In a Lawless Love

Charlotte sat in front of a fire, her hair tightly woven in its braids, her body covered in a blanket. Pregnancy was hard on her body, and she was constantly tired with stress and cold. The doctors who monitored her hesitated to provide her any medications for fear of harming what was considered a precious child.

Amber entered the room with a silver tray carrying a tea pot. The tea would warm Charlotte and comfort her stress. Amber set the tray on the small table next to the chair Charlotte sat in and poured a cup of tea.

“How are you feeling now?” Amber asked.

“I should say I’m quite tired,” Charlotte said. Rain thundered outside the window. It had been only a week since she had argued with Jason about running away and she missed him terribly. She pulled her blanket tighter around her body.

“Have you spoken with your driver, Miss?”

“I have not,” Charlotte said and sighed. “We mustn’t speak of it now, Amber dear. I should not like any ears listening in.”

“Of course, Miss Charlotte,” Amber said and gave a weakened smile. She looked down at the tattoo on the third finger of her left hand; at the reminder of her marriage and that the only reason for it was the young woman sitting under the blanket longing to see the man she truly loved.

“I feel that this child should never be born, it is taking such a great deal of time indeed.”

“Babies always take time,” Amber said. “I should like to someday have a baby,” she added. She moved around the room, dusting and rearranging things so to look busy.

“They cause a great deal of sickness,” Charlotte said. She took a sip of the tea Amber had poured for her. She was startled slightly when Matt burst into the room. He was tired, his eyes red and his face unshaven. She looked at him with wide eyes and terror.

“Why do you stare as though I should hurt you?” he snapped.

“You look unwell, husband,” Charlotte said and set her cup on the tray.

“I have spent my night with my mother…” he said. “She was no expected to see the morning. She is with us still…only barely. I will be quite surprised should she live to dinner.”

“It is a shame,” Charlotte said and turned her attention away from her husband.

Amber was still in the room, straightening the bedding on Charlotte’s large bed. She was slightly aware of Matt’s eyes on her back and she felt violently uncomfortable. She pretended then like she was not being watched and continued on the bed.

“You, maid,” Matt said.

“Yes sir?” she asked uncomfortably.

“You care for Mrs. Hayes, correct?”

“Yes,” Amber said and turned to face him. She prayed he couldn’t see the nervousness in her face.

Matt nodded his head slightly before giving a glance to Charlotte. “Darling, wife,” he said in a voice too sweet for Charlotte to bear. “I think it best you take some air this afternoon. The house should be quite miserable, with mother’s death coming quite soon. I have arranged for your driver to take you some place safe from the rain.”

“I do not wish…” Charlotte started.

“I did not ask you!” he shouted, frustration clear in his voice. “You will go now, as instructed.”

Charlotte stood then, for the first time in what seemed like months, with fear coursing through her. Amber rushed to assist her into clothes suitable for her to leave in and she hurried from the room, Matt still standing near the door looking tired and angry.

Matt caught Amber’s arm as she attempted to leave the room. “Wait,” he said.

“What…may I assist you with…Mr. Hayes?”

“You are the maid girl who was recently married in my gardens, no?”

“Indeed,” Amber said and took a deep breath.

“How do you enjoy marriage?”

“It is quite pleasant,” she said in a timid voice.

“Oh?” Matt said. “Sit! On the bed you have so beautifully made, girl.”

“I’m afraid I have many things to do for Miss Charlotte,” Amber said.

“I employed you, did I not?!”

“Of course,” Amber said, her eyes fixed on the ground.

“Then sit!”

She immediately complied, fear present in her own body. She could tell quite well that he was not all together this afternoon. “Can I get you some tea, sir?”

“You can politely shut your mouth!” Matt shouted. “Listen…what is your name, girl?”

“Amber,” she said and took a breath to calm her nerves.

“You are aware of my wife’s medical condition,” Matt said as he shut and bedroom door.

Amber trembled as she heard the bolt on the door snap into place. Matt pulled his suit jacket off of his body and let it fall onto the floor. He paced a little bit in front of the door, his eyes looking wild and exhausted.

“Yes,” she said.

“She has…put into place certain rules…that I should not be able to touch her during her pregnancy. Can you believe it!? My own wife has forbidden me the pleasures of marriage!”

“I do not wish to be involved in matters so personal, sir,” Amber said in a shaking voice.

“But my dear…where else should I alleviate the need? I’ve been…quite busy with my mother…my business…my life’s work. You see I am so very stress ridden…I am in need of a place to…bury my problems,” he said and shifted his eyes to her.

