A Headstrong Woman

by Maness, Michelle

  “Really?” Jonathon placed his hand over her stomach and smiled down at her.

  “I’m late, I’ve never been late before and I have all the symptoms.”

  “You need to be sure you get extra rest,” Jonathon admonished her.

  “I’ll try but Millie announced she’s leaving.”

  “Why?”

  “Her sister’s sick and she’s the only family she has.”

  “We’ll start looking for help, when is she leaving?”

  “In a couple of weeks,” Alexandria shared.

  “That’s not much time,” Jonathon commented. “I’ll go to town tomorrow.”

  “Can I go with you; I wanted to see Dr. Carver?”

  “Sure. Alexandria,” Jonathon started hesitantly.

  “What is it, Jonathon?”

  “I haven’t been completely honest with you,” his blue eyes were dark as he held her gaze.

  Alexandria swallowed hard. Her heart accelerated; she was afraid of what he had to tell her.

  “I love you,” he shared and watched her eyes close. Behind them lightening split the sky and rain began to pour.

  Alexandria felt as if it were her heart that had split open and not the sky. “Why? Why would you marry me knowing that…?”

  “I couldn’t lose you.”

  “Jonathon…”

  “You think I should have sat back and let you marry a stranger? That I should have lain out there in the bunkhouse not saying a word and torturing myself with the thoughts of another man touching you?” he asked her. Alexandria shuddered at the thought of another man touching her and frowned. “But no one would have been hurt,” she said rather lamely.

  “I would have only you would have never known it.”

  His words made her heart ache. “I don’t deserve you.”

  “You deserve better.”

  “You could have had any woman in the area, why me?” she demanded.

  “Because I love you, Alexandria, because I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you. You’re the kind of person the heart sees and falls for.”

  “What?” Alexandria’s brows crinkled in confusion.

  “I see you with my eyes and I like what I see, but if I didn’t see a heart that my heart could love your beauty wouldn’t matter.”

  “I feel guilty having someone as special as you are and not even being able to say I return your feelings,” she informed him.

  Jonathon smiled. “You have an odd way of looking at the world, Alexandria. What’s so special about me? I’m just a cowhand who fell for his boss.”

  “No, you’re not. You are one of the most considerate and rare men I know; do you know how few men would have helped me and looked out for me without smothering me,” she asked incredulously.

  Jonathon caressed her cheek and smiled at her. “That’s a high compliment, Alexandria; thank you. Do you know what I love about you?” he asked her and watched her shake her head. “I love the way your whole face lights up when you smile, I love the way your eyes flash when you’re angry and that chin comes up. I love the way you square your shoulders when you feel the most vulnerable. I love the way you love a little girl that isn’t even your own like she is. I love that you’re close to your family and think of others first…I love you, just you for who you are,” he informed her rather passionately.

  Alexandria had tears in her eyes. “I don’t want to hurt you,” she whispered in torment.

  “You haven’t and that you’re concerned for me demonstrates what I mean. You’re a great person, Alexandria.”

  “Jonathon,” Alexandria stared at the buttons on Jonathon’s shirt a moment before forcing herself to meet his gaze, her cheeks were already stained pink. “I’m glad I’m having your baby,” she informed him.

  Jonathon kissed her passionately before pulling her into his arms and holding her.

  Alexandria closed her eyes and clung to Jonathon. She would be lost without him, she realized. Did she love him? Was this what love felt like between a man and a woman? Before she could contemplate it further shouts reached them. They turned to see Ted racing toward the house.

  “Come on,” Jonathon said as he turned and led Alexandria into the house. It was then that he noticed the wind had died and frowned. Ted met them at the top of the stairs.

  Alexandria felt disoriented; the house seemed dark for midday.

  “Get Lilly and get in the cellar,” Ted ordered. “There’s a tornado coming this way!”

  “Dear God,” Alexandria breathed as she dashed into Lilly’s room and scooped the sleeping child into her arms. Millie was already standing in the pantry, the trap door to the cellar standing open. When she spotted them coming she preceded them in and took Lilly. Alexandria climbed down the steps and turned to her husband expectantly.

