by Jillian Hart
He couldn’t look at her, but he heard her silence and the weight of questions she did not ask. They stood between them as solidly as the table. He could feel them. He winced. “I hope that’s not what you think of me. That I’m a fair-weather man. That if times get rough, I’ll break my vows to you.”
“No, that’s not what I think. Not at all.” Her words rang low and as sweet as the apple pie in front of him. Warmth crept into her voice, the kind that came with a deep caring. “I only meant that you weren’t banking on having two extra horses to feed through the winter, and that’s a cost to you. Now me and the children to feed and shelter, and that’s a greater cost. If the crop isn’t enough…Well, I’m already doing piecework for Cora Sims. I’m sure I could do more.”
He squeezed his eyes shut. She had no notion of what she was doing to him with her generous compassion and willing heart. “Joanna, you do more than enough every day. We’ll get by. I’ve got savings put aside. I had a good crop last year. You’re not to worry.”
“But with part of the wheat crop gone, I imagine we’ll need to watch every penny.”
“True.”
“And my wages will help.” She watched his reaction through her lashes. His jaw was granite, his gaze stony. “You don’t think a woman ought to be concerned with making ends meet, is that it?”
“No, I was just thinking I’m not taking your wages.” He cut into his pie with his fork, his voice flat. “I’m not a man who takes his wife’s money. Now, before you start arguing—”
“How did you know I was going to argue?”
“You’re a woman. And if there’s one thing I’ve learned, a woman always has an opinion.” His mouth crooked in the corners.
“Well, you are right about that, mister.” She picked up her sewing and began stitching away. Poking the needle through the fabric gave her some satisfaction at least, as she could not accomplish as much with him as easily. “It’s my opinion that I won’t be a burden to you. I owe you, Aiden. More than you know.”
“How did you come to that opinion?” His forehead creased as if he was puzzled. “You are a good wife, Joanna. You deserve all I can provide for you—more than I can do for you.”
“You don’t know what you’re saying.” She reached the end of the seam and knotted it swiftly. Her eyes were hot and she had to squint to see what she was doing. She tried hard not to think of those dark days of chaos and disappointment of her first marriage. Of trying so hard. “You appreciate everything I do. You compliment every meal I make. You see me, Aiden.”
“It would be hard not to. All I have to do is open my eyes.”
“You know what I mean.” He could try to tempt her away from her feelings with that dry humor of his, but it wasn’t going to work. Love bubbled like a wellspring in her soul, always running, always renewed.
She lowered her gaze, hoping that would hide any rogue feelings showing in her eyes. She bowed her head over her work, hoping the shadows would mask her. “You don’t make me feel less than. I can’t tell you what it means to me. Your kindness…”
She stopped there, willing her tongue to stop forming any more words that could give her away. She was in love with him. It would not be right to let him see that she had already broken a promise between them. She blinked hard and knotted the thread again and a third time, before weaving the end thread through the fabric.
“My kindness is the least of what you deserve, Joanna.” He looked lost again. “You had heartbreak in your first marriage as surely as I did in mine. In little bits at a time. I can see how it was. One disappointment after another until there was nothing left but pieces of your dreams.”
“Yes.” She was not surprised that he could see this in her so clearly. Aiden always had that knack. She prayed he could not see her as clearly now. She wrapped her love for him up and hoped it was hidden deeply enough that he would never see. “We’re a pair, aren’t we?”
“Yep.” He paused to stare out past the pool of light to the window, where night and shadows beckoned. “How do you do it?”
“Do what?”
“You’ve had heartache and hardship in your life, and yet you’ve never closed your heart. How have you done it?”
“I did not have your losses, Aiden.”
“No, but love lost is the same in the end.” His chest hurt something fierce. He set down his fork, feeling trapped, needing to feel the breeze on his face and the expanse of the sky blowing on by. She reached across the table and laid her hand on his. The shards that had once been his soul stirred.
