Gabriel's Bride (27 page)

“I’ll just . . .” Rachel rose to her feet and went to the stove, stirring the big pot of soup for something to do with her hands. The weather was almost too warm for soup, she thought. Then she switched to wishing Gabriel could hear her thoughts and hurry home.

She just hoped he hadn’t picked tonight to avoid her altogether.

Joseph elbowed Simon at the wash stand. “I told you she would come home.”

“Quit pushing.” Simon winced but continued about his business. Their prayers had been answered. Sort of. Mary Elizabeth had returned, and that was
gut
. Now maybe their
dat
would send Rachel away. Then life could go back to the way it was. The thought should have made him jump for joy, but it didn’t. All thanks to Matthew, it made his stomach hurt instead.

How could his father love Rachel? What about their
mamm
? How could he love two women?

Matthew’s words came back to Simon as he waved his hands about to dry them.
Mamm doesn’t have a place here anymore. Her place now is with Jesus.

Tears stung at the back of his eyes, but he blinked them away before they could fall. What if Mary Elizabeth took off again because
Dat
had married Rachel, and she no longer felt welcome?

“We gotta do something, Joseph,” Simon said.

Matthew, David, and Samuel had all left to go back into the house, leaving Simon and Joseph with a moment alone.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, something,” Simon repeated. He pushed back Matthew’s words. Thankfully he hadn’t promised to stop trying to make Rachel leave. “Something to get our family back to the way it was.”

“You want Rachel to leave.”

He nodded.

“I think I like her,” Joseph confessed.

“You’re just saying that because you’re happy Mary Elizabeth is back. But who knows how long she’ll really be here. What if
Dat
makes her leave because he doesn’t need her to take care of us since he married Rachel?”

Joseph chewed on his bottom lip in what Simon considered his thoughtful look.

“Matthew starts
rumspringa
next year, and Samuel will go to school in the fall.”

Joseph shook his head. “Teacher won’t take him ’cuz he don’t know his letters.”

“Rachel’s been teaching them to him. You can count on it, he’s going to school. With all of us in school and Matthew running around, why would he need two womenfolk in the
haus
?”

“
Dat
won’t make Mary Elizabeth leave.” Joseph’s words sounded tiny and hollow.

“Are you willing to take the chance on that?”

Simon was just about to go back into the house when the creak and rattle of a buggy reached his ears.

“
Dat’s
home,” Joseph cried, jumping up and down with excitement.

Simon stilled his steps and turned to wait on his
vatter
.

Gabriel pulled the buggy to a stop and swung down, giving Simon and Joseph a questioning look. “
Wie geht, buwe?
”

“
Gut! Gut!
” Joseph hopped into the air as if Christmas had come early. “Mary Elizabeth’s home,
Dat
! Ain’t that great?”

Gabriel’s hands stilled on the harnesses. “What did you say?”

“Mary Elizabeth’s come back,” Simon answered this time, but with less enthusiasm than his
bruder
.

His heart gave a painful thud. His baby girl had returned? “Mary Elizabeth?” He turned to his son. “Simon, take care of the horses.”

The boy complied without complaint, taking the reins and leading the beasts toward the barn, but to Gabriel everything moved as if in slow motion. His Mary Elizabeth had come back. Gabriel tried his best to dampen his excitement, to slow his steps as he neared the house, but his emotions were all there, tamped down but alive and beating with every thump of his heart.

He wrenched open the door and rushed inside the house. There she was, sitting at the table like she’d only been gone for the afternoon instead of nearly two months.

“
Dat
.”

She stood, and he stumbled trying to get to her. He wrapped her into his embrace and held her tight. His baby girl had come home.

Reluctantly, Gabriel released his daughter, soaking in her very presence. The world hadn’t gotten to her. She might be dressed like an
Englischer
, but she had returned, a little pale, but home.

She lowered herself into a chair, and he pulled up a seat next to her.

As he studied Mary Elizabeth, he began noticing the tiny differences that he hadn’t seen before. Her normally sparkling blue eyes seemed dull and sad. She was thin, many pounds lighter than when she had left. He supposed the
Englisch
world was not all that she had imagined or she never would have returned, but it was the changes in her that worried him the most.

“It’s so
gut
to see you again,” he said, containing the tremble that threatened his voice. “I was so worried about you.”

She wiped away her tears. “I’m so very
froh
to be home.”

If’n she was so happy, why was she crying?

Rachel caught his eye and stood. “I sent the boys upstairs,” she said, standing and taking the lid off the bubbling pot of chicken soup. “We should eat now, before it gets too late.”

