Amish Country Box Set: Restless HeartsThe Doctor's BlessingCourting Ruth Page 6

  What was there in his comment to raise her hackles? He didn’t know, but he wanted to.

  “I was the kid who was always looking over the pasture fence, wondering what was on the outside.”

  She nodded, gray eyes thoughtful. “I can see that. But why a cop, of all things?”

  “That was Bill’s fault.” He smiled. “Bill Brinks. State Trooper assigned to this area. He had a soft spot for the Amish kids. He’d follow the buggies home on dark nights, when maybe someone had been having a wild rumspringa.”

  “Someone like you, for instance?” Her lips curved.

  “Guilty,” he said, trying not to imagine how those lips would feel against his. “My mother says I gave her more gray hairs than all my brothers put together.”

  Her eyebrows lifted. “I can imagine that.”

  “Anyway, Bill went from being an interfering nuisance to being a mentor. My family liked him, but they didn’t like where my friendship with him was leading me. Away from them. I suppose your family would have felt the same in that situation.” He said it deliberately, watching for her reaction this time.

  The reaction was there, quick but unmistakable. Odd. He could guess what kind of family life the Flanagans he’d met would have—warm, loving, nosy, interfering. Like Amish Irish. But apparently that wasn’t what Fiona’s family life had been like.

  “So you left home to become a cop.”

  He nodded. “I left the community before I was baptized into the church, so I wasn’t breaking any vows by the actions I took.”

  Should he remind her that her mother had done the same? Maybe not. She didn’t need the reminder.

  “You didn’t go into the state police, like your friend,” she said.

  “I was too young, then, and I wanted to see a little of the world. I went to Chicago, worked, finished my education, eventually went to the police academy there.”

  She looked at him with a bit of skepticism in her face, as if trying to picture him as a big-city cop and having trouble doing so. “Obviously you didn’t stay. What made you decide to leave?”

  Everything in him hardened against her at that. No one here would tell her, and he wouldn’t, either. “Just got to longing for the rural life again. So here I am.”

  “And they welcomed you back.”

  No wonder she sounded skeptical. The Stolzfus family hadn’t exactly welcomed her.

  “They did. They don’t understand my choice, and they have a lot of trouble seeing me wear a gun, but they accept me.” He took a step closer to her, close enough to see the tiny blue highlights in the gray of her eyes. “You see, I know how much pain it causes an Amish family when a child leaves. I know, because I did it.”

  Her gaze evaded his. “But—children do leave home. It’s natural, isn’t it?”

  “It’s natural for the world. Not for the Amish.”

  Her head came up. “It’s not my fault that my mother made the choice she did.”

  “I know that. They do, too. All I’m saying is—”

  What was he saying? What did he hope to gain by telling his story to this outsider?

  But she wasn’t an outsider, not really. And she was hurting. He could see beyond her brave facade. He knew she was hurting, probably more than she wanted to admit.

  “Just be patient.” He forced a smile. “Maybe, in time, your mother’s family will come to terms with Hannah’s choice, like mine did.”

  Her eyebrows lifted. “Didn’t you leave a little something out of your story?”

  “I left a lot out.” His mind flickered to the pain of those last months in Chicago, and he pushed the thought away. “Most of it pretty boring.”

  “What about your relationship with my aunt Emma? That’s kind of pertinent, isn’t it?”

  “Rachel told you.” He traded annoyance for resignation. Young Rachel bubbled on like a brook, and there was no changing that.

  She nodded. “I thought maybe—” She stopped, as if reluctant to voice what she thought.

  “You thought my attitude toward you was affected by my courting Emma.” He shrugged. “Well, maybe it was, but not in the way you think.”

  “You don’t know what I think.” She rushed the words.

  He couldn’t suppress a smile, thinking of Fiona’s younger self. “I was sixteen, maybe seventeen. Emma was the same. She was my first love.”

  “They say you never forget your first love,” she said.

  “They say?” He raised an eyebrow. “What about you? Have you forgotten your first love?”

