by Alice White
“There’s something that you need to know, Elizabeth.”
She smiled up at him and wanted to wrap him in her arms. The man looked so tired; she could give him rest with a few kind words.
“I’m ready,” she said as she smoothed her hands down the length of her skirt. “Whatever you and your children need.”
“But that’s just it. They are not my children.”
Her heart started to pound wildly in her chest. Not his children? So what were they? Rescues from another orphanage that he was using to nab himself a wife? Elizabeth tensed and thought that she could climb off and race back to the rails when Jacob laid his hand over hers.
“My sister’s,” he continued. “She was all they had in the world. I came around to help when their old man bit the dust.”
“How horrible that must have been for them.”
“Not easy,” Jacob confessed. “And I can’t handle them on my own anymore.”
“You trying to scare me off?” she asked. “I came all this way. What’s to stop me now?”
Jacob sighed as he whipped his horse back to total attention.
“You should meet them first,” he said. “Then we’ll talk.”
They stopped at the edge of a ranch house with a long porch. Jacob stepped down and raised his hands to help her to her feet. Elizabeth glided down the length of his long body and sighed into his shoulder.
“I’m sure it’s not all bad, Mr. Larson,” she said.
“Jacob,” he said. “We should use first names.”
“Fine. And I really do want to help.”
They shared a smile that shattered as two small figures with matching blonde hair stomped down the porch steps. The boy had a fuzzy teddy bear clasped to his side.
“Hello!” he squealed as he let the stuffed animal fall closer to his feet and reached up for someone, anyone’s hold. Elizabeth took the lead and took the boy to her breast.
“Who is your friend?” she asked. “I’d love to know him better.”
“He doesn’t have a name. Just carries him around like a sack of potatoes.”
The little girl looked far too weary for so young a girl.
“Don’t let it get to you,” Jacob whispered. “She was like this before she lost her mother. Charlie? Sarah? This is Elizabeth.”
Both children came closer to her skirts, and Elizabeth instinctively wrapped her arms around their small bodies and tried to find their eyes as she spoke fast.
“Lizzie is fine,” she said. Jacob started to correct her when she touched his arm.
“So much easier for little mouths,” she said. “Please.”
Jacob smiled as he retrieved her bag from the back of the wagon.
“If you really think it’s best,” he said.
“I do!” Charlie squealed as he quickly nodded his head, and Sarah nibbled at her nails before tearing the tips of her nails from her teeth.
“Just don’t get sick,” she said. “None of us want to go through that again.”
She led her brother off to play, and Elizabeth delighted at the sight until her mind curled around the reason for the letter.
“Where is their father?” she asked.
‘Whole family had the flu,” he said. “Arthur looked after them while he waited for me. When I came around, he could hardly stand up.”
Jacob’s breath hitched in his throat, and as she looked at him closer, she wondered why it had taken him so long to come to his family’s aid.
“He fell away pretty fast after that. And my sister.”
There had to be a reason why he was asking for a brand new mother, and she touched his arm and wanted him to feel the warmth of his eyes as another cut in.
“Mommy wanted to be with him more than the rest of us. So here you are.”
Another blonde with a look of violence in her eyes moved to her siblings and fell to the grass so she could pick dandelions and release a series of heavy sighs.
“Let’s get you inside.”
Jacob started to guide her into the house, but Elizabeth could not help but look back.
“Is it really safe to leave them alone like that?” she asked.
“We can trust them for a bit. So we can talk terms.”
The kitchen was modest but clean, and Jacob guided her down a hallway and turned the knob of the last door.
“Here’s yours,” he said. “I hope it’s to your liking.”
Jacob set her bag down and started to turn away when Elizabeth reached for his hand.
“What is this?” she asked. “Here I thought that you were a lonely father in need of a wife for his children.”
“Parts of that are true,” he admitted. “The three of them were left in my care. And getting them a mother made sense.”
“And what really happened to your sister?”
Jacob tensed as he opened the curtains to let in the light. His failure to answer the question spoke volumes, and Elizabeth inched closer to his side and let her hand graze his back.
“Hillary speaks the truth. My sister could not bear up without him. And she jumped off the cliffs. Do I really have to go on?”
She was used to that. There were friends from the orphanage who could hardly stand to reflect on the moments that meant the end of her lives. Truth be told, she had kept her own story close to the skin until she had Caroline to lean on.
And now Elizabeth wanted to tell him so much.
“The reverse with me,” she started. “Sickness got my mother. And I don’t know if my father wanted to bow out, but he certainly didn’t fight it when he hit the ground.”
Jacob turned and pressed his hands to her hips. He looked so much fairer when he smiled.
“Was it more than good luck that brought you here?” he asked.
“Maybe. I’d like to think so.”
Charlie whined through the window for a meal, and Elizabeth playfully smacked him away with a smile.
“I worked in a restaurant,” she said. “Show me what you have and I’ll make you all happy.”
Jacob nodded with a smile as he took her hand.
Chapter Three
“And here is the chicken!” Elizabeth beamed.
