River Road
Praise for R.C. Matthews
Tortured Souls series
Devil’s Cove
Blackburn Castle
“This genuinely creepy supernatural story . . . has many shocks and twists along the way . . . to keep readers absolutely riveted. A most unusual romance.”—Library Journal
“Ms. Matthew’s main characters are vibrant, well-thought out, and exciting.”—InD’Tale Magazine
Other Crimson titles by R.C. Matthews
Little White Lies
“Little White Lies by R.C. Matthews is entertaining. The characters are funny and very well developed, making this book enjoyable and easy to read. Matthew’s descriptions are well written and can easily put you into the different scenes of the book. I’ve never been a cruise. But now that I’ve read this book, I’m thinking that I will need to change that.”—Tumbleweed Book Reviewer
“Each character really melted together in a perfect way to form a great book.”—N Kuhn Reviews and News, 5 stars
“ . . . the passion almost made my iPad overheat!! . . . Totally love it; check it out for yourself!”—5 stars, Swirling in My Love for Books
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Contents
Cover
Praise for R.C. Matthews
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
Author’s Note
About the Author
‘Little White Lies’ Excerpt
Copyright
Guide
Cover
Contents
Start of content
River Road
Tortured Souls, Book 3
R.C. Matthews
Avon, Massachusetts
This book is dedicated to my sister, Judy, who has read every single one of my books in draft form! I hope you’ll love all the changes to the manuscript since your first pass through.
Chapter One
April 4, 1861
Prince William County, Virginia
“We aren’t fucking animals!” Charles Moore hissed.
He hauled his comrade to his feet by the collar of his shirt, where deep scratches marred his skin. Lying on a pile of hay was a weeping woman, her bodice gaping and skirts hiked to her waist. Charles could not hold her gaze, with those wide and frantic eyes, or he would retch. She scrambled to the corner of the barn stall, peering through her tangled mass of hair.
“You’d best leave,” Charles said gently, holding her attacker at bay. “Go on, hurry.”
“Stay out of this!” his comrade growled.
Frederick threw a punch, but Charles leaned back, evading the jab. So this was the way the scene would play out? Fine. Because this shit will not happen on my watch. He nailed his opponent with an upper cut to the gut. Frederick heaved in a sickening gasp, his mouth flapping like a guppy.
More men around them roused from their sleep, and the woman finally came to her senses. She held her bodice together while running for the exit. Her hiccups fueled Charles’s rage, and he slammed his knee into Frederick’s groin. The disgusting pig fell to the ground, groaning.
Soldiers were honor-bound to fight and protect.
“Where do you think you’re going?” another soldier asked, snatching hold of the woman’s long tresses. He yanked her back, wrapping his arms around her from behind. “You’re a pretty one. But you started the fun without me? That wasn’t very nice.”
She shrieked and struggled in his grasp, but Warren only chuckled.
Charles stormed toward them, heat blazing through his veins like wildfire. “Let her go. You’re feeling frisky? Then milk your cow yourself.”
“Don’t think so,” Warren said, grinding his hips into her buttocks. “Not when I’ve got a soft pokehole to enjoy. Settle down. No need to fight. We can all enjoy her company.”
Warren had a twisted mind. The woman’s tears were not an invitation to rut between her thighs.
“Would you like to leave?” Charles asked the woman, his voice soft.
“Ye . . . yes . . . ” she choked out.
Pulling out his knife, Charles held the weapon steady. “You heard the lady. She isn’t interested in playing with you or anyone else. Release her. We’re soldiers, not a band of mangy mutts.”
Warren snorted but shook his head. “What say you, Jacob? I know you’re aching to taste her hot cunny. Three against one. I’ll take those odds against a seventeen-year-old puppy.”
Another man stepped out of the shadows, wielding a five-inch Bowie. “Count me in. Take her in the stall. We’ll deal with him,” Jacob said, eyeing Charles as Frederick closed in from the other side.
Oh, hell! Things were about to get ugly. But the woman couldn’t defend herself, and she didn’t deserve to be brutalized. Charles gripped the handle of his knife tighter while assessing the two men. Jacob was the greater threat, experienced and built like a bear. He had to go down first while Charles still had his full strength.
He advanced on the bigger man but was distracted by a feral growl from behind. What the hell? As he turned toward the threat, Frederick’s head plowed into Charles’s stomach like a battering ram. They fell to the ground in a pile of body parts. All of the wind rushed out of his lungs, and his head smacked against the wood floor.
He saw stars and shook his head to clear his vision. Searing pain burned a path across his chest, and he glanced down. The motherfucker had sliced through his shirt, grazing his skin. A cut meant to warn, not harm. Blood seeped from the gash, the coppery scent flooding his nostrils.
