* * *
It took longer than Olivia Mae thought it would. Exactly ten days later, a familiar buggy pulled down their lane. She was out with the sheep, so instead of hurrying toward the house, she waved her arms over her head, hoping that Noah Graber had come to see her and not her grandparents. He turned the pretty sorrel buggy mare toward her, and pulled up next to the pasture fence. He hopped out and joined her, though she was standing on one side of the fence and he was on the other.
“Where are the rest?”
“Rest of what?”
“Rest of your sheep.”
“Oh. This is all we have.”
Noah pulled off his hat, held it up to block off the late-afternoon sun and made an exaggerated motion of counting her ewes. “Six?”
“Ya.”
“You have six sheep.”
“I do, as you’ve so accurately counted.”
“Why couldn’t the little lamb play outside?”
Olivia waited, both dreading and looking forward to the punch line.
“It was being ba-a-aaad!” As she shook her head in mock disgust, he plopped the hat back on his head and crossed his arms across the top board of the wooden fence. “I honestly don’t know a thing about sheep.”
“Though you do know a lot of jokes.”
“Tell me about your flock.”
She didn’t think he was asking for their names, though she had named them all. Instead she simply offered, “They’re Lincoln sheep.”
“I don’t know what that means.”
“They’re large, as you can see. Ewes can weigh from two hundred to two hundred and fifty pounds.”
“I thought they were just fat.”
She slapped his arm. “Rams can get up to three hundred and fifty. They’re a gut sheep to have if you’re raising them for their fleece. Lincoln sheep are very long-wooled.”
“I can see that.”
Olivia Mae laughed. “Wait until you see them just before shearing. This is nothing.”
“So you sell their fleece?”
“Ya, it’s quite popular for spinning and weaving.”
“Why do you only have six?”
Olivia Mae shrugged. Though she didn’t want to go into it, she understood that making small talk made Noah comfortable, so she played along. “We lost two to predators...”
“Predators?”
“Probably a coyote. That was in January, and then we had another two that wandered off into the road during a late snowstorm in March. I check the fencing regularly, but they’d somehow found a way through. It was a hard winter.”
“I’ll say. So you had ten, which doesn’t sound like very many, and now you’re down to six.”
“My initial plan was to slowly build the herd, but...sometimes life doesn’t work out like you plan.”
“Said with the wisdom of a matchmaker.”
She waited.
“Speaking of that...”
“Of what?”
He tossed a look her way and smiled. Good teeth. Wait. Did she just assess his teeth? That was terrible. But good oral hygiene was a plus in the dating world.
“Speaking of matchmaking, I have a problem that I was hoping you could help me with.”
“Is that so?”
“My family is driving me crazy.”
“Huh.”
“My dat wants me to learn to farm.”
“I thought you were an auctioneer.”
“My bruders are all up in my business.”
“Aggravating.”
“But it’s my mamm that is pushing me over the edge.”
Olivia Mae knew that his mother was a sweet, if concerned, woman. After all, they’d had a good long talk on Monday, when Olivia Mae had taken over a blanket for Sarah’s child. The baby wasn’t due for another four months, so it had been perhaps obvious that she was making up a reason to visit, but Sarah had been thrilled with the knitted receiving blanket—yellow and green, made from Olivia Mae’s own wool, and with a small sheep motif running across the edge.
Of course, she’d picked a morning when she was sure Noah would be at the auction house, and was it her fault that his mother, Erika, had brought up finding a match for Noah? Olivia Mae thought it was a completely natural concern. She might have suggested that Erika make a deal with Noah.
“You’re awfully quiet over there,” Noah said.
“Am I?”
“Where do sheep take a bath?”
“Let me guess...”
“In a ba-a-athtub,” they said together.
She really did need to get him to focus or they’d be here all day. And while his jokes were cute, she had to see to Daddi and Mammi soon. “You were telling me about your mamm.”
“She offered me a deal.”
“Did she, now?”
“Her deal, or suggestion, is that I give you three chances.”
“Excuse me?”
“Three chances to...you know.” He twirled his finger in a circle. “Do what you do.”
When she only raised her eyebrows, he laughed. “It’s like you need to hear me say it.”
“I do need to hear you say it. I can’t read your mind.”
“Mamm suggested that if I give you three chances to find me a suitable girl, which I guess you’d be happy to do—”
“Of course I would.”
“And if by some chance those three girls don’t work out—”
“No reason why one of them wouldn’t.”
“Then she and Dat will leave me alone.”
“Leave you alone to—”
“Live my life in peace.” This last sentence he practically growled.
Olivia Mae scratched the ewe closest to her between the ears, made her way out of the gate, being careful to latch it securely behind her, and finally turned her attention to Noah.
“I’m not sure that will work.”
“What?”
“It sounds as if you’re being coerced.”
