by Jo Goodman
“I was in love with Eli Barber once upon a time,” she said, slipping the bridle on her mare. “I’ve been thinking that you might want to know that. I’m not sure that it’s important, at least to the way I behaved when you kissed me, but it might be, so that’s why I’m telling you.”
Of all the things she might have said, this was easily the most unexpected. Israel decided the wisest course was to say nothing and let her go on. She must have sensed his presence because she didn’t turn around, and she kept on talking.
“About Eli . . . we were young. I was Annalea’s age. He would have been twelve. Our families had been feuding for a long time, and it was rather Romeo and Juliet of us to act in defiance of that. When he proposed, I said yes.” She laid a blanket over Felicity’s back and then hefted the saddle into position. “Neither of us knew quite what to do then, so I suggested that we take a blood oath right there at the fence line. It was all very dramatic.” She glanced at the underside of her right wrist as she fastened Felicity’s girth. “I still have a scar from where I cut myself on a barb. I think he might have one as well. I don’t know; I never asked.”
Israel did not have a mental picture of Eli Barber so he inserted his twelve-year-old defiant self into the ceremony, all unruly dark hair, long legs, and insolent smile. The image of Willa that he brought to mind looked a lot like Annalea. She wore a single braid, not two, and her eyes were darker than her sister’s, but they were just as lively back then, and she looked at him with the purity of a child’s joy. He would have opened a vein for her. If Eli had been moved to do the same, he probably did have a scar.
“What happened?” he asked without inflection.
Willa shrugged. “Family mostly. We kept our engagement a secret for years, but eventually we were found out. We didn’t get married, and we didn’t kill ourselves.” She took Felicity by the bridle, finally turned, and began to lead the mare toward Israel and the exit. “I was thirteen when I was packed off to the Margaret Lowe School in Saint Louis. I wrote to Eli once a week for the first six months of my incarceration, but he never wrote back. It occurred to me that Malcolm and Edith were not allowing him to see my correspondence, but I believed, and I still believe, that he had a responsibility to initiate a letter. Something would have reached me eventually.”
She came abreast of Israel. “By the time I returned home, he was at a school in Virginia. That presented him with an opportunity to write to me without interference from his parents. He did nothing with it. Eventually he came home, but my perspective was considerably changed by then, and I did not care. I had responsibilities, real ones, and when I looked at Eli Barber with fresh eyes, I did not particularly like what I saw. I tend to think it was the same for him.” She handed Felicity’s reins to Israel so she could put on her gloves. “It broke my thirteen-year-old heart when he didn’t write, but a broken heart at that age is merely a rite of passage. Do you understand?”
Israel nodded. “Bea Winslow.”
“Ah, yes.” She smiled faintly. “The first girl you asked to dance.”
“That’s right. So you are not still grieving for him.”
“No.” She took back the reins and pointed to the door. “Will you open that, please?” As he walked away, she said, “No, I am certainly not grieving. You know he’s proposed since then, and I’ve always said no. That is not going to change.”
The door jerked unevenly as Israel pulled it sideways. The metal rollers emitted a high-pitched squeal as they moved along the track. He recognized it now as a cry for oil. That would be his responsibility, and he made an absent note to take care of it before someone asked him.
Willa’s eyes lifted to the top of the rolling door. “You’ll take care of that?”
And just like that, he was her employee again. “Yes, ma’am.”
One of her eyebrows lifted, but she made no comment, and after a moment, she walked on.
Israel watched her, and when she was gone, he went looking for the oilcan.
That night he lay in bed on his back, his head cradled in his palms, his lashes at half-mast. Three bunks away, Zach was whistling through his nose. Beside him, Cutter ground his teeth.
Israel hardly noticed.
His thoughts were occupied by something Willa had said that afternoon and never got around to explaining, or perhaps never meant to. The snippet had stayed with him through supper, nagged at him during the lasso lesson, and kept repeating itself during card play with Annalea. After asking him to pass the bread plate three times, Happy demanded to know if he was taking a train of thought back to Chicago. Zach threatened to lasso his neck if he didn’t pay attention. Annalea was perhaps the most direct. She threw her cards at him when he was too long taking his turn.
The way I behaved when you kissed me.
That’s what Willa had said. He was recalling it out of context but that was hardly important, and it was going to keep him up all night if he didn’t get an answer to what the hell she had meant by it.
* * *
Willa’s eyes flew open and she sat straight up in bed. She did not know what had disturbed her sleep, but her first instinct was to look toward the bed where Annalea slept. The oil lamp, which Annalea insisted should remain burning until she fell asleep, flickered ever so faintly now, but its light was sufficient for Willa to make out the top of Annalea’s head above the blankets. She listened closely for the sound of her breathing and heard nothing that provoked her concern, no labored breaths or congestion, no coughing or fevered murmurings.
Relieved that she had been startled awake by something other than a problem with Annalea, she turned back the covers and put her legs over the side of the bed. As soon as she set her toes on the floor, cold penetrated the soles of her feet in spite of the thick woolen socks she was wearing.