“I should not have been here, waiting for you tonight.” It wasn’t understanding or sympathy in her words, but love. Quiet as dawn coming and as sure as first light, that’s how she sounded.
Did she know she was so transparent? She deserved better than a man like him, barren of heart and grasping for any embers that might remain. He was too tangled up to pray. Too unsettled to feel his way to that calm place of God. Aiden passed his hand over his face, torn up inside, feeling like a rope unraveling shank by braided shank.
Footsteps crossed the porch behind him. Finn, was his first guess, but the heavy gait was wrong. Just wishful thinking, Aiden supposed, wanting his youngest brother to come back to his senses. Wanting to save him, maybe because he could not save himself.
A soft knock sounded on the door frame. He was already on his feet, heading toward the door. He didn’t recognize the man’s shadow on the back step until he came closer and saw the faint glint of a silver star. The sheriff. This had happened before.
“Clint.” He yanked open the screen door. “Don’t tell me this is about Finn. I’m not in the mood.”
“You know that’s why I’m here.” The lawman swept off his hat. “Now, I can leave or I can tell you the truth. Which way do you want it?”
“What did he do this time?” Aiden tensed, as if he were bracing himself. “Tell me he’s sleeping it off in a cell.”
“I would, but that’s not the whole truth. He’s in big trouble this time, Aiden.”
“What kind of trouble?”
“He was taking part in a robbery.”
“I knew he was going to get into trouble again. How bad is it?”
“Bad. I’m holding him in jail until the judge comes to town. He was armed, Aiden. I regret having to tell you that someone got hurt.”
“I was afraid something like this might happen.” Aiden’s wide shoulders slumped.
“You can see him tomorrow if you want. Thought I’d swing by Thad’s place and let him and your mother know.”
“That’s good of you, Clint.” Aiden wedged one shoulder against the door frame, as if bracing himself. “I appreciate you coming out all this way.”
“That’s all right. I’m sorry to have to bring you news like this.” The sheriff took a step back into the darkness. “I know you’ve been trying to keep him on a better path.”
“Nothing I’ve done has worked.”
“Sometimes that’s the way it is, and it’s a shame, too. I’ll be seeing you, Aiden.”
“Thanks, Sheriff.” He didn’t move from the doorway. He stood stock-still, maybe too stunned by the news. Maybe too discouraged.
“I didn’t mean to overhear.” Joana was across the room without realizing it, drawn as if a rope were pulling her. “I’m sorry.”
“I am, too.” He sounded hollow, as if all the life had been sucked right out of him. “I was afraid he would get into worse trouble than before. He’s not a bad boy, but he loses all sense when he’s in the bottom of a bottle.”
“This isn’t your fault, Aiden.”
“I made him leave. Without money. Without a place to live. I tried to do the right thing by him. To make him think about what he was doing.”
“That was his choice.” Her hand settled on his shoulder. She could feel the agony vibrating through him. “Likely he wouldn’t have stopped no matter what you did.”
“I should have done more. What, I don’t know. Now I’ve lost him, too.”
“I know you, Aiden. You did everything you could for him. You gave him a new start. I know, because you did the same thing for me. You gave him a chance to improve his life. Believe me, that’s quite a gift to hand someone.”
“He’s going back to jail for a long time.”
“That was his choice, too.”
“I feel as if I failed him.” Aiden sounded tortured. He moved away from her touch, slowly, as if breaking away hurt him, too, and strode into the darkness. There was no moonlight to illuminate him, just faint stardust. It gilded him in the velvet blackness of the night like a dream. His shoulders were wide, feet braced apart and head bowed as if in prayer.
She closed the screen door quietly. Should she follow him? Did he need comfort? Or would he want to be alone? She longed to go to him. She had to be careful not to give herself away, she thought as she padded down the steps. It wasn’t easy to pull back her affection and lock it in her heart. She gave thanks for the night that hid her face as completely as it hid his.