“Please sir…” Amber whispered.

“I do hope you won’t cry as much as Miss Charlotte has…” he said then before coming to her like a raging bull.

Charlotte was with Jason, sitting in the old house, watching the fire burn. Her son moved within her strangely. She turned her attention to the man standing near the fire place, leaving her alone on the sofa.

“Jason, please,” she said.

“Charlotte…you must understand…” he said.

“No! I cannot understand! I have given you my heart…my body much to…much to the danger it presented I have given you a child! Why do you regard me as though I am only your master!?”

“Because Miss Charlotte, until you agree to leave with me that is all you can ever be!” he said with frustration.

He turned away from her. For a long moment the only sound in the old house was that of the fire burning and the rain beating at the windows. The rain that would last for a week more. The rain that had come when Margaret Hayes had taken ill for her final time a week before.

No matter how much the fire warmed the house seemed dreadfully cold to Charlotte. She hugged herself tightly in an attempt to warm her skin. For a moment she hated her child, hated all the problems she’d allowed herself to be into. How could she have let herself fall in love with a man that was not her husband? Why hadn’t she been able to love Matthew Hayes? The man she was supposed to love?

She spent a moment thinking of all the things she had done wrong and of all the poor decisions she’d made. Finally she forced herself onto her feet, trying to ignore the pain in her back and knees at the added weight of her son, and she walked across the floor to where Jason stood.

She put her hands on his face, holding it tenderly, and she met his eyes with her own. She searched for a moment to read his emotions and his thoughts but she could not see into his soul through his blue eyes. “Jason, please,” she said in a quiet voice. “Please understand I do love you and I would love very much to run away from all of this with you.”

“Then why do you deny me?”

“Because it is not so simple,” she said. “Matthew is a very dangerous man. I do not think him less than capable of causing us both great harm. I am very sorry; I wish I could leave with you. But when I deny your request it is to protect you. It is to make things safe for us both.”

“I could take you away from all of this,” he whispered. “He would not…”

“Please listen to me, Jason. I am forced to lie next to him each night, I know much better than you that he is not stable minded. He is not…not well. And now he has been under much pressure…to try and leave now would surely lead to us constantly living a life in fear until he found us.”

“Though it pains me…I have no choice but to trust you…” Jason said and looked to the floor. “I am sorry. I have not behaved like a gentleman.”

“Just know my heart will forever belong to you,” she said and kissed him on his mouth hard and passionately.

They remained together in the house for many hours, watching the fire, and Charlotte painting a portrait of the rain falling on the window. She listened to the sound of the rain and the sound of the crackling fire and she was happy. She thought for a moment then that she could live this life quite happily forever. She wanted to tell Matt the truth of her son’s paternity. Wanted him to know that the law would stand by her side, for her true husband was the father of her child. But she feared should Matt ever find out all the laws the world had ever known would not protect her now.

They were paged back to the house some time later. Charlotte immediately felt a sense of heaviness as she walked through the doors of the home she had been forced into some time before. She was instantly met by Margaret’s Maid.

“Mrs. Hayes wishes to see you before her death,” the woman said.

“Me? Why she has always…”

“She wishes it, and I will not deny her wish.”

Charlotte didn’t protest when the woman took her arm and pulled her into the wing of the house Margaret lived in. It all seemed strange and foreign as she was lead through rooms and hallways she’d never in her life seen before. Then suddenly they stopped in front of a large door. The door was made of thick dark wood, carved beautifully in an intricate design of flowers and vines.

“She is there…you listen to me, you do not hurt her! I do not understand why she should want to see you…of all the garbage in this house…but she does, and you should have no part in making her death any harder.”

“I can assure you I will not,” Charlotte snapped. “And I should also see to it that once your mistress has left us you should be discharged for your impertinence.” She turned her head up before opening the heavy door and going into the room.

In a large redwood four post bed Margaret sat up against some pillows. Her eyes were closed, and her skin hung uncomfortably from her bones. She was frighteningly thin and seemed quite small as she sat in against the pillows of a very large bed. The room had an unpleasant smell of perfume and sickness.

“Ma’am,” Charlotte whispered.

The old eyes opened and landed on Charlotte. Margaret made a motion for Charlotte to come closer to the bed. Charlotte did as instructed, moving quietly and smoothly across hard wood floors.

“Child,” Margaret said. “I have been quite cruel.”

“No matter now,” Charlotte said.

