Caroline's Secret (24 page)

Whatever for?
Thankfully she managed to keep the question to herself. She knew why Trey wanted her to dress like the English. Because he wanted her to marry him, give up all things Amish. Including her family. The thought made her stomach pitch.

“I don’t know,” she murmured, the idea making her squirm in her seat. She had never dressed
Englisch
before. Not even when she and Trey had been sneaking around. She might have gone against a lot of what she had been raised to believe, but giving up her prayer
kapp
and
frack
would be like stripping away her identity. Part of her being.

He shot her that sweet smile that had melted her insides from the very first time she had ever seen him. Maybe it was the time that had passed, but now she recognized it as what it really was: coercion. He wanted something from her, and he was willing to pull out all the stops to get it.

“Are you embarrassed to be seen with a Plain girl?”

He laughed, his smile lingering on his lips. “Caroline Hostetler, you are far from plain.”

“You know what I mean.”

“I do. But don’t you think you would be more comfortable if you were to take your hair down?”

Would she be more comfortable? Or would the action just show her how much she didn’t belong in Trey’s world?

Only one way to find out.

She reached for the pins holding her
kapp
in place.

Trey swerved a bit as he took his eyes from the road to watch her. He seemed almost mesmerized by her actions.

“If you don’t watch where you are driving, then I’m not going to do this.”

“Right.” He turned his attention back to the front, but turned to look at her every few seconds.

“Strange” was not the word to describe how it felt to have her hair down during the middle of the day. She put it up first thing in the morning and took it down the last thing before going to bed.

But strange seemed to be the direction her life was taking these days. And there was nothing she could do to stop it.

She had left Oklahoma to find Trey, reconciled with her parents only to have the man at her side want her to walk away from it all once again.

“We could run by the mall and get you some different clothes if you like.”

“It’s not necessary,” she said, head down as she tried to get used to the feeling of her unbound hair and traveling faster than she thought man was intended.

You better get used to it
, a small voice taunted. If she married Trey, all this would be a part of her life.

“I know it’s not necessary, but I think it’ll be good.” He glanced to the backseat where Emma was peacefully playing with a colorful plastic car toy Trey had brought for her. It had its own miniature steering wheel and toot-toot horn. “We can get some things for Emma too.”

Caroline shook her head. “You don’t have to do that.”

“Of course I do,” Trey said. “That’s my job. And once we are married, I’ll buy you things every day. No time like now for you to start getting used to the idea.” He exited the highway as they neared the city limits.

Caroline didn’t comment as he drove them to the mall. All she could think about was the confident way he spoke about the two of them binding themselves to each other for a lifetime.

Was that really what she wanted?

“Oh,
nay
.” Caroline shook her head as Trey steered his shiny car into her parents’ driveway. They’d had a fun time in Nashville, but she was tired and the sight before her was more than she wanted to deal with right now.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

Caroline swallowed back the lump of worry in her throat and pointed toward the buggy parked off to one side. “That’s the bishop’s buggy.”

Her hands flew to her head. But her prayer
kapp
was at the bottom of the shopping bag that Trey had stored in the trunk of the car. “Oh,
nay, nay, nay
.”

How was she going to explain the way she was dressed and her lack of a head covering to the bishop?

She had only done it because it was the only way to know if she could. She felt exposed and promiscuous in the tight-fitting jeans. And the clingy shirt had no modesty at all.

The bishop’s horse had been unhitched from his buggy and was grazing in the pasture with the rest of the Hostetler animals. He had most likely come for supper and planned to stay long enough to talk to her.

“Calm down,” Trey said, turning off the car engine and turning to face her.

“I can’t be calm. This is bad, really bad.” She started to bundle her hair at the nape of her neck. She had nothing to secure it there and it immediately tumbled back down. “The bishop would only be here for one reason, and that is to call me to task about . . . everything.”

Trey laid a warm hand on her leg, and Caroline jumped at the soft touch. “What difference does it make?”

“It makes a lot.”

“Not if you marry me.” His narrowed eyes grew stormy. “You aren’t going to, are you? You’re not going to marry me.”

