“Well, thank you. I am honored.”
So the three of them, Luke, Rose, and Emily, sat down and enjoyed her fried chicken dinner. Emily felt awed, thrilled, stunned. Around her she could hear the sounds of silver clinking on dishes, of the other boxes being auctioned off, and the awkward moment when Reverend Ackerman himself finally had to bid on Clara’s box because no one else did. It was all there, buzzing in the background. But what she heard in her mind, repeated over and over, was Luke saying, I just took everybody out of the running.
~~*~*~*~~
After everyone had eaten, Reverend Ackerman announced that with the money earned at this event, added to proceeds from earlier bake sales and bazaars, the church had achieved its financial goal and the roof could finally be replaced instead of patched. Applause and cheering rippled through the well-fed group, and Clara Thurmon took advantage of the moment to bow as if she had personally donated every penny and cooked every meal.
Then the Duffy brothers took their place at the edge of the floor and the dancing began. Luke held out his hand to Emily.
“What?”
“Come on with me, Emily.” He tucked her hand in the crook of his arm and pulled her toward the dance floor. The drumming sound of feet on wood planking kept time with the lively music.
She resisted. “Luke! I can’t do this.” When she’d hoped that he’d ask her to dance, she hadn’t realized how she’d feel if he actually did.
“Do you mean to tell me that an etiquette teacher doesn’t know how to dance?”
“Yes, of course I do—at least I used to. But I haven’t danced in a very long time. I’m not sure I remember.”
He gave her a disbelieving look. “Yes, you do. You’re just being shy again. Your shoulders are rounded.”
She gaped at him. Had he studied her so closely that he knew her gestures?
“Come on,” he repeated and twirled her out to the floor. She feared that she’d trample all over his feet, but he led her with ease, and the steps came back to her. How nice it was to be held in his arms, to be able to look up at his face instead of down, as had often been the case with the dance partners of her girlhood. Smelling of bay rum, soap, and fresh air, he was surprisingly graceful and light on his feet, and the music and rising stars combined to make it a magical experience. She was aware of everything about him—the way he looked, the texture of his wool coat under her hand, the warmth of his touch at her waist. Onlookers watched them with approving and admiring glances, and Emily, wearing her new dress and held in the arms of her handsome farmer-prince, felt like Cinderella at the ball. Haunting thoughts of Cora, Belinda, and the uncertainty of her position fell away with each passing moment.
“Did you get your money’s worth at dinner?” she asked, before realizing how it sounded.
His smoke-gray eyes gleamed with a raw flicker in the setting sun. “I got enough food, if that’s what you mean, Mrs. Becker,” he said next to her ear. “But I’m still hungry.”
She met his gaze, her mouth open slightly. There was no doubt, even in naïve Emily’s mind, what he meant, and his words sent a delicious shiver of anticipation through her. His eyes touched her here and there, as blatant as a hand, yet unnoticed by others. Her heart throbbed, and though she supposed it might be due to the exertion of dancing, she knew it was more than that. The air seemed to grow very heavy, and the music and chatter around her faded away into the background. There were only Emily and Luke, waltzing under a twilight sky. If they were truly alone, what would he do? she wondered. She had only a vague idea, but it thrilled her just the same.
At last, the weather seemed to be working against them and the wind had picked up. Even the Duffy brothers gave up their spot by the dance floor. Napkins and loose tablecloths blew across the grounds, and the stiff gusts flattened women’s skirts against their legs. People were gathering the belongings and children to head for home. Luke glanced at the darkening sky. “We’re going to get a storm. We’d better pack our things and get home. You don’t want to get caught in the rain in your new dress.”
No, she didn’t. “Where’s Rose?”
Luke looked around. “There she is, talking to Billy Reed.”
Emily followed his gaze. “Billy Reed? Really?”
“Why, do you know him?”
