Orphaned as a child, Pandora Sherwood grows to be wild, fierce, and independent—the scandal of Galveston society. Her rebellious spirit, however, appeals to one man: Ward Gabriel, a self-made adventurer who vows to have her as his own.
But the visions that haunt Pandora's dreams compel her to seek out the answers to the questions of her restless soul. She flees to Europe and gains fame through her art, but along her journey of self-discovery her heart remains in Galveston with Ward.
Yearning to return to the man she loves, Pandora must unveil the mystery of her dreams and the secret that tore her from her home—and from Ward's embrace.
"One of the finest and most gifted writers. A master storyteller!" —Romantic Times
Orphaned as a child, Pandora Sherwood grows to be wild, fierce, and independent—the scandal of Galveston society. Her rebellious spirit, however, appeals to one man: Ward Gabriel, a self-made adventurer who vows to have her as his own.
But the visions that haunt Pandora's dreams compel her to seek out the answers to the questions of her restless soul. She flees to Europe and gains fame through her art, but along her journey of self-discovery her heart remains in Galveston with Ward.
Yearning to return to the man she loves, Pandora must unveil the mystery of her dreams and the secret that tore her from her home—and from Ward's embrace.
"One of the finest and most gifted writers. A master storyteller!" —Romantic Times
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Overview
Orphaned as a child, Pandora Sherwood grows to be wild, fierce, and independent—the scandal of Galveston society. Her rebellious spirit, however, appeals to one man: Ward Gabriel, a self-made adventurer who vows to have her as his own.
But the visions that haunt Pandora's dreams compel her to seek out the answers to the questions of her restless soul. She flees to Europe and gains fame through her art, but along her journey of self-discovery her heart remains in Galveston with Ward.
Yearning to return to the man she loves, Pandora must unveil the mystery of her dreams and the secret that tore her from her home—and from Ward's embrace.
"One of the finest and most gifted writers. A master storyteller!" —Romantic Times
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781626813052 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Diversion Publishing |
| Publication date: | 02/06/2019 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 366 |
| File size: | 5 MB |
Read an Excerpt
CHAPTER 1
September 15, 1893 Galveston, Texas
Ward Gabriel stood at the window of his beach cottage, nervously running his fingers through his unruly shock of black hair. His mood was as turbulent as the sea outside. A muscle twitched at one side of his square jaw and his slate-gray eyes reflected the Gulf's restlessness. Something more than foul weather was brewing, but he wasn't sure what. Maybe part of his uneasy feeling had to do with the flame-haired beauty who was celebrating her birthday tonight.
He had declined the Sherwoods' invitation to the elegant soirée. He'd used work as his excuse and, since Horace Sherwood was his employer, there had been no questions asked. That was good, he told himself. He would have been hard pressed to explain his real reasons for excusing himself from the festivities. He wasn't sure he understood them himself.
He had wanted to be there for Pandora's birthday celebration. He'd been looking forward to it. For years he'd watched with rapt attention as Pandora grew and changed — from an adventurous child to a mischievous, preteen pixie to a charmingly flirtatious coquette. Now here was the moment he had waited for so long — the night that Pandora Sherwood would become a woman. An exciting thought! He'd even decided on a very special gift for her.
But then Mr. Sherwood had confided in him. "There'll be a surprise in store for our guests. Since Pandora's turning eighteen, I've decided to announce her engagement to young Dr. Saenger at her birthday ball." Ward had been too stunned to reply.
It had come as a shock to hear that Pandora planned to marry ... ever. Somehow he had pictured her racing her matched team of white horses up and down Galveston's streets forever, leading the town's dandies on a merry chase for years to come, and trucking off to Europe whenever the spirit moved her. He couldn't picture her catering to a husband, managing a house, raising a passel of kids. Pandora wasn't the type. She wasn't like ordinary women. She needed excitement in her life, adventure, fun ... passion.
But now she was going to be wed. He had known for years that Pandora's parents desired this match. It had even been mentioned in her father's will. The wealthy Sherwoods had feared their daughter might fall prey to some fortune-hunting cad. Jacob Saenger was both brilliant and stable, the perfect man to manage Pandora and her money. Still, Ward had never believed that Pandora would accept such a loveless match.
