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“I am fine. I have to do the kitchen work, Austin. I want you to see I’m not a lazy wife.” Gentle, her show of strength, but she braced her patched shoes on the floor as if ready for an argument.
“Your being lazy never crossed my mind.” He swallowed, confused by the tangle of softer emotions sitting dead center in his chest. “I am more concerned about your condition.”
“Oh, the baby.” It was almost as if she’d forgotten the babe’s existence. A quick pinch of dismay down turned her Cupid’s-bow mouth. In a blink, it was gone and she drew herself up, as if searching for fortitude. “I’m fine. I’m a good worker, Austin. Just like I said in my letter.”
He could see that attribute was important to her, so he nodded and let her take the dishcloth from his hand. At the whisper of her fingertips against the base of his thumb, another electric shock telegraphed through him with enough force to weaken his knees. “For the record, I’m a good worker, too.”
“I see.” Her tense shoulders relaxed another fraction and what almost passed for a smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. In the lamplight, with tendrils of dark curls framing her face, she looked like some magical creature out of a fairy tale, too beautiful and sweet to be real.
His throat closed and he was at a loss for words. He felt disarmed, as if every defense he’d ever had was shattered by her touch. He felt too big, too rough, too average to be married to a woman like her. He still couldn’t believe it was his ring shining on her finger. His bride. The last ten years of loneliness felt worth it because they would come to an end tonight.
“I’ll go see to the fire.” He blushed—he couldn’t help it—as he eased through the kitchen door.
“All right.” She nodded timidly, a vision in patched and faded calico. She plunged her slender hands into the soapy water, intent on her work. There was nothing else to do but to put one foot in front of the other and set about bringing in enough wood for the morning’s needs.
He hesitated at the door, casting one last look at her. The little splashing sounds, the clink of flatware landing in the bottom of the rinse basin, the swish of her skirts and the gentleness of her presence made the tangled knot of feelings within him swell.
Tonight. Tonight he would not sleep alone. She would lie beside him in his bed, his bride to have and to hold. This was his chance to truly belong and matter to a woman. His turn to find the meaningful, enduring love he’d watched his parents share.
Happiness lit him up like a slow and steady light that would not be put out. He turned on his heels and paced through the house, hardly noticing the bite of bitter cold when he stepped out to fill the wood box.
“How are the dishes coming?” The door opened to the pace of his steps returning to the kitchen.
“I’m done.” Willa wiped the last plate dry and set it on the stack in the cupboard. “It took hardly any time at all. I need to thank your sister for the meal.”
“No need to, as I’ve already done it.” He sidled up to her, bringing with him the scent of wood smoke on his clothes. His big hands hefted the washbasin off the counter. “You look pale as a sheet. Are you all right?”
“It’s been a long few days.” She hung the dish towel up to dry, avoiding his gaze. Why was he being so courteous? He walked away with the basin without explanation and opened the back door. He disappeared in the swirl of snow that blew in and returned dusted with white. “I think I made a bigger mess than I meant to.”
She shrugged and spotted a broom leaning against a nearby wall. A few swipes took care of the stray snow, but he was still covered with it. The need to brush off the ice from his face surprised her. She stepped back to let him do that for himself. She’d learned her lessons well in her first marriage. Men had a way of punishing you for trying to care about them. At least this time she understood that. At least this first wedding night would not be spent like the last one … full of misery, disillusion and silent tears.
“It is nine o’clock, if you can believe that. The day flew by.” He shrugged out of his coat and hung it by the door. “I spent all day getting ready for you. Hard to believe, I know, but I’d left a lot to do until the last minute. Like getting new plates. I didn’t want you to show up and have to eat off the chipped ones I was getting by with.”
He had an amicable way about him. She had to take care not to fall victim to it. She rescued the basin he’d emptied and set it on the counter to air dry. The kitchen was toasty warm from the stove, warm enough to have chased away the cold from her bones but not the trepidation. If not for the new life she carried, she would never have remarried. She never wanted to be pushed and pulled by a man’s manipulations again, but the ring on her finger was a reminder she had made a commitment to Austin until death parted them. She would make the best of it.
“Could you show me to my room?” She held her breath, fearing what was to follow.
