One Wore Blue Read online

  “I’LL FIGHT YOU EVERY STEP OF THE WAY.

  AND THE SOUTH WILL WIN!”

  “Maybe the battles, but never the war,” he said quickly.

  He realized that he wasn’t talking about the great conflict between the North and the South. He was talking about the two of them.

  Suddenly, the tension was so great that it was nearly unbearable. He felt her heat, felt the raw desperation and fury and determination in her.

  And he felt the fire that had always burned between them. Dear Lord, he wanted her. The memory of what had once been between them was suddenly naked in her eyes.

  Damn, but I will have you again! he vowed in silence.

  CRITICAL RAVES FOR

  HEATHER GRAHAM

  THE VIKING’S WOMAN

  “Heather Graham is a writer of incredible talent. Once again, she brings to life a sometimes violent, but always intriguing era of romance and adventure.” —Affaire de Coeur

  “Passionate love scenes, action and intrigue combine to make a fast-paced, well-developed story which artfully blends historical fact with romantic fiction.” —Rendezvous

  SWEET, SAVAGE EDEN

  “SWEET, SAVAGE EDEN IS A KEEPER! An engrossing, highly sensual non-stop read. You’ll be captivated by the engaging characters and the fascinating portrait of early colonial life. Heather Graham never disappoints her readers. She delivers high quality historical romance with three-dimensional characters and a sizzling love story that touches the heart.” —Romantic Times

  A PIRATE’S PLEASURE

  “The sexual tension in A PIRATE’S PLEASURE sizzles like the hottest summer sun. Heather Graham’s sense of humor sparkles throughout this delightful and well-researched tale … just one more shining example of why Ms. Graham is a bestselling author. She continually gives us hours of reading pleasure.”

  —Romantic Times

  LOVE NOT A REBEL

  “A very, very hot, fast-paced, ‘battle of wills’ love story that is guaranteed to thrill Heather Graham’s legion of fans … enough historical details, colorful escapades, biting repartee, and steamy sexual tension to keep you glued to the pages.”

  —Romantic Times

  DEVIL’S MISTRESS

  “The familiar and charged role of the unwilling bride showcases Graham’s talents for characterization and romantic tension.”

  —The New York Daily News

  “This book may become a minor classic.”

  —Romantic Times

  “One of the most exciting romances ever read.”

  —Romance Readers Quarterly

  Dell books by Heather Graham

  SWEET SAVAGE EDEN

  A PIRATE’S PLEASURE

  LOVE NOT A REBEL

  DEVIL’S MISTRESS

  EVERY TIME I LOVE YOU

  GOLDEN SURRENDER

  THE VIKING’S WOMAN

  ONE WORE BLUE

  AND ONE WORE GRAY

  AND ONE ROAD WEST

  LORD OF THE WOLVES

  SPIRIT OF THE SEASON

  RUNAWAY

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Other Books by This Author

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Part 1 - John Brown’s Body

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Part 2 - A House Divided

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Part 3 - War

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Part 4 - A Separate Peace

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  About the Author

  Copyright

  This book is dedicated with many, many thanks to some of the wonderful people we’ve come to know in Harpers Ferry and Bolivar, West Virginia.

  To Mrs. Shirley Dougherty, who has bewitched, intrigued, entertained and taught us so many times with the “Harpers Ferry Myth and Legends” Tour (Ghost Tour!)

  To Dixie, for being the gentleman that he is, but especially for his kindness that very first time we came.

  To Mr. and Mrs. Stan Hadden for their hospitality and their charm, and for the wonderful Civil War flavor of Stan’s “Eagle.”

  To many of the National Park Service guides for their own love of history, for their enthusiasm, for their patience.

  And it is dedicated to Harpers Ferry itself, a town where the mists still hover over the Shenandoah and Potomac rivers, where the mountains rise into the distance, where the past and present seem to collide, and, as Jason says, where a haunting quality seems to settle over the streets by the darkness of the night, and a restless spirit still remains. Perhaps they still walk here, men in blue, and men in gray.

  Lastly, but very especially, it is dedicated to my editor, Damaris Rowland, with tremendous gratitude for the enthusiasm and support she has unwaveringly given this project. Damaris, thank you.

  1

  John Brown’s

  Body

  Prologue

  KIERNAN

  Kiernan’s world, it seemed, had split in two.

  One side was blue, and one side was gray.

  Ever since it began to come apart, everything had changed. All that had been beautiful in life had begun to fade. A way of life that had been full of charm and wit and easy grandeur had passed away. They were holding on to it tightly, but it was gone. The world was split apart, and families were split apart—like Camerons.

  One wore blue, and one wore gray.

  One had been her childhood friend back in Tidewater Virginia. He and Kiernan had tramped through fields together, they had been chastised together. They had told their dreams to each other during long lazy days when they had lain by pleasant, bubbling springs beneath powder-blue skies.

  And the other Cameron brother had been her hero. As a child, she had adored him. As a woman, she had loved him. And when the world had changed, she had hated him—fiercely, desperately, as passionately as she had loved him. She had her beliefs, and she had her loyalties.

