Promised to Another (17 page)

But there he stood, holding a flashlight so that it illuminated his face, as he’d always done when they were courting.

With a groan, Annie opened the window and leaned her head out. “Jah?” she hissed.

“I told you I’d kum by tonight.”

She must have imagined telling him not to come. “I’ll be right down.” She wanted to say, “I told you, I needed to pray about it first. Go home.” But she was afraid of what he’d do if she rejected him then and there. She closed the window again, quickly dressed, and then hurried down the stairs, avoiding the squeaky step. She’d wait until she was outside, away from the haus, to tell him to go back home. Otherwise, his temper would probably wake her parents. And Joshua.

She stepped into the dark kitchen, wishing she’d taken the time to grab her own flashlight. Even the almost full moon didn’t illuminate the haus very well. She extended a hand to feel her way around the table and chairs. Two or three steps was all that it took for her to run into something. Hands gripped her upper arms, and she gasped.

“Easy there, Annie,” Joshua said, his tone bemused. “Where are you off to in such a hurry?”

Heat flooded her body, and she stepped out of his arms. “Ach, just…um….” Well, this was awkward. How could she tell the man of her dreams that her former beau was waiting for her in the side yard? She cleared her throat. “What are you doing up?”

“I came down for a glass of water. I thought I heard something.” He flicked on his small flashlight. “And I did. Hear something, I mean.” He paused and, in the dim glow of his penlight, surveyed her with a serious look. She thought he looked almost passionate, like he wanted to kiss her. His gaze flickered over her lips.

Annie felt her heart leap to her throat. He did want to kiss her! Her, Annie Beiler. Worse, she wanted that kiss, with every cell in her body. She held her breath.

For the longest time, he stood there, studying her, as if attempting to memorize every inch of her face. But then, he suddenly blinked and stepped back. “Go on. Your beau is waiting.”

“He’s not my beau,” Annie whispered. Tears welled in her eyes, and, this time, they spilled out, drenching her cheeks. Would she be turning her back on what her heart really wanted by going out to Luke?

“Ach, Annie. Maybe you should tell him that.” Joshua sighed, then reached out with his right hand, his fingertips grazing her damp cheek. He swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple bobbing, as a finger came to rest on her lips. It lingered there a moment before he dropped his hand. “Go. Before I do something I shouldn’t.”

He was right. He shouldn’t kiss her, and she shouldn’t want him to. At least he was man enough not to take advantage of a woman with little self-restraint. That spoke volumes of his character. Maybe it really wasn’t as Luke had suggested. Maybe Joshua actually liked her for her, and not for the sake of his ego.

She blinked the tears from her eyes, wiped her face, and slipped past him, out the door.

***

Joshua stepped over to the kitchen window and watched Annie hurry to meet Luke. His heart ached, and his fingers curled into his palms, the nails digging into his skin. Luke said something to her as he gestured toward the road, and they started walking in that direction.

Good thing Joshua hadn’t given in to the almost overwhelming temptation to kiss her.

Then again, maybe he should have. Because he was pretty sure she was getting kissed tonight, either by him or by Luke. And he wanted to be the one.

He took a step toward the door. He wanted to go after them, to keep an eye on things. But it would be wrong to slip out into the darkness to spy on a couple, even though he didn’t trust Luke one bit.

He turned around and went back upstairs, dragging his feet all the way. He would go back to bed, though he doubted he’d sleep a wink until he heard Annie come back inside.

And maybe not even after that.

Instead, he stood at the window in his bedroom, watching them. Hoping Annie would tell Luke to leave her alone. Send him away. Tell him a firm “Nein.”

What he would do if Luke kissed her, Joshua didn’t know.

***

Annie kept her distance from Luke, as before, walking silently beside him as he talked about his plans for their future together. How he intended to build a small, one-bedroom haus on his daed’s property, just to start with. How his job working for his daed would support them. He even promised to join the church. Annie listened, all the while thinking about what Joshua had said, as well as waiting for a chance to fit a word in edgewise.

Finally, Luke paused, and she spoke up. “We’re not courting, Luke. Please don’t build anything with me in mind.” She moved further away from him, wishing she hadn’t awakened and answered his summons. She should have stayed in the kitchen with Joshua, instead. Would he have kissed her if she hadn’t been going to meet Luke? Did he really like her in that way? If so, her decision to meet Luke, anyway, certainly gave the wrong impression.

Luke said something else, but Annie didn’t catch it. Oh, well. Hadn’t his daed fired him once before, only to hire him back when he’d come home? She frowned, trying to recall whether that had been rumor or fact. Regardless, she didn’t want to lead him on any longer.

“We aren’t getting married.” That had come out a bit harsher than she’d intended. No telling how Luke would take it.

He growled and stopped walking. She could feel the anger radiating from him. And she caught a whiff of his breath—whiskey? “You don’t know your own mind, Annie. You
are
going to marry me,” he insisted.

“Not if you don’t treat me with some respect!” She hoped he didn’t think that respectful treatment would change her mind, though. No matter what, she wouldn’t settle for Luke—or for anyone else she didn’t love. Much less anyone who didn’t love her.

“I do respect you, Annie. How dare you say I don’t? I haven’t even tried to kiss you, other than that one time when I was drunk. I missed your mouth and kissed your cheek, instead, and then you slapped me.”

