Chased Distance: A Novella (WLW)

Chapter Eighteen: March 26th, 1876, Donaldsonville, Louisiana

Elu woke to the sounds of carriages and a glass breaking, followed by laughter. She jolted into a sitting position, feeling a pulsing, yet dull ache at her side. As she was grabbed from behind, she gasped and was pulled into a familiar embrace. She glanced up at her warm, gentle captor and found Bethany, immediately holding onto the arms around herself.

"Bethany, are we... Are we still in the same place? Safe?" She simply nodded in reply and despite the grin on her face, her eyes were saddened. Elu sat up once more and turned around in her arms, cupping her cheek. "How long have we been here?"

Bethany leaned into her touch as tears threatened to stream down her cheeks and Elu felt her trepidation rise, setting a loud pulsing in her ears. "Three days. You have been in and out of it with an infection. Luckily, a physician stabilized you and your fever broke last night. It's morning now."

"Why are you so sad? What happened?"

Bethany swarmed her and got on her lap, wrapping her arms around her shoulders as she sobbed into her neck. Ignoring the pain, Elu gathered her in and ran her fingers through the back of her hair until her sobs had subsided into sniffles. She pulled back and cupped Bethany's cheek, rubbing away her tears with her thumb. After tucking a few strands of her long locks behind her ears, Elu patiently waited for further explanation, desperate to stop whatever plagued her so much as swiftly as possible.

"I met my family."

Elu tilted her head to catch her eyes. "You mean your father? Is he here?"

"Yes, and so is my half-brother and mother." Bethany's eyebrows arched and she rested her forehead against her jaw with a long exhale. "I have so much to explain."

Elu turned them around and settled Bethany along her uninjured side, holding her closely as they both outstretched their legs. "Tell me."

"When my father swindled his business partner out of that money and set him up to take the fall, he and my mother fled to Tennessee. Apparently, they gave me to my mother's midwife and told her to run in the hopes that I would survive if they did not. When they returned to New Orleans and used my mother's connections to hide within what is now Donaldsonville, she sent people looking for me.

"Mother had no way of knowing what happened to me and during the entire expedition you and I shared, someone was tailing us, trying to meet us. It was Lewis. She sent him to find me and he was just shy of doing so when Foret's paid men did just prior. Lewis arrived back here after hearing this was our destination and watched the train platform, then followed Foret Senior's stagecoach.

"As far as mother goes, she spent nearly all her personal money to find me, which she made in this establishment. It was not for a long while, which she claims is not the case for most women in her profession, but is now owned by both she and my father. He, however, passed most of his days drinking and spending money he did not have, which made looking for me very hard for my mother. She... She never stopped, though. She always searched for me and once Lewis was old enough to understand, he helped as best as he could. When he turned fifteen, he started going with the men to find me, but his latest journey was alone. He... He is already seventeen, has a different father and other than that, I know next to nothing about him. My own brother. My mother... All I know is what I have explained and nothing more..."

"But you were not abandoned, Bethany." Moving her hand from her hip, Elu caressed Bethany's cheek with her hand, kissing the opposite side of her face. "Don't you see? Not entirely."

"You're right. Only by my father who...is even worse than I imagined." Bethany buried her face into Elu's chest, wrapping her arms around her waist.

Elu gathered her in and began running the fingers of one of her hands through her thick, brunette hair. "Do you regret coming here?"