“You mean, our room.” He watched her intently without a hint as to what he might be thinking. “It’s the first door to your left. Come, I’ll show you.”
“Thank you.” She felt self-conscious, and every step she took through the door he held for her felt like the toll of an executioner’s bell. The front room’s crackling fire and pleasant furnishings were no comfort as she approached the wall of doors.
“I thought this smaller one would make a good room for the baby.” Austin opened the one farthest away, stepping aside for her to inspect the space. “Evelyn brought over a crib as a welcome gift. She is thoughtful that way.”
A crib. Her throat closed at the shadowed sight of carved rails and polished oak. Her head swam and Austin’s words sounded far away.
“It is the one Ma used for us. Pa made it for her when they were expecting me. You will like my father. I took over the livery from him when he retired.” His footsteps echoed against the bare floor and walls, seeming to grow in the shadows. “He’s looking forward to meeting you.”
“Of course your entire family knows about the baby.” She hadn’t even considered his family. She hadn’t thought further ahead than meeting Austin Dermot. She was still taking one moment at a time. The next moment loomed ahead of her like a ghost in the dark, the moment when Austin would lead her from this room and into the one they would share for the night.
Together.
She swallowed, not sure if she felt strong enough to face that. Worry had worn away at her like water on rock and she felt frail. Maybe it was from seeing the crib with its sweetly carved spools. She tried to imagine the time it had taken to make and could not imagine a man sitting patiently for the hours upon hours it would take to whittle, sand and stain each piece of wood.
“No, only my sister, who has sworn to keep your secret until you are ready to tell it.” He shrugged. “I did not tell them. Evelyn showed up with this yesterday. I suspect when she was cleaning for your arrival, she found the newspaper with the advertisement I’d circled. My sister is nosy.”
His grin was infectious and she found the corners of her mouth turning upward. “The crib was a thoughtful gift.”
“She cares about you already.” He chuckled. “I hope that doesn’t turn out to be overwhelming for you, since you’re not used to so much family.”
“No, I’m sure I will like her.” She blushed, awkward with the intensely private subject of her pregnancy. “I suppose we will have to break the news, but I don’t want to tarnish your reputation. I know how small towns can be. People can leap to conclusions and think the worst things.”
“There’s no shame in your situation. It must take a lot of courage to marry a man you’ve never met for the sake of your child.” The shadows hid him, but not his essence. That shone as solid and unmistakable as the lamplight tumbling through the threshold from the other room. “I meant what I said in my letter. I will treat the baby as my own. Your child is our child now, just like the others that will follow.”
“The others.” That wasn’t something he’d written about in his letters. She gulped, feeling dizzy. The future wasn’t something she looked at. It was something best left unexamined. Of course there would be more children. He was a man. He would expect certain affections from his wife.
“Maybe I’m getting the cart in front of the horse.” He chuckled and his big hand closed around her forearm as if he knew how weakly her knees knocked. “We will focus on getting this baby into the world safely. One thing at a time. How’s that?”
She nodded, overcome, shocked by the possessive heat of his hand banding her like a manacle she did not know how to break. She let him lead her from the room. Her head swam, her heart thrashed against her sternum wildly as she stumbled toward her destiny, toward her fate as this man’s wife.
One of two bedside lamps was lit, tossing a sepia glow over its bedside table and onto the wide four-poster bed. A patchwork quilt in the colors of spring draped the feather tick, and snowy white pillow slips covered plump pillows. She’d never dreamed of such a room, with a window seat and a bureau to match the carved bed’s foot and headboards. A looking glass reflected back at her and she ran her fingertips across the polished wood frame. A real mirror.
“Of course, you will want to change all this. My sister said the curtains are a shame. But my mother made the quilt. You might want to replace it, that’s fine by me, but I thought it was pretty. Better than the wool blanket I had there before.” Bashfulness had him dipping his head as he backed from the room. “Your satchel is on the window seat. I’ll leave you to get ready for bed.”
She waited until the door closed before she released her breath. She sank onto the chest footing the bed, shaking so hard she felt sick. In the other room she could hear the fall of the bolt in the door and Austin’s boots crossing the room. The sharp sound of the fireplace utensils told her he was busy banking the fires for the night. She would not have much time before he came back through the bedroom door and she had no intention of being caught undressed.
