by Stacy Henrie
A light appeared ahead, but Rex kept the sleigh moving past it. It was the new doctor’s home, and there weren’t any children or grandchildren living there. He’d met the newcomer at church awhile back, but he didn’t think the other man was as “nice-looking” and “amiable” as he’d overheard some young women professing.
“Rex, wait.” Samantha’s gloved hand rested on his arm for a moment. A moment that didn’t last nearly long enough, in his opinion. “I’d like to give some jam to Dr. Hobson. He’s been so good about looking in on my father.”
He eyed her innocent expression. Was something else motivating her desire to stop besides gratitude for the doctor’s skills? “I’ll turn around then.” He maneuvered Titus in a slow circle and headed back the way they’d come.
At the doctor’s home, he hesitated. Did Samantha wish for him to join her or not?
“I’ll only be a minute,” she said as she slid off the seat and selected a bottle of jam.
Rex frowned. Now what? He couldn’t very well announce he’d like to go to the door too. He’d look completely foolish. “Fine.” He nodded for her to go ahead. “Titus and I will wait here.”
If she caught the tense edge to his voice, she didn’t respond. Instead she hurried up the walk and rapped on the front door. A few seconds later, it opened to reveal the doctor standing in shirtsleeves and trousers and no shoes.
“Miss Whitefield,” he exclaimed, “what a surprise.” His eyes grew wider when he glanced past Samantha and saw Rex in the sleigh.
“Evenin’, Doc.” Rex tugged the edge of his hat, not bothering to work up a smile.
“We’re out delivering Christmas gifts,” Samantha said, waving at the sleigh. “I mean, my father and I are usually the ones to do it. But since he’s ill . . .”
Rex thought she stumbled a bit too much through her explanation. Was she embarrassed to be seen with him? Or did she fear the “nice-looking” doctor would get the wrong impression about her and Rex being together?
“How is your father this evening?” the doctor asked.
There was a smile in her voice when Samantha answered, “A little better. Though he very much wished he could come himself.” She passed him the jam. “This is from Mrs. Montgomery, our neighbor. She makes the best jam.”
Dr. Hobson accepted the jar. “I don’t know about that, Miss Whitefield. I’ve tasted your jam and it is far superior to anything I’ve tasted before.”
Rex rolled his eyes, fighting a scoffing laugh. Did Samantha like this other man’s blatant flirtation? Not likely. But to his surprise, she ducked her head, as if pleased by the doctor’s flattery.
“Thank you, but I’m sure you’ll find Mrs. Montgomery’s jam is just as good. If not better.” She gave a light laugh that made Rex swallow hard. It was her nervous laughter.
“Why don’t you come in?” Dr. Hobson stepped back. “Both of you.”
To Rex’s intense relief, Samantha shook her head. “We need to finish delivering gifts. I can’t thank you enough for helping my father. You’ve been so kind and attentive.”
The doctor grinned. “It’s been my pleasure, Miss Whitefield. Truly.” Lifting the jar, he waved it in the air. “Thank you for this. I will enjoy it. Merry Christmas.”
“Merry Christmas to you too,” Samantha called back as she walked toward the sleigh. “Good night.”
Rex avoided looking at her as she sat and gathered the blankets onto her lap. Perhaps his hopes of minutes ago had been for naught. Samantha may have already opened her heart to someone else. The idea lanced him with remorse as he drove the sleigh away from the doctor’s house.
“Thank you for stopping.” Samantha threw him a smile, which he couldn’t return. “I didn’t want him to think he’d been forgotten simply because he’s alone.”
“Forgotten by whom?”
She regarded him with large eyes. “By us, Rex.”
His next words were out before he could bite them back. “I doubt that. After all, it isn’t me who makes the best jam he’s ever tasted.”
Rex braced himself for her argument, one that would either dash his newfound hopes or confirm them. But instead of defending herself, Samantha laughed. The merry sound rang out across the frozen landscape. “If I didn’t know better, you sound jealous, Rexford Montgomery.”
He cringed as much at her use of his full name as he did that she hadn’t actually denied feeling anything but polite interest for the doctor. “Do you fancy him?” he forced himself to ask, even as dread pulsed through him.
“Rex . . .” He couldn’t quite read the expression on her face.
He pulled back on the reins, bringing the horse and sleigh to a stop. Regardless of what she felt for the doctor, he had something that needed saying.
