Southern Seduction by Brenda Jernigan

her a message that she wasn’t needed. And the truth was . . . she wasn’t needed.
    Brooke really didn’t understand Mr. Dubois’s problem, but both men appeared very concerned about this person who they called the sugarmaker. Nonetheless, she wasn’t going to stand outside like a child waiting for her parent to return. She’d never learn anything that way.
    She tied Gray Mist under a tree so the horse could munch on the green grass, then she followed them over to the sugarhouse.
    The sugarhouse, which was nothing more than a simple shed, seemed to be a beehive of activity. Brooke was surprised at the various apparatus used for crushing the cane. She paused and watched, knowing she needed a firm understanding of how her plantation operated. She now realized that it would take her a long time before she could ever attempt to run something the size of Moss Grove. Another reason that marrying Travis sounded better than it first did.
    As soon as she stepped into the open end of the shed, the sweet, pungent air from inside felt like a hot breath in her face. She noticed that everyone working under the shed wore their shirtsleeves rolled up or no shirts at all. And she could understand why. Here she was dressed in long sleeves and full skirts, and her clothing was already damp and clinging to her.
    Over in a corner she saw the piles of stalks that had been brought up from the field. A few of the women were hand-feeding the stalks one at a time into a set of rollers, one on top of the other, designed to crush and force the juice from the cane -- at least, she assumed so since there was a collecting pot underneath. The rollers were turned by mules who plodded around and around in an endless circle.
    As she continued her exploration, Brooke saw three huge boiling pots. The heat from the fires beneath each kettle threw off a tremendous heat. She didn’t know how any of workers stayed in here. Three men, one behind each pot, stirred continuously. They glanced up at her for only a moment, then turned back to the task at hand. She wasn’t sure what they were doing, but it was obviously important. It was apparent that she would have to wait until Travis had time to explain the process because nobody seemed to have time to speak to her, much less explain what they were doing.
    A big black man in a plaid shirt was dragging a bundle of crushed can over to the pots. The two men tossed the cane scraps onto the flames. The fires belched great puffs of black smoke up the chimneys, producing heat so intense the air became hazy.
    Brooke felt like she was choking. He air stung her nose and her eyes began to water. Her eyes were watering so bad that she didn’t see the sparks shoot out from the fire toward her.
    “ Watch out!” someone shouted.
    Brooke heard the warning but didn’t know what or whom they were shouting at. She turned to see why everyone was waving at her, but she couldn’t see anything.
    The next thing Brooke knew someone had clamped an arm around her waist and hauled her out of the sugarhouse.
    Once outside, she was sat on her feet where she immediately began coughing. She jerked her handkerchief out of her sleeve to wipe her eyes. It took several gulps of clean air before her coughing subsided and she could see again. What had just happened in there?
    Travis brushed at her skirts as he swore. “You little fool,” she heard him hiss from behind her.
    “What are you doing?” Brooke retorted, jerking at her skirt. “I am not a rug.” She felt much like a quilt that someone was trying to beat the dirt out of.
    “Trying to keep you from setting your fool self on fire,” he angrily informed her. “I don’t have time to hold your hand.”
    “I never ask you to!” she spat and then looked down, gaping at the smoke coming from the hem of her skirt. “Oh, no.” She had no idea she’d gotten so close to the fire.
    “You must be careful around the boiling pots,” Jeremy cautioned. “As you can see, they can be very