by Nerys Leigh
“You’ve known her for twenty-six years,” Will pointed out.
“I’d love to stay,” Daisy replied. “Thank you for your kind invitation.”
Will muttered something under his breath that she didn’t catch.
Mr. Raine held out his hand, giving her a firm handshake when she took it. “Daisy, all joking aside, I would be more than happy to have you as a daughter-in-law, and Nicky as a grandson.” He leaned forward and lowered his voice so only she could hear. “Don’t worry, he’ll come around. He likes you very much.”
She hoped he was right. “Thank you, Mr. Raine. I appreciate that.”
Will frowned at his father. “What did you just say to her?” When Mr. Raine simply smiled and walked back outside, he looked at his mother. “Ma, what did he say?”
Abigail shrugged. “I have no idea.”
“May I help you with lunch?” Daisy said, fighting a grin.
Abigail glanced at her son. “Thank you, but there’s hardly anything more to do now. It just has to cook for another twenty minutes or so. How about you and Will go for a walk?”
Daisy looked at Will. “Would you do me the honor of allowing me to accompany you for a stroll before dinner?”
Huffing out a sigh, he rose from the chair. “Oh, stop it.”
They walked outside and made their way around the house.
“Could I put Indiana in with Ginger?” Daisy asked as they approached her horse.
“Sure.”
Will was quiet as he took the saddle from Indiana’s back while Daisy removed her bridle. When she was in the field with Ginger and the Raine’s two horses, Daisy and Will wandered along the fence, away from the house.
The strongest urge to slip her arm around his gripped her. Now they were officially courting, more or less, she felt inexplicably different around him. Which was ridiculous, as it had been all of ten minutes, and he hadn’t even agreed to it.
She kept her arms to herself. “I know you’re annoyed at me.”
He didn’t look at her. “I’m not annoyed at you.” He paused. “All right, I am annoyed at you. Going to my parents without telling me first was a sneaky thing to do. Now they’re all hopeful that I’ll actually become a respectable family man.”
“I didn’t intend to ask them to court you when I came here. I was just going to ask your mother’s advice on how to change your mind about marrying me. But then I saw Ginger and… I don’t know. The idea just came to me.”
He pushed his hands into his pockets. “I explained last night why we can’t ever get married.”
“No, you explained that you’re convinced you wouldn’t make a good husband or father. I happen to know that you’re wrong. And by the way, knowing when you’re wrong is the first step to being a good husband. You should learn that now.”
He looked away, but she didn’t miss his smile.
They came to a halt in the shade of a large oak and she took his hand, turning him to face her. “I’m sorry I sprang this on you, but you’d never have agreed if I’d asked you first.”
“No, I wouldn’t have.” He sighed. “Why me, Daisy? You could have any one of the unattached men in town, or outside of town, and you wouldn’t have to pretend to court them. They’d jump at the chance. Why don’t you choose someone else?”
“Because I don’t want anyone else, I want you. And I know you want me too. You said so.” They began walking again, and this time she did slip her arm around his. “And I’m not pretending to court you. I’m courting you for real. You can expect some serious courting to happen.”
“Women don’t court men.”
She smiled. “They do now.”
Chapter 4
Daisy followed Nicky into the house and closed the door.
“Take your jacket off first,” she said as he headed for the living room.
He trudged back to her, holding his arms up like he used to when he was smaller. It was a sure sign he was tired. He usually took his own jacket off now, although it didn’t always make it to the hook on the wall by the door.
She pulled off his jacket and hung it up as he plodded towards the living room again, yawning. He was always tired after visiting Gareth’s parents. Mr. Monroe was a furniture maker and Nicky loved helping him in his workshop. Daisy was pretty sure he was a hindrance more than a help, but Mr. Monroe seemed to enjoy having him there, and Mrs. Monroe always had cookies or cake. They were wonderful grandparents. Daisy suspected spending time with Nicky helped ease the pain of losing their son, just as it had for her losing her husband.
She wondered how they would feel about her marrying again. Not that she would ever keep Nicky from them, but she couldn’t help wondering if it would affect their relationship with her. She hoped not. She adored them both, and they’d been extremely supportive of her. When Will finally saw sense, she’d have to tell them.
She shrugged off her jacket and hung it beside Nicky’s. When she walked into the living room, he was sitting on the settee, his head resting against the cushion behind him. He opened his eyes and yawned as she sat beside him.
“Looks like you could do with a nap,” she said, stroking her hand over his dark hair.
“I’m too old for a nap,” he replied, the sentence ending on another yawn.
“No one’s too old for a nap. Grownups take naps too, if they have the time.”
His eyes drifted closed again. “You don’t take naps.”
“That’s because I don’t have the time.”
There were a few seconds of silence and Daisy thought he’d fallen asleep.
And then… “Does Will take naps?”
“I don’t know. Maybe you can ask him when you see him next.”
“Do Grandpa and Grandma Moran take naps?”
Had she ever seen her parents take a nap? “I think so.”
“Do Grandpa and Grandma Monroe take naps?”
“I don’t know.”
