Mrs. Bender gave a quick nod at their appreciation. “Danki. Eat hearty—there’s plenty more,” she said, moving back to the stove.
Luke cleared his throat and looked back to Mr. Bender as Rose arched a delicate dark brow in expectation of his response. He knew that look; it was a blatant challenge. He’d seen it enough when she’d dared him to climb higher in the old oak or to ford a rushing stream. He gave her an enigmatic smile.
“I’m feeling much better today, sir. And, of course, it really wasn’t Rose’s fault.” He took a sip of his coffee as he let his words sink in and watched Rose turn to him across the table with a surprised glare.
Ben looked up from his cup. “Not Rosie’s fault, you say? What exactly did happen?”
Luke shook his head. “Ach, I’m not one for telling tales on my future bride.”
James laughed. “Ya, but she’s still our sister and narrisch in her ways. Go ahead and tell.”
“Ya, Luke,” Rose murmured through tight lips. “Do tell, but don’t leave out the bit about your behavior. I mean, just because we’re to be married doesn’t mean that we should . . . well . . .” She broke off helplessly, and Luke almost choked on a laugh as the attention of the whole table now turned with quiet interest in his direction. His Rose could give as gut as she got.
Mr. Bender fixed him with a wary eye. “Perhaps we should have the whole story then.”
“Ach, by all means,” Luke returned easily. “But I’ll let Rose begin.”
The attention of the table swung back like a pendulum to Rose as she gave Luke a saccharine-sweet smile. “Certainly, Daed. We were in the woods together, Luke and I, near the old shack. You remember that tumbledown place about a half mile back on the Lantz property? Well, the sun was shining and the day was young, and Luke thought that the place might actually be a nice place to . . .” She paused. “Won’t you go on, Luke?”
“Ya, go on,” Mr. Bender suggested, tapping his empty kaffee cup against the wood of the table.
Luke shrugged and took another bite of his pancakes. “I thought it might be a fair spot to build a house for Rose and me—you know, far enough away from everyone for a newly married couple, kind of a pretty spot. I suppose it was foolishness, but I wanted to surprise her with it.”
“But I thought you were going to live with—” Mark broke off quickly when Luke gave him a quelling glare.
Then he smiled at the table at large. “You’ll no doubt think it was too forward of me to want to lead Rose into the place, to imagine the fire in the old fireplace, the placing of furniture, and where best to carve her windows for light.”
Mr. Bender cleared his throat and gave a gusty laugh. “I think that’s just fine, sohn. Just fine.”
Aenti Tabby smiled, her eyes misting, and Rose’s brothers were momentarily silent. Then James harrumphed in disappointment at the tale. “Well, what wasn’t Rose’s fault then?”
Luke shook his head with regret. “Ach, she wanted me to test the roof.”
The men groaned as one and turned to stare at Rose with accusation. “The roof, Rosie?” her father asked in disbelief. “How could you do that to a man?”
Luke watched Rose open and close her mouth like a beautiful, gasping fish; then she flung her napkin down on the table and ran from the room and out the back kitchen door.
“She left her cloak,” Luke observed, rising to wrangle with his crutches. “I’ll take it to her.”
He swung himself from the room, listening to the murmured comments behind praising his romanticism and foresight, and grimaced. He had the distinct feeling that he’d won the battle but was about to lose the proverbial war.
Chapter Eighteen
ROSE TOLD HERSELF THAT IT WAS FOOLISHNESS TO CRY so, simply because Luke had bested her in an argument. Then she admitted to herself that she was really crying over the drawing in her pocket and the terrible lie he’d told when he’d really been fixing that cabin for another woman.
She nestled more deeply between the hay bales of the barn, her sobs dissolving into hiccups, as she tried to warm herself.
“This might help.” Luke’s voice echoed from above her, and her cloak fell about her shoulders.
She scrambled into the garment and rose, not wanting to feel trapped by the hay and Luke’s presence. “Go away. You’ve had your bit of fun.”
