"You!" she hissed, somehow managing to turn that one simple word into verbal poison as she mentally kicked herself for not having discerned his unmistakable accent earlier at the plantation, before she'd gone ahead and hopped into his carriage, thinking that he was...But he was speaking now.
"Ah, bonjour ma chérie," Remy LeBeau greeted with his usual easygoing swagger, tipping his hat while flashing an impish grin that could have melted an iceberg. His charm, for once, failed to work its magic on Rogue, as she spared a brief glance at the slowly darkening azure sky before pointing out dryly, "It's evening, Remy. How can you still say bonjour?"
"That's become my standard greeting to you, though, hasn't it, mon petit?" Remy replied cheerfully, the amused grin never once faltering on his face. Rogue scowled, and if looks could kill, the charming Cajun would have long since been buried.
"Let me off, Remy," she ordered, with as much control over her voice as she could gather. "Ah've had more than quite enough of your presence after that little speech you gave about honoring mah wishes and not wanting to get slapped anymore, and the last thing Ah need is for you to be tricking me like this and...and...and just what are you doing coming back like this after you swore you'd leave me?!" Remy casually pulled out a cigar, sticking it into the corner of his mouth but for the moment choosing not to light it just yet as he swept the Maximoff mansion with a lazy, relaxed look while drawling, "Don't look so surprised there, chérie, you know I couldn't leave you." He paused to light his cigar, while adding casually, "Besides, who were you actually expecting back by the forest--Pietro?" Rogue felt her face go red despite herself, as she coughed and scrabbled around for a dignified answer--or even a less than civil retort--to his remark, but, finding none, finally settled for commenting tightly, "Ah really would prefer you didn't smoke that in here." In a flash, the expensive cigar was smothered out and placed back into its case, as Remy shrugged and replied pleasantly, "And I would of course prefer to respect a lady's wishes."
The
two rode on in silence, Remy's laid-back and confident, Rogue thinking
furiously to herself as she went over the dizzying events of the last twelve
hours. Finally, she ventured weakly, "Where are you taking me?" Remy's
response was immediate, as he replied without hesitation, "Why, to the
nearest church in Paris, of course...that is, if ma chérie still
wants to."
"Paris!"
Rogue nearly fell off her seat, and would have done so had there been more
room for her to plummet. "Remy, are you crazy?! Ah can't go to France,
let alone as your hostage!" Remy gave her a lazy grin, reminding her, "Chérie,
you'll never be a hostage so long as you're with Remy. You can get off
whenever you want to." Rogue set her lips into a determined line, growling
through clenched teeth, "Fine, Ah will!" And she turned around and opened
the carriage door, preparing to jump off.
"However,"
Remy spoke up, while she was still looking down at the rapidly moving ground
and trying to decide which was the best way to leap off without inflicting
too many bruises on herself, "before you do leave, you might want
to reconsider what's waiting for you in Mississippi."
"Mah
family, Miss Ororo, the plantation, people Ah know, people who won't kidnap
me to run off to Paris...!" Rogue listed off without a moment's hesitation.
"And
of course, there's also your charming role as the county wallflower, not
to mention the fact that your debonaire Pietro Maximoff's probably well
on his way to South America by now," Remy teasingly finished for her in
that maddening tone of his that made her want to toss something--any random
projectile--at his face with its mocking smirk and amusedly flashing eyes.
Rogue's deep auburn brows slanted together angrily across her forehead
at his flippant jibe.
"Isn't
it a bit hypocritical of you to be talking like that about Pietro, when
you yourself ain't some prime example of the upstanding American citizen?"
she pointed out with testy sarcasm, alluding to his fiasco with Belladonna.
"Ow,
touché there, chérie--a well-dealt blow," Remy grinned devilishly,
making Rogue want to slap him. She wasn't just verbally sparring with him
for entertainment, like he seemed to think she was, she wanted to...she
wanted to...
"Oh,
you're impossible, Remy LeBeau!" she finally huffed angrily, refusing to
flat out admit that he had a point--both about her dismal position in society
as the wealthy wallflower, as well as the fact that Pietro Maximoff was
definitely not ready to commit himself to marriage, if not to the lovely
and talented Miss Jean, then certainly not to her petulant younger sister
either.
"Thank
you for reminding me," Remy answered playfully, flashing another smile
in her direction while Rogue merely frowned this time and turned her face
to the window.
"Like
Ah said, you really are impossible," she muttered sourly to herself.
