by Lisa Cooke
Time to change the subject. “What made you decide to move here from New York?”
“I, uh, thought it would be a good place to raise Julia.”
“She’s a lovely child.”
He nodded, then moved another one of his books. If he didn’t quit scooting them around, he was going to wear out the bindings.
“Sometimes,” he said, “I don’t know exactly what to do for her.”
Katie stopped sorting the items in John’s desk drawer and raised her eyes to him. He sat on the floor near the bookcase, staring off in some unknown thought or maybe a memory, a black book forgotten in his hand. She felt a need to bring him back. “You just love her,” she said, because it was the best advice she had at the moment.
He lifted his eyes to hers before he looked quickly away. “So sometimes love is necessary?”
“It is for children,” she answered, and she knew it was true. Her family loved her, and that love was the only thing that had kept her going. She’d give love to her children, whether she felt it toward her husband or not. Through the years, she could learn to love him or at least respect him and that was close enough.
Their discussion became much less personal after that, thank goodness. And as a result, by afternoon, the office was finished. All books put away, all crates emptied.
Katie sighed with pleasure when the last item, a picture of Julia, was placed on the mantel. “Done, at last.”
John grunted. “But we should’ve stopped hours ago. Now I’m afraid it’s going to turn dark while you’re walking home.”
Katie glanced toward the window. The sun was setting and by the time she made her hour’s walk home, it would no doubt be dark. “I’ll be fine. I walk in the dark all the time.” She tried to act nonchalant. Normally the night wouldn’t frighten her, but lately she’d been hearing something in the woods. She’d just be sure to carry her stick.
And she did carry it, all the way home and even while she ran the last bit after a growl interrupted the quiet of the forest.
Chapter Thirteen
Katie turned the frying chicken in the skillet one more time before she drained the boiled potatoes and added a glob of butter. Freddie should be arriving anytime now and even though he didn’t seem to eat much, Grandpa’s appetite always picked up whenever there was company.
“Did you bake a cake, Katie girl?” Pa ambled into the kitchen to steal a taste of the potatoes as Katie mashed.
“No, I didn’t have any sugar.”
“I thought the doc was payin’ you so you could get sugar and such.”
“He’s going to pay me. He just hasn’t yet.” She twisted the masher into the buttery white potatoes, knowing she didn’t need to add salt. Grandma had been through earlier, taking care of that necessity.
“If he ain’t goin’ to pay you, there’s no reason for you to be traipsin’ off to his office so much.”
“He’s going to pay me,” she repeated, fighting the urge to rap Pa’s knuckles with the masher.
“I still think you oughta quit. There’s things here what needs done.”
Her anger flared. “I’m doing my chores.”
Pa snorted. “Still ain’t right, you being around him so much. He ain’t married, right?”
Grinding the masher into the potatoes, she moved the bowl away from Pa’s reach. If he was going to insist on irritating her, at least she didn’t have to let him taste the potatoes. “He’s a widower.”
“No wife around?”
“No, but John’s a good man, and he’s never been anything but respectful to me.”
“You call him John?”
Katie felt her face heat. “Of course not. I call him ‘Dr. Keffer,’ and he calls me ‘Miss Napier.’ He’s always a gentleman.”
Thank goodness, Freddie arrived and Pa forgot about John as he hurried to the front room. It took most of dinner before Katie’s temper calmed enough for her to join in the conversation. She hoped Freddie didn’t think her sullen behavior was on his account. He’d obviously gone to a great deal of trouble to get ready for this evening.
He must have spent half the day and half a jar of pomade to get his wild hair to lie down against his head like it did. He didn’t say much except “Mighty fine meal, Katie,” which he said no less than fifteen times, and each time he did, Pa commented on what a fine young man he was.
Katie suspected he was a fine young man, but when it came time to sit and chat after dinner, Pa had him out the door to chop firewood before she could talk to him at all.
“Pa,” Katie complained as they headed toward the door, “he’s a guest.”
“He don’t mind, and we got to see if he’s work brittle.” He yelled to Freddie, “Do you mind helpin’ out, boy?”
“No, sir, Mr. Napier,” was Freddie’s reply, and Katie wished she’d rapped Pa over the head with her potato masher. Maybe it would’ve knocked some sense into him.
The chopping session lasted until dark and until Freddie mashed his thumb between two logs. But Katie had to give him credit. He didn’t complain while she bandaged the bloodied nail, despite the fact that it had to be hurting something fierce.
“I’m sorry Pa had you doing that,” she said, tying the bandage in place while they sat at the kitchen table.
“Oh, it’s all right,” he said, but for the first time since she’d known him, his face was white instead of red. Most of his curls had sprung free of the pomade, and the glisten of moisture across his upper lip caused her to suspect he was close to passing out.
“Would you like to sit a spell on the front porch?” she asked, figuring the least she could do was spare him from an evening of visiting with her family, especially Pa. He was liable to have the boy putting shingles on the roof if she didn’t do something now.
“I’d like that,” he said, the color returning to his face. She led him from the kitchen to the front door, where they put on their coats and stepped onto the darkened porch.