“Will it be dry?”
Sarah did not mince words, and Elizabeth placed the platter at the center of the table. Charlie looked ready to eat anything, and Jacob was tense. She drew the cloth aside and revealed her masterpiece.
“It looks great!” Charlie cried out as he banged his knife and fork to the table. Jacob waved one hand before his face and told the boy to wait as Elizabeth smiled at her fare.
“It is,” she started. “At least I hope that you will all like it.”
She started to carve when Hillary scoffed.
“Don’t you want Uncle Jacob to that?”
Elizabeth dropped the utensils and started to nod for Jacob, but he failed to leave his chair.
“I think the cook should have the privilege,” he said. “Unless Elizabeth wants to take a load off.”
Stunned and charmed in equal measures by the sound of his voice, Elizabeth smiled softly at the idea of sitting. And she wanted to watch his hands move around the large knife and fork.
“Please do the honors,” she said. “I added some rosemary in the dressing. Hope that no one minds.”
“It’s not the way we usually have it,” Hillary said, her tone sullen as she picked at the bread and never placed one crumb in her mouth.
“Herb garden has to be good for something,” Jacob said with a slight shrug. “Is it an old family recipe?”
“No,” Elizabeth answered slowly. “From the restaurant. The chief cook was always one for trying new things.”
Charlie perched on the edge of his seat, his eyes practically popping out of his head as he waited for his helping and asked an array of questions at a million miles per minute.
“What restaurant? Is it the one in Briar’s Patch? Did you get to eat everything they made?”
“I was known to sample the menu,”
she said with a little laugh. “But they weren’t paying me to eat.”
“You were probably too busy looking for a way out,” Hillary said as she plopped her broken bread to the plate and brought her arms across her chest.
“That’s not nice, Hillary,” Sarah said. “I mean even it’s true, it’s still rude.”
“What’s rude is our uncle bringing a common waitress into this house and thinking that we’ll call her mother.”
“Enough!” Jacob slammed his large hand on the tabletop. The meal and the entire room shuddered under the impact, but Hillary’s smirk still shifted into a sneer of cruel laughter.
“It’s best if she knows what she signed up for,” Hillary said. “Now will you tell me to go to bed without supper, Uncle Jacob? Or does this person get to do the honors?”
“You can go hungry for the rest of your days if you don’t apologize,” he threatened. Hillary looked as if she would never back down when Elizabeth’s stomach grumbled at the memory of the orphanage.
“Don’t do that,” she murmured. “No one should ever go hungry.”
“How could you go hungry working at a restaurant?” Charlie asked.
“It was in another life,” Elizabeth said as she reached across the table and let her hand fall over his. “You three are not the only ones to lose your parents. Be grateful that you have your uncle here.”
The room fell completely silent, and when Charlie broke through the silence and started to ask another set of questions, Sarah nudged his side and shook her head.
“Let’s just eat. Before it gets cold.”
“Now that sounds like a fine idea, Sarah.” Elizabeth unfurled her napkin and centered the fabric over her lap. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Jacob’s face flash with worry, but she simply handed him in a plate and forced a smile.
“Let’s not let my efforts go to waste.”
Jacob dished the meat and the potatoes out, and the only sounds in the room were lips smacking together as cutlery banged against the plates. Hillary sulked and failed to touch her food when Sarah looked to her sister.
“This is good,” she said. “You’re only looking silly by not giving it a try.”
Hillary cut to the meat and chewed slowly. Watching her face intently, Elizabeth saw the girl satisfied. Their eyes locked and Elizabeth hoped that they might share a smile. Hillary just buried her head in her dish. But she polished off the plate nonetheless.
“Did everyone enjoy it?” Elizabeth asked as she abandoned her chair and started to clear the table.
“And how!” Charlie beamed. “You can cook for me any time!”
“That’s sweet of you to say, Charlie,” Elizabeth said. “Does anyone want to help me clear?”
Now Hillary kicked her chair out from under her and stomped towards her room hidden deeper in the house. Jacob seethed but let her leave as his fingers circled around Elizabeth’s free arm.
“The young ones take care of that,” he said. “Love of work does a mind and a body good.”
“But I really don’t mind,” Elizabeth insisted.
“I do,” he said. “And I need to talk to you.”
Obeying his order, Elizabeth let him lead her towards the porch. The twins groaned but got on with the washing as they hit the night air and he sank to the top of the steps.
“How about you sit here with me for a moment,” he said. Elizabeth gave in and longed to lace her fingers in his when he stared up at the stars.
“Tell me why you were hungry,” he asked. “I don’t want there to be any secrets between us.”
“Same here,” she whispered. The tale of the orphanage came out. It was nothing to reveal her past with his warmth at her side. When she came to the end of her story, Jacob touched her knee through her skirt.
“Seems strange,” he said.
“What does?”
“That no one else came along before me,” he said. “Wouldn’t want to make you forget that and find better times.”
She nearly told him about Gregory, but she pushed the image of the other man away as she took his hand.
