by Ciara Knight
His Holiday Promise
Ciara Knight
His Holiday Promise
Book I
A Love on the Ranch Novella
Copyright ©2018 by Ciara Knight
All rights reserved.
* * *
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
Cover art ©2018 by Yocla Designs
Created with Vellum
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Also by Ciara Knight
Chapter One
“A month?” I asked, the coffee cup in my hand lowering faster than my mood. How could I stand in my son’s way, though? Jeb had become a man of means, an upstanding citizen, owner of a cattle ranch, honest, hardworking, handsome, and alone. Probably even more alone than I felt.
He raised a dark brow at me and eyed the coffee. “Is that for me?”
I lifted it to him, and he took it without even a token thank you. He probably thought the notion was too frivolous. In that moment, I realized I’d done the job I’d set out to do. Raised a son nothing like his pa. The only problem was that when I pounded the ethics into his mind, I forgot to pour the love into his heart. In the end, I’d failed him.
I sipped a few bitter swallows in time for him to choke his down in two gulps and abandon the cup on the oversize, empty kitchen table. “Don’t look so glum. If you don’t want to go back to living the way we were when Pa was alive, I need to work.”
“I don’t think we’ll starve if you don’t secure that big military contract for this summer. We’ve done fine so far.” I took a long, steady breath. Enough was enough. “You’re spending so much time working, you don’t have time for anything else in your life.”
“Fine isn’t going to build our security. I will never return to our former life.” He rubbed the back of his neck. He’d been working so hard on the barn that he’d worn himself out. I only hoped he wouldn’t take ill. The boy never stopped. Perhaps he was afraid the past would catch up if he slowed down. A past of broken dreams, abusive fathers, and a dead sister.
“Like I said, Teddy will be here in case you need anything. The other men will be here for a couple more weeks, and then several of them will head to town. I’ll send word when I arrive in the East.” He shoved his hands into his coat sleeves and lifted it over his broad shoulders before fixing the collar and buttoning it tight. He had the stature of his pa. At least before his pa had drunk himself into the size of a skeleton.
I cleared the cups and glanced out the window at the darkening sky. “Looks like it could snow. You’re sure you must go this month? I mean, what if you don’t make it home by Christmas?”
He shoved his hat on his head, covering his thick dark hair, and shot me a sideways smirk. “Would it matter? It’s not like there are children in the house.”
I sighed. Finally we could afford a happy Christmas with all the trimmings, and he wouldn’t be home to enjoy it.
“Speaking of children. My wife will be here in the spring,” Jeb said in a matter-of-fact tone.
I stumbled, catching myself on the table. “Wife?” What on God’s great land was he talking about? He hadn’t stopped long enough to shower most days, let alone fall in love with a woman.
“Yes. I’ll need sons to help run this ranch when I get older. I can’t have sons without a wife.” He retrieved his bag and headed for the door, as if we’d just been discussing the price of feed.
“Wait.” I blocked his escape, knowing he dropped that load before running away so he didn’t have to face the questions.
He let out a hearty sigh of defeat. “No, I don’t know who she is. No, I won’t let her steal my money and leave you starving like Pa and his prostitutes left us. Yes, she will be here in the spring, according to a Mrs. Scarborough from Georgia. She is a broker for wives.”
“A broker?” I shook my head and placed my hands on my hips. “You listen to me. If you’re going to marry, you shouldn’t marry a stranger. Marry for love.”
“Love?” He snorted and nudged me out of the way. “Haven’t you always warned me to follow my will, not my desires?” He paused at the door. “Didn’t you say you loved Pa before you married him? He wooed you, courted you, made you feel special, only to steal all your money and run off? No thanks. I’ll enter into a marriage arrangement. I’ll care for the woman, keep her clothed and without want, and she will produce sons for me.”
My mind spun like a typhoon swirling with confusion. “You can’t order her like cattle. What are you going to say next, that you’ll rope her and tie her up in the barn if she doesn’t do exactly what you order?”
He opened the door, sending a cold blast of air into the warm house. “Trust me. I know what I’m doing. We need boys, and we’ll have them. Since we escaped Kentucky, haven’t I always provided for us?”
That deep hollow feeling in the pit of my insides stole my breath for a second. It always opened like an endless pit when I thought of the night we buried Joanna. The night Jeb and I walked for miles and miles until we collapsed on the steps of a half-constructed church. The starvation pains still haunted me, but it wasn’t for food. It was for my baby girl who died before she was a month old. Not from disease or wild animals but from poverty. “Yes, but—”
“But you should relax. You spent so much time when I was young working and providing for me. It’s my turn now. Enjoy your quiet time here. You always said you never learned how to sew or cook the way you should have since your parents died when you were still young. Now is your time to practice.” He placed a token kiss to my cheek. “I’ll be back soon.”
The door shut, leaving only silence and bone-chilling coldness to keep me company.