He sighed. “Rose. I’m sorry.”
“Ach, yes you are, Luke Lantz—as sorry a man as I’ve ever seen.” She pushed past him, almost knocking him off balance as she angrily swung a milk bucket down from a hook on the wall. The barn cats begin to entwine about her as she plunked down on a milking stool near Bubbles, the milch cow.
“Look, I should have been more honest with you yesterday, and I shouldn’t have let you take the worst of that in there. Please forgive me, and listen.” His voice was the husky, cajoling voice of the stranger, and she shook her head furiously as she concentrated on the rhythm of milking, trying to ease away her hurt.
“Rose, come on, please.” He bent near her.
She took deep breaths as she filled the cats’ pans, then turned to look up at him from the stool. “Fine. Say whatever you like, but I already know the truth. Or . . . at least one person of it.”
He straightened. “What do you mean?”
“Who’s Ally?” she asked, staring him straight in the eye.
She watched him blink in surprise. “How do you—”
“Just answer me, Luke. Who is she?”
“A little girl.”
“Is she—yours?”
He shook his head in obvious disbelief. “You’d think that?”
Rose lifted her chin stubbornly. “I went back to the shack last night. I found this.” She reached into the pocket of her apron and withdrew the coloring sheet. She handed it up to him without a word.
She watched him balance on his crutches to open the page; then he lifted his head to stare at her, anguish and anger lighting his blue eyes.
“I was wrong,” he said slowly. “I thought I was the one wearing the mask, but it’s you. You, who would marry me, think that I’d leave a child unclaimed, hidden, who was my own? How little you must truly believe in me.”
“Well, what am I supposed to believe, Luke?” she cried. “How does all of this look? You just told me yesterday that you couldn’t tell the secret, that it belonged to another woman—an Englisch woman! Do you know how much that hurt?” Rose could feel the blood pounding in her ears and knew that she was raising her voice.
He drew a deep breath. “All right. You’re right. I can see how this must look to you.”
She rose and came to stand in front of him, her eyes brimming with unshed tears, her words softer now. “Can you, Luke? Can you understand? I don’t think badly of you. I just wanted to know for sure. I—I didn’t know if I could accept it, if you’d hidden her from me all this time.”
“I didn’t hide her from you,” he whispered low. “Not intentionally.”
Rose reached out to touch the coloring page. “Why is she so sad . . . this Ally? Her clouds are crying.”
He stared down at the paper. “That’s the part that’s not mine, Rose. It’s not mine to tell, but I need you to trust me. To help me, even. To help Ally and her family.”
“Her family? They’re Englisch?”
Luke nodded and met her eyes. “Ya.”
“And they’re important to you?” Rose reached her purple fingertips to stroke his hand where it held the paper.
“They were . . . important to my mamm.”
“Your mamm?”
He nodded, his mouth set in a grim line.
She could have pressed him further, fought him for answers, but thoughts of what the Lord expected as far as honor and fairness in an individual swirled through her mind. She understood valor, as part of her people, to be that part of self that yields instead of fights.
Rose swallowed. “Then they’ll become important to me too. I’ll help you.” She stretched on tiptoe and sealed her words with
a kiss.
Chapter Nineteen
THE WEATHER CONTINUED TO TRACK IN WITH THE MERCURIAL moods of Pennsylvania autumn. Cold to frost one day, blazing sun the next. The trees were beginning to lose their foliage now, and the leaves underfoot were a sure sign that Rose had let too many days slip past before visiting Priscilla. She knew it for sure as she looked across the table into her friend’s drawn face.
“Has it been that bad?” Rose asked, wishing she’d visited sooner.
Priscilla nodded. “I just don’t understand what all of this means. I’ve tried to reason it out, and it almost seems like—well, like maybe all of these things going wrong are a sign that I’m not on the right path.”
Rose caught her friend’s hand in her own. “Priscilla, you know you love Chester.”
But Priscilla was staring down in horror. “Your hand is purple.”
