was half a head taller, she met his challenging gaze with one of her own, and her voice did not falter as she pointed out, “You don’t know anything about me, Gator, or whatever your name is, and until you do, don’t sit in judgment. It just so happens I don’t enjoy fancy parties and balls, because I find most of the people stuffy and boring.
“But the last thing I’d ever want to do is jeopardize anybody’s livelihood, much less their lives, so you don’t have to worry about me bothering you or your people again.”
For an endless moment, their gazes locked. Finally, Anjele drew a breath and murmured, “I think you’d better go now. Thank you for bringing my clothes.”
He nodded and moved from the caressing web of the willow tree. He took a few steps, then turned to sweep her with a thoughtful gaze, his dark eyes twinkling with secret mirth. “You don’t have to cross the bayou off your list of places you’d like to visit, Miss Sinclair. Next time you want to go there, let me know.”
He walked up the grassy bank to disappear over the top.
Anjele felt a strange warmth flowing through her veins that was disturbing.
He had not touched her, yet she felt somehow caressed.
It was a feeling she’d never before experienced…but one she would long remember.
Chapter Four
The pealing of the big iron bell, signaling another day’s end at BelleClaire, broke the stillness of the sultry July evening. Slaves and hired hands sighed with relief and began to shuffle from the fields, shoulders stooped in weariness.
Among them was Brett Cody, known only as Gator. As was his way, he walked alone, not joining the grumbling ranks of fellow Cajuns heading for the intricate paths leading into Bayou Perot. He preferred being alone. Companionship led to intimacies he didn’t want, questions he wouldn’t answer.
Heavy in his thoughts was regret for having left the sea. No matter that New Orleans was a lifetime away from Vicksburg, Mississippi, and his growing-up years in the mysterious Black Bayou. The wild sweetness of the tangled green foliage, combined with the lush fields of cane and cotton and rice, evoked bitter memories he’d thought long buried.
Worse, he mused with furrowed brow, was how his first glimpse of Anjele Sinclair had made him think, for one frozen moment, he was actually looking at Margette. He’d quickly dismissed that painful illusion.
The flame-haired beauty he’d spied among the scrub palmettos bore no resemblance to the petite blond whose memory evoked bitterness, anger. Besides, dainty little Margette would never think of venturing into the wilderness. Hers was a pampered world of luxury wrapped in lace and satin and honeysuckle and magnolias. The only thing about Anjele that reminded him of Margette was the image of yet another wealthy plantation owner’s spoiled, bored daughter seeking forbidden excitement.
“Hey, you, Gator.”
He glanced around, annoyance mirrored on his sunburned face, but didn’t pause, doggedly continuing on his way.
Simona was running between the cane rows to catch up.
“Hey, we got to talk.” Panting, she swung into step beside him. “I’m worried about my friend. She not come back to see me.”
“Good.”
“Hey…” Simona dared poke his shoulder, immediately wishing she hadn’t as he stopped walking to glare down at her with dark, scathing eyes. Mustering courage to go on, she gave a helpless shrug and pointed out, “You being rude, Gator, not talking to me. All I do is ask about my friend and how come I have not seen her. It been weeks since she was here.”
He bit off the reminder, “She doesn’t belong here.”
“That’s not for you to say.” Simona was starting to get mad despite the way he was looking at her. “She been my friend all my life, and who is you to come here and tell us what we can and cannot do? Jus’ because your poppa is overseer in the cotton fields don’ give you no right to tell me and my friends how to do.”
He started walking again.
Simona was indignant at the brusque dismissal and yelled after him, “Hey! How come you not go back where you come from? And yo’ poppa, too. I hear from my people in the fields he is one mean man, and he beats the slaves and would beat them, too, if he could, but he knows they stick a knife in his ribs if he do. And you just like him, ain’t you?”
He shut out the sound of her shouts and quickened his pace, disappearing into the brush. Furious, he plodded onward, not glancing about as he usually did, ever alert for alligators or water moccasins.
But any creature about would, no doubt, have thought twice before venturing to disturb Brett Cody that evening, for his was the face of a man with fury stirred to near menace. He trembled with rage to be likened to his father, because he knew Leo Cody for the cruel, insensitive man he was. Now he was fueled more than ever to return to the sea but sadly knew it wasn’t possible till grinding season ended in January, months away. Elton Sinclair had taken one look at his brawn and promptly pulled him to one side and promised top wages, even a bonus, in return for assurance he’d stay the season. Brett agreed, but only because he felt honor bound to pay off the debts from his mother’s sickness and burial. He knew his father damn sure wouldn’t bother. Leo spent everything he made on gambling, whiskey, and women. Always had and always would.
