calling you Ada. At least, in my mind I have.”
“Oh, yes.” The flush in her cheeks deepened. “I am so sorry. I am tired, and I keep making foolish mistakes.”
“That’s understandable.” He took a bite of the sandwich. “This is pretty nice, I’ve got to say.”
Ada cleared her throat. “Jack, we haven’t said grace yet.”
He stopped chewing for a moment. “Grace?”
“Yes. Of course. Will you do the honors? I’d rather not.” He tried to speak casually, like tossing a horseshoe. But, as with a horseshoe, his words landed with a thunk.
Ada shrugged. “Very well. Then I shall do so.” She nodded at him.
“For what we are about to receive, may the Lord make us truly thankful,” Ada intoned. “Amen.”
He muttered his “amen,” even though he was every inch the hypocrite to do so. Men who didn’t believe in God shouldn’t pray as though they did.
Ada helped herself to sandwiches and then began eating. He ate, too, gazing around the room in wonder. It looked different. Brighter, somehow. It smelled like lemons, too.
“Looks good in here,” he said. “I guess you’ve been putting those gals to work.”
Ada tilted her head to one side, as though thinking things over. “I don’t know. I don’t think they’re lazy. I think they just have no direction. Plus, if you’ve been eating in a barn, they don’t have much motivation to make the house look pretty.”
The chicken sandwiches were tasty, and so was this cucumber-tomato concoction. It was a good thing, too, because it put him in a better mood. He could go toe-to-toe with Ada Burnett if he was well fed and in a nice kind of environment. “Look, a cowboy has to take care of his horses. I learned this way of life when I was a kid. It’s a hard habit to break. Besides which, it would be silly to sit in here and eat alone.” It was lonely, too. He’d tried it once and felt miserable for days afterward.
Ada ate a bite of the cucumber salad. “I suppose I could understand that.”
He nodded, satisfied. It was pleasant here, with the breeze blowing in through the open windows. Ada looked nice, too. She had changed at some point and was wearing a dress that was less stiff and severe. Her hair had been redone, too. She was very pretty, sitting there, and her presence and the cleanliness of the house made him feel better. Not that it mattered what she looked like, since she was here to serve one purpose: bringing Laura home.
Still and all, it was mighty enjoyable to be dining in the company of a good-looking girl again, and in such a fresh, sparkling room. The food was better than Mrs. H.’s usual fare, too.
Maybe this plan would work out, after all.
Ada passed him the sandwich platter once more, and he caught a glimpse of an ugly red mark across her wrist. “What happened there?”
“Oh, that.” She gave an embarrassed laugh. “I tried to help lift a pot of boiling water and ended up scalding myself a little.”
He shook his head and rose. A little aloe-vera juice would keep that burn from turning worse. He went out onto the front veranda and cut off a spike of the ugly little plant. Then he brought it back inside and knelt beside Ada’s chair. She looked down at him in startled wonder, her blue eyes growing wide.
“Let’s see it.” He took her wrist in his hand and pushed back her sleeve. Her skin was as pale as moonlight, with the scald mark glaring angrily across the smooth surface. When was the last time he’d been this close to a lady? Her skin was so soft under his callused fingers.
He was acting like a fool. He forced himself back to the problem at hand.
The burn was bad but not the worst he’d laid eyes on. He squeezed some of the juice from the plant onto the wound.
“What on earth is that?” Ada demanded. “It looks like nothing I’ve ever seen.”
“It’s aloe vera. It’s a desert plant. It grows wild out in west Texas,” he replied, gently rubbing the juice onto the wound. She flinched and held her breath. He took care to be gentle, given that her skin was raw and her wrist delicate. “I took a cutting years ago, when I was bringing some cattle through Odessa. Folks out West use it to help heal burns.” He paused, surveying his work while trying to maintain calm. Ada was now a permanent member of the household, and he needed to get used to being around her without thinking of her as a woman—if that made any sense. “Does that feel better?”
“Yes, surprisingly.” Ada stared at her wound. “It doesn’t sting nearly as much.”
“Good.” He released her hand and tossed the aloe onto the table. She looked at it pointedly, but he refused to pick it up. He would eat at a table and even eat vegetables, but he would not tidy up in the midst of a meal.
Was now a good time to bring up the trip they’d have to make? Probably not, but then, there might not ever be a perfect time. He took a bite of his chicken sandwich to fortify him for the task ahead.
“So,” he began in what he hoped was a conversational tone, “are you up for a honeymoon?”
Ada stood on the train platform, waiting for her husband’s private train cars to be hitched to the train itself. Just a few short days ago, she had occupied this same spot, waiting for Aunt Pearl and an unknown future. Now she was waiting to go to St. Louis, to collect the stepdaughter she’d never met. An unlikely honeymoon, but one completely in keeping with their arrangement.
She glanced down at the pocket watch on her lavender lace lapel. She had changed to half-mourning after her first day in the Burnett home and not just because her sudden matrimony should, at least to outsiders, seem like a cause for celebration. No, it was merely that her frocks in shades of purple and gray were made of lighter fabrics for summer wear and thus more practical for life out on the prairie.
“Well, don’t you look pretty as a picture,” a female voice crowed behind her.
Ada jumped and whirled around. “Aunt Pearl,” she gasped. She was not really ready to see her aunt yet. A large part of her was still angry at being traded as casually as a mule, even though she admitted it was a practical solution to her problems.
Some of her hesitation must have shown on her face, for Aunt Pearl held up her gloved hands in protest. “Now, now, I’m not here for a lecture, Ada. I just wanted to say goodbye and God be with you. Lord knows that poor child has been through enough already. It will be such a wonderful thing for her to be home with her daddy.”
Sudden nervousness flooded Ada’s being. She wasn’t ready for this. She was not prepared to be this great a part of a stranger’s life. What if she couldn’t measure up? She glanced down at her burned wrist and bandaged hand, recalling accident after accident she’d had in the past few days. Sugar in the saltshaker. Baking soda in the bread instead of baking powder. So much starch in Jack’s shirts that they stood up by themselves. One broken item after another. True, there were two maids to do the work, but she insisted on helping. The only problem was, her attempts to assist met with constant catastrophes.
