A Hope Unseen (Escape to the West Book 2)
Page 24
“My face?” She touched her hand to her cheek and hissed in a breath when pain flared.
“That’s where Pulaski hit you,” Daniel said. “Does it hurt a lot?”
“It’s not so bad,” she said. “Just bruised.”
He frowned. “I should have let Bess work on him for longer.”
The door crashed open and Will burst into the room. “I heard...” His eyes fell on Daniel. Daniel grinned at him. “It’s true. You can see.”
He nodded, still grinning.
Will closed his eyes for a few seconds, whispering, “Thank You.” Then he blinked a few times and cleared his throat. “That’s... um... great. That’s really great. It’s OK, isn’t it, Doc? His eyes, they’re OK?”
“As far as I can tell,” Doctor Wilson said. “It’s not unheard of for sight to spontaneously return after an injury like this, but I think we’re all thanking the Lord for this one.”
“Yeah,” Will said. He looked at Daniel. “What happened to your arm?”
“Long story,” he said. “The short version is Pulaski shot me. I’ll tell you the extended version later.”
“You gonna be OK?”
“It will take a while to heal,” Doctor Wilson said, “but it’s not a serious wound. I’d say Daniel should recover well. His wife is proving a very good nurse.”
Daniel lifted her hand and kissed the back, staring into her eyes. “She makes me feel better just by being around.”
“So you’re going to be one-armed for some time?” Will said. “You know, I’m beginning to think this is all just a ruse to get me to do most of the work on the farm.”
Daniel rolled his eyes. “You caught me.”
“Can I have a raise?”
“I’ll think about it.”
“Because I could get another job tomorrow if I needed to.”
“We’ll talk about it when we get home.”
“Smart, strong, skilled men like me are in high demand.”
“For what, being annoying?”
A warmth growing in her heart, Sara shook out a shirt the doctor had brought for Daniel to use, his being covered in blood and dirt, and helped him dress while listening to the brothers bicker.
It was the sound of home, and she loved it.
Chapter 35
Daniel’s eyes snapped open as a sudden movement next to him snatched him from sleep.
“Sara?”
He could just see her in the darkness of their bedroom, sitting up and gasping for breath, her hands covering her face.
He immediately sat up beside her, his heart pounding in fear. “Sara, what is it? What’s wrong?”
“I’m all right,” she said, her voice soft. “It was just a bad dream. I’m sorry I woke you.”
Ignoring the pain from his gunshot wound, he wrapped his arms around her. She turned to him, burying her face in his chest, and his heart broke to feel her so vulnerable.
“I’m here,” he murmured, tightening his arms around her. “You’re safe.”
“It was him,” she said. “It was dark and I knew he was in the house with me, but I couldn’t see him. And you were outside and you couldn’t get in. I was screaming for you and trying to get the door open, but it wouldn’t open and you were calling me and I tried and tried, but I couldn’t get to you and he was coming for me...” Her words faded as she clutched onto him, trembling in his arms.
Daniel couldn’t remember ever feeling so helpless, even when he was blind. It had been less than twenty-four hours since Pulaski tried to kill him and abduct Sara and he knew it was too much to expect that it wouldn’t affect her, but he hated to see her suffering.
“I’ll do anything,” he said quietly. “Just tell me what you need.”
“I don’t know what I need. I can’t stop thinking about how he was watching me all that time and I never knew. He was following me. He knew everything about me. I know I shouldn’t still be afraid now he’s in jail and I’m trying to be strong, I really am, but I don’t know how.”
He stroked his hand slowly down her hair. “Then let God be strong for you.”
She drew in a trembling breath and lifted her head. The faint moonlight shimmered in her eyes as she looked up at him, her lips pressed together.
He gently moved a strand of hair from her cheek. “There’s no shame in crying.”
A single tear grew in the corner of her eye and spilled over, drawing a gleaming track of wetness down her cheek. Another followed it.
He drew her back to him and she collapsed into his arms, dissolving into tears.
Closing his eyes, Daniel held her tight and began to pray. He didn’t stop until long after she had fallen asleep again.
Chapter 36
It had been a good day.
Daniel’s gunshot wound was healing well and he and Will had started construction on the new barn. Sara had even helped. They were still at the stage of planning and cutting the rough lumber to size, but she now knew how to join two pieces of wood together in five different ways and by the time the barn was completed she hoped to have acquired a whole host of carpentry skills.
They had also attended a wonderful wedding, with no less than a further three more due to take place in the near future. It was definitely the season for love in Green Hill Creek. Sara couldn’t have been happier.
“You were right about building the new barn more to the right,” Daniel said as they sat together on their bench, watching the swallows catching insects over the paddock, swooping at breakneck speed around Peapod and the horses. “The view is even better without the old one in the way. I should have thought of that the first time.”
She smiled. “At least this way you don’t have to move it for me.”
His quiet laugh vibrated into her side where they touched. “If you’d asked me, I would have.”
“I know.” She had no doubt he would do anything for her. That was what love did to a person. “I’d move barns for you too.”
“I believe you could,” he said. “There’s nothing you can’t do. Gardener, farmer, carpenter, and my personal favourite - baker of the tastiest cakes in the world. That was the best sorghum cake I’ve ever eaten.”
Bess raised her head to look at them for a moment before lowering it back to her paws, thumping her tail lazily on the wooden floor of the porch.