Another
brief pause settled between the two, broken with smooth ease when Remy
spoke up to ask teasingly, "Are you going to jump out of the carriage right
now, Miss Rogue, or will you wait until we've stopped at the train station
to leave then?" Rogue finally turned back toward him, looking him evenly
in the eye and asking calmly, "Do you want me to leave?" Remy grinned,
taking out another cigar and raising it to his lips as he said, "Obviously
no--oh, excuse me, chérie, I'd forgotten how much you disapprove
of me smoking in front of you," he added at Rogue's pointed frown. As he
returned it back to its case, he murmured, "In that case, it's the church
of Paris, I see." Rogue lifted an eyebrow.
"Ah
wanted to ask you about that," she ventured. "Why a church?"
"Good
question," Remy grinned. "So, chérie, why a church indeed? What
kinds of ceremonies are performed at churches?" Rogue's eyes widened in
shock.
"Oh,
no..." she started to snap, her voice trailing off as the first unwanted
bits of reconsideration began pushing their way into her mind.
"But
of course," Remy returned her earlier arched brow with a playful one of
his own, as Rogue began to protest, "But...but you just said only hours
ago that you would leave me...that you would never bother yourself with
a formal marriage proposal again..."
"I
said I would leave this county, not you," Remy corrected her. "And I'm
keeping my word about the formal proposal business as well--I'm not asking
your father for your hand, I'm asking you directly." Rogue felt that her
jaw had probably dropped straight through the carriage floor and onto the
ground when she heard those words, her eyes widening and her heart rapidly
picking up speed.
"Remy
LeBeau," she breathed with grudging admiration, "you truly are impossible.
That you are."
"So
what is chérie's answer, then?" Remy asked after a while. "Or should
I get down on one knee and make this seem a bit more traditional?" Rogue
rolled her eyes in his direction, as the carriage continued to jolt down
its rugged country path.
"Don't
bother, you'll make a fool out of yourself, what with the limited space
in this vehicle and all," she huffed dryly, shaking her head while muttering
something under her breath to herself.
"Then
is it yes or no?" Remy asked, that familiar devilish grin returning to
his lips. Rogue didn't miss a beat with her answer.
"No,"
she replied sweetly, exaggeratedly fluttering her eyelashes at him.
Epilogue, Christmas Eve, 1853
Kitty
snuck carefully into Jean's room, glancing around behind her every other
second to make sure nobody had seen her slip upstairs. Once inside, the
pretty brunette made a beeline directly for Jean's ornately-carved white
oak desk, pulling open every drawer and leaving each one open once she'd
searched through its contents to mark the ones she'd already checked.
"Come
on," she murmured impatiently to herself, rifling through a sheaf of love
sonnets one of Jean's numerous suitors had composed specially for her.
Kitty knew that hidden in here, somewhere, was a letter written to her
older sister from none other than Rogue, who'd eloped with that charming
Cajun during all the chaos of the aborted Maximoff wedding several months
earlier. Kitty felt personally insulted that Rogue hadn't deemed her
trustworthy enough to keep such secrets as the new Mrs. LeBeau's address
and whereabouts, but with Jean's uncanny ability to sense whenever something
was wrong, her sister hadn't had many chances to go through her mail for
that precious letter...until Christmas, that is, when the beautiful redhead
was too preoccupied with hosting the evening party and entertaining the
many guests to spare even a brief second to her intuition.
Kitty
continued to stubbornly search through the desk, nearly banging her head
on one of the open drawers in her overzealousness and letting out a muffled
cry at the sudden flash of pain. Her hands closed around an envelope, and,
crying a triumphant, "Ah hah!" she quickly pulled it out, only to frown
in disappointment when the German address that stared back at her gave
no indication of belonging to Rogue. Kitty was about to put it back, when
she noticed something familiar about it, and, quickly drawing the envelope
closer to her, examined the handwriting and then the letter folded neatly
inside, before crying to herself in recognition, "Pietro?! Jean got a letter
from Pietro...and she never even told me about it? Ugh, what is
it with all these people thinking I'm not mature enough to handle their
big secrets?" Kitty was about to stomp off, offended and feeling rather
defeated about her unsuccessful search, when, as she was putting Pietro's
letter back after sneaking a quick peek at the first page and noting what
actually sounded like sincere apologies and a brief recount of how his
studies were going in Germany, her fingers happened to brush against one
last letter, and she pulled it out with eager curiosity. The envelope itself
had been long discarded--to protect the address of its writer, perhaps?--and
as Kitty unfolded the sheets of paper and skimmed across the words, an
instant light of recognition flashed across her eyes as she found herself
staring at the familiar, precise handwriting.
"It's
Rogue!" she whispered, awestruck, to herself. "It's the letter from Rogue!"
Quickly, darting a single guilty glance around as if she were acknowledging
that what she was about to do was wrong, Kitty scurried out of Jean's room
and locked herself into her own, where she might read the letter in peace,
without the constant worry of being discovered.
