Read Glorious Angel for Free Online

don’t believe in a divided nation. If states are allowed to secede and form new nations, what is to stop all the states from doing so? We would end up another Europe. No, my loyalty is with the North and the Union.”
    “But your brother joined the Confederacy,” Angela reminded him.
    “Zachary is a hypocrite,” Bradford replied, his voice suddenly cold. “He joined the Confederacy for God only knows what reason, but it has nothing to do with loyalty.”

    “How long have you been back? I mean—”
    Bradford chuckled. “You’re determined to know why I’m here, aren’t you?” he said, his tone more congenial. “Well, it’s no big military secret. I came in on one of the blockade runners today, all aboveboard, mind you. At present, I am no longer in the army. I was wounded during the Seven Days’ Battle in Virginia and discharged because of it.”
    “But you’re all right now?” she asked anxiously.
    “Yes. I took a chest wound and it was assumed I wouldn’t recover. But as you can see, I made fools of those army doctors.”
    Angela giggled. “I’m glad to hear it.”
    “But,” he added as an afterthought, “I will be joining up again, just as soon as my old commander is replaced. We never saw eye to eye. In fact, he caused me more frustration than the enemy. In the meantime, you could say I’m on furlough. Hell, I’m telling you more than I should. You have a way of drawing me out, Angel.”
    She was in love with Bradford Maitland all over again. This was the happiest day of her life.
    “I’ve talked enough about myself,” Bradford said now. “What about your family?”
    “My family? It’s just me and my pa.”
    “Who is?”
    “William Sherrington.”
    Angela couldn’t see the frown that crossedBradford’s brow. “Then your mother was Charissa Stewart?”
    “That was her name before she married my pa,” Angela answered with surprise. “But how’d you know that?”
    “So you are Charissa Stewart’s daughter,” he remarked oldly, ignoring her question.
    “Did you know my mother?”
    “No, fortunately I never met the—woman,” Bradford returned and then fell silent.
    Angela stared at his tall frame silhouetted in the dark beside her. What did he mean, “fortunately”? Had she really heard anger in his tone? No, surely it was her imagination.
    Angela closed her eyes, swaying with the bounce of the carriage, and reflected on the first time she ever set eyes on Bradford Maitland. It was three years ago. She was just eleven, and Bradford was twenty then, home from school for the summer. She had gone to the city with her father to sell the corn crop, but she got tired of waiting around the marketplace and decided to go on home. It had rained heavily the night before, and as she ran along the river road, she made a game of dodging mud puddles.
    And then he charged by on a swift black stallion, on the way to the city. He looked like some avenging angel, dressed all in white, riding tall on that giant black beast. When he passed her, his horse splashed red mud all over the front of heryellow dress. Bradford pulled up his horse and trotted back to her. He tossed her a gold coin, apologized, and told her to buy a new dress, then galloped away.
    From the moment she stared up into his handsome face, she was in love. She told herself many times that it was silly to think she was in love, for she knew nothing about that. Maybe she just worshiped him. But whatever it was, it was easier to call it love.
    She still had that gold coin. She had worked a small hole in it and begged her father to buy her a long chain so she could wear it as a necklace. It was around her neck now, as it had been for three years, resting between the two small hills of her breasts. She had continued to wear it even after she decided she hated Bradford Maitland for joining the Union. But she didn’t hate him anymore. She could never hate him again.
    They reached her home all too soon. After she watched Bradford drive