She changed in a hurry into her nightgown. With fumbling fingers, she washed at the basin stand, cleaned her teeth and brushed out her long dark hair in front of the looking glass. The face reflected back at her was ashen, thin and afraid. By the time a quick rap sounded on the door, she was steps away from the bed.
“Come in,” she called, pleased at his politeness, and pulled the covers over her. The bed was the most comfortable thing she’d ever felt, both soft and firm at the same time, with flannel sheets. The door whispered open and Austin stalked in, perhaps shy also because he did not look at her as she rearranged her pillow.
He was a more decent man than she’d dared to hope, than she could even now believe. He turned his back to her to pour fresh water into the washbasin. “You’re comfortable?”
“Oh, yes.” She rolled on her side, facing away from him. The splash of water, the rustle of clothing, the pad of stocking feet on the floor marked the minutes ticking away until his side of the bed dipped beneath his weight. She closed her eyes, cold with fear over what was to come.
Chapter Four
The bed ropes creaked beneath his weight. She felt the mattress dip. Fear skittered through her and she held her breath. She tried to close out the memories of the nights when Jed had roughly pulled her into his arms. She drew in a shaky breath listening to the sheets rustle and feeling the mattress shift as Austin stretched out on the bed beside her.
Just don’t forget to breathe, she told herself. Relax, it hurts less that way. This was the price to pay for being a man’s wife. She thought of the cold nights huddled in the barn so hungry she could not sleep. She thought of the babe growing within her. You can do this, she thought. It will be over before you know it.
“I’ve got an early morning.” His buttery baritone rang softly as the bed ropes squeaked again. The lamp went out and darkness descended. “The livery opens at six.”
“I’ll be sure and have breakfast ready for you.” Yes, concentrate on what needed to be done tomorrow. That would give her mind something to focus on. Preparing breakfast, taking stock of the pantry and planning her meals for the day. Don’t notice he’s moving closer.
“How has your morning sickness been?” His big hand lightened on her shoulder and she jumped.
“F-fine.” Think about the curtains. With pretty little ruffles around the edge. She braced her body, every muscle drawing tight. Yes, those curtains would look so nice in the front room. Cheerful.
“Willa?” His voice rumbled through her thoughts, like a lasso drawing her back. His iron-strong form lay a few inches from hers, so close she could feel his body heat on hers. Terror struck, making it hard to breathe.
She blotted out what she knew was to come. The roughness, the pain, the humiliation, his weight holding her down until he collapsed on top of her. Her first wedding night rolled back to her like a nightmare. The innocent girl expecting love and romance died that night, too wounded to even cry out. At least this time she knew what was coming. She knew what marriage was about.
“Willa?” His voice gentled. “Darlin’, you’re shaking the entire bed.”
She was? “I’m s-sorry.”
“I don’t think it’s good for you or the baby to be this upset.” His hand left her shoulder to brush a strand of hair out of her face. A tone she’d never heard before rang low in his words. It was soft and warm and it made her turn to face him. “I take it your first husband wasn’t a gentle man?”
“No. Jed drank far too much for gentleness.” She laid her ear on the pillow, making out Austin’s face in the darkness—the tumble of his hair, the line of his jaw and the curve of his chiseled mouth. His eyes were black pools with depths she could not read.
“What was your first day married to him like?”
“He was a stranger, too.” The words rushed off her tongue, impossible to stop. Maybe it was easier to talk in the night, where she felt hidden. “I answered his advertisement in the territorial newspaper.”
“This isn’t your first time as a mail-order bride.”
“No.” She swallowed hard, thinking of the girl who’d kept staring at her left hand, a new bride wishing for a wedding ring. Maybe one day, that girl had thought hopefully, still seeing only blue skies ahead. “I had such dreams of a happily-ever-after. Jed had written a charming letter and I was immediately smitten. He seemed so funny and confident, he made me laugh and I thought, what a nice way to go through life alongside a man with a good sense of humor. But his humor lasted as long as it took to reach his farm.”
“What happened then?”
“He ordered me down from the wagon, gave me the reins, told me to put up the horses and fix him supper.” She could still remember standing in shock in the scrubby grass by the leaning ten-by-ten shanty, with the reins dangling in her hands. “He took a bottle of whiskey from the wagon bed and shut himself in the shanty. He drank his way to the bottom of the bottle by the time I had supper on the table.”