  “Stay here, Alexandria; for Lilly and the baby stay here. I’ll be back; I promise,” Jonathon said before closing the door.

  “Jonathon!” Alexandria screamed and started toward the steps.

  “Come on, Alexandria,” Millie said gently as she took her boss by the arm and led her to a barrel and sat her there. “He’ll be fine; Lilly needs you now,” Millie instructed as she placed Lilly in her arms. Alexandria hugged Lilly to her. Why had Jonathon left her like that?

  She was angry with him; furious even.

  What if something happened to him?

  The noise outside the house intensified, it sounded as though a train was coming close to the house, a low moan and a high screeching its terrifying companions. Alexandria could hear things hitting the sides of the house above and moaning, creaking, and the sound of breaking glass. The sound intensified and then moved further away. Alexandria felt like a limp rag by the time Millie suggested they emerge from their shelter.

  The door opened freely and the two women slowly climbed into the pantry; they both eyed the door to the kitchen warily. The day had been unnaturally warm and all the windows open, were there windows left? Was there a home outside that door?

  “Well let’s see how bad it is,” Millie opened the door. The kitchen was a mess, chairs scooted out of place, dishes and pots scattered over the floor, but the room intact. A quick survey of the rest of the home turned up two missing windows and a mess in almost every room from where the wind had tossed things around. The house was over all intact; she returned down stairs to share the good news with Millie.

  “Can you watch Lilly?” she requested after she had relayed her findings.

  “You know I will,” Millie assured her. Alexandria hurried outside and noted the mess around her. She could see the path the tornado had taken several hundred feet from the house. Several trees had been twisted and snapped and tin and other debris, from where she wasn’t certain, clung to the tops of the remaining trees. She noted the barn was intact and stopped Rusty as he rushed past her.

  “Have you seen Jonathon?” she asked him.

  “He’s in the barn,” Rusty related before continuing on his way. Alexandria stood rooted to her spot. She had intended to go see him but found she suddenly didn’t want to, instead she turned back to the house and threw herself into cleaning up the mess that was left behind.

  Jonathon helped Sparky ease onto a bale of hay and examined the younger man’s leg. He had been the first to make a dash for the house to warn them the tornado was coming and had been rewarded with a large splinter of wood in his thigh.

  “The wind just hurled it at me,” Sparky said on a gasp.

  “Harold, could you go for Dr. Carver? Here, Chris; hold this cloth there would you? Has anyone seen my wife yet?” he asked the men who had gathered around him.

  “She was just outside asking about you,” Rusty shared. “We’ll see to things here; you go on,” the older man offered.

  “Thanks, Rusty,” Jonathon said with a hand on the man’s shoulder before he moved toward the house.

  “You okay, Millie?” Jonathon asked as he poked his head into the kitchen. Lilly sat at the table a glass of milk untouched in front o
f her. She jumped up when she saw Jonathon and ran to him.

  “We fared just fine,” Millie assured him.

  Jonathon turned from the kitchen and checked for Alexandria down stairs before finding her upstairs in one of the extra bedrooms. She was cleaning up broken glass from one of the windows and had gathered several scattered items and piled them on the bed to be sorted through.

  “I’m sorry, Alexandria; I was going to come back to the house after I helped loose the horses. They didn’t stand a chance if the barn took a hit. By the time we had turned them out the twister was on us,” Jonathon explained as he approached his wife.

  Alexandria glanced up and he caught a glimpse of hurt and something else in her eyes before she turned her attention back to the mess in front of her.

  “I’m fine,” she responded, though Jonathon could tell she wasn’t. He had caught a glimpse of the same desperation in her expression that had been in Lilly’s when she had hurled herself into his arms but Alexandria wasn’t allowing herself that comfort.

  “Alexandria, I’m sorry,” he said again and watched helplessly as she continued to clean.

  “I said I’m fine; there’s a mess to be cleaned up in case you haven’t noticed.”

