Reluctant Brides Collection

by Cathy Marie Hake

  “What? Why?”

  Christa had thought it strange that Adelaide hadn’t made an appearance at school but supposed she and Grant had a lot of plans to make. That would be why Adelaide asked Christa to finish out the week of teaching.

  Maybe something wonderful had happened for them—like their deciding to elope.

  Or maybe something terrible happened. “Is it Adelaide’s grandfather?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t know. Grant said they had to catch the train and he’d explain when he returns. Dora and Clem visited later. They only know the Montgomerys graciously thanked them for their hospitality.”

  On Friday, Miz Dora stopped by to say Grant had returned, but before she could get anything out of him, he was called away to a logging accident.

  Determined to be useful, Christa spent Saturday visiting those who made crafts.

  When she sat in the front row of church Sunday morning, she thought she heard Grant’s voice, but he did not sit beside her. Perhaps he sat farther back with his fiancée—the real schoolmarm.

  Uncle John stood up and announced, “After the service, some matters need to be addressed. I hope you’ll all be able to stay. Now, let’s get on with our worship.”

  Todd led the singing. Uncle’s John’s sermon seemed shorter than usual. No one came forward for special prayer. Uncle John said, “Our doctor has an announcement.”

  Grant walked to the pulpit. Christa prayed she’d conceal her emotions, particularly if he announced that his fiancée had become his wife.

  She looked up when he described an important doctors’ meeting in Asheville. Dr. Montgomery hadn’t planned to attend, but a situation arose that changed his mind. At the meeting, the doctor made an impassioned plea for funds and equipment to turn Grant’s cabin into a clinic. They would appeal for a doctor just out of medical school to come and train under Grant.

  Christa joined in the applause. She was happy for Grant. His dreams were coming true. Oh, how she wished she could see these things materialize.

  “I’ll need men to help renovate the cabin,” he said, “and women to help with furnishings.”

  Birr Morgan spoke up. “We’ll do what we can at the sawmill. Free of charge.”

  “It’ll be hard with crops coming in,” Jeb Norval said, “but me and my boys will help.”

  Other offers sounded throughout the church.

  “One more thing,” Grant said. “The Montgomerys have a commitment from the Asheville church to send school supplies. Mr. Warren, who is eager to mentor Todd when the time is right, has also promised help from Charleston schools.”

  After taking a deep breath, Grant cleared his throat. “Miss Montgomery plans to take a teaching position in Charleston.”

  Christa stared. What did that mean? Would Grant leave the cove after he trained another doctor?

  “I think, if Miss Walsh will continue at our school, we need to make a bigger commitment to her than one day or one week at a time. She deserves better.”

  Others agreed, but Christa focused on her gloves when Grant walked past her up the aisle.

  Dora stood. “Christa, do you have something to say? You know we want you here as teacher.”

  Christa had thought this was what she wanted. Now, she wasn’t sure. “I need to think this over.”

  Dora smiled. Uncle John looked tenderly at her.

  Clem nodded. “Jeb had a good point. We were so eager to have a teacher, we wanted the children in school even though it’s summer. But you men want to help with the clinic. Children are needed to help bring in the crops. A few weeks off school might be good.”

  Grant spoke up. “That would give Miss Walsh time to get her crafts and think about teaching permanently. Since she has been so gracious to teach for us, we should let her make the decision about the school schedule.”

  Sounds of affirmation sounded.

  Christa stood. “At school tomorrow, I’ll send notes home with the children about the schedule.”

  The meeting ended. Adults expressed their wish for her to be the teacher.

  When Christa went out into the yard, a few men were walking away from Grant. He acknowledged her with a nod, then headed toward his cabin. She supposed he had plans to make that didn’t include her.

  Men came at daybreak to start renovating the cabin. Clem and Dora, who insisted Grant live with them while the work took place, left on Monday morning for Asheville. Christa left on the same train with craft samples for the shop. She had sent notes home with the children that school was dismissed until further notice.