“Um, no, I just heard his name once or twice.” Emily had never told him about Rose’s scuffle with the boy. She worried that they were fighting again. But when she spotted them, they were sitting on the church steps and seemed to be getting along just fine. Rose was even holding a pink wildflower. Emily smiled. She guessed that Billy no longer thought that Rose’s dress looked like it came from a carnival sideshow.
“Rose!” Luke called. “Let’s get going! That sky is going to open up.”
“Aw, Daddy! Just a few more minutes?”
“Nope, now!”
With a last glance over her shoulder at Billy Reed, Rose came dragging over with great reluctance. Within a few minutes, goodbyes had been said and they were in the wagon, heading up the hill for home. It was hours yet before midnight, Emily thought, but Cinderella had to leave the ball.
This time, though, Cinderella was leaving with her farmer-prince.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
After everyone had changed out of their Sunday best, there was work to do. Luke unhitched the team and went to feed the stock. Emily heated water on the stove, and she and Rose washed the dirty dishes they’d brought home from church. Then Emily sent Rose upstairs to get ready for bed.
Outside along the western horizon, a thin line glowed with a faint, eerie green-white light, and dark clouds had made night come on two hours early. The wind still rustled the trees and made one of the shutters on a henhouse window bang back and forth.
Emily searched for Luke from her own window, but she saw lamp light still pouring from the barn door. What would happen when he came in? She glanced at her own bed and wondered if she would sleep alone here tonight, or share it with her husband. Nervous anticipation shimmied down her spine. Would he be impatient and demanding? Gentle and patient?
Finally she changed into her own nightclothes and walked down the hall to check on Rose. The girl sat on the edge of her bed, brushing her hair. Well, ripping at it would have been a more accurate description. She still didn’t have all of her ladylike behaviors down pat. But what an improvement had taken place in the last few weeks, Emily marveled. She still had her implacable moments—a whiny response, a loud, exasperated sigh, an occasional hint of sullenness—but since her father had begun spending more time with her, she’d made great strides toward becoming the well-behaved young lady that Luke so wanted her to be.
Emily paused in her doorway and watched as Rose tugged at a tangle, pulling out long dark strands with her impatience. “Here, let me help you with that. You’ll go bald if you pull that hard.”
“No, I won’t,” Rose said, giggling at Emily’s exaggeration. She handed Emily her brush and turned her back. Emily pulled the bristles through the strands with long, gentle strokes.
“Did you have a good time at the social?”
“Oh, yes! It was so much fun watching people dance and seeing kids from school. Daddy hasn’t liked to go to dances and things. Maybe he will now. Especially since he danced with you.”
“Maybe. Did you make up with Billy Reed?” Emily asked.
Rose glanced over her shoulder briefly, giving Emily a view of a scarlet blush that reached her hairline. With supreme effort, she suppressed a grin.
“He said my dress looked nice.”
“And it does. It takes a big person to admit when they’re wrong.”
“He didn’t exactly do that.”
“Perhaps not in so many words, but he made the effort. Apologizing is very hard for some people to do, and that’s too bad. Sometimes people hold grudges, and that’s bad, too.”
“I told him I was sorry for beating him up.”
Now Emily did smile. “I’m very proud of you.” She continued to work
the tangles out of Rose’s hair, and the child relaxed under the soothing touch.
“What’s it like when you’re in love with someone?” Rose’s voice had turned low and sleepy-sounding.
Emily was unprepared for the question. What did she know about being in love with a man, anyway? “Why? Do you think you’re in love with Billy?”
“No! But if it ever happens to me I’d like to know what to expect.”
What to expect. What could she tell her, she, Emily, who had so little experience it was worthless? “When you find the right person, you’ll know,” she hedged.
“Like the way you feel about Daddy?”
The brush stilled in Emily’s hand and she swallowed. “Well, I certainly like and respect him.”
“But you love him, too.” Obviously Rose took this for granted, despite knowing the circumstances that had brought Emily here.
“Y-yes, Rose, I do.” It was an indisputable fact, she realized. She admitted this truth to herself while admitting it to the girl. She loved Luke. And she had for some time now.