  It was just that she had loved him so long.…

  Even when she had stood before the altar with another man and promised to love and honor and cherish that man until death did them part, she had loved him.

  Almost as much as she had hated him.

  She had told him that she hated him the day that she walked away from him.

  But he had been destined to ride back into her life that day, Kiernan would later realize.

  Jesse. Jesse Cameron.

  The one who wore blue.

  It began very late in the afternoon of that autumn day in 1861, when the breeze was cool, when the mountains seemed the most gentle.

  They came against the beautiful fall colors of the twilight. They were like a great wave, cresting and falling, rising again. Beneath the dying sun they seemed to weave and undulate. A piece of metal—a belt buckle, a sword—would catch a ray of the fading light, and it would flash and shimmer. They came onward still, visible almost like a writhing snake one moment, then disappearing into shadow the next. When they disappeared, the peace, the tranquillity of the coming night in the Blue Ridge Mountains, seemed to deny that they could exist. Here, where fall came so gently and so beautifully, where those last rays of sun and the
coming shadow fell upon oaks and rolling fields of green and amber, here at Montemarte, they could not possibly exist.

  But they did.

  And still they came. Men marching, and more men on horseback. Rows and rows of soldiers.

  Kiernan Miller could see them on the distant mount as she stood by the old oaks in the summer garden of Montemarte. In the dim light, it was difficult to see what color they wore. But even as she watched them, she felt panic and dismay rise within her. Her hand flew to her throat, as if she could swallow her despair.

  The Confederates had pulled out of the nearby town of Harpers Ferry—she knew that. They had blown up the munitions there and pulled out. They were still near—she knew that too—but they had no large numbers, and so the horde slowly but surely rising toward her had to be Yanks.

  As they came closer, she could see the blue uniforms—standard Federal issue. Union Army. They weren’t deserters or guerrilla fighters.

  There could be only one reason for them to be riding toward Montemarte.

  To burn it to the ground.

  She stood very still, only her bright, beautiful green eyes betraying the depths of her tension. The night breeze rippled through the gold and honey-rich fire of her hair. Her slim form was as straight as the old oaks. In better times, she might have been a picture of elegance, for the breeze also touched upon the fullness of her fine gown—white eyelet over a full silver-blue skirt and a low-cut bodice with French puff sleeves. It was a beautiful gown, right out of the pages of Lady Godey’s. She didn’t know why she bothered to dress for evenings anymore, except that she had found herself plunged into a new world, and she was fighting to hang on to the traditions she knew so well.

  The Yankees were coming.

  She wanted to scream, and she wanted somewhere to run. She wanted to cast this information upon one of the many gallants she had known in her life. And she wanted one of them to stand up and sweep her up and promise her that everything would be all right, that she would be cherished and protected.

  But there was nowhere to run, and no one to run to. Inside the house, the children would have seen the men by now. They would be coming to her. She would have to have something to say to them. It was doubtful that she could save the house—Miller firearms had already been used too successfully against the Union. She had to save her charges, though, and the slaves dependent upon her.

  But the Yankees were coming.…

  A cavalry unit was leading, with infantry in the back, she realized. There must have been a hundred soldiers.

  Suddenly, even as they headed nearer and nearer her, the party split. Half now headed toward her, and half toward the Freemont estate down the hill.

  “Kiernan! Yankees! For the love of God, Yankees!”

  Kiernan swung around. Patricia, her twelve-year-old sister-in-law, stood on the front porch, her fingers clenched into her skirt.

  It was curious how very lovely Patricia Miller looked. She, too, had dressed for dinner. Her blond hair hung in a single braid down her back, and her muslin gown filled with soft lilac flowers. She was framed by the house, the gracious and elegant house that looked so very beautiful and welcoming in the twilight.

  Montemarte sat upon the hill on the outskirts of Harpers Ferry. Like others in the area, the Millers had found their riches in the production and manufacture of arms, and Montemarte was a monument to those riches. It was not a plantation home but a magnificent manor. There were stables for the horses that had once been the Miller family pride. There were gardens to feed the household, and there were gardens for beauty, but there were no fields for income—just the manor with its classic white Greek columns, and the stables and outbuildings.

  “Kiernan—”

  “I know, I know!” Kiernan told her softly. “The Yankees are coming.” With a sigh she squared her shoulders and fought off a last temptation to burst into tears. She lifted her skirts and hurried for the porch. “Patricia, they’re going to want to burn the house.”

  “No! They can’t! What will we do? Where will we go?” Patricia asked, tears in her wide brown eyes.

  Despite its beauty, Montemarte was just a house, Kiernan told herself. Their home, yes, but still just a creation of brick and wood and mortar and plaster. They were not destitute; she could bring the Miller children to her father’s home, deep in Tidewater Virginia, on the peninsula, where the Yankees would dare not come lest they met up with Stonewall Jackson or General Lee.

