by Mindy Steele
“It’s not a suggestion.” She looked at him, gave his expression a long study, and then pulled another frame from the super. Adam stepped closer.
“Being stubborn will get you stung.” Was she purposefully ignoring him? She didn’t look up, focused on the frames and their careful placement so as not to harm a single bee.
“Barking orders will get you ignored,” she said, with the same sweet voice she used when she spoke to bees. There was that pluck again.
“Why are you dressed like that?” His gaze made a slow sweep over her. But even as he stated the question, he figured out the answer. A dress would certainly invite a few dozen stings. Why hadn’t he thought of that sooner?
Belinda glanced at her clothing. If she was grinning, he couldn’t tell. “Oh, these are my pants Mamm purchased for me.” She said it as if it meant nothing at all. “Can’t work out here all day in a dress, can I? Are you always this grouchy at the end of the day?” Adam nearly choked on her defiance. Since when did the shy girl next door talk back? She stepped away from the hives, lifted her veil in slow movements.
“Hattie paid for you to wear denim? Belinda, we took the same baptismal classes, joined the church when we were twenty.” Belinda knew the rules, the responsibilities they’d committed themselves to when they’d been baptized. Just because she didn’t mingle socially didn’t mean she could pick and choose which to follow.
“You remember that?” Her voice rose. “I mean, what does our baptism have to do with anything?”
“The bishop doesn’t allow this.” Adam motioned toward her chosen apparel.
“He allows it for me,” she said smugly. “And what I wear is none of your concern. You have too many hot and cold moods, Adam Hostetler. You could just say, danki.”
His mouth opened, but nothing came out.
“And I am permitted when helping my dawdi with the bees,” she added. “Mica spoke to Bishop Mast in Kentucky and our bishop years ago.”
Adam had seen plenty of Englisch females in denim in town, but the last thing he needed was this mental image of Belinda Graber in jeans to intrude on his long, stretched-out days. Despite his hard shell, she was getting under his skin.
“Okay then. But what if someone sees you? People might ask questions.”
“No one ever does, and I wear a veil most of the time, so I doubt they’d even realize who I am. No one pays a care to who is under it,” she retorted. “Mica says I look like a bu anyway.”
There was that slight smile, the timid one when she wasn’t trying to be funny, but was. It weakened his temper. “I can’t imagine you being mistaken for a boy,” he mumbled, earning him a frown. But he stood by his statement. Who wouldn’t notice that way she stood, her delicate stride, even the way she tilted her head so often? And the curves that womanhood had gifted her obviously gave her away. “And what are those?” Adam asked, pointing toward two yellow squares of cloth that looked more like something Mamm cleaned the bathroom with than tools for a honey harvester.
“These are beetle traps. The inspector said you needed them in one hive, but after looking, I think this one needed it too.” She backtracked, lifted a lid from the ground, covered the hive she had been inspecting, and stepped away. All without her veil. Adam thought he might just explode at her careless behavior.
“Stop doing that,” he said between clenched teeth. Belinda had seen to a potential problem that would protect his bees, but that still didn’t mean she could ignore safety when it came to her own protection. She walked back toward him, head down, lip captured by her teeth. He considered reining in his temper, sensing he was stepping on her delicate nature. But it couldn’t be helped. If she got stung, attacked by a thousand angry bees, he could never forgive himself.
“The inspector wants me to use those?” he asked, pointing to the wrappers in her hands.
“Jah. Dawdi uses those plastic ones you put oil in, but the inspector had a couple of these on hand. He said they work like magic.” Clearly she wasn’t upset with his harshness today.
“I read about these, but heard the bees might trying pulling them through the escape hole and get trapped. You should have asked me first,” he said firmly.
She bent to gather the packaging from the Beetle Bee-Gone pads. “If you check your hives regularly, as one should, that won’t happen.” She turned to face him. “You asked me to help you, trusted me to do the job—and since you haven’t been around to speak to, I did what I felt was best, for the bees.” There was a hint of vinegar in her tone.