“I don’t know,” Caroline cried. “I don’t know what to do.”

“I only want to help.”

She sucked in a deep breath just as her
mamm
came out onto the porch. Even with yards separating them, Caroline could see the pain and apprehension in her mother’s eyes.

She had done that. She had brought this shame and dishonor onto her family. Maybe Trey was right. Maybe there was only one way to solve it.

If she stayed here, no one would ever forget. Emma would pay the price in never having a father. No man would want Caroline after they found out the truth. Just look at Andrew.

The mere thought of his name sent a stabbing pain through her heart.

That time in her life was over.

The Bible said there was a time for everything: a time to reap and a time to sow. Now was her time to grow up. She had put her family through too much already. She couldn’t continue to do this to them.

Lord, please tell me I’m doing the right thing.
She prayed. Then she turned to Trey.

“Okay,
jah
,” she finally said. “You’re right.”

He shook his head. “About what?”

“About everything.”

“Yeah?”

“Jah,”
she said again. “I’ll marry you.”

A rush of relief washed over Trey. Caroline was going to marry him. They would be a family, and to the devil and back with his father’s offers and worries about appearances.

One sure thing about the media circus, it always died down. As soon as fresh news hit, the press forgot the transgressions of the day before.

“That’s wonderful,” he said, reaching across the console to pull her close.

She shook her head and held up a hand to stay his approach. “My
mamm
is watching.”

He pulled away. “Shall we go in and tell them the good news?”

She hesitated. “Maybe we should save that for another day.” She shot a pointed look toward the bishop’s buggy.

Trey didn’t know a great deal about the ways of the Amish, but he knew that Caroline would have a lot of explaining to do. “You want me to come in?”

“Nay.”

“I will, you know. You didn’t get into this situation all by yourself.”

She gave him a trembling smile. “It’s okay. This is something I need to do myself. Then in a couple of days, when the dust settles, we can make our plans for the . . . wedding.”

He didn’t miss the slight hesitation before the word. She might be having misgivings, but he would make certain that they were taken care of and gone before she walked down the aisle. And he would do everything in his power to make that happen as soon as possible.

But for now . . .

“I’ll come by in a couple of days?”

She swallowed hard.

Despite her doubts, the love he had for her grew a bit more. She was worried now, but not for long. He would show her how great life was going to be as they became a family. And he would put that smile back on her sweet lips.

Caroline watched Trey drive away with a rock in the pit of her stomach. Thankfully her mother had gone back into the house before Caroline had gotten out of the car, leaving her a few minutes alone to gather herself.

At least her mother hadn’t seen her in the
Englisch
clothes that Trey had bought her.

She held Emma on one hip and plucked at the front of the orange-colored T-shirt she now wore instead of her modest blue dress. She had been terribly uncomfortable in the clinging outfit, but she would have to get used to it. Marrying Trey and living among the
Englisch
, she would be expected to dress like other
Englischers
. It was just the way it was.

She supposed she would get used to it eventually.

Lord, I pray that I’m doing the right thing. Emma needs a father. And Trey wants to marry. So why does it feel like I might be making the biggest mistake of my life?

Mistake or not, she had promised Trey that they would get married. She would keep that promise to him and give Emma hope for the future.

“
Allrecht
, Emma, my girl, let’s get this over with.” She kissed the top of her
dochder
’s head and started toward the house.

She wasn’t sure whose gasp was louder, her mother’s or her father’s.

Bishop Glick was strangely calm, as if he had heard so many bad rumors about her that nothing as mundane as
Englisch
clothes could surprise him.

“Caroline, what have you done?” Her mother rose, moisture in her eyes, and Caroline had to blink back tears of her own.

“Trey asked me to marry him, and I said yes.” She let Emma slide to the floor. The child immediately toddled over and climbed into her
grossdaadi
’s lap.

Caroline swallowed back the lump of regrets and turned toward the bishop. “I’m sure you are here for me.”

“Jah,”
he said.

She lowered herself into the seat opposite him and folded her hands on the table in front of her.

“I take it Trey is the baby’s
vatter
?” Bishop Glick asked.