  She knew why Patricia was so desperate. The war had scarcely begun, but already Patricia had lost everyone. If it hadn’t been for Kiernan’s reckless marriage to Patricia’s brother, not even Kiernan would be here now for the children.

  “Don’t worry,” she told Patricia. “We’ll be fine, whatever happens.”

  “Like hell!” snapped a voice, and Kiernan’s eyes quickly rose to meet those of Patricia’s twin brother, Jacob Miller. Brown-eyed and tow-headed like Patricia, he was already very tall and very straight, and he carried his father’s old rifle. He gazed at Kiernan with hurt and with knowledge that shouldn’t have been seen in eyes so very young. “Bad things are happening in a lot of places, Kiernan. Lots of bad things. You’d best get yourself and Patricia hid somewhere.” There was a catch in his throat. “’Tricia’s young yet, but when them Yanks see you—”

  “Jacob,” Kiernan said, and lowered her head to hide a smile. He meant to defend her honor—to the death. She had heard some of the same stories about the invading Union Army that he had, but she couldn’t believe that fifty men, riding with such discipline, were coming to dishonor one lone woman. “We’re going to be all right. They’re coming because of the Miller Firearms Factories. It’s revenge, I’m afraid, but nothing more.”

  “Kiernan—”

  She set her hand upon the rifle, lowering it. “Jacob Miller, you can’t take on an entire Union cavalry company. In memory of your parents and Anthony, I have to make sure that you grow up and live to a ripe old age. Do you understand?”

  “They’re going to burn us out.”

  “Probably, yes.”

  “And you want to just surrender the place to them?”

  “No, Jacob.” She offered them both a grave smile. “I want to make the evening as wretched for them as we possibly can. I want you both to go back inside. One of you sit in the library and read a book. One of you go and make sure that Janey has started supper. I’ll stay and meet them on the porch, and when they order us to go, we’ll go. But on our own sweet time, and with lots of dignity.”

  Jacob still looked as if he wanted to start shooting. Dear God, the twins had always listened to her in the past! She prayed that Jacob wouldn’t pick this moment to defy her.

  “Jacob, please, for the love of God. Help me now. I swear I won’t bear the sight of any more blood right now. They won’t want to hurt you.”

  “All Yanks ever want to do is hurt southerners!” Jacob claimed, a catch in his throat. He was still just a child. He didn’t want to be hurt.

  He also didn’t want to be a coward. He was the man of the house now, and a man stood up for what was his.

  “That’s not true,” she said. But she herself wasn’t certain anymore. War had changed everything. It had ravaged the land, it had torn apart families.

  There had once been a time when they in the South had believed that the North would just let them secede, let them go their separate way.

  That time was long past.

  There had also been a time when they had all thought that the southern soldiers wouldn’t need more than a few weeks to whop the North.

  That time was also long past, no matter how brilliant the southern generals were, no matter how valiant her men, no matter how gallantly they rode their horses and wielded their swords. It had really started that long-ago day at nearby Harpers Ferry, when John Brown had made his move to seize the arsenal. The old fanatic had been captured and tried. He had committed treason and murder, and he had been condemned to hang.

  And he had promised the
m all, on the day of his hanging, that the land would run red with blood.

  “No one is going to hurt you. Put the rifle away.”

  “I want it close at hand,” Jacob said stubbornly.

  He turned to put it away. Thankfully, she thought, he wasn’t going to throw away his life in a foolhardy quest for valiance.

  “Thank you,” Kiernan told him, smiling.

  But the Yankees were still coming.

  “Go in!” she commanded them. “Quickly—now!” She didn’t want them to hear her voice quavering.

  She clenched her hands before her. She didn’t want them to see her fingers trembling.

  Suddenly, Janey was on the porch with them. Plump and aging, her anxiety shone in her ink-dark eyes. “Miz Kiernan! The Yankees are coming!”

  “Janey, I know that,” Kiernan said, surprised at just how calm she managed to sound. “Go back in and start supper.”

  “Supper’s on this minute, Miz Kiernan. But didn’t you hear me? The—”

  “Yes, yes, the Yankees are coming. Go on in, all of you. This is a house where dignity has always resided. We will go on with our lives. I will wait to greet the—er, visitors. You all go in and go about your business.”

  They stared at her, all three of them, as if she had gone crazy. But then Patricia—bless her—lifted her little nose, turned about, and walked regally into the house. After a moment, Jacob followed her.

  “It don’t make sense!” Janey said. Kiernan stood her ground on the porch, and Janey sniffed. “I said that it don’t make sense. You want me to go make supper so that they can burn supper to the ground too! You ought to be hightailing it out of here right now, missy, and that’s a fact! They get their hands on you, and they might not just burn the house!”

  “Janey, nothing is going to happen to me. Those are obviously not guerrilla troops. Watch them march. I’m not going to be—”

  “Maybe they aren’t gonna rape you,” Janey said bluntly. “But you’re the last adult remaining of the Miller family, and after the damage done by Miller firearms, why, they just might want to send you to some northern prison camp, and as I hear it, they aren’t mighty nice places to be!”