Dear Jean,
I'm sorry it's taken me this long to write...I guess I still need some
time to adjust to being Mrs. Remy LeBeau. Life here in Paris, with Remy,
is amazing, but I often find myself still missing home, missing the simple
pleasures of plantation life, and, most important of all, missing you.
My family. I look forward to the day when Remy and I can return to America
instead of living the rest of my life here in France in what Remy's often
teased me about as being "in exile," but I can honestly say that I have
no regrets over what I've decided. Remy and I are truly happy together
here, so please don't worry about me, and if you could, find some way to
reassure Papa, Kitty, and Miss Ororo of that without quite giving away
the fact that I've written to you. This is probably the only letter I'm
going to write in quite a while, because I simply cannot risk having it
slip the location of our new home and have Papa send the entire U.S. police
force up here to look for us. I know I can trust you to keep our secret,
but I'm not ashamed of what I've done, and if my religion sees it fit to
condemn me for marrying a divorced man, then I'm ready for their punishment.
I'm sorry that I couldn't be there for you after your wedding that wasn't,
but if you're willing to listen to a younger sister who's discovered that
love truly does work in strange and magnificent ways, then you'll realize
that Pietro just isn't right for you--at least, not right now--and that
someday, you'll find your prince, the same way I did.
Affectionately,
Your sister, Rogue
Kitty's eyes barely managed to scan over the last few words when Jean's
voice, gentle but somewhat tired from her hosting duties, floated up the
stairway to call out to her youngest sister, "Kitty? Are you upstairs?"
The startled brunette nearly jumped off her bed, where she'd been lounging
reading Rogue's letter, upon hearing her sister's voice, as she hastily
tried to arrange her features into their most innocent expression while
calling out in what she hoped was a smooth, nonchalant voice, "Yes, Jean.
I'll come down right away, I didn't mean to walk out on you like that."
"That's
all right." Soft, graceful footsteps signaled the imminent arrival of Jean
on the second floor, and Kitty nearly tripped over the frothy, voluminous
skirts of her new flowered seafoam-colored taffeta dress as she unlocked
her door and scurried back to Jean's room, sticking the letter underneath
the pile of correspondence in her sister's white oak desk.
Kitty
was hurriedly exiting through the bedroom doors when Jean's elegant form
appeared by the winding spiral stairway, and an expression of bewilderment
settled across the beautiful redhead's features simultaneous with her own
guilty look.
"Kitty?
What were you doing in my room?" Jean asked quietly, and the younger girl
felt a quick wave of relief as she observed that her sister's voice carried
no hint of suspicion or distress--at least, not yet.
"I,
um, was...I was...looking for a shawl...borrowing a book...checking to
see if the windows were closed...um, I was..." Never having been the most
convincing liar, Kitty finally decided to give up and just blurt out the
truth. "All right, I'll admit it! I was looking for Rogue's letter." Jean
leaned back, a startled look washing over her face while dramatic dark
lashes fluttered above viridian eyes in a single blink, and as Kitty nervously
watched her oldest sister's reaction, she ventured timidly, "You're not
going to tell Papa or Miss Ororo...are you?" Jean sighed, before crossing
the hallway and entering her room to seat herself daintily on her white
feather bed.
"No,
I suppose not--I can't, really, because if knowledge of Rogue's letter
reaches them, they'll certainly send a search party to bring her back,
and that will violate her wishes to stay married to Mr. LeBeau in peace,"
she finally decided. Kitty felt a big smile of relief spring up on her
face, as she raised her hand to her chest and vowed sincerely, "And you
can depend on me to help you keep that secret, Jean--honestly, I don't
see why Rogue and you were so concerned that I shouldn't find out, I'm
more trustworthy than that, you know!" Jean smiled, tilting her head to
glance at the baby of the family.
"I
would hope that you are," she teased lightly, as Kitty huffed and pretended
to be insulted.
"Well,
I am," she said emphatically. "And I'm also very glad for Rogue
that she's so happy being married to Mr. LeBeau, even if the rest of the
county's torn her reputation to shreds."
"That's
very generous of you," Jean commented, as she got up and gathered her elegant
hoop skirts to resume her duties downstairs at the party.
"Thank
you," Kitty curtseyed briefly, her cornflower-blue eyes lighting up as
a new idea came to her and she thought out loud, "I hope Rogue will be
generous as well, now that I've found out she's living in France--since
I do want to look my best when Kurt and his family return from their
trip to Germany next month, do you think she might send me the prettiest
and most fashionable rose-pink Parisian silk dress she can find? I'll pay
her for it, of course!"
"Kitty!"
Jean laughed, as the two sisters linked arms and headed downstairs together.
The
End