Katie took a seat in her questioning rocker, as she was beginning to think of it, while Freddie took the rocker beside her. She realized he hadn’t been heavy enough to creak a single board.
“Freddie?”
“Yes’m?”
“Why do you want to marry me?” Maybe she shouldn’t have asked him so bluntly. His chair quit rocking, and she wasn’t sure, but she thought he swallowed his tongue. “Freddie?”
“Uh.”
Oh dear. Was he about to swoon?
“I…” he started again, and Katie felt guilty for putting him in such a spot, but before she could let him off the hook, he answered her question. “You’re a fine cook.”
Him too? She was going to start burning her meals from now on.
“And,” he continued. “I’ve always been sweet on you, Katie.”
She smiled. Finally someone who had actual feelings for her. “You have?”
Her response must have given him courage because she could see his head nodding in the dark. “Yes’m, I sure have.”
“I think that’s important.”
Freddie didn’t respond. He just bid her good night and walked off her porch to his waiting horse.
Katie watched him ride away, thinking that life truly was full of surprises. Who’d have thought that poor Freddie would manage to top the other two after all?
John looked at his dismantled library and cringed. The days he’d spent categorizing and sorting all his prized books had been disheveled and disorganized in a matter of moments. Maybe not moments, but it had been much easier to undo his work than it had been to do it. He hoped this mess would last long enough to get the locals switched to him for their medicinal needs.
The slight guilt he felt dispelled quickly when he reminded himself that Katie would be busy with a new husband soon and would probably enjoy the reprieve from tending to others. Unfortunately, the guilt was replaced with another feeling he didn’t care to investigate just now.
He bounded down the steps to answer the door chime, slightly perturb
ed to discover that Mrs. Adkins and Julia had beaten him to it.
“Hi, Katie,” Julia squealed, hugging Katie’s skirts before she’d even made it into the hallway.
Katie laughed and handed her coat to Mrs. Adkins, who also seemed pleased as punch to see her.
“Would you like some tea, Katie?” Mrs. Adkins asked.
“No, thank you. It’s actually warm out today.”
Julia tugged impatiently on Katie’s sleeve. “Can we take a walk, then?”
Katie stooped down to Julia’s level. “I’m not sure. I’ll have to see what your pa wants me to do.”
“I think a walk would be fine,” John interrupted from the stairs. The longer it took them to straighten up his library, the less likely he’d need to destroy another part of his home. “Maybe we can go to Frank’s store later, if Mrs. Adkins has anything she’d like us to pick up.”
Mrs. Adkins grinned, and said, “I think I can find a few things,” before she took Julia’s hand and led her to the kitchen.
Katie turned toward John, her face still shining with a beautiful smile, and his mouth suddenly went dry. Her gaze dropped to the floor, and the pink tinge to her cheeks told him he must have been staring. He hadn’t meant to. Wouldn’t have, in fact, if she hadn’t looked so damned radiant.
“I’m hoping you could help me with my library,” he blurted, trying to fill the embarrassing silence. “I haven’t had a chance, and as you know, I’m not very good at organizing.” He turned and headed up the stairs, hoping she’d followed.
Her light laughter behind him confirmed that she had. “I think you may be good at it, just not very fast.”
He smiled, because he knew she couldn’t see him, and because he couldn’t stop it anyway, and led her into the upstairs library. The mess was impressive if he’d say so himself.
“Oh. My.”
He turned back to see Katie frozen at the door. “This is going to take a while,” she muttered, and he certainly hoped so. It was one of his best disasters.
Katie spent several minutes walking from pile to pile, her slender hand coming to her lips every once in a while, her head shaking from side to side as though she didn’t know where to start. He might have overdone it.
“Maybe if we sort the fiction from the nonfiction first?” he offered, afraid if he didn’t, she would scream and run from the room.
“Yes.” She forced a frightened smile, causing him to chuckle in response.
“Don’t tell me you’re faint of heart?”
“Of course not, but…” She turned in a small circle to survey the room. “Where will we sort them to?”
He looked around the room as well, noticing that in his haste to empty the shelves, he’d failed to leave any space on the floor for resorting. That was going to add to the time it took to fix this mess. Brilliant.
He shrugged. “I guess that will need to be our first job.”
Sighing, she nodded, then began moving books. Being as tiny as she was, she could only move a few at a time. Being as sneaky as he was, he did the same. Even at that, the little woman was quite a worker, and she was making way too much progress.
Time to slow her down. “How’s it coming with the fiancé choosing?”
She stopped carrying and frowned. “Not well, I’m afraid.”
“What’s wrong?”
She turned toward him, her brows still furrowed. “I can’t seem to make a decision. They all have good points and bad ones, and I don’t know what to do.”
“I’m sure you’ll figure it out eventually.”
“Would you help me?”
Help her? Damn. “How could I possibly help you do that?”
She sat on a stack of books. “I’ve been thinking that maybe I need to make a list of what’s important in a husband. Then I could use that to sort them out.”
“Sounds like a good plan.” And not one he needed to help with.
“But I’m not sure what a good husband should be like. I’ve never had one.”