“
Jah
,” he agreed. The dinner smelled
gut
, like it hadn’t been scorched. The blessings just kept coming. He took Mary Elizabeth in again. There was still so much to talk about, so many things that he wanted to ask his
dochder.
Then again, she was home and those many questions could be answered tomorrow.

Mary Elizabeth stood. “I’m so very tired,” she said, with a shake of her head. “I think I’ll just go on up to my room and lie down.”

He didn’t want to, but he couldn’t help but be caught in those bottomless brown eyes belonging to his wife. She had been sleeping in Mary Elizabeth’s room. Now that his daughter was back, they were one bed short.

With Mary Elizabeth asleep upstairs, Rachel was strangely quiet throughout the meal. Or maybe it was that the boys were exceptionally chatty. They all talked at once, making plans to take Mary Elizabeth down to the creek and over to see Annie’s baby. Samuel wanted to take her out and introduce her to Rachel’s dairy goats and the new litter of kittens that were born the week before.

Gabriel used the opportunity to relax, or rather try to. His meeting with Beth Troyer had been a chore at best. That woman walked the line between
Englisch
and Amish like none he had ever seen. But that was a problem for the bishop to see to. Gabriel had told her to quit hanging her private laundry for all the world to see and left it at that.

He now wished that he had hurried home instead of stopping by Gideon’s to check on Annie and the new
boppli
. Michelle, they had named her. Michelle Elizabeth after Annie’s mother and his daughter—the one currently upstairs sleeping in the bed he’d promised his wife.

After supper, they sat down for the Bible reading, but Gabriel had trouble paying attention. He so wished Mary Elizabeth had stayed downstairs and heard the Good Lord’s word, but he could see the exhaustion on her pale face. She would have plenty of time to soak up the verses she needed, and until then, he had five sons that needed their daily dose of the truth.

Still he cut it short, and watched with his heart thumping as Rachel shooed them all upstairs and into bed a full half hour before their normal bedtime.

Which left him exactly thirty minutes to decide what to do with his wife.

“I’ll sleep on the couch,” she said quietly. Rachel made her way from the kitchen to the living room, wiping her hands on a dishtowel as she approached. The action didn’t hide the tremor in her fingers. Nor could it mask the familiar light in her eyes.

He shouldn’t have kissed her that night at the hotel. He should have tempered his response to her, fought the forces that seemed to be pulling them together. He hadn’t expected love from this relationship. This marriage was about needs—his need to provide for his family and hers to remain in Clover Ridge. He had been honest with her from the start, but perhaps he should have hinted that it could be about more. Because now, as she stood there, tendrils of hair escaping her bun, a small smear of flour on one shoulder and a smudge of cherry pie across one cheek, he found himself sucked in by her chaos.

He stood to fight the pull and moved as far from her as possible. “I think I’ll turn in now.” He walked stiff legged past her and to his bedroom in the back of the house. It had been a long day and was proving to be an even longer night.

Gabriel opened his eyes in the darkness, hardly aware that he had been asleep. He had dozed off and on for the past few hours, dreaming of Mary Elizabeth when he was asleep and thinking about her when he was awake. A body could hardly call that resting.

He threw back the covers and stood. Lying there awake wasn’t accomplishing anything. Maybe a drink of water would help, or a glass of milk, a piece of pie . . .

Quietly he crept into the kitchen and filled a glass with water from the tap. He didn’t really need anything to eat. He wasn’t hungry. He wasn’t even thirsty—he was anxious. Anxious to know what had caused that terrible sad look in his daughter’s eyes. Yet he didn’t want to know, was afraid that he couldn’t handle what life experience with the
Englisch
had caused such melancholy.

He stared out the window over the kitchen sink, watching the night. Not much moved in the yard, just the wind blowing the trees and an occasional bird braving the dark.

The couch springs squeaked behind him and he stilled, listening for signs that he had disturbed Rachel. There was no sense in both of them being awake, but her footsteps padded quiet and sure across the bare floor.

He felt her before he knew she was there, and he jumped when she touched him, that small hand on his back sending fire right through him.

“It’s going to be
allrecht
,” she whispered.

But it wasn’t. Nothing would ever be the same again.

He turned without thinking and swept her into his arms, holding her close, burying his face in her neck. He breathed in her familiar scent, tried to lose himself in her warmth. How long he stood there holding her, just holding her, he did not know. She kept his tears at bay, the realities yet unfaced, the truth and tragedy and every clawing demon he fought far from him.

“I can’t . . . I don’t want to let you go.” If he turned her loose, he’d break to pieces.

“Then don’t.” Her words were quiet, but like a shot to his heart in the darkness. He lifted her from her feet, and with arms still wrapped tightly around her, he carried her to his room.

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