“Coerced? Who uses words like that? Did you read them in a book?”
“What book?”
“I don’t know what book. I suppose you read Englisch romances. That’s why you’re so keen on this whole true-love business.”
“I will admit to having a few sheep magazines as well as some books of knitting patterns. I don’t have a lot of time for reading, though I do enjoy it when I have the rare hour to myself. I might have read a novel or two last winter when the weather was too bad to accomplish any work outside.”
“Look, I’m not being coerced. I’m being worn down.”
“Is there a difference?”
“I don’t know.”
The look on his face was so miserable that Olivia Mae couldn’t help but feel a little pity for him.
“Nice sorrel,” she said, walking up to the reddish-brown mare and allowing it to smell her. She then reached into her pocket for a carrot. “What’s her name?”
“Snickers—like the candy bar.”
She scratched the mare between her ears, causing it to nicker softly.
“Do you do that a lot?”
“What?”
“Take care of things—sheep, horses, people.”
He’d stepped closer and she could smell the soap he’d used, and other things probably from the auction house—old wood and leather and some kind of oil. What was that like? To spend your day selling off people’s memories? Maybe she was thinking of it wrongly. Maybe what he did was the ultimate recycling—making old things new again. She looked up at him and smiled, then took a step back.
“What did you mean when you said you’re not sure it will work? Would I be such a challenge for you to match up?”
“Most people come to me wanting to find a suitable husband or wife.”
“Ya
.”
“You’re practically saying you hope it won’t work.”
The smile on his face grew. She hadn’t known Noah Graber long, but already she knew him well enough to worry when he smiled that way. A girl could fall for that kind of charm, and she made it a point not to harbor romantic feelings about someone she was trying to match.
“You don’t think you can do it.”
“What?” Her voice came out like a screech owl. She smoothed down her apron and lowered her voice. “Why would you say that?”
“I’m too big a challenge for you.”
“Oh, please. I’ve matched worse—” She almost said misfits. “I’ve matched more stubborn bachelors than you.”
“Is that so?”
“It is.”
“But younger, I’ll bet.”
“Matched a thirty-two-year-old last fall.”
“Widower?”
“I don’t see what difference that makes.” She did. Of course she did. The widower had wanted a wife. He was desperately lonely, struggling to raise five children on his own and willing to do whatever she suggested. No need to share all of those details with Noah Graber, though.
“Clearly this is what your mamm wants—”
“And my dat, my bruders, my sisters-in-law—even the bishop.”
“Lucas has spoken to you?”
Instead of answering that, he said, “Dating may not be my primary concern, but I’ll play along.”
“How do I know that you won’t sabotage my efforts?”
“Because I’m giving you my word that I won’t.”
The growl was back. Noah Graber was the full package—tall, handsome, hardworking and with just enough humility to care that he not be called a liar.
She wiped her hands on her apron and then stuck them in her pockets.
“Fine.”
“You’ll do it?”
“I will.”
She began walking toward the house. Noah tagged along beside her, as she’d known he would. Just like teasing a fish with bait, she thought. Good thing Daddi had taught her how to fish.
“What happens next?”
She stopped suddenly. “I’ll call you.”
“You’ll call me?”
“Phone shack to phone shack, of course.”
“I thought you’d just...give me a name or something.”
“I need to think on it, prayerfully consider the situation. You wouldn’t want me to rush.”
“Kind of, I do.” He rolled his eyes when she stared up at him. “As soon as this is over—”
“You’ll be able to live your life in peace. I heard you the first time.”
“I give you my word that I’m not going to sabotage anything, but you’ll see.” The grin was back. “I’m not the marrying type.”
“You’re not?”
“And as soon as this is over, I can get on with my life, establish my reputation as an auctioneer and hopefully make enough to buy a bachelor place.”
She could have argued any one of those points. Instead she smiled again—what she hoped was a sincere smile and not one that conveyed how much she’d like to pick up the bucket of water sitting on the front porch and dump it over his head. Anything to erase that condescending grin on his face.
“Great. I’ll call when I have some ideas.”
And without a backward glance, she hurried up the porch steps and into the house.
Chapter Four
“She still hasn’t called?”
Noah and Justin were eating lunch at the Subway sandwich shop in Shipshewana. He had two hours before the next auction, so when his brother had shown up, it had seemed like a good idea. Now he wasn’t so sure.
“I already told you that.”
“You told me that yesterday.”
“And the day before.”
“Did you check the recorder at the phone shack today, on your way into work?”
“I did.”
“And still nothing?”
“Only a message for Widow King. Something about a crate of baby chicks she’d ordered.”
Justin bit into his meatball sub and stared up at the ceiling as he chewed, as if he’d find the answer to their current puzzle written there.
