Western Winter Wedding Bells

by Cheryl St. John, Jenna Kernan

  “Mrs. Guntherson?”

  She turned toward him. He reached for her just as Addy pushed between them.

  “I want to see.” She stood on her toes. “Ooh!”

  Eliza, rescued from her own folly by Addy’s timely interruption, stepped back. What had he meant to do? she wondered. It almost seemed as though he intended to kiss her, right here in his kitchen.

  She scooped up their dinner and placed it in the center of the trivet upon the table and then seated Addy and laid a napkin across the child’s lap. Then she took her own place and bowed her head.

  Trent removed his hat and coat and joined them, folding his hands.

  “God, we thank You for bringing Mrs. Guntherson to us and for all of Your many blessings, Amen.”

  Eliza choked out, “Amen.” But the grinding guilt ruined her pride in the meal and her joy at pleasing him. It was a lie, start to finish. She needed to tell him the truth.

  She would do so, as soon as Addy was in bed.

  She served him and Addy, but found her own appetite had fled. The apple pie crumbled in serving, but Trent told her it did not spoil the taste.

  Addy was excused to retrieve the patches for the doll quilt, which her father studied carefully and praised lavishly, despite the awkward seams. How wonderful to have a father who was so easy with his approval. Addy positively glowed with joy.

  Eliza cleared the table as Addy told her father all about the quilt and the apple slicing and how she sprinkled the sugar and added “pads” of butter.

  When Eliza turned, still drying her hands, she found him smiling at her again as Addy, perched before him, traced the lines of stitches that held the piecework together.

  “Would you like to walk Mrs. Guntherson to the hotel with me, sweet pea?”

  Eliza was quite ashamed at the relief she felt. She would not have to tell Trent, not with Addy there. Still, the real housekeeper was overdue, and that hung over Eliza’s head like the Sword of Damocles.

  Addy bounced with delight. “Yes, oh, yes!”

  “Get your coat then.”

  Eliza made a weak attempt to dissuade him from bringing Addy out in the cold. “But it’s dangerous out at night.”

  Trent’s smile didn’t waver. “I can take care of my own.”

  “But I thought it was my responsibility to see her put to bed.”

  “I’ll manage tonight.”

  She retrieved her coat, feeling like an outcast, sent from the warm, cheery kitchen and into the cold.

  “Your bag show up yet?”

  Her cheeks heated. “Why, no. Not yet.”

  Eliza busied herself with her buttons so she wouldn’t have to look at Mr. Foerster. When she finally dared to lift her gaze she found him holding a folded sheet out to her.

  “I checked your letter. You did write you’d been widowed after fifteen years of marriage and you wrote it in script. There was no stray mark.”

  His cold eyes studied her as all the air seemed to leave her body.

  “You lied to me, Mrs. Guntherson, and I’d like to know why.”

  She could not have answered if she had wanted to, not with him menacing her with his stony stare. Her notions of telling him the truth and confessing fled in a wave of panic. She barely recognized the loving father she had glimpsed a moment ago. This man—this stranger, frightened the wits from her.

  “I thought…” She groped for some reasonable explanation and failed.

  “Well?”

  She shook her head.

  “If you believed I would not have hired a woman of your age and obvious inexperience—” he glanced at the apple pie “—you were right. Your arrival is already causing gossip, and I absolutely will not have any shame brought down on my daughter’s head because of this. Do you understand?”

  Eliza jerked her head in a clumsy nod.

  “Do you know why I am not firing you on the spot?”

  She shook her head.

  “Because my daughter adores you. She’s happy for the first time, well, since my mom was here. I have you to thank for it. But this lie has put me to considerable trouble and expense. I’ve a mind to deduct the hotel costs from your wages.”

  Her head hung low as a puppy that had just wet the rug.

  “If you have anything else you may have misrepresented, you had best tell me now, for I cannot abide a deceitful woman.”

  She swallowed past the lump. He wanted the truth, but if she told him, he would fire her—or worse. She squeezed her eyes shut and vowed that tonight she would flee.