He reached for the plastic bags the yellow pads had come in, brushing her fingers lightly. The jolt of electricity affected them equally. She jerked away from the contact, dropping everything in her hands. Quickly tossing her veil aside, Belinda went to gather up the mess, but Adam had already knelt and began collecting them.
“Ack,” she sputtered. When their eyes locked, Adam’s chest pounded like a runaway team of work horses. In the absence of her veil, those blue eyes had captured him again, and he was completely aware she was also displaying cheeks tinted an appealing peach shade. He was a fan of peaches. He could no longer deny it. Belinda Graber still intrigued him. Quite a bit. And that wouldn’t do at all. Wasn’t he still angry with her?
“Blue,” she muttered, then quickly got back to her feet. Did she read minds too? He surely hoped not.
“What?”
“Your eyes. I thought they were green, but they are blue—at least for the moment. I think they change depending on the light.” She tilted her head. “It’s fascinating they can do that.” She lowered her gaze again. “Sorry.” She was blushing, and now he was too.
Adam swallowed. Other than Mamm, no one had ever spoken about how the color of his eyes did tend to change under various lights. Susanne certainly hadn’t. With that thought he turned away from Belinda. It would do no good to keep letting her affect him like she was. He was angry with her, wasn’t he?
“They tend to lean one way or another, depending.” He should be addressing her lack of safety, not discussing eye color.
“Depending?”
“On the light, the color shirt I wear, my mood—or so Mamm says,” he said, stuffing the trash in his pocket. It was hard to focus around Belinda.
“Your mood,” she whispered, but he heard it still.
“Belinda, you really shouldn’t ignore safety. I can’t have you getting hurt.”
“What makes you think I will get hurt?” she said stubbornly. Those blue eyes had the ability to soften a man’s mood and shoot fiery daggers in the same look. He could tell her she was irresponsible, careless, and treading a fine line between proper and defiant, but his lips wouldn’t budge.
“I should go,” she said, and began walking toward home. Without her kapp, Adam couldn’t help but admire the long braid of hair under a small white kerchief. It hung down her back, between thin shoulder blades that Mica’s shirt draped over like a waterfall. Not wheat-colored, but honey-hued, he decided. Her hair was as rich as honey, and the thought of touching it, toying with the strands, disrupted his thoughts. He had never had to chase after a woman before, but found himself helpless to catch up with this one.
Chapter Twelve
Belinda had half a mind to tell Adam to find someone else to help him. Instead, she kept her head down and picked up her pace. The faster she got to her side of the road, the better.
“Belinda, wait!” His voice reached out. She kept her pace. “You didn’t tell me everything the inspector had to say.”
She glanced over her shoulder. “He said you had the best hives in the state.” That should make him happy, she thought.
He reached her side. “I can see to getting you a bee jacket. It would be wiser than just thin linen sleeves.” She glanced down at her clothes. Mica’s shirt worked fine. How dare he speak to her as if she were a child with no idea what she was doing? She picked up her pace. The bis
hop approved her attire, so Adam Hostetler’s opinions didn’t matter.
“It wonders me how Susanne puts up with you.” How anyone put up with him.
“The florist, Marcy, says she would like a few dozen tulips and wanted to know if you had a certain kind of petunia—I think she called them million bells.” Adam’s voice slowed her steps. Here she wanted nothing more than to rid herself of this stubborn man, back out of their arrangement, and then he had to go and remind her he had done just as he was supposed to do.
“And any daisies that you’ve got,” he continued. “She has orders piling up and a couple weddings next weekend.” She slowed to a stop.
“She really wants to buy my flowers?” Belinda said, shocked. Had he really worked out an arrangement with the local florist? The news snuffed out her current anger with him.
“Jah, she does.” He let out a sigh, clearly happy he had stalled her.