Adrenaline coursed through Charles’s veins, and he got to his hands and knees, willing himself to stand. A booted foot smashed his wrist, and he cried out, falling to the ground once again. His weapon clattered beside him, and Jacob kicked it away with a mean grin. He kneeled on Charles’s back, pressing his chest to the ground. With the man’s full weight crushing him, Charles could scarce draw breath.
The woman lay only feet away in the barn stall, her tear-streaked face visible through the doorway. Raw terror flashed in her wide, brown eyes, pleading.
“You’re going to watch, little pup,” Jacob growled in his ear. “Don’t close your eyes, or it’ll go worse for her. Let’s see if your cow moos to be milked when we’re through.”
“Help
me,” the woman whimpered.
Charles couldn’t fight off three men. His focus turned to the bits of hay clinging to her raven hair. The golden strands lengthened and morphed into a halo of blond tresses. He blinked rapidly as his gaze flashed to her eyes. What the devil? They were no longer brown, rather as blue as the fathomless sea. The deck of his father’s clipper ship emerged from the barn floor as wind whistled in his ears. He shot to his feet, no longer a weak, teenaged boy, but a strong, muscular man. The ship rolled upon the waves, and he lost his bearings, wobbling to the side.
A woman screamed, terrifying cries for mercy, her voice hoarse, almost unrecognizable. Nicolette. With her body tied to the mast of the ship and flames consuming her gown, his fiancée was helpless.
She howled and thrashed. “Charles, save me!”
Heat blasted him square in the face, and he instinctively held his forearm out, protecting himself against the blazing fire. He sprang forward, dodging a rolling barrel. But no matter how fast he ran, or how many obstacles he traversed, he couldn’t get closer. Her screams morphed into the deafening blare of a horn, and Charles gaped as a steamer ship crashed into the hull of the ship, splintering the wood.
• • •
April 4, 1881
Port of New Orleans, Louisiana
Charles “Hatchet” Moore sat up in bed and gripped the sheets as another blast of the horn blared through his head. Nausea roiled in his gut. His heart pounded mercilessly, and his head ached. He scrambled to his feet, staring out the porthole in his quarters. All was quiet again. The first rays of sunlight shimmered over the horizon. So the steamer hadn’t rammed his ship? Another dream, then.
He couldn’t breathe in the confines of his room. He needed fresh air. Yanking on breeches, a shirt, and his boots, he stormed out into the hallway and up the stairs to the quarterdeck.
Sweat gathered on his brow despite the cool morning breeze. With trembling fingers, he lit a cheroot and puffed hard on the end. He blew out the sweet smoke, obliterating the stench of sewage all around him. With each inhale and exhale, the vestiges of his past faded.
He hadn’t dreamed of the Civil War or Nicolette’s death since his last visit to New Orleans six years ago. Time might’ve dulled his fiancée’s features in his mind’s eye, but he would never be free of the guilt he bore over her senseless death.
“Another nightmare last night, mate?” Victor asked, walking up from behind.
Nodding, Hatchet rubbed his eyes with his thumb and forefinger. They burned from lack of sleep. “Every bloody night for the past week. Coming home is torture. That damned Civil War ruined this place for me.”
Gripping the ship’s rail, Victor sighed. “Talk to me, old friend. You never speak of the war. Get it off your chest.”
Talking would only dredge up more memories. Hatchet turned his attention to the neighboring clipper ship, drawing once more on his cheroot. The meaty smoke doused his lungs, and his shoulders relaxed. No, he didn’t want to share the horrors of war or remember the gruesome scenes. Best he bury that shit deep.
“You don’t want to hear those stories,” he said, flicking the end of his cheroot over the side of the ship. “Pillage. Murder. Rape.”
Instead, Hatchet focused on a gentleman walking up the gangplank of the neighboring ship. On the dock, a sleek black carriage, drawn by two handsome Clydesdales, stood waiting.
“Victor, did you send notice of our early arrival to my family late last night? I did not, and yet that carriage belongs to my father.”
“Certainly not. That’s rather odd. Why hasn’t he boarded our ship?” Victor asked with his gaze narrowed on the conveyance, as though willing the door to open.
“Because he’s bartering with the captain of The Angelica as we speak.”
Victor sought the pair out on the forecastle deck of the neighboring ship, his eyes widening. “That cannot be good. Why is Isaac dealing with a scurvy pirate? Captain Corbin is the worst sort of offal.”
“Why, indeed?”
It’s not like his father was in danger. At over six feet, four inches, few men were able or willing to look Isaac Moore dead in the eyes, including Hatchet. Sometimes he wished he were Isaac’s biological son, if only to have inherited the man’s height.
In that moment, Captain Corbin held out his palm. Only after Isaac relinquished a fat coin purse did the captain gesture to his first mate, who handed over a wooden box. After lifting the lid and glancing inside, Isaac gave a curt nod and strode back to his carriage, where he deposited the container inside before boarding The Savior.