Finally he dropped the sandwich onto the wrapper and admitted, “It only took two days for Olivia Mae to match me with Sarah.”
“Two days?”
“Longer for us to court and all, but it only took two days from the time I first visited Olivia Mae. Does she still have that scrawny herd of sheep?”
“If you can call six a herd.”
“I wonder what’s up with that.”
The bell over the door rang and a trio of Amish girls walked in.
“Maybe she needs to cast her net wider.” His brother nodded toward the girls. “Plenty of fish here in Shipshe.”
“Those aren’t fish. They’re girls.”
“Women.”
“And I don’t think I specified a geographic location.”
“Maybe you should, though. Maybe let her know it doesn’t have to be a Goshen girl. Could be we have a shortage or something.”
Noah didn’t want to talk about his dating life—or his lack of one. He focused on finishing his sandwich, and thought they had moved on from the subject when his brother crossed his arms, sat back and cleared his throat.
“What happened to you?”
“What do you mean?”
“While you were gone. When you were on your extended rumspringa...” He waved toward the window. “Wandering all those years.”
Noah shrugged. “I don’t know what you’re asking exactly.”
“’Course you do. You just don’t want to talk about it.”
“If you’re so astute, why bother me at all?”
“Because I think you need to talk about it. I think whatever happened out there, it’s going to follow you here unless you work through it.”
“You sound like Bishop Lucas.”
Instead of responding to that, to the fact that their bishop had already asked the same question, Justin plowed on.
“It was hard on Mamm and Dat, you know—your being gone, them not knowing when or if you were moving back.”
“I don’t need a lecture from you, little bruder.”
“And I don’t intend to deliver one. Just making sure you’re aware.”
“Oh, I’m aware.”
“Mamm probably thinks if you met a girl and married that you’d settle down, that you wouldn’t leave again. That’s her biggest fear at this point.”
“I am settled down—married or single. I’m here to stay, Justin. I’m home, and I don’t plan on leaving.”
Justin searched his eyes for a minute and apparently found the assurance he needed. “Gut. I’d like my son or daughter to know their onkel Noah.”
With that image planted firmly in his mind, all of Noah’s defensiveness melted away. He wanted to be there when Justin’s child was born. He wanted to watch all of his nieces and nephews grow up. In truth, he had missed his family more than he’d realized. How many nights had he gone to sleep in a strange town, knowing no one and depending on the kindness of strangers? How many times had he lain there envisioning his father’s farm and wishing he was back in Goshen?
His pride had kept him away. He could see that now.
In the end, he’d returned home because he didn’t know where else to go, but he was staying because he realized this was where he wanted to be.
They finished their meal, threw their trash onto the tray, dumped it into the nearby trash can and refilled their drinks. Stepping outside, he relaxed. He loved working in Shipshewana, loved how busy it had become and yet it still managed to remain Plain in so many ways.
Sure there were Englisch vehicles, but there wer
e also buggies in every direction he looked.
There were Englisch tourists—many probably there for the auction—but there were still plenty of Amish folk, as well.
Englisch restaurants abounded, but Jojo’s Pretzels and Amish Frozen Custard were as busy as ever.
In short, northern Indiana was what he’d been looking for all along. It was a place where Plain could live beside Englisch. They didn’t have to worry about ordinances that would require them to diaper their horses. They didn’t have to be concerned about becoming less Amish, if there was such a thing.
He could be happy here. He could be content. If only his parents could understand that marriage wasn’t for everyone.
If only they’d let him be.
As the brothers were walking back down the road to the auction house, Noah decided maybe Justin would be a good person to vent to. Maybe his brother would realize he was right and tell his mother to cancel the deal they’d made. Already he was regretting it. There had been something about the glint in Olivia Mae’s eyes that made him uncomfortable.
It wasn’t that he thought she would find the perfect match, but there was a marked look of determination in her eyes. He didn’t want to be her pet project.
If he’d been pressed, he would have admitted that he didn’t believe there was someone out there for him. Hadn’t his past proven that? But between his mother and Olivia Mae, he was in for several weeks, maybe even months, of misery before they understood the futility of what they were attempting to do.
He needed someone on his side—someone who understood his position. Noah glanced back at the sandwich shop and then nudged Justin. “Those girls back there were very young—too young.”
“For what?”
“For marrying.”
“They looked old enough to me. One was carrying a boppli.”
“Could have been a niece or nephew.”
“They didn’t seem too young to me.”
“Seventeen, maybe eighteen.” Noah jerked the hat off his head and ran his fingers through his hair. “I’m twenty-nine. That’s part of the problem.”
“Why is that a problem?”
“Because I’ve never been married before.” He rammed the hat back on his head. “I’m like...”
“A freak?”
“An anomaly.”
“Whatever.”
A Perfect Amish Match (Indiana Amish Brides Book 3) Page 4