When the disturbance occurred again, Willa had no difficulty identifying what it was. She stood and padded quietly to the window. The scratching sound had come from there. Where the hell is John Henry? she wondered. The hound should have howled, should still be howling for that matter, but the space where he slept at the foot of Annalea’s bed was empty, and he had not yet appeared.
Willa parted the faded blue gingham curtains and peered out between the panels. Well, she thought, surveying the moonlit scene that confronted her, she had found John Henry and solved the mystery of why the traitorous dog had not made a sound.
He was cradled like a baby in Israel McKenna’s arms having his belly rubbed and no doubt being told what a very good dog he was.
She wanted to bang her forehead against the glass but feared that the percussion would wake Annalea. Instead, she carefully raised the window a few inches and knelt on the floor so she could speak through the opening. The rush of cold air made her rethink her choice.
“What are you doing here?” she whispered harshly. “And don’t tell me you’re returning John Henry. I won’t believe you. You probably stole him in the first place.”
Israel stepped closer to the window. “I want to talk to you.” His dark brows lifted a fraction. “Did you just growl at me?”
She thought she might have, but she was not going to admit it. “I’m coming out,” she hissed. “And I’m taking John Henry back!”
She closed the window with more authority than she’d intended and immediately looked over her shoulder to see if Annalea was stirring. She was not, and Willa was able to release the breath in her ballooned lungs. Willa rose, and the curtains fell back into place, but not before Israel snared her attention with his careless and charming grin.
She quelled an urge to stick out her tongue because it was immature, and lacked dignity. That, and he could no longer see it anyway.
Willa shrugged into her heavy woolen robe and belted it tight. The hem of her flannel nightgown fluttered around her ankles as she hurried to the kitchen to find her boots. She sat down to yank them on and then bounced to her feet as though
she had springs in her knees and was out the door moments after that.
Israel was not waiting for her on the back porch. He was also not standing in the yard where she could see him. Was he still loitering outside her window? Willa ignored the steps and jumped off the side of the porch instead and walked around the corner of the house. Israel was still there, although he had moved about four yards back from the window. She supposed that was his idea of being discreet.
Willa employed long strides to reach him, and when she did, she held out her arms for John Henry. One of the hound’s long, black-tipped, brown ears was draped over Israel’s arm, and his belly was still exposed. He would probably howl if Israel passed him over now. Willa dropped her hands to her sides and was immediately beset by a shiver. She folded her arms in front of her and tucked her hands under her armpits. In another moment, her teeth would begin to chatter.
“I’m here. What is it?”
He looked her over. “We can’t really talk here, can we? You’ll freeze.”
“Exactly my thought. Hand over John Henry so I can go back inside.”
“I’ll put John Henry in the house, but you and I are going to talk in the barn.”
“I’m not going into the barn with you.”
“Why not? We were there this afternoon.”
“That’s right. It was afternoon, not the middle of the night.”
“It’s not the middle.” He stopped scratching John Henry’s belly to put up a hand to halt her protest. “All right. I’ll concede that it’s night. My point is that it is a difference without distinction. We’ll have privacy and warmth in the barn just as we had earlier.”
“Yes, but—” She hesitated, glanced warily in the direction of the barn, which loomed like a great black hulk against the night sky, and then shook her head. “It’s not a good idea. Whatever it is, it can wait until morning.”
“Not if I am going to be able to sleep tonight.”
If he had reported this to her as a complaint, Willa would have summarily dismissed it, but it was not issued as a grievance, only as a matter of fact, and since she had some experience with sleepless nights of late, she had a measure of sympathy for this state. Some of that must have shown in her expression because he angled his head toward the barn and lifted his brows once more in question.
“All right,” she said at last. “But let me put John Henry in the house first.”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea. John Henry should come with us. You can take him back when we’re finished. Besides, if someone wakes and wonders where you are, you can say you were looking for him.”
It seemed reasonable, but that only made Willa question the soundness of her thinking. “I don’t think anyone is going to miss me,” she said, falling into step beside Israel. “Happy was tippling last night, so he won’t wake until coffee’s on, maybe not even then. And Annalea slept through you scratching at the window.”
“That was John Henry.” Israel took one of the hound’s short forepaws in his hand and waved it at Willa.
A bubble of laughter swelled in her throat and she snorted softly to cover it. “I don’t understand you,” she said when she could trust herself to speak. “Is there anything you take seriously?”
“Is there anything you don’t?”
“That is not an answer to my question.”
“Nothing gets past you, does it?”
Willa set her teeth together hard, but she freely admitted to herself that it had as much to do with the cold as with Israel’s failure to respond in a straightforward manner.
When they reached the barn, Willa pulled the door open because Israel was still cradling John Henry. It moved soundlessly on the track. She looked up and then back at Israel as she slipped through the narrow space she’d made for them.
“Yes, ma’am. I fixed it.”
She stepped to the side when he came through and closed the door. “Don’t do that,” she said. “Please.”
“Do what?”
“Call me ‘ma’am.’”
“Cutter does.”
“I didn’t ask Cutter to marry me.”