“Neither have I,” he noted, hoping she’d leave him out of this.
“No, but you’ve been married. What’s important in that relationship?”
What’s important in a marriage? Love? Trust? Sex? Hell, he couldn’t point out that one. “I think that changes according to the individual. You’ll have to decide for yourself what’s important.” Then again, stopping to make a list would take up considerable time. He knew he was going to regret this. “But I think making a list is a good idea. I’ll help any way I can.”
He sauntered downstairs to his office to retrieve some paper and pen and ink. A return saunter ate up a little more time, but his sauntering might have backfired. By the time he made it back to the library, she all but had a spot cleared on the floor for sorting books.
“I have some paper.” He handed her his supplies, so she couldn’t clean anymore, then proceeded clearing the top of the desk in the room. The fact that he cleared it by moving the books to the spot she’d just made only added to his satisfaction.
“Now.” He pulled a chair up to the desk and motioned for her to sit. “Shall we begin?”
Katie wrote the names of her fiancés down the side of the paper: Randy, Harold, and Freddie.
“I’m not sure where to start.”
He shrugged and scooted another chair up to the opposite side of the desk to face her. “I guess you should start with what you think you want in a husband.”
Tapping the pen against her chin, she stared off for a second to think. “He’d have to be smart. Not too smart, but I don’t want a man who can’t think or cipher.”
“Intelligence seems like a good quality.”
She nodded and wrote it on her list. He’d hoped by giving her the task of actually writing the list, it would take a little longer, but her quick and fluid writing dispelled that hope.
“How about money?” he asked.
“I want him to be willing to work, but he doesn’t have to be rich, just not too poor. I want my kids to have things if they need them.”
“So not too smart. Not too dumb. Not too rich and not too poor?”
She frowned. “I’m not doing very well, am I?”
“Not too.”
“Oh.”
“But maybe if you keep going, you’ll be able to narrow it down a bit.”
Nodding in agreement, she looked off again before she said, “I think he should be handsome.”
He remembered her telling him he was handsome, and his heart picked up a beat. “And why should that matter?”
“If I’m going to look at a man for the next fifty years, I want to enjoy it.”
“Fair enough. Does it matter if he’s too handsome?”
Her cheek dented with its dimple as she responded to his teasing. “A man can’t be too handsome.”
“Ah. Just too dumb?”
“Some of them are.”
He chuckled. “I think I’ve met a few of those, myself.”
“Then you understand my concern.” She studied her paper again; then with a raising of her pen in an unspoken aha, she added, “He has to be kind. I won’t tolerate a man who isn’t kind to me or my children.”
“Nor should you.”
“And he should love me.”
“I thought you said love wasn’t important.”
“I said I didn’t have to love him. I didn’t say anything about the other way around.”
John laughed and Katie’s eyes shone.
“Is that all you need on your list?”
“No,” she answered, suddenly turning serious.
“What’s missing?”
“He has to be a good kisser.”
Kisser? His eyes riveted to her mouth as he thought of kissing her full, soft lips. Her tongue darted out to moisten the lower one, and he felt it in his gut…or maybe a little lower. Would she like his kiss? He suspected he would like hers. Clearing his throat, he attempted to jerk his mind back from its sidetrack. “Why would that matter?”
She blushed, and he realized what a stupid question he’d asked. “I want children,” she murmured, writing the last item on her list. “I imagine some kissing would be expected.”
“Yes, well.” He searched for the perfect comeback. Finding none, he simply said, “Now that you have your list, maybe we should get back to work. You can always add more to it later.”
Katie knew exactly what she would be adding to her list later. When her husband looked at her the way John had, it had to do things to her insides the way John did. Those warm bubbles stayed in her insides until they stopped for lunch, and Julia bounced into the library ready for her walk.
They hadn’t accomplished much. Between her list making and John’s snail pace, very few books had been sorted and none had been put away. It was odd really, how a man as big as John could have no more strength than he did. She carried stacks of books as big as the ones he carried, if not bigger. Maybe he had a bad back like Pa.
“Mrs. Adkins told me what she wants from Mr. Davis’s store,” Julia said, her coat already buttoned under her chin, “but she said I couldn’t tell you until we get there.”
“Oh,” Katie said, raising her brows. “Then we’d better hurry in case it’s something important for dinner.”
Julia’s excitement was contagious and by the time they’d put on their coats and headed toward the store, there were smiles on each face. Julia grabbed Katie’s hand, then John’s, forming a human link that allowed her to lift her feet occasionally and dangle between them to avoid water puddles. Of course there were no water puddles, but one can’t be too careful at the age of five.
“Oh, look!” Julia squealed, as a butterfly flittered past. She pulled Katie’s and John’s hands together instructing them to “Hold my spot” as she chased after the elusive insect.
Their pace slowed considerably. John’s large hand engulfed Katie’s, and she suspected he was as uncomfortable with this as she was. Should she pull away? She didn’t want to, but they weren’t courting, and what would her fiancés say if they heard about this? Maybe if she loosened her grip, he could release her hand if he chose.
