I asked a few stern-looking widows before resorting to writing an advertisement,” he confessed, carrying the kettle to the stove. He set it down with a clunk. “They were all horrified. Of me, or wild Amelia, I’ve never been sure.”
“It was you,” she assured him, laughing for no reason at all. “Amelia is a gem.”
“Right.” Humor lit his face, softening the chiseled planes of his cheekbones and the carved line of his mouth. It drove away the shadows from his eyes, leaving a sincere openness in those depths of blue. For an instant he looked approachable, unguarded. He settled on the sofa beside her. “Yes, it must have been me. I’m told I’m a difficult man.”
“No. Not difficult.” She wanted to lay her hand on his sleeve, to bridge the distance between them, but it wasn’t necessary. He’d never felt so close, so real. She rather liked this man. A whole lot. “Life has dealt you a blow, that’s all. Sometimes we’re never the same afterward.”
“No, we’re not.” The muscles in his jaw worked. He leaned forward, away from her, planting his elbows on his knees, hands to his face. He took a moment, breathed in and out. “You must have loved your husband very much.”
“I did. I married him when I was seventeen, starry-eyed and full of dreams.” She hardly recognized that girl she’d been, standing at the front of the church with her friends and family watching, vowing to honor the dashing farmer who’d stolen her heart. “I was more in love with him than he was with me, I’m afraid. It took me a while to learn to see the real man, instead of the one I’d wanted to see.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.” He pulled his hands away from his face and straightened, his empathetic gaze searching hers. “I just assumed you had a happy marriage.”
“I did, for the most part, but Timothy had his struggles.” She stared at her hands, too, hesitating. “I loved him. I was devastated when he died.”
“I know how that feels.” He paused, letting the silence take over. But since it was broken by the rumbling of the teakettle, he got on his feet and rescued it from the stove top before it whistled and woke the boy. “When Alice passed, it was like the sun going out, never to shine again. I’ve been in the dark ever since.”
“That’s the first time you’ve talked about her.”
“I try not to.” Other than mentioning he was a widower, he’d purposefully avoided anything to do with Alice in his letters. It hurt too much. He grabbed the kettle’s handle with the hem of his shirt and carried it to the kitchen nook. The darkness in the room’s corner made it easier to open up. “She was my world. After the way I grew up—my father passed away from a field accident when I was about George’s age. Because of our financial situation, we were about to lose the farm, Ma had to remarry. She had nothing if she didn’t and three children to provide for. Her biggest fear was being homeless and us starving with no place to go. So she married a man from our church.”
“That had to be so hard for her, to marry without l-love.” Her words caught, as if she felt not only sympathy for his mother, but sadness for herself.
That’s when he knew for sure. He could feel it in his gut. Deep down, Mercy was hoping for a connection between them, for something more than a simple, courteous convenient marriage. Troubled, he measured tea into the ball, hands shaking. Tea leaves likely fell onto the small table, but it was too dark to see them. He dropped it into the teapot and reached for the kettle.
“It was a hard sacrifice Ma made.” He listened to the water pour, rushing into the pot. Telling by ear when it was full. He set the tea kettle aside, aching in a way he couldn’t describe. He hung his head, drew in a breath and hoped—no, prayed—he was wrong about Mercy’s hopes.
“The man Ma married was well-thought-of by many, but we saw his true colors.” He did his best to keep at bay those old memories of the scared and vulnerable boy he’d been, struggling to hide his wounds from his ma. “My stepfather was brutal. I was the oldest, so I made sure I bore the brunt of it.”
“To protect your younger siblings,” she said, as if she’d memorized every fact he’d ever written during their correspondence. Not only committed them to memory, but to her heart. Her caring warmed the air, drove back the shadows, made her lovelier than ever. “Is that why you are so good to George?”
“Partly.” He reached down a mug from the shelf and held himself very still. The truth—the admission—didn’t come easily. “Alice died in childbirth. Our son was stillborn. She lived long enough to see his face and then she was gone, too.”
“Oh.” Shocked silence followed. Mercy bowed her head, as if she’d been struck. “I’m so sorry. I had no idea. That had to be unbearable for you.”
“Unbearable,” he repeated. It was the closest word to what he’d gone through. He’d nearly died of sorrow, too, but Amelia had been three years old and he’d had to find a way to go on. “My heart broke for the final time that day. I walled off the pieces, picked myself up and I’m still getting by the best I can.”
“And so that’s why you want a convenient marriage.” Her soothing, sympathetic tone reached out to him. She studied him over the back of the sofa, her beautiful face soft with understanding.
He’d never seen anything more lovely or compelling. He didn’t know why he could see inside to her heart or why he could read it so easily. But he saw there the dashed hopes for an emotional connection between them, the sorrow for his lost wife and son, and the understanding of what his heart had been through. Without a word, he nodded, acknowledging what he’d seen in her. She smiled sadly, knowing what he meant.
“That’s why I was so interested in you,” he confessed, reaching for the teapot and filling the cup. “You’d lost a husband, so you know what it’s like. And you had George.”
“Yes, George.” Her tone came falsely bright, layered with too many emotions to name. “You are a blessing to him.”
“As he is to me.” He carried the cup toward the light, toward her, and gave it to her. “I can’t tell you what this afternoon meant. Teaching him to ride. Watching him discover the joy of having a horse. I hope what I gave to him had at least as much value as what he gave to me today.”
“More.” She blew on the tea to cool it, because she needed time to gain control of her emotions or she wouldn’t be able to hide the most private ones from him. “George was floating he was so happy. I’ve never seen him like that.”
“Good.” As if buoyed by that, Cole nodded, sank onto the edge of the sofa and steepled his hands. Half in the shadows, half in the reach of the lamp’s light, he made a stunning image of light and dark, of strength and heart. “I think George and I are going to get along just fine.”
“I do, too.” She took a sip of tea, although her hand was trembling so it wasn’t easy. She burned her lip, scorched her tongue, and spilled some on her dress. None of that mattered next to the enormous swell of affection and grief filling her. “If you could have seen him before, watching our neighbors back in North Carolina. Mr. Fulton would be out in the alley playing catch with his sons or in the backyard rubbing down their horse, and the yearning on George’s face would make me cry every time. You’ve done something for my boy, something you don’t even know.”
“I do.” His throat worked, the tendons cording with the strain of his emotions. “I’ve been yearning for a son, too.”
Tears