“Maybe I was waiting for you,” she said. He breathed deeply and pursed his lips before hers. Elizabeth ached for the taste of his kiss, but Jacob turned his head even as he kept his hand on her leg.
“Probably more than you bargained for,” he said. “I’m sorry about Hillary.”
“She’s angry,” Elizabeth said. “Can’t say that I don’t know where it comes from. But maybe in time she’ll come around.”
“I’ll pray for that,” he said. “I want you to be happy here, Elizabeth.” And when he placed a tender kiss on her brow and gently ran his fingers through her hair, she already was.
“So what happens now?” she asked.
“We go to bed,” he said. “Have to get up early around these parts. Do you want to help me with the twins?”
“Of course.”
Charlie smiled at a job well done when they returned to the house, and they walked the twins to their room and got them into their nightshirts. Once the children were tucked into their beds, Jacob lowered the lamps and told them to have good dreams.
“Can Lizzie sing us a song?” Charlie asked.
“She’s probably tired,” Sarah said.
“No, no,” Elizabeth said. “I don’t have much of a voice. But I’ll give it a whirl.”
Perched between their beds, she recalled the sound of her mother’s voice and launched into the only song that she had committed to memory.
“Sleep my child and peace attend thee,
All through the night
Guardian angels God will send thee,
All through the night
Soft the drowsy hours are creeping,
Hill and dale in slumber sleeping
I my loved ones' watch am keeping,
All through the night.”
The twins had drifted off before the song came to a close, and Jacob eased her away from their beds and guided Elizabeth towards her room.
“You sleep well, too,” he said. “I’m happy that you’re here, Miss Wilder.”
She felt sad when she saw him go but fell into the sheets with a smile on her face.
Chapter Four
“Now what else do we need?”
A picnic seemed as good an idea as any. It would get them out of the house, and Jacob would not be back until much later on account of the cattle run for Wesley Mitchell two plots over. They had to yet to wed or even set a date.
And Elizabeth was already exhausted.
It took more strength than she knew she had to mind the house and deal with the twins’ questions and Hillary’s cold eyes. Jacob sat with her on the porch on the nights when he didn’t nearly pass out at the table. The thought that this life would bring with it a new kind of loneliness made her wonder if she had made the wrong call.
But they needed to eat, and a change of scenery would do the children a world of good.
“You can count me out,” Hillary said. “I’m not going to eat food outdoors like a peasant.”
“Hillary, you really don’t have to fight me on everything,” Elizabeth said. “I hear that the lords and ladies of London have picnics.”
“Well I would rather take my meal in private. Do I have that right?”
Feeling that the battle was lost, Elizabeth gave in with a groan even as she handed the girl a sandwich.
“Finish every last bite,” she said. “And I’ll leave you a piece of pie for later.”
“Don’t do me any favors.”
Hillary disappeared into her bedroom, and Elizabeth wondered how she would make this work for a lifetime when Charlie’s small hand tugged at her skirt.
“Someone’s here,” he said.
“Someone looking for your uncle?” she asked.
“Uncle Jacob doesn’t know anyone that looks like this.”
The surety in Sarah’s tone sparked her curiosity, and Elizabeth told the children to hang back when she raced down the porch steps a
nd felt her jaw drop.
“Gregory?”
He doffed his hat and gave her a polite bow as he reached for her hand. Elizabeth still tingled at his touch but quickly drew back as she glared into his eyes.
“What are you doing here?” she asked. “How did you find me?”
“I made some inquiries,” he said. “You’ll be pleased to know that Caroline was no help.”
“Because she’s my friend.”
He laughed at that before his eyes turned sad and he brushed his fingers against her face.
“You look tired, Lizzie,” he said. “What are you even doing here?”
“I’m trying to build a new life,” she said. “Thought you were working towards the same thing.”
“Don’t be like that. Aren’t you even a little happy to see me?”
The man sparkled in the light of the fading sun. She could smell the spice of his cologne and remembered what it was to dance in his arms as he brushed a stray strand of hair from her eyes.
“Why did you come all this way?” she said. “Has something changed?”
“It can,” he said. “If you’ll come back with me.”
He rested his hands on her shoulders and started to pull her close. Their lips met without her wanting, but she started to fall into his familiar kiss when Charlie busted through the front door.
“Why is he kissing you?” Charlie asked. “What about Uncle Jacob?”
Turning away from Gregory, Elizabeth fell to her knees and searched for an answer to his questioning stare. How could she tell this little boy that she was lonely in ways that he could not even begin to comprehend? She wished that he would go back inside when his lip started to quiver.
And in that moment she knew that she could never leave them.
“It’s nothing, darling,” she assured him. “Lizzie is just saying goodbye to an old friend. Now let’s say you and your sister finish packing the basket and I’ll be right up.”
The boy hesitated but slowly took her at her word as he disappeared back into the house.
“You always wanted kids,” he said. “But it doesn’t have to be all the way out here.”
“Gregory, I really don’t know what you thought this would accomplish. But I’ve given my word.”