Poppy might have curled her lips slightly at that.
The Amish neighbors in Bienenstock, the settlement in northern Wisconsin where they lived, had nicknamed Poppy and her two schwesters the Honeybee Sisters because they kept beehives, sold their honey at a local market, and made all sorts of wonderful-gute honey desserts.
He should have stopped at that, but he never could resist needling Poppy just a bit. “Think of all the boys who would never get the thrashing they deserved if you only had one good hand.”
She yanked her hand from his and winced at the sudden movement. “You know perfectly well that I don’t hit boys anymore. That was when I was a girl, and I’ve grown out of it. Though for you, I might be willing to make an exception.”
“I’d rather not be the exception.” He casually twined his fingers around her wrist again, pulled her hand close, then pressed gently in search of broken bones. “After I see you safely home, I think we can agree to stay away from each other unless your hand gets stuck in another car window. I prefer girls like Dinah Eicher who are pretty and demure and who don’t hit people. You don’t like boys at all.”
He saw something deep and aching flash in her eyes before she snatched her hand away from him again. With a speed he had not thought possible for a girl, let alone a girl with a bad hand, she took off down the road. “You don’t need to see me home,” she called over her shoulder.
“Jah, I do. What if you faint?” Dinah Eicher would have fainted.
“I don’t faint,” she said, without breaking her stride.
He frowned. Had he hurt her feelings?
He hadn’t said anything that they both didn’t already know.
With long strides, he followed her over the small bridge that marked the beginning of the Honeybee Sisters’ property, down the lane past the red barn with the orange door, and practically raced her to the house. He had definitely hurt her feelings. No one would be that diligent without reason.
Had it been his comment about liking pretty girls? Surely Poppy wouldn’t be bent out of shape over that. A girl like her didn’t much care if she was pretty. Luke liked girls who were delicate and graceful like flowers. Poppy was pretty in her own way—a fact Luke usually ignored because of all her other bad qualities. A boy would have had to be blind not to notice the shocking green eyes and hair the color of golden honey, the smattering of freckles across her nose or the hint of a dimple that appeared every time she moved her mouth. But he’d also be deerich, foolish, to forget the stubborn independence and hot temper that were as much a part of Poppy as her green eyes.
He wasn’t about to apologize for the “pretty” comment. Pretty is as pretty does, Mamm always said, and if Poppy wanted boys to think she was pretty, she would stop yelling at people and show some gratitude when someone risked his life to save hers.
Poppy didn’t get her feelings hurt. She punched people.
ZEBRA BOOKS are published by
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Copyright © 2016 by Jennifer Beckstrand
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ISBN: 978-1-4201-4020-0
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Sweet as Honey Page 34