"Pandora married?" He couldn't imagine it.
What had shocked Ward most was his own gut reaction to the news. He'd felt cheated and angry, and it didn't make a particle of sense. Why, he was allowing himself to pout like a rejected lover! Nothing could be farther from the truth.
He was fond of Pandora. He'd always liked her. Well, almost always. He frowned, remembering. From their first meeting, when she was only eleven and literally fell into his life out of an oak tree, she had seemed more adult than child to him. And even then, as angry as he'd been, he had taken to her. Since that initial, explosive meeting, when he'd caught her spying on him and a lady friend, she had intrigued him. She was different, a little wild at times, with a quick temper and a strange, faraway look in those wise, green eyes. Ward felt as if she knew some secret that no one else in the world would ever be allowed to share. Perhaps it was her sense of mystery that so attracted him.
Although Ward had often wondered what made her so different, so exotic — yes, that was the word — he'd never thought of her in a romantic context. He was much too old for her — almost thirty to her eighteen. And the life he led, traveling the world as mercantile tycoon Horace Sherwood's chief purchasing agent, left little time for settling down. Not that he'd ever seriously thought of it, mind you.
Still, he mused, his heavy brows drawing together in a frown, she could have waited and given me a chance! He'd thought for a long time now — never seriously, of course — that it might be interesting to give her a whirl, provide her with a few thrills before she settled down to wifing and mothering. He'd told her five years ago, when she'd asked why he'd never married, that he was waiting for her to grow up. He realized now he'd been only half-joking.
Yes, the news of Pandora's engagement had hit him hard, there was no denying it. Perhaps he'd reached that time in life when his mortality was beginning to make itself felt. After all, if a man never married, never fathered children, what did he leave behind on earth to show that he'd ever lived and loved and toiled — that he'd ever even existed?
Or perhaps the very opposite was true, he and Pandora were two of a kind — both free spirits, meant to blow with the wind. If she could get entangled in the web of matrimony, then he could be none too safe himself. Maybe for the first time in his life he was experiencing real fear. Whatever the cause, he had no longing to be present when the end of Pandora's freedom was announced.
Ward turned away from the window and the thundering waves of the Gulf. He'd said he would work tonight and so he would!
Setting his coffee mug down on the cluttered oak desk, he opened a thick ledger and stared hard at the neatly penned entries. The lines of figures danced before his eyes and his mind wandered, straying to the white mansion on Broadway. His hand moved from the page to touch the antique box he'd meant to give Pandora tonight. The hand-rubbed mahogany felt smooth and soft to his touch — as alive as a woman's warm flesh.
Abruptly, Ward slammed the ledger shut and stood up. He wandered back to the window that overlooked the storm-tossed beach. There seemed no logical explanation for his black mood, and no help for it.
Perhaps he'd been too long without a woman. For a moment he thought of paying a visit to Abbie Allen's sporting house on Postoffice Street. Abbie's girls were always happy to see him and more than willing to provide him with an hour's entertainment. He flopped back down in his deep leather chair with a weary sigh. No, that wasn't the answer.
Without giving any thought to what he was doing, he reached for Pandora's box and opened it, fingering the objects inside, wondering who had put them there and what mysteries lay locked in their past.
A few blocks away, the Sherwood mansion glowed that night, and all up and down Broadway the sweet strains of a string quartet filled the warm night air. Carriages arrived in an endless flow of polished wood and gilt trim, their smartly groomed teams prancing in high spirits that befit the occasion.
Pandora's engagement to Jacob Saenger was an ill-kept secret thanks to her aunt and uncle, Tabitha and Horace Sherwood. The crème de la crème of Galveston society arrived, glittering with their best jewels and twittering with the juiciest gossip of the year. It wasn't every day that the only son of a middle-class German family managed a match with a beautiful heiress. Nor did it often happen that a strange, wild girl like Pandora Sherwood was able to find a respectable man to marry — fortune or no fortune!