  “And it’ll still be there in a few minutes from now,” he reminded her. He set Lilly on the bed and moved to his wife. “Alexandria, don’t shut me out!” he pleaded as he took her by the arms and pulled her close. Alexandria remained stiff in his arms a moment before clinging to him.

  “Mommy’s scared of storms,” Lilly commented.

  Jonathon glanced at the top of his wife’s head and wondered how he’d missed that.

  “I’m so sorry, I should have been there with you,” Jonathon said as he led her to the bed, sat down and pulled her into his lap.

  Lilly giggled beside him. “Mommy doesn’t fit in your lap.”

  “She doesn’t?” Jonathon asked with a smile. “I think she does,” he countered as he invited his stepdaughter to snuggle against him. She cuddled against his side and raised wide blue eyes to his.

  “Daddy.”

  “Yes, sweetheart?”

  “It was real scary,” Lilly admitted.

  Jonathon’s heart turned over at her admission. All the horses and cattle in the world couldn’t match the value and importance of these two.

  “But I’m glad the horsies are okay,” she added almost as an afterthought.

  “Do you think my family’s okay?” Alexandria asked Jonathon.

  “Ted’s on his way over there if he’s not there already,” he shared; Alexandria nodded against his neck. “Why don’t you two take a nap?”

  “I need to clean up…”

  “I’ll clean up the mess in here; you need to rest.”

  “I’m fine,” Alexandria persisted.

  “The doc’s not here to order you to bed so I am,” Jonathon informed her.

  “I don’t think I want to be up here by myself.”

  “Then you lay on the settee and I’ll pull two chairs together for Lilly and you two can rest in the parlor closer to where Millie will be working,” he suggested.

  “Is Mommy sick?” Lilly asked her small brow scrunched up in concern.

  “No, Lilly, we haven’t found out for sure from the doctor, but we think you may be getting a little brother or sister,” Jonathon shared. Lilly scrambled onto her knees and smiled at him.

  “Really?”

  “We think so.”

  “I want a little brother,” she declared.

  “Well, we don’t get to decide if you get a brother or sister but either way I know you’ll be a good big sister.”

  “Oh I will, I’ll help and I won’t get into things,” she promised. “You know I’m real lucky.”

  “How’s that?” Jonathon asked her with a smile.

  “I got to have two mommies and two daddies and lots of grandma’s and grandpas and aunts and uncles and now I get to have a little brother or a sister. Do you think we can get whichever one we don’t get this time later?” she requested. Jonathon chuckled and could hear Alexandria doing the same.

  “I think so, but time will tell,” Jonathon told her.

  “What does that mean?” she asked, her little nose wrinkled.

  “It means be patient my little pixie.”

  “Oh,” Lilly said with a dejected sigh. Patience was not her strong point.

  “You want to do your first big sister help?”

  “Now?” Lilly asked with wide eyes.

  “Now.”

  “What do I need to do?”

  “You need to go get a pillow and blanket from your bed, take them down stairs and wait for me. I need you to set a good example for your Mommy, she thinks she has to do everything at once but right now she needs extra rest for the baby.”

  “I can do that,” Lilly nodded and scrambled off the bed.

  “That was low,” Alexandria informed him as she looked up into his face.

  “I’m just trying to take care of you, Alexandria. I’ve already failed you once today,” he said as he stood and placed her back on her feet.

  “No, you didn’t, I was being…”

  “Alexandria, you are far more important to me than horses and had something happened to me…the thought of you working yourself to the bone on this place again, especially now,” Jonathon stopped, his eyes suspiciously moist as he swallowed hard and tried to regain his composure. “I promise to be more careful in the future. Today I reacted from adrenaline; I didn’t even stop and think about it.”

  “We’re all okay, that’s the important thing,” Alexandria reminded him.

  “I’m glad we’re all okay, now go set an example for your daughter who is trying real hard to be big right now,” he encouraged her.

  Alexandria smiled before turning to go.