  A faint flush bloomed like a rose. “We weren’t talking about me.” Her eyes slid away from his.

  Well. That was an interesting response from a woman her age, he’d think.

  “I guess we weren’t. Well, I was already planning on leaving, and like any young fool in love, I wanted Emma to say she’d go with me.”

  “She refused to leave her family?”

  “She refused. Smartest thing she could have done. We weren’t anywhere near ready for marriage.” He’d still rushed away in anger and hurt. “But we didn’t see that then, and she stayed because of her mother.”

  Fiona instinctively moved her hands, as if to push him away. He met her gaze and held it.

  “She’d been a small child at the time, but she remembered what happened when Hannah left. She remembered that their mother seemed to turn into an old woman overnight. She remembered the pain that she felt nearly killed her mother. And she wouldn’t go with me, because she couldn’t subject her parents to that pain again.”

  Fiona’s face whitened, her gray eyes looking very dark. “It wasn’t my fault.” It was a whisper.

  “No, it wasn’t.” Sympathy for her flooded him. “I’m not saying it to hurt you, Fiona. I’m not blaming you for anything that happened to Emma and me. It was for the best. She has a happy marriage, and I have the career I want. We’re friends. But the family—well, now you know how they were hurt when your mother left.”

  “Now I know,” she repeated, looking as if the words were acid in her mouth.

  “Just tread carefully where the family is concerned. For your sake, as well as theirs.”

  He touched her then, gripping her shoulder in what he meant to be an encouraging gesture. He wasn’t ready for the warmth that surged through him from that touch. It was as if they were connected by a current that flowed back and forth between them, binding them together.

  He let go, his mind scrambling for something coherent to say. There wasn’t anything. But it was very clear that Fiona wasn’t the only one who’d better be careful.

  * * *

  “Aunt Siobhan, that sandwich tray is beautiful.” Fiona shook her head at the array of food that her Flanagan relatives were piling on her kitchen table and counters. “This is too much. I didn’t expect you to do all this.”

  Her aunt paused in the act of sorting cookies onto a serving tray, glancing at her with something like surprise in the deep-blue eyes that were so like Gabe’s. “Well, of course we want to help, Fiona. That’s what family is for.”

  Something grabbed Fiona’s heart, making her momentarily speechless. Maybe Aunt Siobhan realized it, because she left the cookies and came to give Fiona a quick hug, her movements as light and supple as a girl’s.

  “We love being part of your open house, dear.” She pressed her cheek against Fiona’s. “You wouldn’t take that away from us, would you?”

  “Just be happy the men aren’t here.” Mary Kate, Aunt Siobhan’s older daughter, pushed her way through the screen door, balancing a large white box filled with cupcakes. “You don’t know how they can eat. There’d be nothing left for your prospective mothers.”

  “It won’t just be moms,” Fiona said. She took the box, sliding it onto the counter. “Although I’m hoping for a good turnout of possible clients.” And praying. “I’ve invited the whole township, it seems. You never know who might be in a position to refer a pregnant woman.”

  “Good business,” Mary Kate said approvingly
, running a hand through curls so deep a red they were almost mahogany. Those came from the Flanagan side of the family, and Mary Kate’s two kids had inherited the red curls, too.

  “It was nice of you to come. I hope you didn’t have to hire a sitter.” She said the words tentatively, knowing Mary Kate’s husband had died about a year earlier, not sure how she managed with two young children, and a burgeoning career as a physical therapist.

  “The kids are busy pestering Grandpa this afternoon.” Mary Kate smiled. “And I’m happy to have some girl-time, even if I’m not a prospective client.”

  Something seemed to shadow Mary Kate’s face at that. Regret, perhaps? She was still young, still capable of falling in love again, having more children.

  The door swung again, and Nolie came in with Terry, the younger Flanagan daughter who’d followed her father and brothers into firefighting but had gone on to become a paramedic. The kitchen was suddenly filled with laughter and female voices, and a warmth she hadn’t known she was missing flooded Fiona.