He opened his eyes, now more awake. “Does…”
A knock on the door saved her from a conversation that could have lasted a very long time. Leaving her son hopefully drifting towards sleep again, she rose to answer it.
“Hi, I heard you had an interesting conversation with Mrs. Vernon yesterday,” Edith said the moment Daisy opened the door. “I brought cake for us to discuss it over.” She lifted a basket looped over her arm.
“I want cake,” the little boy holding her other hand stated, looking up at his mother.
“I know. You can have some too.”
Daisy stifled her sigh. Of course the supposedly private conversation in the general store about Will would be around the town by now. It had, after all, been almost twenty-four hours since it had taken place.
“Come on in.” She smiled down at Paul. “Nicky’s in the living room. Go wake him up and the two of you can play in his room.”
He grinned and ran off. Edith was one of Daisy’s closest friends, and Nicky and Paul had grown up together, being only eight months apart in age.
A few seconds later she heard “Ma brought cake” drift through the open living room door.
The two boys appeared a moment later and followed their mothers into the kitchen.
Daisy cut two small portions of Edith’s ginger cake, placed them into two bowls, and handed the boys one each. “You can take them upstairs, but eat them at Nicky’s table. And try not to drop any crumbs on the floor.” She knew it was a futile instruction, but she had hopes that one day it would work.
“Thank you, Mrs. Monroe,” Paul said, holding his bowl carefully in both hands. At least he would probably get most of the cake into his mouth. He loved his food.
“Thanks, Ma,” Nicky echoed, leading the way from the kitchen.
“So,” Edith said, sitting at the table once their sons were gone, “I heard you put Mrs. Vernon in her place.”
Daisy cut two slices of cake for them and sat opposite her. “You should pay less attention to gossip.”
“I don’t contribute to it, but so
metimes it’s impossible to not hear it. And when it involves my friend, I can’t help but pay attention, especially when she has completely failed to tell me anything herself.” She raised her eyebrows pointedly and took a bite of cake.
Daisy gave her a reproving look and took a bite of her own. Not that she minded Edith knowing about her and Will. There was a time when she thought the two of them would be sisters-in-law, Adam being Edith’s younger brother.
“So what happened?” Edith said.
“You know Mrs. Vernon. She all but accused me of having an inappropriate relationship with Will. I simply informed her that she was wrong and she shouldn’t spread unfounded rumors.”
“Ha! I wish I’d been there to see that. How did she react?”
“I don’t know. I left the store.” Daisy paused. She didn’t care what people thought of her, but maybe she should know. There was no avoiding Mrs. Vernon in Green Hill Creek, no matter who you were. “What have you heard?”
“Just that Mrs. Vernon was a bit shocked. Folks don’t usually disagree with her, you know that.”
“Well, maybe it’s time that changed. I could be a pioneer.”
“Is a pioneer still a pioneer if no one follows in their footsteps?”
Daisy snorted a laugh. “I can’t help it if I’m the most courageous person in town.”
She considered what to tell her friend while they finished their slices of cake. “I do have some news,” she finally said. Edith would hear about it soon anyway, so it may as well be from her.
“Oh?”
Daisy nudged a cake crumb across her plate with her fingertip. “This morning, I asked Mr. and Mrs. Raine for their permission to court Will.”
There were a few seconds of silence before Edith spoke. “Could you repeat that? I don’t think I heard you correctly.”
“Yes, you did.”
There were another few seconds of silence while Edith stared at her, her face a picture of bewilderment. “You asked their permission for you to court Will?”
“Yes.”
“As in, court him?”
“Yes.”
“As in, entice him to marry you?”
“Yes.”
“Court? As in, take him flowers and gifts and to dinner and such? Courting?”
“I haven’t got so far as planning what I’m actually going to do, but yes.”
“Hmm.” Edith stared at the tabletop for a good ten seconds before speaking again. “Well, that’s… unusual. But given that it’s you, not unexpected.”
“I don’t know if I should be insulted or not.”
“Nor do I. Does Will know?”
“He was there.” Daisy briefly related what happened at the Raines’ house. By the time she was finished, Edith’s hand was clamped over her mouth to contain her laughter.
“I have to admit, a woman courting a man is a new idea for me,” she said, once she’d stopped giggling. “But I like it. And it’s about time you and Will married. You two belong together.”
Daisy sighed. “It’s going to take some doing. Will is convinced he can’t be a husband and father. He doesn’t think we belong together.”
“Oh yes he does. We just need to get him to realize it.”
“We?”
Edith grinned. “What are friends for? Get some paper and a pencil. We need to come up with some ideas. By the time we’re finished, he’ll be begging to marry you.”
Chapter 5
Will hung the shovel onto its hook on the barn wall and dusted his hands off against each other, turning to where Daniel was just finishing off Peapod’s milking. Will liked the days when it wasn’t his turn.
Dan rose from the stool and leaned down to pick up the bucket of fresh milk. Without pausing in her eating, Pea jerked sideways, shoving Daniel’s shoulder and knocking him off-balance. He stumbled and fell onto his backside.
Where she lay by the door, Bess raised her head, regarded her master sprawled on the floor for a moment, then lowered it again.