  “Daddy?” Addy’s voice rang with concern. “Why is Mrs. Guntherson crying?”

  “Put your scarf on, Adeline.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  He clasped Eliza’s elbow and steered her out the front door. When they reached the main street he released her in order to scoop his daughter into his arms. Addy had been unusually quiet and now nestled close, her breath warming his neck. He knew his daughter well enough to know she was troubled by the palpable strain between him and Mrs. Guntherson.

  He glanced at the woman beside him. Her head hung like a whipped dog. Perhaps he had been too hard on her. Had she discovered through experience that most families wanted an older woman? Such a pretty woman would be a distraction to any man, and Lord knew he was distracted to the point that he couldn’t even sleep last night.

  Damn it, why couldn’t she have been an older woman as he expected? He wanted her out of his house and he wanted her in his bed.

  Chapter Eight

  Eliza waited upstairs for a time. She wanted to be sure she did not run into Mr. Foerster outside. When she judged enough time had passed, she retrieved her bag and fled down the back stairs again. She would have to find someone leaving town and beg for help. It would be humiliating, but she could not stay here. She reached the street and paused.

  “Eliza!”

  She turned at the call and only afterward realized her mistake. There stood Trent’s deputy, not ten feet away, staring directly at her.

  Her heart exploded into a wild thumping that made her light-headed. He knew her name! She swayed.

  The deputy caught her elbow, steadying her.

  “You are Eliza Flannery.” It wasn’t a question. He knew.

  She tried to speak, but no words would come. The man took her bag.

  “Come on now. Let’s get you inside.”

  Jail. He was taking her to jail. Eliza stumbled along beside him and nearly through the hotel lobby before she realized she was not yet headed for a prison cell. He guided her into the restaurant on the ground floor. She glanced about dumbly, not understanding what was happening. Why had he brought her here?

  He motioned to a seat and she sagged into it. He set her bag in the one beside her and then sat across the table from her.

  “Joey Backer, ma’am. You remember me? Met you yesterday and looked after Addy last night while Trent walked you to the hotel.” He removed his hat, hanging it on the back of the chair holding her bag.

  She nodded.

  He left her and returned with a glass of water. “Coffee’s coming. Drink this. Ma’am, you’re pale as snow. Now listen here, I’m not going to hurt you. You hear me? Drink this.”

  He pressed the glass into her hand and she took a swallow. Her hands shook, so she set the glass back on the table.

  “You leaving town?”

  She nodded.

  The waitress brought their coffee and left the pot at Mr. Backer’s request. His gentle smile disappeared when he turned his eyes back to her.

  “From the beginning, now. Let’s hear it.”

  She drew a breath and then told him about her predecessor and the arrest and how frightened she had been and how she had run. Eliza answered every question, and when he was done interrogating her, she sat numbly, waiting for what the deputy would do next.

  “Why you running now? Why tonight?”

  “Mr. Foerster knows I misrepresented my background. He said he’d fire me if I lied about anything else. How
could I tell him?” She found no answers in Mr. Backer’s steady stare. Eliza dropped her head and covered her face in her hands. “I never should have come here. I’ve interfered too much already. I don’t want to hurt Addy or disappoint Mr. Foerster any further.”

  “Why not?”

  She shook her head.

  “Best spit it out, now.”

  Her hands slipped to her lap. “I—I love his daughter already, and I’m afraid I have feelings for Mr. Foerster, as well.”

  “That’s fine.”

  Eliza glanced up in astonishment, to find Mr. Backer grinning at her over the rim of his coffee cup.

  “He tell you about Addy’s ma?” He waited until Eliza shook her head. “He never told me, either. I guess she hurt him bad. Won’t have nothing to do with women now. Won’t court them, won’t even speak to them hardly. But you, well, you got under his skin faster than a chigger. Burrowed in good and tight, too. He walked right by the jail this morning. Never done that before. And, according to Trent, Addy’s taken with you. Obvious to anyone that’s seen you with the gal that you two belong together. First I thought he just made up the story about a housekeeper so he could sneak you in. Thought maybe you was the girl’s real ma, but that was before I seen you in the light and your hair’s too dark. Plus, why would he put you in a hotel? Didn’t make sense. Then I got that telegram from the real Mrs. Guntherson.”