“That’s...it’s wunderbaar. I can walk them over to you at first light if you can drop them off before your shift.”
“I’ll come get them. She doesn’t need them until Monday,” Adam said. Belinda bit her bottom lip and stared at her boots as they walked back toward home.
“You should meet Jackson, her sohn. He is a hoot. Asked me about three dozen questions before I could leave,” Adam said, chuckling. Less than a minute ago he had been questioning her safety sense, and now he was gossiping away like they were the closest of friends. Did all men have such ever-changing moods?
“I’m glad you like him.” Her voice remained steady, but her insides were anything but.
“And the baker, Mia, she’s Italian. Talks funny. I think you would like her. She said she wants pansies, enough to do four cakes. What does that even mean?”
Belinda glanced over and tried not to look overly shocked. “The baker? You made a deal with the baker too?” She would kiss him if she thought he wouldn’t get the wrong idea, or if she thought kissing an appropriate thank you, which she didn’t.
“I must have a knack for sales,” Adam jested. Belinda couldn’t argue that fact. Adam had secured her two buyers for her flowers. “So what does a baker do with flowers, exactly?”
“She sugars them and puts them on her cakes. It makes them look...schee.”
“It wonders me what kind of person eats flowers.” He shook his head.
“It’s safe to eat all kinds of them; weeds too.” He made a face. It was hard staying angry with someone who made faces at you. The breeze carried on it all the magnificent scents from her family’s gardens, mingled with sawdust wafting off her partner. It was a strange but invigorating mix.
Adam had held up his end of their partnership. Belinda needed to show him she was doing hers. “I can start pulling frames from your hives in the morning.”
“I can’t Saturday. I have plans. We will start Monday. It should go faster with two and you won’t have to be here so long.”
Belinda bit her bottom lip at an unexpected twinge of disappointment. Reminding herself that she was being foolish, she huffed out a breath, straightened her shoulders, and clutched her hands together.
Her reaction clearly surprised him. “What?” he demanded. “Why do you look offended? I just meant I know you like your space.” He was back-pedaling, badly.
“Just because I prefer keeping to myself doesn’t mean I don’t understand when someone doesn’t want to be around me.” Her chin lifted a notch. “I know you wish it was Mica here instead.” Her voice trembled.
“I didn’t mean it that way, Belinda. I meant I’m sure you have plans on a Saturday. I heard Noel Christner has been pretty eager to see you. I thought maybe...”
“Nee, I don’t have plans with Noel. Not tomorrow or any other day.” Just the thought of it made her stomach curl. “You shouldn’t listen to gossip.”
“I guess I shouldn’t.” His tone deepened. “Noel is a nice fellow, you know.”
“Noel is scary,” she said. Noel was more than scary; he was too bold for his own good. Like rude neighbors who smile one minute and scold the next.
“How so?” Adam asked coolly. Belinda glanced up, noted her home lights in the distance, and picked up her pace again. She just wanted to get back to her side of the road.
“He hasn’t talked to me before, and when we were kids, he used to stare at me all the time.” She tipped her shoulder upward instinctually, hiding her cheek.
“Maybe it took a lot for him to ask you out. Maybe he was nervous.” Adam gave her a sideways glance. “Some boys are more nervous talking to girls.”
“You know that isn’t true,” she snipped.
“Why?”
His obliviousness irked her into being more blunt than she might have been otherwise. “Buwe didn’t talk to me in school unless it was to say something cruel about my looks. I don’t figure they’ve changed much just because they grew taller and started to shave.” She fidgeted with the veil in her hands and watched her house come into clear view. When they entered the Hostetler yard, she hoped Adam would simply leave her to her own devices and go inside, but no, here he was, sticking to her side like jam on a biscuit.
“A couple were cruel, jah, but not all. Trust me, most wanted to talk to you, to be your friend. They just didn’t want to upset you when you seemed like you wanted to be left alone.”
