Free Elizabeth Grayson by Moon in the Water Page A

tapered spokes. He caressed the satin-smooth turnings and savored the feel of the engine’s vibration in the hollows of his palms.
    He closed his eyes and let loose a sigh that felt like it had been building behind his sternum for half his life. He’d never believed he could have this—a boat of his own and a river he could follow into the sunset—the sum total of all he’d ever wanted for himself.
    As he guided the
Andromeda
north, the banks of the Mississippi rolled past him. To the east lay Illinois, swampy scrub country that masked its towns and villages in a gray-brown haze of branches. To the west the state of Missouri was slipping by, the St. Louis waterfront giving way to lumber mills and manufacturing plants, scattered farmsteads and forested banks that climbed a low, gray bluff set well back from the water.
    Chase rang the bells to the engine room for half-speed as he maneuvered the
Andromeda
toward the mouth of the Chain of Rocks channel. It was one of the most treacherous sections on the Mississippi. In just the last ten years its rocky, saw-toothed reefs had killed seventeen steamboats outright and maimed countless others.
    The current was stiff and the Mississippi so swollen by spring runoff that the
Andromeda
was having to fight up every inch of the Chain’s seven-mile course.
    “Eddy to port,” Rue pointed out from where he was leaning against the breastboard at the front of the pilothouse.
    Chase held the wheel over hard, then brought it back. The
Andromeda
came about like a saloon girl ruffling her petticoats at a potential customer.
    In the next hour and a half, they clawed their way north, struggling upriver toward the point where the Missouri flowed into the Mississippi from the west. The
Andromeda
bucked as they swung bow-first into the Missouri’s current. Then, as they penetrated the mouth of the river that would take them all the way to Montana, she settled again.
    “They say boys go up the Mississippi, and the men the Missouri,” Rue offered with a grin. “Guess what that makes us?”
    “Damn fools for getting into steamboating in the first place,” Chase answered and turned into a crossing toward the opposite bank.
    “Want me to take the wheel?” Rue asked eagerly.
    Chase measured the pleasure of piloting the
Andromeda
against the demands of his other duties and shook his head. “I’ll hold her steady for awhile yet.”
    Rue shrugged, then ambled toward the door. “I’ll head down and get us some coffee before the cooks start dishing up supper.”
    Chase nodded absently and let him go.
    Though piloting took most of Chase’s concentration, he couldn’t seem to keep his thoughts from straying to Ann. How delicate she’d looked as she’d glided across the parlor this morning. How stubborn and uncompromising she’d been, standing at the head of the gangway this afternoon.
    He’d recognized the resolve in her that first day, but it had been tempered by the mortification of being offered in marriage as damaged goods. Chase saw now that when she’d clenched her fist and refused his ring, it had been as much an act of rebellion directed at her father as at him.
    But when he’d faced her across the cabin this afternoon, she’d showed such temerity and resolve that Chase found himself wishing he could give her what she wanted. Still, keeping Ann aboard the
Andromeda
was impossible. No matter what James Rossiter had done or how single-minded he was when it came to his daughter, Ann was better off in St. Louis than on a steamer bound for Montana.
    Chase stayed on at the wheel for a good deal longer than he’d intended, well into a sunset that turned the river ahead to molten copper. It wasn’t until after they’d tied up at Portage de Sioux for the night, that Chase left the wheelhouse, finally resigned to dealing with Ann.
    She was his wife, his responsibility, and maybe once they’d shared a companionable dinner, he’d be able to make her see it was best that she take passage