The Marriage Agreement

Her knees sagged and he circled her with his other arm, the poster falling to the floor at his side. “Talk to me, Lily, or Yvonne, or whatever the hell your name is. Who did you think you’d killed?”

“Stanley Weston,” she gasped. “The Yankee colonel who took me with him when he left our plantation.”

“When he left your plantation.” Morgan repeated her words aloud, then watched her skin turn pale, as her eyes closed and her head rolled back. “Damn you, don’t you dare faint now.” He shook her once, a violent movement that snapped her eyes open. They were black, so dark he could not see the division between the pupil and the color surrounding it. “Do you hear me?” he whispered.

She nodded. “I hear you.” She stiffened in his grasp and with a tremendous effort, her legs held her upright and she caught her breath. “I hear you,” she repeated.

“From the beginning now,” Morgan said through gritted teeth. “Who are you?”

“Lily. I’m Lily Devereaux.”

His hands moved to her shoulders and his grip tightened. “One more time. The truth this time, Lily.”

“Yvonne Devereaux died when I left New York,” she whispered. “I became Lily. I’ve told you that already.”

“That’s not quite the way I recall it, but we’ll take your word for it for now, and call you Lily. After you left New York—hell, before you left New York. Did you try to kill a man?”

“I hit him with a poker. I saw him fall to the floor, and there was blood all over the place.”

“And so you robbed him?”

She shook her head. “No, I never took anything from anyone. I ran. I left in a pouring rain and walked until I found a place to stay for the night.”

“Where?” he asked, feeling her pain even as he strove to inure himself to the emotions she brought to life within him. “Where did you go?”

Her eyes were listless, as if they beheld a time so fraught with peril, so frightening she could not bring herself to deal with it. “To a pawn shop. I had a brooch from my mother and the dealer gave me cash for it.” She inhaled, a deep breath that seemed to give her strength. “I stayed that night in a hotel, a place where there were men sleeping in the hallways, because they didn’t have enough money to pay for a bed.”

“And you had a bed?”

“A man felt sorry for me and gave me his. He spent the night sleeping in the hallway.”

“And from there?” Morgan asked, noting the flicker of awareness that told him she heard his query. “Where did you go from there, Lily?”

“I took a train west, toward Chicago.”

His voice was a low growl as he repeated the query that was uppermost in his mind. “What did you take from Weston?”

Her eyes focused on him and once more she stiffened, trembling in his grasp. “I took nothing from him. I thought I’d killed him, and I ran.”

“Well, according to this poster, you’re accused of robbery.” He watched her closely, saw the ashen cast to her features and felt a moment’s pity for her.

“Why did you hit him, Lily?” Morgan lowered her to sit on the edge of the bed and she shot him a grateful glance.

“Thank you,” she whispered, placing her feet carefully side by side, her hands folded neatly in her lap. “He offered me a house to live in.”

“And you took offense at that?”

She shook her head. “No, I was angry because he’d promised to marry me when we left the plantation, and when we got to New York he kept putting me off and he…”

“He what, Lily? What did he do?” And even before she spoke the words, Morgan knew the story she would tell.

“He said he’d never marry a girl who couldn’t even speak proper English. He was already engaged to a society woman in the city, but he’d like to keep me as his mistress.” As though the word were poison, she spat it from her lips, and then bowed her head.

“Proper English? He said that?” And for the past days Morgan had enjoyed the soft phrases that slipped past her lips, the slurring of letters that proclaimed her heritage. “The man was a fool,” he said harshly, then knelt at her feet. It was time to make a major decision here, and not much leeway to do it in.

“Can you bring yourself to trust me? Will you do as I ask you?” As the query penetrated her mind, he watched, noted the expression of confusion that painted her features, and then the hope that dawned in her dark eyes.

“I don’t know what to do,” she murmured. Her hands gripped together and her knuckles turned white as he watched them tighten. “I thought he was dead.”

“Lily.” He spoke her name once, then again. “Lily, listen to me.” His thoughts moved quickly, past this day to tomorrow and the next, to the multitude of Wanted posters that would be cluttering towns from Chicago to New Orleans and back. “You can’t be known as Lily Devereaux any longer. Not if you don’t want to be found.”

“But that’s my name,” she said.

“If you pretend to be my wife, you can become Lily Morgan.”

She looked up and met his gaze, her eyes narrowing with suspicion. “And then what? Pretend for the rest of my life?”

“I can use you as my wife. You’ll make a good cover for me.”

“A good cover for what? What are you, Morgan? Some sort of a crook?”

He shook his head. “No, far from it. But right now I need to get back on the job, and with you along as my bride, I’ll fit the image I need to portray.”

Her shoulders squared and her spine stiffened as she gathered herself, a visible process he recognized. “Let me get this straight,” she began. “You’re willing to believe me now, but you didn’t before? And now I find you’ve been holding out on me.” Her voice rose. “And you accused me of lying, of hiding the truth.”

“You were lying to me,” he said patiently. And then one hand touched her mouth, stilling her protest. “Let me change that. You weren’t being entirely honest, let’s say.” He spoke quietly and slowly, knowing that his movements from this point onward hinged on her reply. “If I tell you what you need to know, will you help me?”

“Do I have a choice?”

“We always have a choice, Lily. I told you that before. Remember?”

“That was about going home again,” she reminded him. “This is something altogether different. What if your plans cause me to break the law? Is there a law against posing as someone’s wife?” She looked so honestly befuddled Morgan was tempted to laugh. He took pity on her innocence.

“I don’t think they can put you in jail for posing as my wife. But they sure as hell can toss you in prison for trying to kill some dandy up in New York.”

“Well, maybe I deserve it. I meant to kill him. I thought he was dead.” she said.

He shook his head. “Oh, Lily. If you could only hear yourself. The man is after you, sweetheart. He’s going to hunt you down. And then he’s going to gnaw on your bones.”

She shivered again, but her chin jutted forward as her eyes narrowed a warning. “He’ll have to catch me first.”

“He’ll catch you all right,” he told her agreeably. “Unless you listen to me.”

“Any guarantees, Morgan?” she asked.

He shook his head. “None. Except that I’ll take care of you to the best of my ability. I won’t ask any more from you than I’m willing to give you.”

She shook her head. “Like what? What are you talking about? What are you going to ask of me?”