He reached his isolated pirogue, a dugout he called home. Uncorking a jug of wine, he took a deep swallow, attempting to wash away the bile. But the memories had been ignited, and there was nothing to do but let them play on his mind.
Raggedly, he allowed himself to drift back to the time when he’d left Black Bayou, after Margette Laubache, an older woman of nearly eighteen, had made him the laughingstock of Mississippi. He’d been a fool to ever let himself get involved with her in the first place, but Lord, what a beauty. There wasn’t a man alive who wasn’t stirred by the sight of her. Yet he’d admired from afar, well aware he was only a poor Cajun field hand, and she was born into a life of privilege. It was only when word spread of his famed battle with the largest alligator ever seen in Mississippi that Margette took notice of him. She sent by a slave that she wanted to meet the young man who’d bested such a savage creature.
Brett had laughed when he heard that. Everyone was making him out to be some kind of gladiator who’d challenged a wild beast in a fight to the death. The actuality was that the damn thing had crept up on him, and he hadn’t had time to think about courage or bravery. He was scared to death and fighting to stay alive in the black, cold water. Never would he forget his burning lungs, screaming for air, as he fought to hold off the snapping jaws of death as the gator rolled him over and over, trying to drown him.
He did not, however, share such private thoughts with Margette when he defied all the rules and met her that night in the wisteria-draped gazebo near the river. He hadn’t been able to think of anything except how beautiful she was. He remembered what she was wearing—a white lace gown that dipped low to accentuate large and luscious breasts. She smelled of lilacs, and her flaxen hair hung loose about her heart-shaped face.
That night was the beginning. She summoned him again and again, and before long, she was unbuttoning his shirt to dance her fingers across his chest and marvel over his muscular build—all the while teasing his mouth with her lips. He tried, even then, to tell her he shouldn’t be there, that they were courting trouble, but she swore her love and demanded avowal of his, and, bewitched, he didn’t hesitate to oblige.
Then came the moonless night when there was no turning back. She asked him to come at midnight, when the world around them was sleeping. She wore only a thin nightgown and robe, which she boldly cast aside before lying on the gazebo floor and pulling him down beside her.
Till then, that summer of his sixteenth year, Brett’s few sexual encounters had been with cheap prostitutes in Vicksburg, when he ventured into town on Saturday nights with his friends. The episodes were hurried and devoid of emotion. Margette Laubache was a different story. Wild and wanton, she showed him ways of making love he’d never dreamed about, leaving him spent, exhausted—and charged with a feeling he mistook for immortal love.
As weeks turned into months, they met almost every night. Brett was worn out. Toiling all day in the sun, he had only a few hours to nap in the evening before sneaking into the gazebo to remain till nearly dawn.
When grinding season began, he was forced to work eighteen hours a day. Fires under the boilers making sugar never went out, and laborers were assigned shifts, with three quarters of them constantly at their stations. No man got more than six hours of rest out of twenty-four, and Margette demanded those hours be spent with her.
He was exhausted, and it showed. His mother thought he was out carousing with his friends and told him it had to stop. After that, he waited till she and his father were asleep before crawling out a window.
She flew into a rage the night she caught him, screaming, “So! It is true, what I have heard. You are sneaking out to meet that girl.
“Look at you,” she wailed, tears shining in the glow of the candle she held in her quivering hand. “Thin like a snake, shadows in your eyes. And I have heard the rumors. I know it is all because of the Laubache slut.”
“She’s not a slut,” he defended.
“Eh?” Her brows snapped together. “What you say? She is no slut? Well, what kind of
lady
sneaks out of her house in the night to meet a man? Slaves gossip, my son, and it is only a matter of time till Laubache hears, as I did. Then there be big trouble, for sure.”
Brett decided he might as well tell her. “He’s going to hear, anyway, as soon as grinding season is over. That’s when she plans to tell him we’re going to get married.”
At that, she gasped and cried, “You are a bigger fool than I thought if you believe her. Her kind marries her own kind, not a poor boy like you from the gutters of the world.”
She began swaying, funny moaning sounds coming from deep in her throat. Afraid she was about to faint, Brett reached out to take the candle as he tried to reassure her, “It will work out. You’ll see. She does tell the truth—”