  “Will she come back?” Grant asked John when they stopped for the lunch that women brought to the work site.

  Christa’s uncle gave Grant a long look. “I didn’t ask.” He proceeded to fill his plate.

  Grant sensed that a lot of meaning lay behind that simple statement. He followed John and absentmindedly spooned food onto his plate. “I haven’t asked, Pastor John, because I didn’t want to influence her decision.”

  “What decision, Grant?”

  Grant stared after him, feeling the impact of that question. By his silence, he’d gotten Christa into teaching. Now, by silence, he’d likely driven her away.

  For the rest of the week, he worked with the other men from daybreak ’til dark, then spent the nights in the Carmichaels’ cabin, wondering where they were. What was Christa doing? Should he go to Hendersonville and find out? Or wait here forever, wondering what might have been?

  He felt lonely in church Sunday. The Carmichaels hadn’t returned. Christa wasn’t sitting in the front row.

  On Monday morning, he told the men to quit working on the clinic at noon and tend to their crops and businesses.

  In the afternoon, he stood outside the depot when the train pulled in. Holding his bag and a ticket to Hendersonville, Grant headed for the train. He stopped when Dora and Clem exited, followed by Christa, wearing the same questioning expression he’d seen when he first ran into her.

  “You going somewhere, Grant?” Dora asked

  Where he was going depended on Christa.

  He took Christa’s suitcase from her hand. “For now, let’s just say I’ve come to welcome each of you home.”

  His heart skipped a beat when Christa smiled at him and said, “It’s good…to be home.”

  Chapter 15

  Grant remembered his first ride with Christa in Clem’s wagon. Out of desperation, he’d wanted to ask, “Will you be my fiancée?”

  Now he wanted to ask the same question from a desire to spend the rest of his life with her.

  If he did, she would likely get that suspicious, confused look again. However, when he stopped by Pastor John’s and asked if she’d like to see the progress on the clinic, she agreed to go.

  He asked about her trip to Hendersonville. She answered politely. They even talked about the weather. Had she lost trust in him because he’d kissed her while engaged to another woman? Was she leaving the cove, meaning the end of their relationship before it really had begun?

  The tension vanished when they reached the clinic. Her enthusiasm rekindled his as he explained each room. She walked across the hardwood floors, commented on the waiting room, looked into the treatment room, and touched cabinets. He led her to the addition at the back that would be sleeping quarters for his assistant.

  “This is fine, Grant. Even if you don’t get an assistant right away, this is so much better since patients will be able to come here.”

  He agreed. “And the cove people will appreciate it because they helped build it. That’s the difference between here and the city. We don’t take things for granted.”

  “I learned that from teaching,” she said. “No one takes teachers for granted. That makes it so worthwhile.”

  Hope sprang in him. He opened the screen door, and they went out into the backyard, smaller now because of the extension to the cabin. They walked toward the gurgling creek. Maybe she wouldn’t hear the pleading in his question. “Does that mean you will stay o
n as teacher?”

  He stepped on a stone in the creek and held out his hand. She hesitated, then tilted her head and smiled. “I can do it.” She lifted her skirts slightly and stepped from one stone to another. His foot slipped. Hers did, too, and they grabbed each other’s hands. Laughing, they reached the other side without filling their shoes with water.

  “I could have done it,” she said, “if you hadn’t done that silly dance on the rocks.”

  Ah, it felt good to have her behave in that spunky manner again. “Sure you could.” He couldn’t resist adding, “But holding onto someone else helps one’s balance.”

  Maybe he shouldn’t have looked into her eyes then. She ducked her head slightly and walked ahead of him into the woods. In the coolness and the shadows, he tried to regain that sense of togetherness.

  “For your information,” he said, “I plan to build a bridge over that creek. Since I’ll be living in the glade, I’ll be called upon come hail or high water and don’t want to wade neck deep in the creek.”

  She laughed. “Good idea.” How grand that he and Adelaide would have a beach home in Charleston and a mountain home in Bear Cove.