“Jah, and I’ll slap you again if you so much as touch me. Just leave me alone, please? I think you need to listen to Bishop Sol and think about why you want to join the church. If it’s just so you can marry me, then you can forget it.”

“I wouldn’t be the first man to join the church for a girl. I bet half the men in the district joined because their future fraus wanted them to.”

“But did any of them actually leave the community to go live in town?”

“Some of them did, jah.” But there was a shadow of doubt in his voice, as if he couldn’t provide particular names to prove his point.

Annie was tempted to ask for names, just to egg him on. Instead, she merely sighed. “Luke, I’m sorry, but I need to pray some more about this. I just don’t feel secure about you. What if you decide you want to be Englisch someday?”

He hesitated. “You’d kum with me. You know that Bible verse that says,
‘Whither thou goest, I will go’
? That’s what a gut frau does. And you’d be a gut frau, Annie.”

Now, she was angry. “But I don’t want to go, Luke. I want to stay. Amish is who I am, who I’ll always be.”

He shrugged. “You can be anything. You could teach after you were married if you weren’t Amish.”

That wasn’t true. Englisch schoolteachers had to go to college and earn a degree. They couldn’t teach with only an eighth-grade education. But she knew from past experience that it was useless to try reasoning through anything with Luke. Especially after he’d been drinking. “You mean, you expect your frau to work? After you’re married?”

“Lots of Amish fraus work; you know that. Most of them have their little cottage industries. Kind of hard to live on just one income these days, even for the Amish.”

“Jah, but….” “
Sometimes, you’re mean to me
,” she wanted to tell him. Like right now. He was controlling and stubborn. She bit her lip to keep the words from coming out. He’d only deny her accusation, just as he’d done countless times before. Granted, it had usually been after a spell of drinking, but she couldn’t marry a man she feared. And she wouldn’t marry the town drunk. She spun around. “I’m going home, Luke. Danki for coming by, but it’s late. And maybe I’m mistaken, but it doesn’t sound as if you intend to stay here in Seymour.”

“You’re right. You don’t understand. I will stay. Really.”

“Still, it’s late.” She hoped her voice sounded gentle and didn’t reveal the frustration she felt. “Go home and pray about your reasons for wanting to join the church.”

“Nein need to pray. I know exactly what I want.”

Annie smiled sadly. “So do I.” And it wasn’t Luke. But how could she make him see that?

And would she regret turning him away if she found out that Joshua didn’t want her?

She shook her head. She’d rather be a maidal. Spinsterhood was far preferable to marrying Luke Schwartz.

She wanted to say that out loud, but the stench of the whiskey, or whatever he’d been drinking, on his breath was overpowering. And he got mean when crossed. She winced, remembering the hard shake he’d given her earlier. When he’d been sober.

She turned and hurried back across the dark field toward home, never looking back to see whether Luke followed her. Normally, a bu would walk his girl back home, but she wasn’t Luke’s girl now. She was nobody’s girl. And she needed to remember that.

She climbed the back steps and slipped into the kitchen. A couple of lit candles were arranged near the edge of the table, where Joshua sat, his Bible open before him. His forefinger hovered over the verse he’d just read.

Annie skidded to a stop. “Ach, you’re still up?”

His smile was hesitant. Flickering. Kind of sad-looking. “I couldn’t sleep. Decided to read and pray.”

“Downstairs?”

“I forgot my water.” He nodded toward the glass. “Did you have a gut walk?”

Annie shrugged. “Luke’s full of plans. Talking about building a small haus and everything.” She pulled out a chair and sat next to him. “What book are you reading from?”

“Psalms.” Joshua slid a bookmark into the middle of the Bible and closed it. Then, he adjusted the two candles, sliding them a bit further away from him. Far enough from him to cast his face in shadows. “He’s building you a haus, then, jah?”

“Me? Nein. I told him…I said that I think he needs to pray about why he wants to return to the Amish. That we need to pray about the relationship between us.” She fidgeted. “Truthfully, I’d rather be a maidal than marry him.”

“Did you say that?” Joshua leaned forward.

Annie shook her head. “I wanted to, but I was afraid. He has a temper. I mean, he’s normally polite—harmless, really—and he was known to keep the Englisch parties under control during his rumschpringe. But whenever Luke drinks, his temper is easily riled, and he tends to get violent.” She lowered her head. “I think he’d been drinking. I didn’t want him to hurt me, given how much it hurt when he shook me earlier today, walking in the field.” She rubbed her upper arms where he’d grabbed her.

“He hurt you?” Joshua’s eyes widened. A muscle tensed in his jaw.

“Not severely.” She didn’t want to alarm him. “I may have some bruises, though, and it’s a little sore.”

“Annie. You need to stay away from him.”

She nodded her head. “Jah.”

He reached out his forefinger and gently lifted her chin, so that their gazes met. “There was an abusive man who lived near me in Pennsylvania. He was arrested for beating his frau in public. I was there. Scared me to death. I never want to see another woman go through that.”

Tears burned her eyes. “Jah. There are some men like that around here, too.”

“There’s never a gut reason for a man to hurt a woman.”

Whoever landed Joshua Esh would marry a good man. If only she could be the one he chose.

Well, if she allowed him to court her, maybe she would be.

He released her chin and leaned back in his chair. “I suppose we should try to get some sleep.”

Annie took a deep breath and prayed for courage. Her cheeks warmed. “Joshua. When I said nein earlier today, I didn’t mean it. I’d love to go on a walk or a buggy ride with you.”