“I see.” He reached out again to touch her cheek and rub away the remains of her single tear. “He was a drunk.”
“He was a mean drunk.” She remembered setting down fried salt pork and potatoes on the rickety table in the light of a single battered lantern. It was dark, the ride from the stage stop where the church was had taken much of the day and she’d been still desperately clinging to her illusions.
Maybe he doesn’t drink like this very often, she’d thought, filling two tin cups with water. Maybe once he slept off the whiskey he would be back to his charming self.
I don’t want no water, woman. He’d knocked the cup away from his plate and stood up to slap her cheek. Hard. Get yer lazy ass out the door and fetch me another bottle or I’ll teach ya who’s boss.
“He was abusive to you.” Austin’s voice cut into her thoughts, leading her out of the past and the remembered sting against her face.
“After a while I became numb to it.” Her throat knotted up, refusing to feel all that it had cost her to learn to cope with Jed’s cruelty. “I learned to be grateful for the good days when he was more himself.”
“I see.” The darkness polished him like sculpted stone, accentuating his handsome looks in a powerful and masculine way. Silence settled between them and he loomed beside her, big and strong. He was brawnier and larger than Jed had been; there was no way she could stand up against Austin’s physical strength. She’d also learned the hard way fighting only made the inevitable worse.
Why hadn’t he moved toward her? Fear and dread knotted together in her chest, making her shiver harder. The bed ropes creaked with tiny squeaks in rhythm to her quakes. She could not stop them. She gritted her teeth, willed her muscles to relax while nausea swam in her stomach. The waiting was killing her.
“Do you know how long I’ve been reading women’s advertisements for husbands?” Instead of grabbing for her, his mellow baritone broke the stillness. Instead of wrenching up her nightgown, he levered himself up on one elbow. “A year and a half. I started regularly perusing them, wondering about the ladies who were looking for marriage. Several caught my eye, but I never acted on any of them. Not a one.”
She wanted to ask why but the words wouldn’t come. Cold beads of sweat broke out on her forehead and rolled down her face. She needed all her strength to stay in that bed with him and not bolt to her feet and start running. Memories pulled her backward into the past, where she’d been a naive bride turning on her side to go to sleep. No one had told her what a husband would demand in the dark of night so she’d been unprepared when Jed had risen over her in bed and grabbed her roughly by the shoulder, reeking of whiskey and anger.
Don’t you dare close yer eyes on me, woman. Yer my property now. He knocked her onto her back and ripped her knees apart. You’ll do as I say.
“Why did you write to me?” She shook away the past and focused on the question, hating how small her voice sounded in the night, how lost in the dark. She felt small next to him. He seemed to shrink the walls of the room and take up every available inch on the bed. The memories of Jed haunted her as she watched Austin’s face move in the darkness. He furrowed his brow, and the corners of his mouth went down.
“There was just something about your written words that caught me.” Honesty rang in his voice. “Something about you stuck with me long after I’d put the newspaper down.”
“I seemed desperate.” No, there was no doubt about it. “I was desperate.”
“No, that’s not what stayed with me.” Low and soothing, that baritone, mesmerizing enough to ease some of her fear away.
Did she dare hope that when he reached out for her and pressed her to the mattress with his body weight, that he wouldn’t be as rough as Jed had been? She blocked out that ghostly memory haunting her, of that old terror and helpless and tearing pain that left her sobbing. She died that night and every night he’d forced himself on her. A wife’s duty, she knew, but she dared to hope now that maybe Austin wouldn’t hurt her as much.
“I’d be cleaning stalls at the livery or pounding a horse shoe at my forge and I’d think about you, alone and pregnant.” His confession came closer as he eased a few inches nearer. “You didn’t go on like a lot of women about your virtues or your beauty. You didn’t make promises. You didn’t try to seem too good to be true. Your honesty touched me.”
“It did?” That seemed an odd reason to her. “You could have had a more beautiful wife.”
“Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. You are plenty beautiful enough for me. If I’d known you were homeless and living out of a barn, I’d have answered faster.”
“I’m grateful for what you’ve done for me and the—” She hesitated, her burdens weighing heavily on her. “And the baby.”