“Aiden?” She ached to soothe him with the right words. To reach out and let her hand settle on his shoulder again, so he could feel that he wasn’t alone. “You didn’t fail him.”
“It sure feels that way.”
“I’m guessing that you haven’t failed anyone in your whole life. You are so strong. In faith. Of heart. Of character.”
She squeezed her eyes shut, willing back the love inside her. She could not let it show.
When she opened them again, he was facing her. He had moved as silently as the night, and he seemed a part of it. Lost and bruised, with only the faintest light to guide him.
“You’re wrong, Joanna. I am not that man. You see someone else. Someone you wish to see. Not me.”
“I see how much you are hurting. From this news of Finn. From what you’ve lost. From seeing me sitting in your kitchen, and that’s my fault. I let you talk me into moving in when I should have stayed in the shanty.”
“You misunderstand.” He sounded as if he was suffocating. She could only see the faint outline of his forehead and nose. He was pure shadow. “I feel. Before you came, there was nothing, only hard work and making a living off the land and keeping my distance. You changed that.”
“I didn’t mean to.”
“I know, but it happened just the same.”
She worked at the thin gold band on her fourth finger, the one he had put there with a vow and promises he would not break. She didn’t know what to say. Love beat stronger within her, and yet it was not strong enough. “I wanted to make your life better, Aiden. To make your burdens easier, the way you did for me and my children.”
“I know that.” His palms cradled her face, rough with calluses and tender with care.
She brought her hands up to his, holding on to his strength, taking in his sweet tenderness. He cared for her. That was more than she expected. More than she had dreamed. She breathed in the silence, and the night did not seem as bleak. The gleam of starshine seemed to linger like hope.
“I wish I were like you.” His baritone voice was raw, as if speaking brought him pain. “But I cannot do this.”
“Do what?” Was he talking about Finn again? she wondered. Or her presence in his house?
“I know, Joanna. I see how you look at me.”
She squeezed her eyes shut. But it was too late. She had not hidden her love for him as well as she’d thought. Heat swept across her face and regret into her heart. She tugged what defenses she could around her and steeled her spine. Whatever he said next, she knew it was going to hurt. There was no other way it could be. “I know you can’t love me, Aiden. I’m not asking for that. You have to know.”
“I do.” He grimaced, and what little she could see of him was tortured. “Don’t think I don’t want to. I wish I could. Prayer hasn’t helped. I can’t find my heart. Sometimes you lose too much of yourself and you can’t get it back.”
“I’m not asking you for anything.” She had to stop him, because there was only one way this could end. She told herself she wasn’t hurting. That he couldn’t be rejecting her if he never loved her in the first place.
But hearing that he wished he could love her was worse than any loss. Any pain. She saw him for the first time, a man broken beyond repair, struggling for life the way a drowning man fights for air. He was going down and there was nothing she could do to stop him. Nothing but try to fix what she could. She did not want to lose him.
She drew in a ragged breath and gathered up the bits of her dignity. “Nothing between us has to change. Everything is the same, Aiden.”
“It’s not the same.” He choked on the words. “I’ll move out into the shanty.”
“No, you don’t need to do that.”
“It’s what I want.” He stood firm. Resolute. “I won’t uproot the children again, and it makes no difference to me where I live. I’ll move tonight.”
“But it’s l-late.”
“It’s only a mattress and my pillow. Not much to move.”
“No, please I…I—”
“I’m sorry.” Hearing the tremble in her voice was agony. He was cracking apart like a frozen river in spring, one sharp break after another. It was too much. It was more than he could take. “This isn’t what I want. I wish—”
He couldn’t finish that, not with words, not even in thought. The presence of her hands on his destroyed him. She was soft as moonlight and as comforting as prayer and her hands were small. How could she do so much with them? She was powerful enough to tug at the embers of his heart.
“You wish that you had never married me.” Her voice was thin and raw.