“Jah.”

“And he is
Englisch
, as the rumors tell me?”

“He is.” Caroline dipped her chin with more confidence than she felt.

The bishop stroked his beard, the round lenses of his glasses glinting in the late-afternoon light. “As a member of the Amish church, you understand what it means to marry an
Englischer
.”

Caroline took a steadying breath and kept her gaze trained on David Glick. “It means a
meidung
.”

She heard her mother’s breath catch, the sound at direct odds with Emma’s sweet babbling.

“Are you prepared for that?” the bishop asked.

“Jah.”
Her voice was barely above a whisper.

“You will join your life with his until death.”

To her credit, Grace Hostetler managed to keep her sobs to herself.

Caroline hated that everything had to come out this way. The entire situation was unfortunate, trying, and downright painful for all involved.

But soon, very soon, she would be Trey’s wife. Soon after, life would settle into a new normal for her. Her heart thumped at the thought. She had no idea what that normal might be.

“I understand,” she managed to say. It was necessary. By marrying Trey, she would save Emma from a stigma she would carry with her for life. She couldn’t allow her daughter to be punished for her sins.

The bishop studied her with knowing green eyes. The clock on the wall clicked off three full seconds. Everyone seemed to hold their breath. Even Emma grew quiet as if she knew something important was about to happen.

Finally he spoke. “If’ n you change your mind, you know what must be done.”

“Jah, danki,”
she said and stood to escort him to the door.

He’d won that round, Trey thought to himself as he pulled his car onto the highway and headed for home. Yet the victory seemed hollow and heavy at the same time.

Hollow because despite Caroline agreeing to marry him, he had the feeling that the choice was not one she wanted to make. And heavy for the circumstances he now faced.

In September he would start his final year of law school. He’d have a wife who was basically from another time and a child he barely knew. That wasn’t all. They would surely be thrown into a media circus once the hounds got wind of their wedding.

He sighed. They hadn’t even talked about the wedding. His mother would surely want to put together something a little more elegant than a trip to the courthouse, but Trey felt an urgency to make this right like he never had before. Maybe by the end of this week, first of next at the latest.

There was no time for a reception with hundreds of people, hors d’oeuvres, and an open bar. This needed to be done and filed so they could get on to the business of living.

Trey ran through a Chinese takeout and took his solitary dinner back to his apartment. He let himself in, not really wanting to be alone, but not wanting company either. Except for Caroline. He would love to have her sitting across from him. Soon . . . very soon.

He sat down at the table and started to eat. A little wave of guilt washed over him when he realized that he hadn’t said grace.

Never once while he and Caroline had been going around together had she not prayed. In fact, she prayed before
and
after she ate.

How were they going to address the question of faith? He had grown up in church, but didn’t see himself as particularly spiritual. Attending Sunday morning services had been more of a show for the public than anything to do with God.

He couldn’t ask Caroline to walk away from God after she had just abandoned her family. It seemed like they both had a lot of adjustments to make.

He finished eating and took the paper containers to the trash. His mind was still going ninety-to-nothing with all of the decisions and choices still to be made.

On top of it all, he needed to call and talk to his parents. His father would need to call his campaign manager. A lot of people would need to know about the wedding, and soon. He sighed and grabbed his phone. He didn’t really have a date, but it was time to get the party started.

“Trey?” His father answered the phone as if he had been sitting there just waiting for it to ring.

“Hi, Dad.”

“I take it you have something to tell me.”

Trey cleared his throat. He wished he had planned for this moment better. “I’m getting married.”

His father cursed under his breath, but the tone was unmistakable. “Son, you need to think this through.”

Trey rubbed his eyes. “I have thought it through, and this is best for everyone.”

“I don’t know how you can say that.”

“Can I talk to Mom?”

“Trey, this is serious.”

“I am being serious. I’m serious, and I am marrying Caroline. I’m going to be a father to Emma.”

His father swore again. “None of this would be necessary if she had done what she was supposed to.”

Trey really didn’t want to go through all of this right now. Besides, what good would it do? His father was as stubborn as they came. There was no changing Duke Rycroft’s mind about anything.