  “You what?” Eliza started to choke.

  Deputy Backer pushed her untouched coffee cup at her and then continued as if she hadn’t interrupted.

  “Saying she’d be delayed. I figured that was a mistake, but after I seen you leave the hotel last night I changed my mind on that account and got suspicious.” He laughed. “You sure told that Grogan boy what’s what.”

  “You saw that?”

  He nodded.

  “Yet you didn’t step in?”

  “Wanted to see what you’d do. Thought you’d found another keeper but you sent him off. Question is, you staying now ’cause you want to or have to? You a common thief and an uncommon liar or are you telling the truth?”

  “I assure you—”

  “Don’t. I don’t believe you. Not yet anyway.” He reached for her bag and unclipped the latch. “A thief, left alone all day in Trent’s house might have helped herself to a few things to ease the journey. If you lied, there’s hell to pay. But if it happened like you say, I’ll back you with everything I got.”

  Eliza’s eyes rounded. Her private things were in that satchel. “Mr. Backer, there must be another way.”

  “There is. I take you to Trent, then wire the sheriff in Bozeman.”

  Eliza sat back in her chair, gritting her teeth as Mr. Backer rummaged through her personal belongings in public. Satisfied at last, he sat back.

  “Well, now, you sure do pack light.” He closed the bag and placed it back on the chair. “Best tell him before he finds out.”

  Eliza nodded.

  “If you try to leave town again, I’ll track you like a Mississippi bloodhound.” He stood and retrieved his hat, giving it a lighthearted spin. “’Night, Mrs. Guntherson.”

  Eliza arrived the next day knowing that flight was no longer an option. The deputy had seen to that. That left only one option, but she dreaded telling Trent more than she feared jail. She had such respect for him and wanted him to respect her, too. No, she wanted more than respect; she wanted to stay, and she knew in her heart that once he found out the truth her little dreams of keeping his house would burn to ash.

  Upon reaching the Foerster’s home, she discovered a note on the door instructing her to pick up Addy at Mrs. Milward’s, which she did. Trent had been called away in the night to settle some matter with two ranchers and so she received another reprieve.

  The morning flew by with shopping for the ingredients for beef stroganoff, with the help of the recipe that Mrs. Milward had handed her this morning. Eliza and Addy returned home before lunch and afterward they were back at the bag of rags selecting fabric for a new dress and apron for Penelope. Addy was a bright girl and her stitches were nearly straight. But she did repeatedly prick her finger.

  Eliza went to her bag, retrieved her sewing kit and removed the only gift her mother had ever given her, a child’s silver thimble.

  “Here, Addy, you can borrow this.”

  “Ooh.” Addy held up the small cap and ran her finger along the scrolling pattern of lilies of the valley. “Pretty.”

  Eliza sat beside the girl on the large window seat in the kitchen with the cold blue light of the winter afternoon streaming in behind them. “My mother gave me this for my fifth birthday.”

  “Nana said my mommy died. But Daddy won’t say anything about her. If I ask him, he stops talking and looks away.”

  Something inside Eliza’s belly flipped. Her troubles with her own parents suddenly seemed small. At least she knew them. Questions that were none of her business rolled through her mind.

  Addy clamped her tongue between her teeth and squinted in her effort to coordinate the subtle movements of needle and thimble. With a little practice she got the hang of it, and Eliza turned her attention to fashioning a prim white doll’s apron. As the light began to fade, Eliza left Addy to finish the apron hem, as she lit the lanterns. Next she turned to browning the beef and making a batter for the egg noodles.

  Mrs. Milward made noodles sound easy, but she found rolling the sticky concoction nearly impossible. The resulting misshapen blobs went into hot water to boil, bobbing on the top like ducklings on a pond. Eliza eyed them, wondering if egg noodles were supposed to look that slimy, but having never seen them, she was uncertain.