“You must listen…”

“I am indeed.”

“I…was where you are once…” Margaret said. “A poor farm girl brought to marry a man I did not love.”

“Why should you say these things now?” Charlotte asked in a soft voice.

“It is important for you to know…what this life does to a woman…”

“Do not let memories plague you now.”

“Hush and listen girl! I was once a girl on a farm sold to Matthew’s father…a secret I’ve kept from all around me since the day I was forced into this horrid place. I too know the child you carry is not that of my son. A secret I swear to you I should keep to the grave…for I know what it is to love a man you cannot.”

“No…no I do…”

“Hush child, you think I have not seen you with the security man. The way your eyes land upon him when you part each day? I too loved a man in this house…he worked in the kitchen. He was tall…so handsome and kind hearted. Of three children he fathered all but Matthew…the only legitimate and rightful heir to his father’s throne.”

“These are secrets I do not wish to carry…” Charlotte said, tears lining her eyes.

“Listen to me girl,” Margaret said. She slowly placed an old hand on the swollen stomach that held Charlotte’s son. “This child should not be here. You must go…because it should be a shame to let another man grow to be like my son. Do not be worried, darling, you just must go.”

“Matthew is quite insane with love,” Charlotte said.

“I know well,” Margaret said and gave a slight tired nod. “I have not seen a man so in love in some many years…since my kitchen man…Gerald…was taken from me. But I tell you now a story you do not wish to hear. My Gerald…and his two children…all of them dead. Gerald, a mysterious illness, my son Robert, an ear infection turned pneumonia, my daughter Helene, a broken neck. All three deaths spaced exactly two years apart…and all of them planned by my husband. For he discovered my love affair. Matthew was born with his father’s face…the other two, my twins, were not. You see Charlotte…you are in more danger here then you will ever be if you leave.”

“I…”

“You must leave girl…you must…” Margret said.

“Sleep now…are you in much pain?”

“I do not feel…”

“I can help you.”

“Your odd farm girl elixirs are not welcomed in this world, child.”

“This I am well aware…but I can brew them just as well.”

“Help me…for…I wish…only to be with my Gerald…and our two beautiful children…once again.”

At once Charlotte requested the herbs from a maid who would never dare speak a word to Matthew and prepared the heated tea that would let Margret be free of her burdens for the rest of her eternity. She carefully gave the old woman spoonful after spoonful until the cup was finished.

“You can rest now…and when you wake you should be in paradise,” Charlotte said softly as she stood from where she’d been sitting on the edge of the large wooden bed.

Margret held her hand gently. “Thank you, child…please take with you my advice.”

“I should indeed,” Charlotte said.

The old woman took a last deep breath and her eyes rolled back before closing gently and her hand fell limp in Charlotte’s. For a long moment Charlotte stood and cried while her child kicked her from within. Finally she composed herself well before throwing the cup and spoon into the burning fire and going to the door. She opened it to see the maid standing.

“Please inform Mr. Hayes that his mother has left us,” she said, trying hard to remain composed. She watched without pity as the maid suddenly crumpled and broke into hysterical sobs before rushing down the hallway to find Matthew and tell him as she was instructed.

After another moment she attempted to straighten her shoulders and carry herself to her own rooms. She was now quite tired and very drained for all her emotions were used to help the old woman rejoin the family she very much had wanted her entire life.

She was not surprised to find Amber in the room, but the sudden change in the way the girl stood and moved sent a shiver down her back.

“Amber…darling…”

“I should not burden you,” Amber said, tears lining her eyes.

Charlotte examined her body and felt her heart race faster. So many things were familiar. So many things about the poor girl were things she had held onto and concealed herself in the early months of her marriage when she’d been expected to bed her husband.

“Amber…oh no…no…”

“Do not worry! You must stay healthy…you mustn’t worry! Please, I beg of you…” Amber said, her tears falling now. “It was not so bad…please…”

“A man…a man so evil…how should a man so evil be so…”

“Please, Miss Charlotte, sit…rest.”

“How am I ever to sit in this room again knowing he took from you something so…” She was suddenly stopped by a sharp pain in her abdomen that nearly sent her to her knees.

Amber rushed to catch her and pulled her to the bed.

“My…”

“It is your baby,” Amber said. “But do not worry…I will be with you should he come too soon.”

“It is a pain…unlike…”

“No…hush now…you should be quite fine,” Amber said and ran her hand over the braids that remained tightly woven. “I will be with you and you should be quite fine.”