Old Proteus, the Sherwoods' butler, heard it all as he helped the gusts down from their carriages, then led them along the full length of red carpet, rolled out from the front door of the Italianate mansion to the road to protect the ladies' gowns.
"My dear," Mrs. Landes whispered to Mrs. Rosenberg, "I never thought she'd marry. Such an eccentric girl! Lovely, but so different."
"Different matters not at all, my friend, when there's a fortune involved. You know her father was in railroads and left her everything. Jacob Saenger will never have to tend another patient once they're husband and wife. He'll be moving up in the world, no doubt about it."
"Do you suppose they'll dare have a family? After all, the children might turn out as odd as she."
"Ladies, ladies, please!" Mr. Landes interrupted with a reproving glance at his wife. "No more of this. They'll hear you. Jacob's a fine young man and Pandora will make him a lovely, sweet wife. Let's leave it at that, shall we?"
The women fell silent, but exchanged meaningful looks. Both of them had sons who had proposed to Pandora Sherwood. Both mothers had held out high hopes. But both sons had been summarily dismissed by the flighty young woman. She hadn't good sense, in their opinion.
In spite of their bruised egos, the two rejected mothers smiled graciously as they entered the gleaming mansion to greet their hostess, Mrs. Tabitha Sherwood. After all, good manners counted for everything, especially here in cultured Galveston — the New York of the West.
Pandora paced her room, her panic rising with each passing moment. Aunt Tabitha had demanded that she stay put until the right moment. "Once all the guests have arrived, you'll make your grand entrance down the stairway, my dear. Oh, I can see it now! Every woman at the party will be green with envy at the first glimpse of that Worth gown. And as for the young men, well, they'll all be wishing they were in Jacob's shoes. Everyone who matters in Galveston will realize at last how wrong they've been about you. If you are different from their daughters, that difference is definitely to your advantage."
With a slightly indignant sniff, Tabitha had left Pandora alone to await her cue.
Pandora wished her aunt had not made that final remark. She detested being looked upon as different. Granted, she had some strange power that other people did not possess, but did she have to be constantly reminded of it? To cover her "queerness," as most people referred to her unnatural abilities, she put on an eccentric facade. If they wanted to whisper about her, she would give them plenty of juicy gossip for their rumor mill — her extravagant wardrobe, her unchaperoned trips, her many casual suitors, her shocking paintings, and her seeming disregard for what anyone might say about her. The only problem was she'd been caught up in her own act for so long that now she hardly knew any longer where the pretend Pandora left off and the real Pandora began.
"What does it matter?" she said with a sudden, angry flutter of her fan. "I am who I am and there is no help for it."
She tilted her head to one side and thought about it for a moment, then spoke again to her image in the mirror. "Actually, I like myself quite well, thank you. Never mind what anyone else might think."
At least her aunt and uncle accepted her "oddity." They took great pleasure in having her demonstrate her second sight for their friends as if she were some sideshow entertainer. Her own mother and father, on the other hand, had tried to hide her gifts away, to protect her, they'd always said. She'd even been somewhat isolated from playmates until after her parents' death. When at age ten, she came to live with her aunt and uncle and her younger cousin, Angelica, in Galveston where she'd been born, everything changed.
"Eighteen years ago this very night," Pandora said aloud, staring out the window at the palm fronds tossing in the blustery wind. The feel of an approaching storm sent a shiver through her.
Her birth had coincided with an awesome West Indian hurricane that struck the island, battering it viciously. Her mother was visiting her in-laws when Pandora chose to arrive ahead of schedule. Lucretia Pennington Sherwood had thought she had plenty of time before she was due. But the storm, old Dr. Saenger said, brought on her labor prematurely. So Pandora had entered this life — scrawny, sickly, and perpetually shrieking — six weeks before her appointed debut.