“Well, how does it feel?” Rose pressed.
Emily put down the brush, unwilling to share feelings that she herself was discovering now, for the first time in her life. She wanted to examine her feelings and learn the answer in the privacy of her own heart.
“We’ll talk about it later. It’s a very personal subject, and one that deserves more time than we have tonight. Now you should be in bed. We’ve all had a busy day.”
That seemed to satisfy Rose, and she climbed under the covers. “Will you stay for a while, Miss Emily?” She patted the empty space next to her.
“Of course.” Emily smoothed Rose’s dark bangs off her forehead. She felt such a rush of motherly emotion for Rose, it was almost as if she were related by blood. That must be how Luke felt, she realized. It didn’t matter that someone else had begun her life—she was theirs now, Luke’s and hers. And she would do whatever it took to keep Rose safe and happy.
~~*~*~*~~
Luke came into the house after feeding the stock and rubbing down the team, expecting to find Emily waiting for him in the kitchen. When a search of the whole downstairs turned up no one, he climbed the steps. Maybe she’d gone to her room to wait for him. He felt pretty certain that with everything that had been said and implied at the social, this would be the night that he would consummate his marriage to Emily Cannon Becker. He’d even washed at the pump again in anticipation of a night spent in his wife’s slender arms. He would carry her to his bed and begin by kissing her smooth throat, then work his way up to her lips and temple, and back down again to her breasts. Just envisioning his plan gave him an intolerable ache that only she could satisfy.
At the top of the stairs, he saw the lamp lighted in her room and her door invitingly ajar. Suddenly uncertain and a little self-conscious, he ran his hands through his hair. This was the damnedest spot he’d found himself in for a long time. Luke Becker had never had trouble making love to women. Except, it seemed, when his feelings ran deeper than his crotch, as they had with Belinda. And now, as they did with Emily. He didn’t want to examine them very closely—it was still too new, too strange to think of caring for another woman besides Belinda.
He stopped short of buffing his boots on the backs of his pants legs and started what seemed like a very long walk toward Emily’s bedroom. Halfway down the hall, he saw a light in Rose’s room, too. Well, hell, was she still awake? That might put a real crimp in things.
He stopped in the open doorway and looked in. A hush fell upon his spirit and the feelings he’d been harboring in his heart surged forward. Rose was asleep, all right, his small, dark-haired princess. And next to her, on top of the blankets but sharing the pillow, slept his fair-haired princess, Emily.
Luke’s smile was rueful as he studied them and realized that all of his amorous intentions had just been postponed for some other night. But he went to his own room with a full heart and a sense of contentment.
~~*~*~*~~
Rain. The first sound he became aware of was rain. Just a few scattered drops ticking on the roof and the siding. But that wasn’t what woke him. Luke had been listening to rain all of his life. In this part of the country everyone was used to it. The sound was as much a part of the background as birdsong and the east wind in the trees.
A sudden flash filled his bedroom with the white-hot light of a thousand candles, followed almost immediately by a horrendous clap of thunder that seemed to explode directly over the house and rattled the glass in the window frames.
“Jesus Christ!” He jumped out of bed and looked out his own window. Along the top of the oak tree in the front yard, St. Elmo’s Fire danced over the uppermost branches, outlining them in moving veins of blue light.
Another lightning stroke touched the earth, this time hitting the oak with a noise like a dynamite blast. A blinding flash lit the tree trunk from top to base as if it burned from within. The intense heat of the electricity incinerated the leaves and limbs as it split it like a melon. Half of the burning tree crashed onto the henhouse and even from this distance he could hear the squawking of the frightened birds.
“Daddy!” Rose screamed from the hall.
“Luke?” Emily’s voice followed. “What’s happened?”
He ran out to the hallway and met them there. The lamp still burning in Rose’s room provided enough light for him to see his daughter clinging to Emily, her arms wrapped around her waist.
“The henhouse is on fire!” he said. He ran back to his room and pulled on his rubber boots, then charged downstairs and out the back door, dressed only in his drawers.