“Well, there you have me.”
“And you don’t say it the way Cutter does. He’s respectful. You’re . . .”
“Not?”
“That’s right,” she said quietly. “You’re not, not really.”
“Hmm.” Israel set John Henry down. “Stay where you are. I’m going to get a lantern. I don’t want you to hurt yourself.”
“That’s kind of you, but I know this barn”—Willa paused when she heard his soft “oof” punctuated by “damn”—“better than you.” She bent to scratch behind John Henry’s ears as he rubbed his head against her leg. She whispered to the dog, “I do know it better, don’t I? Hmm, don’t I?”
“I can hear you.”
She chuckled and stood, and her eyes gradually did as much adjusting to the dark as they were able. Narrow beams of moonlight slipped through cracks in the sides of the barn and she could make out the darker shapes of the loft ladder, the wheelbarrow, and the wagon. A bench was situated cockeyed near the first stall, and she imagined that’s what Israel had bumped into. She did not take everything seriously, and she could have told him that just then because his bump in the dark had made her smile.
Willa blinked furiously and shielded her eyes when the lantern light suddenly appeared in the same direction she was looking. Israel turned back the wick until the light was reduced to a soft glow that only bathed the area immediately around him. For Willa, it was like a beacon, and she started toward it, John Henry at her side.
“Watch out for the bench,” Israel said as she neared it. “It jumped in front of me.”
“I heard,” she said dryly. She took an exaggerated step sideways to show him she was skirting the bench. John Henry went under it. Several of the horses nickered as she passed their stalls, many more slept undisturbed. Felicity put her nose over the stall door and Willa rubbed it. “No treats, girl.”
Israel lowered the lantern when she reached him.
Willa looked right and left and wondered what it was about this particular place that had made Israel choose it. They were standing in the aisle with stalls and benches on either side. One of the benches was covered with grooming brushes, files, a horseshoe, and a couple of nails. The other held a double stack of horse blankets. Before she could ask if he meant for them to talk here, he pointed to the bench with the blankets.
“You take some, I’ll take some.”
Since she was shaking with cold, his suggestion had a lot to recommend it. What he intended to do with them, though, had her raising her brows.
“That’s an empty stall behind you. There’s also the hayloft and the wagon bed. You choose.”
“I choose to go back to the house.” And in the event he misunderstood or pretended to, she added, “Without you.”
“All right, then we’ll just stay where we are.” He hung the lantern on a nail and picked up one of the blankets. He snapped it open and whipped it around Willa’s shoulders like a cape. She clasped the tails in one fist to keep it secure. He shifted the rest of the blankets to the floor except for one that he spread across the bench. “You can sit there,” he told her. “Do you want another for your lap?”
“Yes, please.” As soon as she sat down, he tucked another blanket around her. She huddled under them, breathing in the scents of horse and leather and not minding in the least.
Israel cleared a space for himself on the other bench and chose one blanket to put under him. He sat and stretched his legs, crossing them at the ankles. John Henry nosed around Israel’s boots for a few moments and then settled himself beside them. “And here we are.”
Willa gave him one of her better cynical looks, the corner of her mouth ever so slightly pulled to one side, her eyes fixed on his face with a dead-on stare. “Y
ou had these benches in mind when you walked back here. I know you did. So why did you ask me to choose between the stall, the hayloft, and the wagon bed?”
“Optimism?”
She made a dismissive sound at the back of her throat.
“Very well,” he said. “Are you all right? Warm enough?”
She was neither of those things, but she did not want to delay whatever discussion he meant for them to have so she said, “Yes.”
He nodded once. “I want to ask you about something you said this afternoon.”
Confident that he could not see her tense beneath the heavy blankets, she kept her expression carefully neutral. It was beyond extraordinary that Israel wanted to discuss Eli Barber.
“You mentioned your behavior when we kissed . . . it keeps—”
Willa could not help herself. She interrupted. “When you kissed me. I recall saying ‘when you kissed me.’ I was clear on that when I said it and when it happened.”
“Oh.” Israel removed his hat, set it beside him, and rested the back of his head against the stall. He regarded her from under his lashes, shielding her from the amusement in his eyes. “So that’s important to you. That I initiated the kiss, I mean.”
“It’s accurate.”
“It is. I kissed you first.”
“Mm-hmm.”
“And you kissed me back.”
Willa felt her throat closing. She made a strangled sound. She wanted to ask him why he wasn’t talking about Eli Barber but knew her voice would not support the question.
“As first kisses go,” he said, casting his mind back, “I thought it went well.” He began to tick off points on his fingers. “We did not bump noses, which can sometimes be funny, but is unfortunate when there is injury. And yes, it’s happened to me. Another point in our favor was that it was a whiskey kiss. We’d each had a glass, remember? No mingling of sour mash and milk, say. Third, you have a splendid mouth with an intriguing slant that fits quite nicely against mine. I think you must have noticed that. Neither of us was aggressive with our tongues, and a chaste kiss is a good beginning, I always think. Are you sure you’re all right, Willa? You sound as if you might be choking.”