  This was how a kitchen should be. Filled with the pleasure that came of working together with family—of having people who accepted her and shared her aims just because they were hers.

  Even if they didn’t approve, as in Ted’s case. His family accepted him back, even though they could never accept the gun and badge he wore.

  “Have you seen Ted Rittenhouse lately?” Nolie asked, as if she’d been reading her thoughts.

  “Not in a few days, at least not to talk to.” Ten days, but who was counting? She’d thought he might turn up again to help Jacob with the carpentry, but he hadn’t, and that job was finished now.

  “He seems like a nice guy, from what Gabe said.” Nolie filled a tray with cupcakes. She paused, pulling one from the tray and handing it to Mary Kate. “This one looks as if someone’s little finger got into the icing.”

  “I guess you’ll have to eat it, Mary Kate.” Fiona could only be glad that Mary Kate’s child’s indiscretion took the conversation away from the subject of Ted.

  The others began teasing Mary Kate about her having to eat any cakes with fingerprints, and Fiona escaped with a tray into what she’d begun calling the “group room,” where she hoped she might eventually hold birthing classes. At the moment, it had two long, covered tables—one for food, the other divided between a coffee and tea station and rows of booklets and materials about midwifery to give out to anyone who was interested.

  The questions about Ted had unsettled her, and she tried to push them away. Ted’s social life was no concern of hers. She had no idea what he did during his free hours. He might be going out on dates every night of the week, for all she knew.

  Not with her. After that revelation about the end of his relationship with Emma, she understood his attitude toward her a lot better. But the attraction was there—they both recognized that, even if they had no intention of admitting it.

  Her mother’s actions had, however inadvertently, ruined his love for Emma. Maybe it was just as well, maybe they’d been too young, maybe it would have ended as unhappily as her parents’ marriage had. Still, he had to find her a reminder.

  She’d known he found her presence painful for his friends. Now she realized that it might be painful personally, as well. No one could blame him for steering clear of her. No one.

  “Your first visitors are gathering on the porch.” Aunt Siobhan hurried in, followed by the others, bearing more trays of food. “Go on, dear, and welcome them. We’ll see that everything is set up properly here.”

  Fiona nodded. She should thank them again, but a flock of butterflies seemed to be fluttering around her stomach, and her throat had closed. Pinning a smile to her face, she hurried to the door to open it officially for the first time.

  * * *

  An hour later she was taking a breather after having given her hundredth introductory spiel when Nolie shoved an oatmeal cookie into her hand.

  “Relax and eat something. Enjoy.” She grinned. “You’re a success.”

  “I guess so.” She looked around at the rooms, still crowded with people. “Are you sure they’re not just here for the free refreshments?”

  “Look at them. Every person is holding some of your brochures. If they’re not going to be clients themselves, they’ll tell someone else. It may take time and patience, but this is going to work.”

  “Patience is a given in the midwifery field. Babies seldom arrive when expected.” She glanced around again. There were several young women who might be in need of her services, but none in Amish garb. “I’d hoped for some sign of acceptance from the Amish today.”

  Nolie poked her. “Well, then, you have it. Look who’s coming in.”

  Pleasure flooded Fiona, and she hurried toward the three women in the doorway—Susie, Aaron’s wife, obviously blooming with pregnancy, along with two other young Amish women. Ridiculous, to be so elated at the sight of them.

  “Susie, I’m so happy you’re here.”

  “I wanted to see your office, even though my baby will be born at home.” Susie patted her rounded belly, and then she nodded to the young woman on her left. “This is my friend, Miriam Hostetler. She wants you to deliver her baby. And her sister, Elizabeth. Elizabeth’s father planted a whole row of celery in the garden this year, so we think a wedding will be announced soon.” Fiona looked at her, puzzled. Celery?

  The younger woman blushed, nodding. Miriam said something to her and then smiled at Fiona. “Celery is an important part of the wedding feast. We say you can tell when a daughter will be married by the amount of celery in the garden.”