Sara felt as if she glowed under her husband’s praise. “There’s plenty left if you’d like more.”
He patted his stomach. “Better not or soon I won’t fit into my clothes.”
She shook her head, smiling. No one knew better than her that there wasn’t an ounce of extra fat on him.
She leaned her head against his shoulder and he tightened his arm around her. Although she loved almost everything she did on the farm, bar laundry day which had yet to grow on her, these were her favourite times, when they would simply sit on their bench together, enjoying the view and each other’s company. It was amazing how she’d spent so much time before she came imagining her life out here and yet the reality had turned out to be even better. She couldn’t even have begun to imagine how deep her love for Daniel would grow. Amongst all the miracles she’d experienced since arriving, that might have been the greatest.
“Do you still have the letters I sent you?” she said.
“Every single one. Got them in a drawer in the bedroom. You never looked?”
“I didn’t want to invade your privacy.”
He pressed a kiss to her temple. “I don’t have anything to hide from you. Besides which, I got rid of everything embarrassing before you arrived.”
She laughed softly. “Glad to hear it. It’s funny to think that just simple letters could have changed our lives so much.”
“I’m not sure I would call them simple letters. I laboured over those letters. I wanted every one to be perfect.”
She stretched up to kiss his cheek. “And they were.”
“There’s just one thing I’ve always regretted about them though,” he said, unwinding h
is arm from around her and sitting back.
“There is?” She couldn’t imagine what he meant. She didn’t have any regrets at all.
He stood and faced her. “I never got to propose to you properly, like a man should.”
Sara’s hand flew to her mouth as he lowered to one knee in front of her, taking her hand.
“Sara, I think I’ve loved you since I read your first letter. I never imagined I could find someone as beautiful, as caring, as smart, as amazing as you are, and I thank God every day for bringing you to me. Would you make me the happiest man in the world by continuing to be my wife and letting me take care of you for the rest of our lives?”
She had thought there couldn’t be a better proposal than the one he’d written in his letter all those months ago. She’d been wrong.
With tears in her eyes she nodded, laughed, sobbed a little, and said with all her heart, “Yes.”
Eyes shining, he stood and drew her into his arms. But instead of the kiss she was expecting, he said, “I just have one condition.”
“Oh?”
One corner of his mouth curled upwards. “You have to promise to take care of me too.”
Sliding her fingers into his hair, she pulled his face towards her, gazed into his beautiful, deep brown eyes, and whispered, “Just try and stop me.”
THE END
Coming next – Lizzy’s story! To never miss a new release, sign up for my newsletter here - http://eepurl.com/b8p5Ur. You will only receive a handful of emails a year and I’m even planning something exclusive you won’t be able to get anywhere else!
Dear Reader
Thank you for reading A Hope Unseen and I hope you’ve enjoyed Sara and Daniel’s story.
If you have a moment, please consider leaving a review on AMAZON, even just a few words. Reviews are very important for independent authors like me and they really do help others find my books. I will be ever so grateful when you do!
If you haven’t yet read Amy and Adam’s story, No One’s Bride can be purchased HERE.
I hope you are having fun reading my British English spelling! If you’d like to contact me about anything, including how strange it is to read a book about the American West with an English accent, please do get in touch via my FACEBOOK page or WEBSITE or at nerys@nerysleigh.com. I love to hear from readers.
A Hope Unseen is the second in the Escape to the West series and I still have three more brides to tell you about, with Lizzy coming next (and let me tell you, her path to true love is as rocky as they come). And if you liked Will in this book I’ll just say that this isn’t the last we’ll see of Daniel’s brother, and he may not be as immune to love as he thinks he is!
God bless you,
Nerys
nerysleigh.com
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Bible Verses
The following are the Bible verses either quoted or referenced in A Hope Unseen, this time from the New International Version (NIV) Bible, just to make it a bit easier to understand for people like me who aren’t so used to the King James Version!
Chapter 1- The LORD does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart. 1 Samuel 16:7
Chapter 6 - Whoever of you loves life and desires to see many good days, keep your tongue from evil and your lips from telling lies. Psalm 34:12-13
Chapter 8 - Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen. Ephesians 3:20-21
Chapter 10 - But the Lord said to Samuel, “Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The Lord does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.” 1 Samuel 16:7
Chapter 15 - And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him. Matthew 6:7-8
Chapter 17 - When I was brought low, He saved me. Return to your rest, my soul, for the Lord has been good to you. For You, Lord, have delivered me from death, my eyes from tears, my feet from stumbling, that I may walk before the Lord in the land of the living. Psalm 116:6-9
Chapter 19 – When they came to the place called the Skull, they crucified him there, along with the criminals - one on his right, the other on his left. Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” Luke 23:33-34
Chapter 20 - Again, truly I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything they ask for, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven. Matthew 18:19
Chapter 23 - Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me? Up to seven times?” Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.” Matthew 18:21-22
Chapter 24 - Do not be afraid, for I am with you. Isaiah 43:5
Chapter 29 - I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. Romans 7:15
Chapter 31 - Is anyone among you sick? Let them call the elders of the church to pray over them and anoint them with oil in the name of the Lord. James 5:14
Chapter 31 – “And these signs will accompany those who believe: In My name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well.” Mark 16:17-18