“I know. Beet juice. Just think, though, if it doesn’t wear off soon, it’ll look really nice with the blue dress for your wedding.”
“That’s not funny.”
“Sorry.” Rose swallowed her smile.
“Well, tell me about you and Luke. How are your plans?”
Rose stifled a sigh. She’d promised to carry out hers and Luke’s “plans” later on that evening, but they weren’t exactly wedding related. Or maybe that wasn’t completely true, she considered. She certainly was being a helpmate to Luke even if no blessing of the bishop had yet been said between them. But even so, she couldn’t reveal any of this to Priscilla, who was looking at her expectantly.
“Fine,” Rose murmured at last. “Plans are coming along just fine.”
In truth, she knew that her mamm and aenti were the ones who were beginning to prepare for her December wedding, while she seemed to be off in a world of her own with Luke. She really needed to work on her dress . . .
“Well, your attendant’s dress is nearly finished,” Priscilla said with relief in her voice. “If you could come over before the wedding to try it on, that would be gut.”
“I’ll be here,” Rose promised. She got up from the Kings’ kitchen table, then bent to hug her friend. “Don’t worry so much. Everything will work out perfectly. You’ll see.”
Priscilla nodded. “Danki, Rose.”
Rose left the Kings’ house feeling glad to escape the tension that radiated from her friend. She hoped her own wedding wouldn’t be as complicated . . . then laughed aloud at the irony of her thought.
“I STILL FEEL NERVOUS LETTING YOU GO ALONE,” LUKE commented, frowning as he watched Rose put things into her basket in the Lantzes’ barn.
“It’ll be light for another two hours,” she pointed out as she looked toward the horizon.
Luke rubbed his chin. “Maybe I should tell Mark . . . let him go with you.”
“Mark?” Rose looked up with a smile. “Mark can’t be still with a joke in church, let alone keep a secret. Not that I know all of the truth myself, really . . .”
Luke ignored her comment. He’d said all he could say. Now he tried to test his weight on his ankle and was forced to catch hold of a support beam to stop from falling. She calmly handed him his dropped crutch.
“Luke, I can be up to that stand of pine trees and back before anyone will ever know I’m gone. Besides—” She grinned at him, her eyes sparkling. “I like being the Rob in the Hood.”
“That may be true enough, I’ve no doubt . . . but you’re not ‘in the hood.’ Won’t you reconsider dressing in Englisch clothes, or at least like a boy?”
“Nee,” she answered, and he sighed in defeat.
They’d gone over this a dozen times. She wouldn’t pretend to be something she wasn’t when she went to see the Englisch woman and her children. And what could he say? He hadn’t told her any more than simply that—an Englisch woman and her children. But she was willing to help blindly, without knowing, just trusting him. He couldn’t ask for anything more.
“Well”—he balanced to reach one hand and place a thumb against her fair cheek—“no one would take you for a boy, no matter your disguise.”
“Really?” She blinked coy lashes up at him, and he had to smile.
“Really.”
“And why is that?” She leaned against his chest lightly and looped her basket over her arm so that she could encircle his neck with gentle arms.
He couldn’t help the catch in his breath at her touch and bent his mouth close to hers. “Ach, perhaps it could be the tip of your nose, or the shell of your ears . . . or the taste of your lips.” He kissed her lingeringly until she pulled away.
“Ach, but I’ve learned my lesson, Luke Lantz. No more kissing strangers in the woods.”
“Nee.” He swallowed, trying to regulate his breathing. “None of that.”
“All right. Then I’ll be going.” She patted him jauntily on the arm.
He turned to watch her go. “Don’t forget,” he called, unable to still a last bit of anxiety. “I’ll be waiting out back of your house, and if you’re not there in two hours I’ll . . .”
She cracked open the barn door and gave him a sidelong glance. “You’ll what?”
“Just be there.”
He watched her smile and slip out into the light while he stood fretting in the dimness of the barn.