“I didn’t want to be teased—that doesn’t mean I didn’t want friends. Yet by not talking to me all those years, they did upset me, and left me nearly friendless, to boot. You didn’t talk to me in school.” She meant the words as she said them to be an arrow straight to his arrogant male heart. When he stopped she kept walking, glad to be rid of him. How would she manage working with such a man?
An instant later, guilt ravaged her, piercing through her indignation. Still, she could not entirely regret her words, though she wished she’d given them a kinder tone. She was not a cruel person, but truth was truth and he hadn’t had two words to say to her until he found himself in a pickle and needed her help. And he did not endear himself to her by scolding her like a child for not wearing the gear he seemed to think was necessary—gear she’d never required before.
She knew he was weary and overworked, but that was no excuse. Adam should have never sought her out tonight. Not until he at least had food and rest. His tongue had a mind of its own, it seemed. But her hopes that they would be parted now were dashed.
“Not for the reasons you think,” he argued, as he quickly caught up to her again. “You were so shy in school. I wish now I had talked to you then. I’m sorry if I upset you.”
“I don’t want to talk about this,” she muttered, her voice trembling. His heart plummeted, and he knew he had awakened old hurts she had hoped to forget.
“I’m sorry. I know I have crossed too many lines this evening. I’m just tired. Then seeing you not taking precautions set me off. It’s no excuse, I know, but I really just want you to be safe.”
Belinda swiveled and took in a deep breath. “I’m not a child.”
“Nee, you’re not.” He shifted. “Forgive me.”
He was apologizing for his sharp tongue. Forgiveness was required. and surprisingly she didn’t mind giving it. “My safety isn’t your concern, but that was kind of you. I guess.”
“I can be kind, and humble, and I’m strong too.” He flexed his muscles playfully to make her smile. Why couldn’t she just stay mad at him?
“And modest, I see.” She rolled her eyes. When they reached the pavement that separated their homes, Belinda stopped. “So you and Susanne have plans Saturday? She could help with the hives, you know.”
“No plans like that. I’ll be repairing a chicken coop.”
So he was going to help his grandmother. Despite his sometimes moody behavior, he cared for his family’s needs. Maybe she would show up, help. She had promised Ada and Atlee she would do her best to make his jobs easier. How har
d could repairing a few rotten boards be?
It had taken less time to get back than either had expected, and suddenly neither was eager to budge one way or another. “I can walk alone from here,” she assured.
“It’s no trouble,” he replied.
“It wouldn’t be proper,” she said softly.
“It would be less proper if I didn’t walk you safely to the door.” He cupped her elbow and escorted her across the road before she could protest further.
“Because one can never know when a bear might attack,” she said with a dry humor.
Adam gave her a quick look. “You never know,” he replied playfully.
“Adam, I forgot. On Monday, Mica is forcing me to go to Shipshewana to the produce auction.”
“Then we’ll start Tuesday.” He paused, and she wondered what he was thinking as their eyes held on one another. Did the contact send a thousand improper thoughts dancing in his head, the way it did hers? She saw his eyes drop to her lips...but no, that must be her imagination. A man who was courting Susanne Zook would never look at a Belinda Graber and think of a kiss.
“Well, gut nacht, Belinda, and danki for helping.” He turned and walked across the road without waiting for her to say goodbye. She told herself she was glad to see him go, taking all the confusing feelings he roused in her away with him.
“I see you walked Belinda home,” Ada said the second Adam entered the house. A strong aroma of cinnamon told him she had made his favorite cinnamon bread, which often meant her saucy ribs for dinner. A dinner he had missed, talking to Belinda—but he could always count on Mamm to keep a plate warm for him. His stomach was growling on empty, and a full meal, a hot shower, and a decent night’s sleep would be the perfect ending to a long day.
“She doesn’t want me walking her home,” he told his mother, not bothering to hide the hurt in his voice.
“And why not?” Ada shoved one tight fist on her hip.
“She doesn’t want anyone to get the wrong idea.”