  “Well, I’m happy to meet both of you. Miriam, if you’d like to make an appointment, I can come to your home, or you can meet me here.” She gestured toward the door to the meeting room. “Why don’t you go in and have some refreshments now, and we’ll talk later.”

  They nodded, moving off in a group. She couldn’t control the elation that bubbled through her. This day was a success, wasn’t it?

  She glanced toward the door, saw who stood there, and swallowed hard. She really shouldn’t feel that rush of pleasure at the sight of Ted’s tall figure. He hovered awkwardly on the doorstep, as if unsure of his welcome.

  She smiled at him. “Please, come in. The open house is for everyone, not just expectant mothers.”

  He stepped inside, holding out something in a soft cloth. “I brought you a little housewarming gift. Sorry it’s not wrapped fancy, like some of those.”

  He glanced at the hall table that overflowed with everything from homemade jelly to houseplants.

  “You didn’t need to bring anything.” She took the bundle, her fingers brushing his as she did. “I didn’t expect gifts from anyone.”

  “Folks around here like to say welcome,” he said. “Open it.”

  She opened the cloth, exposing what it hid. The plaque was of wood, not brass, but otherwise it was exactly as she’d envisioned it that first night when she’d looked at the house: Fiona Flanagan, Nurse-Midwife.

  Her throat choked. “Thank you.” She managed to stammer the words. “And thank Jacob.” For surely this delicate carving must have come from him.

  “Jacob just supervised,” he said. “In spite of what my brother might say, I did the work.” His fingers brushed hers again. “Welcome to Crossroads, Fiona.”

  “Thank you.” She didn’t dare look up at him, because she didn’t want him to see the silly tears in her eyes.

  He glanced over her shoulder, as if sensing her feelings and trying to spare her embarrassment. “I see Susie brought you some prospective clients.”

  She nodded, clearing her throat so that she could speak normally. “Only three Amish turned up, but plenty of other people.”

  “Well, it’s a start.” His fingers touched hers again as he took the sign. “Would you like me to go and put this up for you?”

  “Yes. Thank you.” As he said, it was a start.

  * * *

  The auction sign was large, handm
ade and decorated with a bunch of balloons so that no one could miss the proper turn. Fiona turned her car onto the narrow dirt lane that led between cornfields toward, presumably, the site where she hoped to pick up a few pieces of furniture she needed for the house.

  The corn had been left standing in the field. She’d learned enough in her weeks here to know that was unusual. Most of the corn had long since been cut for silage to feed the animals over the winter. Only here did the stalks stand, brown and sere, looking abandoned.

  She shook her head. Silly to be thinking such mournful thoughts. Perhaps the farmer and his wife had retired to a well-earned rest in Florida or some other sunbelt state, and the proceeds from the sale of things they’d left behind would pay for new furniture for a bright sunroom or a boat to putter along a warm bay.

  She emerged from the cornfields to a busy sight. People thronged over the lawn between house and barn, talking, laughing, acting as if this event was a party. The auctioneer stood beneath a canopy ringed by lawn chairs, already filled. It was probably smart, auction-goers bringing their own chairs with them.

  She pulled into a row of cars in a stubbly field and parked, trying to douse a surge of apprehension. She didn’t look like any more of an outsider than the yuppie couple climbing out of their big SUV next to her. And if any of her mother’s family happened to be here—well, she’d cope with that if it happened.

  In the week since the open house, things had settled down to what might be her new normal. Several clients had come to engage her services, including Susie’s friend, Miriam Hostetler. Ruth’s quilters were back at work, including Emma, but she’d regretfully put the pieces of her mother’s quilt away again. Somehow she didn’t have the heart to ask anyone else to finish the quilt after what had happened.

  She slid out of the car, grabbed her bag and headed for the center of activity. She could hear the auctioneer’s chant from here, and she pushed her way through the throng. It would be nice to see someone she knew, although the odds of that probably weren’t great. The auction had certainly attracted a mob of people—farmers mixed with smart, young well-dressed couples who’d probably come out from Suffolk for a Saturday of antiquing, together with a scattering of Mennonite and Amish.