Chapter Twenty
ROSE CLIMBED THROUGH THE WOODS, EXCITED AT THE prospect of an adventure, even one as simple as bringing some food and supplies to a woman in need. Of course, she wondered why the Englisch woman had not gone to her own people or family, but Rose hadn’t been able to press any more information out of Luke and had decided that it didn’t matter. It was part of Derr Herr’s will that she help those who were less fortunate and in want. And surely a woman living in a tent in the middle of the forest with children was in want.
Time slipped by quickly till she came to the stand of pines. The tent was cleverly disguised from view by branches and bracken, and she might have overlooked it had she not been told it was there. She approached the blue liner of the shelter cautiously, calling out to make her presence known.
“Hello! Heelloo! I’m a friend of Luke’s!” she called out, stepping closer. She noticed a goat tethered nearby and a pen of chickens.
Then she heard rustling and the high-pitched squeal of a child, and a beautiful dark-haired woman came out of the tent. She balanced a red-faced toddler on her hip and stared at Rose with worry in her dark eyes.
Rose smiled. “Please . . . it’s all right. Luke sent me.”
“Is something wrong with him?” The woman’s tone was anxious.
Rose had to bite down on a sudden flare of jealousy; it was more than a fair question when he’d been such a help to the family. “He had a small accident. Just a sprained ankle. But he can’t make it up here on crutches, so he asked me to come instead. May I come in?”
“Yes . . . please. I—I’m Sylvia. This is Bobby, my boy. My little girl, Ally, is taking a nap. There’s not a whole lot for her to do when her brother’s fussy.” The woman held open the tent flap.
Rose entered to find a veritable storehouse of items that had gone missing from the community over the past few months. She had to marvel at the larger items, wondering how Luke had hefted them through the woods alone. Then her gaze fell on the little girl curled up beneath a nine-patch quilt. Her long, black curls cascaded over the fabric squares, and Rose felt a tightness in her chest at the kinship of the skin and hair coloring she shared with the child.
“I suppose Luke’s told you everything about us . . . I mean, for one of your people to come up here.” Sylvia tried to put Bobby down, but he began to sniffle, and she scooped him back up with a sigh.
“One of my people?” Rose asked. “You mean Amish.”
“Yes, sorry. Does Luke have good friendships with the Amish?”
Rose placed her basket on a small chest of drawers. “Luke is Amish,” she said.
The woman laughed low, revealing a devastating smile. “Luke? Amish? Are you sure we know the same person?”
“Hey, I’m sorry if I said something wrong. Maybe Luke just seems different to us.” Sylvia’s tone was genuine, but her words pricked at Rose’s heart.
“It’s no matter. Look, I’ll probably come again soon. Is there anything else you need?” And can you tell me why you’re here . . . in the middle of nowhere, with my betrothed as your provider?
“The Lord has blessed us already with Luke’s providing, and now yours. We’re grateful for whatever you bring. Hopefully, it won’t be much longer until Jim . . . well, you know.”
Rose wanted to say that she had no idea what until meant or who Jim was, but she was glad that the woman’s tone had lingered longingly over the man’s name. She also felt chagrined that the woman mentioned the Lord with such genuineness while she was hardly having Christian feelings herself. Still, Luke could have told her more, since Sylvia didn’t seem to have a problem with her knowing.
She’d just placed the final jar of preserves on a stand when a small, cherubic voice spoke up from the little bed.
“Mommy . . . who’s that?” The little girl scooted up to grab at her mother’s jeans.
“A friend of Luke’s,” Sylvia responded, stroking her daughter’s hair.
“I’m Rose.”
The child’s eyes grew wide with interest. “Your hair’s like mine. Does Luke think it’s pretty too? Why are you dressed up all funny? Did you see my pet goat? Is it Halloween yet? Mommy, when can I have a costume?”
“Shhh,” Sylvia admonished.
“It’s all right.” Rose smiled. “But I need to be going before it gets dark.”
“Wait!” Ally cried. “I always make a picture for Luke to take when he visits my daddy. Shall I give it to you?”
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