From one of the two windows in the old building he could see fluttering wings and high, leaping flames that were fed by dry straw in the nest boxes. The fallen half of the tree had crushed the roof, essentially destroying the little shed. Smoke poured from the gaping hole torn in the roof and the sickening stench of burning feathers, manure, and cooking chicken blew over him in waves. The henhouse was a loss but it was attached to the barn and he had to try to stop the fire’s progress. He ran to the well and pumped water into a bucket. It was more than one man could accomplish alone and yet he didn’t dare take the time to call for help. God, it seemed hopeless but he had to try. If the barn caught—
As he ran toward the fire, another fork of lightning lit up the sky and the yard, followed closely by a clap of thunder. High wind fanned the flames, making them rise and dance.
“Luke!”
He whirled and saw Emily and Rose illuminated by the orange-white glow. Emily had flung her shawl over her shoulders and Rose had tucked her nightgown into her overalls.
“Rose, can you work the pump? And Emily, grab the pail next to it and the one from the back porch,” he called over the roar of the fire and the wind and the thunder. They scampered to follow his orders, and soon they had a bucket brigade formed, such as it was, with only three of them to man it. The tree was green enough that Luke believed it would burn itself out, but the henhouse was just as old and dry as the barn wall it had been built against.
Bucket after bucket Luke poured on the flames with a growing sense of despair. He felt as if they were fighting the fire with teaspoons of water. Only sprinkles of rain fell, barely enough to even dampen the soil. Sweat poured off of him in rivers, from the heat and the exertion. Even Emily, when he had caught a glimpse of her face, bore a gleam of sweat and a look of grim determination overlaid with a mask of soot. Minutes seemed like hours—hours of struggling in this inferno of heat, noise, and smoke. If this was what the end of the world would look like, with fire, lightning, and wind, Luke figured he’d seen everything now.
One of the henhouse walls, in a sheet of flame and heat, groaned and began falling toward him.
Emily screamed. “Luke!”
He jumped back just in time to avoid being caught beneath its burning weight.
Finally, flames began to creep up the barn wall. Luke decided he’d better rescue the stock from th
e barn while he still could. He backed away, putting his arm out to the side to keep Emily behind him.
“We have to let it go,” he shouted over the din. “I’ve got to save the animals before the whole barn burns.”
“Can I help you?” she shouted back, but he shook his head.
“Stay here and look out for Rose. Just in case.” He looped an arm around Emily’s shoulders and kissed her. Just in case.
As soon as their lips met, it was as if fate had taken pity upon them. The sky, which had sent only pitchforks of fire and destruction, now opened over them.
It began to rain in earnest. Luke pulled away from Emily’s lips and looked up at the darkness.
The rain came in heavy, wind-lashed torrents, quickly soaking everything and turning the barnyard into a sea of mud. The henhouse began to hiss and steam, as if a trap door to hell had been slammed shut.
“Oh, Luke—we shouldn’t give up now, should we?” Emily asked.
“No! Rose!” he yelled to his daughter. “Keep pumping, honey! We might make it yet.” Rose, who’d left her post, ran back to it and began working the pump handle again.
The rain, cool and far-reaching, gave them a huge boost of help and courage. At last, the flames began to recede until he felt confident that the worst of the fire was out.
The downpour, a real gully washer, continued to fall, kicking up more steam and smoke from the ruined shelter. Eventually, the storm passed, heading in a northeasterly direction and the moon came out to cast its gray-white light on the scene. All that remained was a charred, smoking ruin that had been the henhouse, and half of the century-old oak tree that had once shaded the house with its graceful limbs. Thank God the tree had fallen toward the barn and not the house. He didn’t know what he would have done if the home he’d built with his own two hands had been destroyed.
Luke dropped his bucket, and Rose and Emily came to him. He picked up Rose and took them both into his embrace wordlessly. Briefly, they clung together, saying nothing, all shaking with fatigue, emotional weariness, and the chill of wet clothes.
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