No, that wasn’t true. But when he tried to tell her, his throat closed up tight. He leaned forward an inch, longing for what he could not let himself have. She tipped her face up. The starlight dusted the curves of her face, revealing her loving heart. She shone like a polished pearl, lovely from the inside out, and he yearned for her tenderness the way stars longed for the night.
He cared deeply about her. He wanted to deny it, to lie to himself, to hide from the truth. But it was like life in his veins, like the beat coming back to his heart. He was drowning, without air to breathe or ground to plant his feet on. If he took her into his arms and let her settle her cheek against his chest and held her tight, he would find what was lost. Letting himself fall in love with her would be like walking in the light again.
Panic made him step back. His vulnerabilities were exposed and the depth of his soul found.
It took all his strength to let go of her. To do the right thing and protect them both. Life was too hard and love too uncertain.
“I’d best get settled.” He left her standing there, graced by starshine and the rising moon, and holding his heart.
Chapter Sixteen
“That’s a dear little dress you’re making,” Cora Sims commented days later, across the width of Noelle’s comfortable parlor. “For your little girl?”
“Yes. From the fabric I bought at your store.” Seated next to Noelle on the sofa, Joanna held up the calico frock. “I’ve made it a bit fancier than usual, with ruffles and satin ribbon trim.”
“Adorable.” Lanna Wolf, an old friend of Noelle’s, put down the quilt patch she was sewing and leaned forward to admire the fine workmanship. “I love the backstitching you’ve done here. And the little embroidery work on the collar and cuffs.”
“I’ll have to have Ida remember this for when we start making baby clothes.” Noelle paused, happiness lighting her lovely face as she waited expectantly for her hint to sink in.
“A baby? Really?” Matilda Worthington, Noelle’s cousin, gasped on Joanna’s other side. “That’s wonderful news.”
“Don’t you tell your mother yet. I’m planning on letting her know in person. She is not fond of surprises.” Noelle stopped to count her stitches with her fingertips.
“Thad must be beyond the moon,” Lanna said. “Your first child. Joe and I are still waiting.”
&nbs
p; “It can come when you least expect it,” Joanna found herself saying. Why there was a lump in her throat, she couldn’t rightly say. “I had been married two years before I found out I would be having James. He was worth waiting for.”
“I guess God knows when the time is right.” Noelle sparkled, radiant with joy. “I’m thankful for this little one on the way. Speaking of which, I think I hear the patter of small footsteps.”
Sure enough, James bolted into the doorway and skidded to a stop. Grass seed clung to his shirt and a grass stain was at his knee. Luckily, he wasn’t wearing his new trousers. “Ma. Can me and Daisy have more pie?”
“Not right now.” She secured her needle and folded up the tiny dress. “It’s about time for us to head home. How about an extra big piece after supper?”
He looked around at the women watching him and squared up his chin. “Okay, Ma. I’ll get Daisy’s toys so we can go.”
“Thank you, baby.” The lump in her throat remained, stubbornly stuck in place. She leaned forward to slip her things inside her sewing basket as his footsteps padded away.
“Oh, he’s such a dear.” Cora watched him go with longing. It was clear to see she was not a spinster by choice, and that she wanted children. “You have such well-behaved little ones.”
“They are good.” Joanna secured the lid on her basket. “They are my greatest blessings.”
“Aiden seems good to them.” Cora folded up her work, too. “At my age, I keep hoping I might find a handsome widower with children. I think there’s nothing that says more about a man than being a good father.”
“We’ll have to see if we can’t find you one of those,” Lanna said, and the conversation turned to which handsome widower in the county might be right for Cora.
Joanna lifted her basket and went to get her things in the corner by the front door. It was a beautiful sight to see the golden wheat fields out beyond the large windows. The air puffing in through the screens smelled like bread baking. Harvest time was coming. A few more days, and she would be busy cooking and baking enough to feed the men. A few days later, she had agreed to do the same, with Ida’s help, in Noelle’s kitchen.