  Jonathon moved to the parlor and scooted two chairs together for Lilly while Alexandria got a pillow and blanket. A thunderstorm had moved in, though it contained none of the steam the other had possessed, both Lilly and Alexandria looked toward the window warily.

  “It’ll be fine, I won’t be far away and I’ll be watching things; I promise,” Jonathon assured them before kissing each on the cheek and leaving the room. Alexandria lay down and pulled the blanket over her close. She had gotten a glimpse of what it would mean to lose Jonathon and it had scared her. Alexandria squeezed her eyes shut against the lightening outside and let her tears flow. She was so scared of loving him and losing him.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Anxious to check on his fiancée and future in-laws, Ted urged his horse forward. Unless the tornado had changed course it had missed their place directly but having grown up on the plains Ted had seen plenty of people killed and injured who weren’t in the tornado’s direct path. He spotted the house in the distance and noted no major damage. His heart momentarily slowed and then sped up. He could see movement in the yard as he closed the gap and saw with relief that Anna and her mother were on the porch sweeping debris into the yard. Anna spotted him, dropped her broom, and ran to meet him as he jumped from his horse.

  “I’m so glad you’re okay,” she whispered as she hugged him fiercely.

  “I’m glad you’re okay,” he returned around a lump in his throat.

  “Is everybody okay at the ranch?”

  “One minor injury among the hands, otherwise everyone is fine,” he reassured her. Thunder sounded overhead and prompted them to move to the porch.

  “Is everyone okay…?”

  “They’re fine,” Ted cut Shirley off to set her mind at rest.

  “Thank God!” Shirley breathed. “Michael and Carolyn left to check on her mother and father at the parsonage, did you pass them on the road?”

  “No, they must already be there. I could see some minor damage to the church and parsonage, but nothing major,” he related.

  “Come on in and rest, Ted, you look exhausted,” Anna invited. Ted smiled and prepared to follow her inside.

  ***
r />   “Well young man you’re lucky it targeted your leg, if it had gotten you in the torso you would be dead right now.”

  “God had to be looking out for me, Doc,” Sparky told the older man.

  “You get some rest and let that leg heal, you hear me?”

  “Will do, Doc.”

  “Good.”

  Jonathon escorted the man out of the bunk house and into the yard. “Dr. Carver, I know you’ll probably be very busy the next couple of days but when things slow down…”

  “If I wait for things to slow down I might never get around to whatever favor you were about to request of me.” Dr. Carver cut Jonathon off.

  “Alexandria may be expecting and we’d like to know for sure but it isn’t an emergency and I’m sure…”

  “Where is she?” Dr. Carver again cut Jonathon off.

  “Inside resting, the storm gave her quite a scare.”

  “It gave a lot of people a scare and killed three that we’re aware of.”

  “I didn’t know,” Jonathon said sadly. They entered the parlor to find Alexandria asleep and Jonathon gently shook her to wake her. She smiled at him before spotting Dr. Carver.

  “Dr. Carver wants to go ahead and look at you while he’s here,” Jonathon informed her.

  “Hello, Dr. Carver,” Alexandria greeted him.

  “Hello, Alexandria; let’s go upstairs and see if you’re right, most women are, they know their bodies pretty well.” Dr. Carver waited for Alexandria to lead the way and allowed her a few minutes to change before joining her in the bedroom to examine her.

  Alexandria watched Jonathon enter the room after the doctor had left. He lay down beside her where she had made herself comfortable on the bed.

  “So what did he say?” he asked her.

  “That we’re going to be parents in about seven to eight months give or take a few days or weeks,” she shared with a smile.

  Jonathon kissed her and pulled her close. “Then I really need to find you some help around the house,” he commented.

  Alexandria snuggled close and would have stayed there had they not heard a buggy rolling to a stop in the yard below. Alexandria sat up and Jonathon stood to offer her a hand off the bed. She accepted and after a quick check in the mirror to assure herself she was presentable, she followed her husband downstairs. She emerged to find Ali and Colton helping Kelsey and Kelvin from the buggy.