“Good morning, Charles,” his father said, drawing Hatchet into a hug while clapping him hard on the back.
Hearing his given name spoken aloud felt odd. No one in his close circle of friends called him Charles anymore. He turned his head side to side, cracking his neck to release the tension. But his family would never stoop to calling him Hatchet, so best he adapt.
His father gave the ship a once-over. “You completed the journey in record time. Didn’t expect to find you here this morning.”
“Fair weather shaved weeks off the trip,” Hatchet said. “And with a pregnant lady aboard, the quick hop across the sea was welcome. You remember Victor Blackburn from our last visit? I mentioned in my letter that he’d be joining me with his wife, Mercy.”
“Of course.” Father shook Victor’s hand. “I made accommodations for you at a nearby inn. You’re welcome to stay with us in town at Magnolia House, but Charles thought you’d prefer a bit of privacy. Both lodgings are in the Garden District, so you can drop in whenever you choose.”
“That’s very kind of you,” Victor said with of tip of his head.
Father grinned and rubbed his hands together. “Tomorrow is your birthday, son. Haven’t celebrated one with you in ages. Thirty-seven, I believe? Once you’re settled in, I’ll reserve a table at our favorite restaurant.”
Had his father gone daft? Mother lay on her deathbed at the family plantation. “We couldn’t possibly. I must go to Mother immediately at Harmon Grove.”
“No need for that,” his father said, hooking his thumbs in his pants pockets. His smile was as jovial as ever. “She’s comfortably situated in town.”
But the plantation was Mother’s childhood home, and she would wish to spend her final days there. With the sugarcane season in full swing, she must be very ill to reside where the doctors were at her beck and call. He was on the verge of voicing his concern when a small form darted across the deck. The lithe shape and loping gait were decidedly familiar.
“Halt, you there,” Hatchet bellowed as he ran to cut off the sailor. “Damnation, Maribeth, is that you?”
The girl barreled into him, wrapping her arms around his middle in a tight hold. “Don’t be angry with me, Hatchet.”
“Angry? Oh, no. I’m furious,” he snarled, marching her to a nearby barrel. “While I tan your hide for sneaking aboard, tell me how you managed to keep hidden the entire voyage.”
She jumped onto the barrel and met him eye to eye. Despite his ferocious glare, her face lit up with a saucy smile. “Unlike you, the crew were happy to have me. I tell the best ghost stories.”
“Traitors,” Victor said, though a smile tugged on his lips.
Father joined them and opened his arms wide. “Come here and give an old man a hug and kiss. You’ve grown since the last visit, Poppet.”
She leaped into his embrace, wrapping her arms around his neck and pecking him on the cheek. “Hello, Isaac. At least one person here is happy to see me.”
A growl rumbled in Hatchet’s chest. “Dominick will have my head when he returns from his honeymoon and you’re not at Devil’s Cove Manor where you belong!”
“Only after he guts you first for lying to him!” she shot back. “This is his ship, and, best friend or not, he wouldn’t have let you sail here without him by your side. You should’ve told him about your trip to New Orleans and the curse before he left.”
The girl was too crafty by fa
r, diverting the attention away from herself. Though her accusation was true, that was entirely beside the point. Maribeth was like a daughter to the whole crew, although Dominick had signed the adoption papers. He would be worried sick about the girl when he returned from his vacation.
“What nonsense do you speak of?” his father asked with a lift of his brow. “Charles is cursed? By whom?”
“Something about a voodoo queen,” Maribeth replied with a shrug. “I should like to meet her. Do you know her?”
“Certainly not,” his father said with a sniff. “Marie Laveau hasn’t been seen in more than a decade. She might be dead for all I know. Do not speak of her or this voodoo nonsense again unless you’re keen on spending the night in a dank jail cell.” His gaze met Hatchet’s. “That’s what happens these days to those who practice the dark arts.”
“Well, what’re we going to do with this baggage?” Victor asked, scowling. “Can’t very well send her back to England unattended.”
Father set her back on her feet. “She’s more than welcome to join us. Charles, your mother will return to the plantation after a short stay in the city. You and Maribeth should accompany her. Harmon Grove offers many amusements for a curious young lady.”
Hatchet could not commit to anything until he found a quiet moment to mull over the situation. Dammit! Maribeth’s presence was problematic, robbing him of hours that would be better served in pursuit of information on the curse.
“Let me think on it after we settle in. The girl is young and fragile, making her vulnerable to disease,” he said with a pointed look in her direction. “I don’t want her too close to Mother.”
His little charge growled. “I’m not fragile.”
Father waved his hand. “No worries on that front. Lucetta is already back on her feet and a woman about town. Been at least a week since she recovered. Only last evening, she prayed for your early arrival so we might celebrate your birthday. She’ll be delighted when I share the news.”