“Let me talk to my mother,” he said through gritted teeth. “We have plans to make.”

The day after the bishop’s visit, Caroline’s family got the sad news that her grandfather had passed. Even though his death had been expected, Caroline was not prepared when the call came to their
Englisch
neighbor’s house.

How many more blows could her family take?

Trey hadn’t been happy that they would have to wait a few more days to be married, but Caroline needed to be there for her father at least this one last time.

They buried her
grossdaadi
on Friday. In true Amish form, Hollis Hostetler had pushed his grief down and not spoken his father’s name since they found out about his death.

Caroline had moved back into the main house. Now that her
grossdaadi
’s house was empty, her cousin and his wife were moving in. It was
gut
timing for the young couple. Their year of living with family had almost drawn to an end. They hadn’t started a house of their own knowing that the eldest Hostetler was not long for this world. Just like everywhere else, land in Ethridge was getting hard to come by. More often than not, houses were handed down rather than new ones built.

“Are you sure you’re going to be
allrecht
?” Sue Miller touched Caroline’s arm as she made her way down the porch steps.

“Jah.”
Her grandfather had been put in the ground, condolences had been given, and the other mourners had headed for their own homes. The Millers were the last to leave. Already the house seemed too quiet.

Sue gave her arm one last squeeze and walked quickly toward her buggy and her husband, who waited in the driver’s seat.

Caroline watched until they pulled onto the road and out of sight. Then she looked toward the barn, wondering if her father was in there thinking about his father. Or if his grief was so deep that he wouldn’t let the memories in at all.

“Poor
Dat
,” she whispered to herself. Her father had been through so much, having to deal with her sins and now losing his father. She could do nothing to help him with the pain of death, but she could keep patching the holes in the bridge between them and continue to pray that they could meet somewhere in the middle.

The sound of a car engine gave her pause. She wasn’t sure why, but she stopped and waited as the car crept along the road, then stopped just in front of their driveway.

Her first thought was that it was Trey coming to talk as they had decided, but the car was blue, not black, and bigger than the one Trey drove.

They must be looking for someone
. Caroline raised a hand to shade her eyes for a better look at who was driving. But the glare of the afternoon sun was too great. Perhaps she should walk over and see if she could be of any help to the poor lost
Englischer
.

Before she could take even one step in their direction, the car turned into the driveway and inched closer.

As it neared, she could see that the driver wasn’t English, but Plain. Perhaps a Mennonite who had known her grandfather once upon a time. Yet there was something familiar about the man behind the wheel.

“Andrew,” she breathed, hardly able to believe her eyes as he cautiously parked the car and got out.

She stumbled over her own feet as she made her way to him, still not certain if he was real. She drew herself up mere feet from him, now able to look into those sea-colored eyes and smell the detergent used to clean his shirt and the essence that was part of him. He was real.

But why was he there?

Andrew accepted the cup of
kaffi
from Caroline’s mother.
“Danki”.

She gave a small smile and slid into the chair opposite him. Caroline sat to his right, and he wanted nothing more to grasp one of her hands in his and absorb some of the pain and disbelief from her eyes. She looked like she had been hit by the bus that brought him all the way to Tennessee.

“I’m sorry that I came on such a sad day.” They had buried her grandfather that morning. He could see the exhaustion and strain in their eyes. But he’d had no way of knowing. He only wished that he had come sooner so he could have been there for them.

All he wanted now was a chance to see Caroline, talk to her in private, tell her all his feelings for her. Make sure she didn’t do something stupid like marry the
Englischer
. But all that would have to wait.

“It’s
allrecht
,” Grace Hostetler said. But he could see the strain of the day in the downward curve of her mouth.

He’d finish his cup of coffee, then find a hotel somewhere and come back tomorrow. Or the next day. The family needed a little time to grieve. He could afford them that—a little time. But he could hardly wait to tell Caroline how much he loved her and how he wanted her to marry him. But he would have to wait. He didn’t want the day he proposed to be the day of her
grossdaadi
’s funeral.