Wallowing was never my strongest trait, so I went to work cleaning the kitchen, floors, and any other surface. Jeb was right about one thing. I did need to learn to cook better. I’d been spoiled in a rich household with servants when I was young so there was no need to learn domestic skills. Not until my husband stole the family fortune after my parents died.
I scrubbed harder, as if to scrub the bad choices of my youth from my life. When I’d finished, I realized that my constant occupation of cleaning over the last several days had left nothing undone. The place was spotless and quiet. Too quiet.
I decided on some fresh air, so I cleaned myself up, donned my coat, and walked outside to enjoy the first hit of wintery weather. It wouldn’t be long before the cold would drive me to the fireside. In the distance, I saw puffs of smoke drifting from the chimney from the new homesteaders in the distance.
Wouldn’t it be nice to have some companionship with another woman? Perhaps I could pay the woman of the house to teach me to cook and sew better. That would help occupy my mind. But I couldn’t show up unannounced, could I? Perhaps if I took a gift. I’d have to walk the long distance, though, because if I asked Teddy for a horse, he’d never let me go. I knew Jeb would’ve threatened his life and job if anything happened to me while he was gone.
I raced inside and looked around, but what did you take to a house of someone who only arrived a month or two ago? My first neighbors. Food. That’s what they
used to do when I was a child.
I eyed my nemesis, the kitchen. Sure, I cooked better than Cookie, the ranch cook, but not well enough to be a gift. Except bread. I could make biscuits.
That was it. I had a plan and went to work. It took a few tries and several hours, but in the end, I had biscuits that rose and baked to a golden top. The prospect of meeting a neighbor urged me to grab a basket, drop my new baked goodies inside, and place a cloth over them. After removing my apron and dusting the flour off my face and clothes, I headed out across our land toward the quaint home with the smoking chimney.
I couldn’t wait to meet the wife and have a friend for the first time since I was fifteen. I hadn’t been allowed friends after I’d married William Clayton. The memories began to flood in again of the man who swept me off my feet, married me, and changed the next day. The loving, attentive man, who’d promised me a family to replace the one I’d lost, had sold my childhood home and swooped me away. Nervous energy crept in, so I quickened my pace across the solid land and focused on the smell of biscuits.
The new home stood sturdy and clean from the outside. Simple but inviting, with greenery affixed to posts and two chairs on the front porch.
A shadow passed by the window. I stopped and willed my hands to settle. Visions of cooking and sewing next to another female forced me to the front steps and up to the door, where I knocked.
The door swung open to a tall, strong, imposing man who looked like he could lift a cow over his head without a problem. “Hello,” he said in a deep, booming voice with a thick German accent. His blue eyes, the kind that sparkled in light like a jewel, settled my nerves.
“I, um, brought a gift to welcome you to our area.” I glanced down at my basket. “Perhaps I could give it to your wife.”
“No wife. She died.” Those four words hooked my sensibility and tossed it over the chimney outside.
After a breath, I corralled my racing thoughts and settled on the appropriate answer. “I’m so sorry for your loss.”
He bowed his head, and his bottom lip thinned and pulled back toward his cheeks. “Yes, I am also.”
An awkward silence settled between us. That’s when I caught a whiff of something divine. The aroma of fresh baked apple pie if I wasn’t mistaken.
“Papa?” a young woman’s voice called from behind him. She slid around his arms and popped up with a winning smile. A woman of strength, beauty with her strong shoulders but delicate waist. “Are you the lady of the house over there?” She pointed toward my son’s ranch.
I nodded. “Yes, I’m Mary Clayton. I live with my son Jeb.” Not sure why I’d added that, as if I had to clarify what lady of the house meant in my circumstance.
“Really?” The girl lit up like the north star on a clear night.
“Yes.”
“Forgive me. I’m Agatha, and this is my papa, Fredrick Krause.” She pointed at the giant next to her.
“Call me Fredrick,” he said in clipped, thick words.
“Is that for us? Papa, why don’t you invite Mary Clayton inside our home. Introduce her to Aunt Helga.”
I glanced past them both through the sliver between Fredrick’s trunk-sized arms and broad chest. At the table I spotted dinner. “I am so sorry to have intruded at this hour. I guess being alone in that big house has taken my manners. Here.” I shoved the basket into Agatha’s arms, curtsied like a schoolgirl, and raced away. I wasn’t sure if it was the fact that I’d met the first man since my husband who made me lose myself and my words or the fact that I was out of practice of speaking to people, but I couldn’t stay another second. I fled with a backhanded wave, ignoring their pleas for me to stay. If there was one thing I’d realized, it was that being alone was the one and only thing I’d learned to be good at. It was my talent.
Chapter Two
The evening faded into night, and the darkness settled like a prison around me. For hours I forced my eyes to remain shut, even though sleep eluded me. By morning, I couldn’t remain still any longer.
Despite my son’s rules, it was time to go for a ride, into town or somewhere other than this darn house, so I headed to the barn.