  They walked into the glade. He watched her look out over the lush green mountains beneath a deep blue sky where the late evening sun hid behind a distant cloud. He wondered if she’d come here to say good-bye—to the cove and to him.

  He stood beside her, and she looked at him, a gleam of gold touching her eyes. “Being here has been good for me, Grant. I love the people, the children, and the sense of purpose I’ve gained. When I arrived, I wanted to do well and make a difference, but it was mainly about me.”

  She turned toward the tranquil view. “I needed to know what was best. I asked God for a sign.”

  “And He gave you one?” That sounded like he doubted, so Grant added, “Of course.”

  She nodded. “I realized William and Bettina’s acceptance was genuine. They loved the crafts and want to purchase them. And I no longer resent Roland. Maybe he did fall in love with the banker’s daughter instead of her money.” She shook her head. “I thought the Lord giving me insight into my own self-centeredness and taking away my resentment was the sign.”

  Just as he figured she would say her place was in Hendersonville, she added, “But it wasn’t.”

  The sun hadn’t brought that glow to her face; it came from inside. He needed to pray for what was best for her, in spite of what he wanted. But what she was saying made him want her even more.

  She faced him. Amazement tinged her voice. “Dora contacted me. Their former church invited me to talk about the school. I was scared but knew they might sponsor a teacher, so I told them about the children and about Todd. They were so impressed. Oh, Grant!”

  She pressed her hands to her chest. “I am now the official cove missionary-teacher, sponsored by a church in Asheville.”

  Emotion flooded Grant’s eyes. “Christa, this is wonderful. You’re perfect for this. I knew it that first week.”

  She looked down. “Even with that, it wasn’t easy. I had to ask myself if this was God’s will. I had to be able to say I would teach even if those I…those close to me were not here. Suppose Uncle John and the Carmichaels left. And you….”

  Was she about to say, “Those I love?”

  His heart thudded. “Christa, I’m not going anywhere.”

  Her gaze met his. “But Adelaide’s in Charleston.”

  He nodded. “She’s in love with Charlie Warren.”

  “Oh,” she said. “Are you…heartbroken?”

  “I was concerned, Christa. I didn’t want to hurt her. I do love her. But when you came into my life, I began to realize that I’m not in love with Adelaide. When I couldn’t seem to get the words out right, she informed me about the difference between loving someone and being in love with them.”

  Christa nodded. “She asked me if I believed in love at first sight.”

  He dared believe what he saw in her eyes. “What did you say?”

  “I said I believed in love coming quickly.”

  His hands moved to her shoulders. “I think that’s something she and Charlie Warren learned. I know it’s something I learned, even though I fought it. I’m in love with you, Christa.”

  She came into his arms. “I’m in love with you, Grant.”

  After a kiss that, this time, neither ran away from, he drew a deep breath and held her close. “May I tell the world I have a fiancée, she’s the schoolmarm, and her name is Christa Walsh?”

  “Please do.”

  He moved away, faced the view, and shouted. “I’m in love.”

  Christa shouted, “Me, too.”

  The mountains echoed back, “love, too” so many times that it began to sound for all the world like, “true love true.”

  A week later, Christa and Grant traveled to Asheville and chose her engagement ring. They rode to Hendersonville and visited William and Bettina, who were delighted with Grant and the engagement. They returned on Monday.

  A few weeks later, they joined the Carmichaels at Adelaide and Charlie’s wedding in a big church in Asheville. The summer sped by quickly. The clinic was finished. A new doctor lived in the addition and studied under Grant.

  Whenever they could, the men of the cove worked on the log house in the clearing where Grant and Christa would live after they married.

  William and Bettina had placed orders for crafts that gave many a renewed sense of purpose. Christa couldn’t imagine getting married anywhere other than in the little church in the cove where Uncle John preached.

  She spent what time she could planning for school, which would begin in the fall. The wedding was set for a week before classes started.

  The wedding day arrived—a beautiful, clear, warm day. Clem and Dora organized the reception to be held in the churchyard.