Will chuckled. “Gotta be quicker than that. Pea hasn’t knocked me over in weeks.”
Dan glared at him as he pushed to his feet. “Do you want to do this?”
“Pretty sure you know the answer to that question.”
“Then stop gloating or I’ll make you.”
Will gave him a grin. “Oh yeah? And how are you going to do that, Shorty?”
He was, in actual fact, only an inch taller than his older brother, but it was an extremely important inch.
Daniel edged carefully up to Pea to retrieve the bucket of milk. “I’ve always been able to take you in a fair fight. That’s never going to change.”
Will choked out an incredulous laugh. “You are clearly losing your memory in your old age.”
Dan placed the bucket onto the old table they kept by the door and returned to Pea. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of. I will simply always be physically superior to you. I don’t think any less of you for it.”
Will drew himself up to his full, one-inch-taller height, and pointed at him. “Now them there’s fightin’ words, mister.”
Dan’s lips twitched. “Care to do something about it?”
They stared at each other. It was a long time since they’d had a good wrestling match. Will had probably still been in his teens. He was twenty-four now, and Daniel twenty-eight.
They were too old for wrestling matches.
It would be ridiculous.
Will grinned. “You’re on.”
“First one to pin the other for ten seconds wins, like always?”
“Agreed.”
“And what will the winner get? Other than the knowledge that they’ve won.”
Will looked at their cow. “The loser milks Pea every day for two weeks?”
Dan nodded. “I could use two weeks’ break from her.”
“That’s a pity, since I’ll be the one getting the break. Are we doing it right here?”
“Better get Pea back into the field first,” Dan said, untying her halter rope from the loop on the wall. “We wouldn’t want to accidentally get too near her.”
Will grimaced at the thought. “No.”
Dan led Peapod out into the yard. Or more accurately, she led him.
Bess at his side, Will walked ahead to open the gate into the field. “I don’t want to do it in the yard or the barn. This shirt’s fresh on today.”
Dan walked Pea into the field. “We could do it on the porch.”
“How clean is the porch? And is there room?”
Dan removed Pea’s halter and Will closed the gate as she wandered off to graze. They both turned to look at the porch that ran across the back of the house. Sara’s garden was coming into bloom. Even though it was only a year since she started digging the flowerbeds below the porch and seeding the grass in front, the whole back of the house had been transformed. It was a far cry from the bare earth that was there before she arrived.
“We could move some furniture in the living room,” Dan suggested.
“I guess so.”
They slowly turned to look at each other, and then they burst into laughter.
“We used to just wrestle whenever and wherever we were,” Will said. “What happened to us?”
“I think we grew up,” Dan replied. “Became responsible adults.”
Will affected disgust. “Speak for yourself.”
“I don’t know, seems like you’re becoming pretty responsible yourself, what with Daisy and Nicky.”
Will glanced away. He hadn’t told Dan or Sara about what happened with Daisy at his parents’ house the day before. Of course, they’d find out eventually, but it wasn’t going to be from him.
“Daisy and I are just friends. Why won’t anyone believe that?”
“Maybe because you spend most of your free time with her. And sit with her in church. And…”
“That’s because we’re friends! Friends spend time together. Nothing is going on between us.” They most definitely weren’t courting.
>
Dan regarded him with his big brother expression, the one he’d been perfecting since Will was two. “I know you’re just friends, but I also know you like her, and I don’t mean as a friend.”
Will pushed his hands into his pockets and looked at the house. This was not a conversation he wanted to be having, especially not with his brother. “You sound like Sara.”
“That’s not a bad thing. She’s smarter than both of us.”
That was true enough.
“I’m just saying,” Dan went on, “maybe you should think about it.”
The back door opened and Sara stepped out with a broom in her hand. Bess trotted over to her, wagging her tail as Sara paused briefly to ruffle her fur.
Dan smiled as he watched his pregnant wife sweep the porch. “There’s a lot to be said for responsibility.”
“Yeah.” For Dan, at least.
The truth was, Daniel had always been responsible, and it was no surprise that he’d bought a farm, made it a success, and was happily married and about to become a father.
Will was a different person altogether.
His thoughts went to Daisy, although they’d barely strayed far from her since the previous day. He hoped she’d given up on the ridiculous idea of courting him. He wasn’t ready for responsibility. He probably wouldn’t ever be.
Besides which, women didn’t court men.
“So are we going to wrestle?” he said, mostly to change the subject.
“Maybe later. We have work to do.”
“Scared I’ll beat you and you’ll end up milking Pea for two weeks?”
“Not even a little bit. Go get Ginger and River hitched to the wagon.”
Smiling, Will headed in the direction of the barn.
He’d just finished hitching the horses when someone rode around the side of the house. His gut dropped at the sight of Daisy carrying a bunch of yellow flowers, the kind a man might bring a woman, if he was courting her.
She hadn’t… had she?
Oh no. Please, no.
She smiled when she saw him. “Good morning, Will.”
Maybe there was a chance he could head her off before Dan and Sara saw her. He hurried forward as she dismounted. “Daisy…”