The baby. What kind of mother would she make with her heart gone and worn away? “What if you hadn’t chosen my advertisement? I don’t know what would have become of me.”
“That’s over now. This is your home now.” He leaned in, the bed sheets rustling, the mattress dipping, the bed ropes groaning with his movements. Her pulse slammed to a stop.
This is it, she thought. Austin might be kind for a man, but he was still a man, with a man’s appetites and strength. The act of marriage was terrible for a woman and she screwed her eyes shut. It would be best if she didn’t have to look at him. If she could think hard on shopping for fabric for the curtains. There might be plenty of choices in material in a town like this. The mercantile looked like a big store and she might be able to find a pretty calico or maybe something with daisies on it …
“Good night, Willa.” His kiss brushed her forehead as soft as a whisper. That was all, just one kiss and he moved away. The sheets rustled and the bed dipped as he settled onto his pillow to sleep.
She opened her eyes, staring unblinkingly into the darkness, waiting. Waiting for what, she did not know. For him to launch at her, to manhandle her into submission, to force himself on her until she sobbed with humiliation and pain? That the moment she relaxed, then he would surprise her cruelly the way Jed might do.
But minutes passed by, measured in the faint muted ticks of the clock in the front room. Austin’s breathing slowed into the rhythm of sleep and she dared to watch him. Dark hair tousled over his forehead, he expelled air in quiet huffs. Austin was so big he took up more than half the bed, but he hadn’t hurt her.
He hadn’t done it.
Tears burned behind her eyes with the memories of a long string of nights of misery and pain. The hopelessness as Jed’s wife had wrapped her in a thick cocoon on that first wedding night, when she’d been too wounded and shamed that not a single tear would come. She’d lain awake half the night, too hurt to move and felt the girl she’d been wither away and all her hopes for happiness with them.
Love did not exist. It was a falsehood, a story told to girls so they would want to get married in the first place. A lie to trick them into a life of servitude and bleak survival, trying to make the best out of a bad situation.
But at least she knew her married life here would not be as hard as it had before. Tears filled her eyes, ran down her cheeks and tapped onto the pillowcase, tears of relief and gratitude she could not stop.
The poor gal sounded real sick this morning. Austin shrugged out of his coat, scattering snowflakes to the wood floor. The fires crackled in the cookstove and hearth as he hung up the coat, wincing in sympathy as he heard Willa retch once more behind the closed bedroom door. Following his sister’s advice, yesterday he’d left a clean chamber pot in easy reach of her side of the bed. Hating that she was ill enough to use it now, he stepped into the kitchen to fix his breakfast. Let her go back to bed, he thought, and rest up after that.
He put coffee on to boil and filled the teakettle. The scrape of a door opening surprised him. Willa stood in the threshold, white-faced and shaky, in a faded and patched blue dress that was so old it was hard to see printed flowers on the calico.
“Good morning.” He set the kettle on the stove. “You don’t look as if you ought to be up.”
“I’m fine.” A dark lock of hair escaped her neatly plaited braid and swept across her forehead. She looked too beautiful for that poor sad dress and too young to be a wife twice over. Not a lick of color could be found in her ashen face. Halfway to the kitchen she stopped, placed a hand on her stomach and swallowed hard, perhaps debating a dash back to the chamber pot.
“You don’t look fine, darlin’.” His bride. His chest swelled up at that thought. He crossed over to pull a chair out at the table.
“I just need to get a little tea.” Big blue eyes avoided his, but she hesitated at the chair he’d drawn out for her. She studied it for a moment, as if considering it, before slipping onto the cushion.
“My sister gave me an earful about expecting women.” He resisted the urge to tuck that stray lock of hair behind her ear or to give her shoulder a squeeze of encouragement. “That’s why I’ve already got the kettle on.”
“That’s good of you, Austin.” She tipped her head back to look up at him. The sorrow in her eyes got to him. No woman, especially one so young, should have eyes like that. As if she’d known a world of sadness. In the full light of morning, he could see her clearly, more than he’d been able to in the lamplight last night.
She was hardly more than a girl, a young woman who ought to be sewing on her hope chest and giggling with friends her own age about fashion and parties and attending her final semester at the schoolhouse. Tenderness wrapped around him, making her sorrow his.