  She left the meat on too long and it was very brown when she added the cream to the skillet. Eliza dumped in the quarter cup of flour. It turned instantly into a thick glutinous mass. Eliza tried to stir the flour, but it resisted, clinging and congealing like tallow, so she smashed it with a wooden spoon. Eventually the thick cream was flecked with clots of flour.

  Addy’s voice roused her focus from the skillet.

  “That doesn’t look right.”

  At that moment the pot of egg noodles boiled over.

  Trent had run into Danny Strecker on the walk home. The man wanted to know if his housekeeper would be at church for Sunday services. Trent had been tempted to draw his gun and shoo him off. Damned if his deputy hadn’t been right.

  Men were already sniffing after Mrs. Guntherson like…well, he’d hired her. Let them go find their own housekeeper.

  Trent stomped down the street, the snow muffling his steps. He knew he couldn’t keep them back for long. There just weren’t a lot of eligible women in Early and certainly none as lovely as Viola. What man wouldn’t want to try sparking her? The idea of her seeing another man made him angry enough to grind nails between his teeth.

  He didn’t like being backed into a corner, but he saw only two choices. Let other men court her or claim her himself. Damn, but he didn’t want to make a fool of himself again. Not after he’d finally finished wiping the egg off his face from the last time. How was it that he could read men at a glance and yet be so completely taken in by a woman? It burned his pride.

  But then again, she was so good with Addy. His daughter had taken to her like a duck to water. Viola would make a good mother, of that he was sure. Perhaps that was reason enough to pursue her as a wife. For practical reasons alone, he should marry her. And he would have considered it, too, if not for the fact that his gut was in a knot just thinking of her with another man. He would not let another woman have that kind of power over him again. If he did marry, it would be to a nice, plain woman who was good to his daughter. Not someone he wanted so bad that he couldn’t sleep at night from thinking what it would be like to love her.

  He was wiser now. Wasn’t he? He understood he was getting crazy over Viola, and that meant he wasn’t thinking straight. But he couldn’t send her off because she was good for Addy.

  Trent stopped in the street as the truth he’d be
en fighting punched him in the gut. Oh, no. Addy’s needs were only the excuse. He wanted her, needed her and knew he’d pursue her like a wolf after a wounded doe.

  It was too late to send her away. Already the obsession controlled him and that meant she could control him if she found out. If she knew, she’d take advantage. All women did. Sweat broke out on his forehead.

  She wasn’t like Helen. So it could be different this time. Viola was quiet, demure and proper. Viola would never take advantage or use him as Helen had. But that didn’t mean she wanted to marry him. He tried to imagine offering Viola the ring his mother had worn until well after his father died. What if she said no?

  Damn, again.

  He’d have to try. That was all.

  Maybe he could keep her from knowing how much he wanted her, just tell her he needed a mother for Addy and…

  His shoulders slumped. He was headed for another train wreck.

  He stared up at the snow falling from the dark sky and then glanced about. Where the hell was he?

  Trent realized he had walked clean past his house. He wheeled about and stormed down the street, reaching his home and stomping the snow off his feet before crossing the threshold inside.

  His disquiet began to ebb the moment he inhaled. He paused to savor the warm air and the aroma of beef and…what? His brow furrowed.

  “Daddy!”

  Addy came dashing around the corner and leaped into his arms. He could feel the heat of her cheek against his cold skin. Her sweet smell calmed him and he found his smile came easily.

  “Look!”

  She held her doll too close for him to see what excited her so, but he accepted the toy and glanced down at her then back to Addy.

  “Her dress, Daddy. It’s new. I made it!”

  “You did?”

  “Well, most of it.”

  He glanced at the pretty pleating, trim sleeves and lopsided hem. Viola again, he thought, teaching his daughter the things that he never could, the skills she would need to be a good wife and mother someday. Gratitude welled, and he transferred Addy to his hip, carrying her into the kitchen.