The Sapphire Brooch Katherine Logan (best beach reads TXT) 📖

He quickly banked a flash of anger. “I’m not trying to buy ye.”

“It looks like it to me. I’m a bottom-line person. Unless you want to go home with me, we have no future. And I refuse to accept a ring which should belong to your wife.”

He stared off into the stream of light now peeking through the drapes, his chest heaving. “Then what we shared means nothing to ye.”

Oh God. How did this get so twisted?

The turmoil in her stomach turned into a whirlwind, and her head became weightless. Blinking, she tried to see through the forming tears. “Of course, it does, and I’m in love with you, but…”

He came to his feet, knocking over the plate of cheese, which crashed to the floor, shards pinging against the wall. “No buts, Charlotte.”

Time washed over her as if she were nothing more than a woman made of sand who would dissolve in the ever-changing flow of life, her life. “I can’t stay here. This isn’t where I belong.”

He grabbed his trousers off the back of a chair, shoving his legs into them.

“I’ve given you my heart, in spite of knowing it will break.” She placed the sapphire on the table and closed her burning eyes. Her breath seemed to run out of her forever, like a final sigh.

67

Washington City, April 14, 1865

Braham balanced on the rear legs of a straight-back chair in John Nicolay’s White House office, reading newspaper reports of the surrender at Appomattox. If the meeting between Lee and Grant had taken place earlier in the week, he would have attended, but he couldn’t risk being out of town tonight.

Lincoln entered the office holding a sheaf of paper, looking bemused. He appeared neatly combed, a marked contrast to his usual rumpled appearance. The legs of Braham’s chair dropped to the floor with a loud thump, and he quickly came to his feet, straightening his coat.

“Come with me to the War Department,” Lincoln said, seemingly cheerful for the first time in many months.

Braham folded the newspaper and dropped it on the seat of the chair. “Yes, sir.”

They walked out into the hall, empty of the day’s crowd, where Braham picked up his slouch hat and gauntlets from a table near Nicolay’s door. “I thought ye promised Marshal Lamon ye wouldn’t go out at night while he was out of town.”

A guard armed with a revolver, one of the four members of the president’s security detail, followed close behind. Lincoln adjusted his top hat and shuffled along toward the War Department. “My reply was evasive. I’ve gone to the War Department every night for the last four years.”

“Lamon’s concern was not yer nightly trips to the War Department. It’s going to the theater that concerns all of us. When ye’re moving, ye’re not a sitting target. Although, wearing the stovepipe, ye do stick out in a crowd.” The corners of Braham’s mouth twitched to contain a smile.

He held the door as they emerged into a promise of spring in the air. The temperature had already teased the blooms in the dogwood trees, and young leaves rustled a serenade in the breeze. Occasional fireworks lit up the sky over a populace who had grown accustomed to streaks of cannon fire. Braham walked on one side of Lincoln, the guard on the other.

The president put his arm around Braham’s shoulders, and while Lincoln’s careworn face revealed nothing, he took a deep, shuddering breath before saying, “I had a dream of a corpse the other night. The sound of people sobbing drew me from my bed. I asked who was dead in the White House and a soldier said, ‘The president. He was killed by an assassin.’ I didn’t sleep the rest of the night.”

Dread coalesced into a cold snake running down Braham’s backbone to coil in his gut. He halted and turned to Lincoln. “Stay home, sir. An attempt will likely be made on yer life tonight, tomorrow, or the next day. There are more people out there like Count Adam Gurowski making caustic comments about yer policies, and some are actively conspiring to kill ye.” He stared helplessly into the president’s dark eyes. How could he convince Lincoln his life was truly in danger without coming right out and telling him John Wilkes Booth would assassinate him at Ford’s Theatre in only a few hours? Braham had to prevent the shooting, but short of locking up the president for the night, how could he? “If ye insist on going, I’ll stand outside the theater box and guard the door.”

“I have a guard, and I believe the Mallorys are still visiting. Go home to your company. Enjoy the celebrations.”

“The Mallorys will not be offended by my absence if they know I’m protecting ye.”

The skin at the corner of Lincoln’s mouth wrinkled with a smile. “I have seen Doctor Mallory’s eyes following you. I would not like to displease her more than I have already.”

“She’s not displeased.”

Lincoln gave no more than a brief snort in reply. Then he took Braham’s hand, clasped it, and continued his slow, ambling gait. “This is a critical time, Braham. I don’t want the country to know it’s necessary to protect the president from assassination. It’s unwise to admit a lack of confidence in the people. I have a twenty-four-hour guard.” Lincoln gestured by nodding toward the much shorter plainclothes officer at his side. “Tonight, I must go to the theater. The papers today announced both General Grant and I would see Our American Cousin. I cannot disappoint the public.”

A sudden rush of fear and helplessness staggered Braham. He couldn’t rid his mind of the photographs he had seen while in the twenty-first century of Ford’s Theatre and William Petersen’s house. Lincoln needed to understand the depth of Braham’s worry and concern. “If Grant had given ye a plain refusal yesterday or early this morning, ye would have been able to cancel