Oddly enough, Pandora remembered every detail of the night of her birth. She even remembered the discussion between her mother and old Dr. Saenger, Jacob's father, only moments after she was born. She recalled her mother's tearful gratitude and the physician saying in a soothing, teasing tone: "I've a fine strong boy for this pretty girl of yours once they're of an age to wed." Pandora always figured that it was Dr. Saenger who put the idea in her mother's head. A good idea, she reminded herself. She was happy to comply with her parents' wishes in this instance. They hadn't often agreed on things. Her parents had always dismissed her dreams, her visions, and these memories of her birth, saying that she had only heard them speak so often of that night that it seemed an actual recollection. Still ... Pandora wondered. Remembering one's birth hardly seemed stranger than being able to see into the future. And that she did regularly.
A sharp rap at the door brought Pandora out of her reverie. "Come in," she called.
Angelica stood before her a moment later — a girl of sixteen with long silver-blonde hair and pale blue eyes large, lovely, and mesmerizing. Her cousin's fragile beauty never failed to shock Pandora. Angelica's features were finely cast, classically sculpted. And her fair coloring gave her an ethereal look. Pandora liked to think of herself as attractive. But when her younger cousin was near, she realized that her own mouth and eyes were too large, her lips too full, and her nose a fair copy of those patrician ladies in Roman sculptures. As for her coloring, she seemed to have been baptized in a brilliant rainbow. Her hair blazed as red as a sunset over the Gulf. Her green eyes were an odd, light shade that reflected the colors around her. On stormy days they were gray-green, while in bright blue weather they turned turquoise and in full sun they paled to the color of tender spring grass.
In artists' terms, Angelica mirrored some pale, cool beauty from Botticelli's brush, while Pandora saw herself more in the image of Edouard Manet's much-maligned Olympia. She even shared the nude model's faithful, dark-skinned servant and her love of cats.
Pandora smiled at these self-deprecating thoughts. Angelica looked too unhappy to be envied. The girl's hostility was a palpable force in the room. Angelica's jealousy had been clear from the moment Pandora came to live in the Sherwood home. Pandora tried everything, but she could not win her younger cousin's trust and affection.
"Angelica, you look gorgeous! That gown is simply perfect for you."
The slender blonde tilted her head back at a defiant angle and stared at Pandora, unsmiling. "Well, it isn't from the House of Worth, but I suppose it will serve well enough for the evening. After all, it's only a birthday party."
Pandora had pleaded with her aunt to order both their gowns from Paris, knowing what Angelica's reaction would be. But Tabitha had replied, "Go to all that expense for a child? My dear, your tastes are far too extravagant. Besides, you'll want to outshine Angelica at your party. She'll look dazzling no matter what she wears. But you must work at it, dear."
Pandora avoided her cousin's accusing gaze and asked, "Is Aunt Tabitha ready for me to come down?"
Angelica shoved one of Pandora's six white cats out of the slipper chair and sat down, being careful not to muss the peach lace ruffles of her skirt. "I think this whole business of a grand entrance is silly."
"I couldn't agree more. But you know your mother when she sets her mind to something," Pandora replied. Then with a twinkle in her eyes, she added, "I'm half-tempted to sneak out the back way and let you come down the stairs while I slip in through the servants' passage. Wouldn't that frost the cake?"
Angelica stared in silence at her cousin. Finally, she said, "I can't believe you really intend to marry Jacob."
Pandora turned back from the window in surprise. "Angelica, what are you saying? Everyone has known for years that Jacob and I would marry eventually. You know it's what my parents wanted for me. Why, I've never given any other man a serious thought. Of course, it won't be right away. Jacob has to establish his practice here in Galveston and I still plan to go to Europe to continue my art studies for a few months. And I'll buy my trousseau while I'm in Paris. When I return, we'll both be ready."
"And where will you live?" Angelica persisted. "In his father's old house over on Avenue O? That will be quite a comedown for you after having been raised in a mansion on Broadway. Honestly, Pandora, I don't see how you can even consider it."
Pandora laughed. "Angelica, when you care for a person enough to marry, it doesn't matter where you live. You're young yet ..."
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "Forever, For Love"
by .
Copyright © 1989 Becky Lee Weyrich.
Excerpted by permission of Diversion Publishing Corp..
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