  The little church was packed with some standing around the walls and others outside looking in the windows. Christa had invited a couple of her married friends from Hendersonville. Some of Grant’s acquaintances from Asheville came, including Dr. and Mrs. Montgomery, who said Adelaide and Charlie were living in Charleston and getting ready for the new school year. They sent their love and a generous monetary gift.

  After Bettina walked down the aisle and took her place as matron of honor across from Clem as Grant’s best man, Todd sang, “O Perfect Love.”

  Christa couldn’t imagine anything more perfect than William walking her down the aisle and saying, “I, her brother, do,” when Uncle John asked, “Who gives this woman to wed this man?”

  Uncle John then said, “We are gathered here to join this man and this woman in holy matrimony.” He cleared his throat and paused, looking from Christa to Grant and back again. “I must add something to this ceremony. The Lord works in mysterious ways….”

  Christa and Grant smiled, then gazed into each other’s eyes. She was asked a vague question and said, “I do.” Grant did the same.

  Uncle John pronounced them man and wife. “You may kiss the bride.”

  Grant and Christa turned toward each other. She felt his arms come around her, and she lifted her face to his, not the least bit reluctant.

  SCHOOL BELLS AND WEDDING BELLS

  by Colleen L. Reece

  Dedication

  In memory of my mother, who ruled her students with a rod of love, and all the one-room schoolteachers who taught lessons in life, as well as from textbooks.

  For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.

  ISAIAH 55:8–9

  Chapter 1

  Boston, Massachusetts—late 1890s

  Sunlight burst through spring-gray clouds and streamed through the magnificent stained-glass windows of the anteroom in Boston’s most prestigious church. It turned Meredith Rose Macrae into a living mosaic. Blue, green, and rose shimmered on her white satin gown and the coronet
of orange blossoms anchoring her bridal veil, then caressed her white prayer book dripping with ribbons and lilies.

  A warning growl of distant thunder mingled with the well-modulated tones of the costly organ in the sanctuary, an unwelcome reminder that March—which had come in with lamblike meekness—might well depart with the temperament of a roaring lion.

  Twenty-seven-year-old Marcus Macrae, Boston born and bred and a tall, dark-haired replica of his twin sister, clenched his hands and fought the storm of anger hidden beneath his fine wedding clothes. Lord, how can I tell Merry? Will it break her heart? Her spirit? He glanced at the young woman who had been a law unto herself from early childhood, then he surreptitiously stole a look at his pocket watch. What little hope he had clung to departed. Herbert wasn’t coming.

  Herbert. Marcus straightened the strong fingers that had automatically clenched into fists. He’d despised Herbert Calloway from the moment he met him. Marcus shook his head. Not a fitting sentiment for a minister of the gospel, but it was a simple fact of life. How many times had he ruefully muttered to himself, “If I had a dollar for every hour I’ve spent on my knees asking forgiveness for feeling this way, I’d be richer than Croesus.” His outbursts were always followed by, “Too bad I’m not. I’d abduct that sister of mine and hide her somewhere until she could see Calloway for what he really is!” Time and Marcus’s many prayers did little to warm him toward his future brother-in-law. Herbert’s supercilious manner, slicked-back hair, and dapper black mustache that resembled a misplaced third eyebrow fired Marcus with the primitive desire to mop up the floor with the man. How could Merry love him?

  Marcus shook his head and stared at his twin, seeing her not as she was on what should be the happiest day of her life, but the way she had been as far back as he could remember….

  Meredith Rose Macrae had charted her life’s course before she was ten. School and finishing school. Travel. Love, marriage, children, and a storybook happily-ever-after. Even as a child, the ebony-haired girl with the direct blue gaze had a way of getting what she wanted. Marcus watched with a great deal of amusement as his twin achieved her first three goals right on schedule. Before God called him to higher purposes, he had accompanied Merry on her jaunts all over the world. The hordes of hopefuls who pursued the well-to-do young woman failed to touch her heart. Neither had Marcus met a woman with whom he wanted to spend the rest of his life.