Teddy greeted me with a missing-tooth smile. He’d had the front right knocked out by a horse when he first started working with Jeb. “Good morning.”
“Good morning, Teddy. I’d like to go for a ride this morning.” I reached for a saddle, but Teddy outstretched his arm to block my advance.
“Boss said you weren’t to ride without him.” There was a slight quiver in his voice. I wasn’t sure if he feared my son or me.
“That isn’t accurate.” I knew it wasn’t nice to manipulate the poor man, but what Jeb didn’t know wouldn’t cause any harm. “He said I couldn’t ride off the ranch without him. That isn’t a problem. I’ll remain on our land. We have enough of it.” I forced a lightheartedness to my voice, even though I felt guilty lying to Teddy. There was no way I’d be locked on our land for the rest of the week when I knew winter would drive me indoors for months.
“Ah, I guess that would be fine.” Teddy withdrew his arm but then grabbed the saddle and headed for the most docile horse in the barn. I’d be lucky if Copper even made it to the edge of the land before she collapsed from old age and exhaustion.
I knew protesting wouldn’t get me anywhere, so I watched Teddy saddle the horse and walk her out of the barn. I followed a safe distance behind since this was the exact horse that had knocked Teddy’s front tooth out. No matter how calm and good-tempered a horse was, you never let your guard down.
“I’ll be back by midday. Perhaps you can join me for food?”
Teddy removed his hat and bowed his head. “Thank you for the invitation, but I need to head to Sherman to finish stocking winter supplies before the first storm hits.”
A heaviness weighed me down for a moment until I realized that meant there would be no one hovering over my whereabouts. “I understand. Be safe.” Before he could say anything to restrict my time away, I mounted Copper and urged her forward. Of course, she only loped ahead, which meant Teddy had no problem walking alongside.
“Only on our land and back by midday, right?”
I nodded and adjusted my coat collar around my neck to stay the cold. It wouldn’t be a warm ride, but it would be an adventure. One long overdue.
With my heels to Copper’s sides, I urged her into a semi-trot that wouldn’t provide exhilaration but would get me to the edge of our land a smidgen quicker.
In Kentucky the trees were closed around us, but here, the land was vast and open. I strained to see as far as I could. It appeared as if the sky and the land merged together in the distance. I loved the openness and how it made me feel free.
I followed the creek until I crossed onto the adjoining homestead, the Krause’s. A flush warmed my face at the memory of my hasty escape. I glanced at the house in the distance that I avoided riding too close to. No reason to repeat my embarrassment. It was funny how a small cabin looked so much more inviting than the big house Jeb had built. Not that I wasn’t grateful. The roof was solid, no critters roamed through our home freely, and no rain seeped through the uneven shingles and onto our blankets on the dirt floor where we had slept when Jeb was a child.
Perhaps if I would’ve escaped sooner, Joanna wouldn’t have died. The ache in my chest only a parent who had lost a child would ever understand threatened to consume me, so I adjusted in my saddle and kept moving. The way I’d kept moving through life without looking back.
I continued for hours until I doubled back and headed home, not wanting to cause too much of a stir. Teddy had probably instructed one of the other men to wait for my return. When I reached the edge of the Krause’s land, I spotted a horse galloping toward me. The man on top was unmistakably Fredrick’s massive frame.
He rode up and pulled his horse to a stop at my side. “Brought basket back. Agatha insisted you need it.” The basket remained settled on his lap, and he didn’t move to hand it to me.
His g
aze fixed on me as if he was looking deeper than my skin, drilling inside to see what I was made of. “No, I didn’t need it, but thank you. I thought it might be an emergency the way you rode so fast out here.”
He smiled and leaned over the horn of his saddle. “Love my daughter but needed escape. She’s difficult these days.” The way his lips curved in greeting, one higher than the other, relaxed my tense muscles.
Funny how a drunk man, nearing death, who could barely stand made me fearful for my life and the life of my children, but this boulder-sized person didn’t make me uneasy in the least. Maybe it was his soft eyes. “I’m sorry to hear that. Is she unwell? Perhaps I can help?”
“Unwell? No. She has baby in stomach.”
“She’s with child?”
“Yes, with child.” He nodded and pointed at his belly as if to make sure I understood.
I nodded. “Sometimes women are a little emotional when they’re in such a condition. If there is anything I could do to help, please ask.”
A flush covered his cheeks, and he adjusted in his saddle.
“What is it?” I asked, nudging Copper a little closer so I could lean over to meet his gaze.
“Wife is gone. No one to help with baby,” he blurted and made a strange motion with his hand from stomach to ground. “You know, to bring baby into world.”
I couldn’t help but laugh. The oversize grizzly with the soft eyes faced the terrifying prospect of delivering his daughter’s child.
“No doctor unless take her to Sherman,” he added with a deep mumble, his gaze darting around as if to find a doctor hidden under a rock.
Considering I’d avoided all men but my son over the last decade, I found it peculiar that I reached out and patted his hand. “I’d be happy to help when the time comes.”