“What are you doing?”
“Sammie.” He cleared his throat and faced her straight on. “You meant everything to me. That never changed.” I love you still, he wanted to say, but he didn’t dare give the words voice if she preferred another man. “Even so, I’m sorry I hurt you. I’m sorry for letting you go and not giving you a choice in the matter.”
He thought he caught the glimmer of tears in her eyes. “I’m sorry too. I could have written, at least once more. Maybe it would have made a difference.”
“Maybe,” he repeated. He gazed at her pretty face, aching to cover every inch of it with kisses. But not if she liked the doctor. He coughed again. “Two more houses, right?”
She seemed to shake herself before she nodded. “Yes.” Had she been thinking of the past or the future? “Do you mind?”
“No, I’d like to finish.” And he meant it. He hadn’t wanted to come, though somewhere along the way he’d found not only his best friend but also himself. He clucked to Titus to move on.
The next two stops were brief. Titus was tiring and the temperature had dropped a few degrees in the last hour. Rex wanted to get Samantha and the horse out of the cold. When they reached the barn, she insisted on helping him unhitch the sleigh and care for Titus.
They worked in relative silence until the horse was ensconced in his stall, munching oats. “It must be Christmas by now,” Samantha said, moving to stand at the open barn doors. Beyond them, the snow lazily circled downward.
“Merry Christmas.” He came to stand beside her. Lifting her ungloved hand, he rubbed her chilled fingers with his own, reluctant for the night to end. Even if she didn’t return his love, he’d cherish the time they’d spent together.
She looked up at him, her eyes like pools of dark green. “Merry Christmas, Rex.”
“Thank you for letting me come.”
Her laugh washed over him. “You were forced into coming, you mean. But I’m glad you did.” She squeezed his hand. Rex didn’t want to let go or leave. And yet, he didn’t have the right to linger.
He forced himself to release her and gathered his gloves. “Good night then.”
“Good night.” He thought he heard a tremor of frustration in her voice. What was she regretting? That she hadn’t had more time with Dr. Hobson?
He started into the snow, then turned back. “Sammie, I wish you all the best with the doctor. I really do. He’s a lucky fellow.”
Instead of smiling in gratitude, though, Samantha folded her arms and regarded him with annoyance. “Rex, you might just be the most stubborn man to ever walk the earth.”
What had he done now? “I only want you happy.”
This time she did smile as she lowered her arms to her sides. “If you want me to be happy, then come back here.”
Confused, he hesitated a moment before crossing back to her side. “Did I forget something?”
“Yes,” she said, pointing upward. She removed his hat and tossed it aside. “You forgot my Christmas kiss.”
Rex barely had time to note the mistletoe hanging above the barn doors—mistletoe he was certain he hadn’t seen there earlier—before Samantha took his coat lapels in either hand and pressed her lips to his.
The sweetness of h
er touch filled him with warmth until he could no longer feel the cold. Nothing existed beyond this moment. It was only him and Samantha and the promise of a future he’d foolishly thrown away.
Then remembering came with a jolt of shock. Rex stepped backward and gripped her wrists in restraint. “Samantha,” he said, his breath coming in quick bursts, “you can’t kiss me when you like the doctor. It’s not fair, to him or to me.”
Her brows tipped upward in amusement, instead of down with contrition. “I guess it’s a good thing I don’t like the doctor then. At least not in that way.” She lowered her chin. “Although his compliments are rather nice.”
Rex gaped at her, trying to make sense of her words. “You don’t like the doctor?”
“Honestly, Rex.” She rolled her eyes. “You didn’t even let me answer your question about whether I fancied him or not.”
He hadn’t? His mind was slowly catching up to reality. And when it did, he grinned. “So it’s the compliments that really win a girl, huh?” He gently drew her hands up and around his neck. “I can think of some nice things to say.”
“Hmm.” She smiled slowly up at him. “Such as?”
“You’re beautiful, Sammie.” He rubbed her soft cheek with the back of his hand. “And compassionate and determined and stubborn.”
She chuckled. “How is stubborn a compliment?”
“Because it’s one of the things I love about you. Always have.”
“Always?” Her gaze glittered with unmistakable hope in the lantern light.
“Yes. I may have teased, challenged, and bested you . . .” Rex pressed a finger to her mouth to silence the retort he sensed coming and realized he liked the pliable feel of her lips. “But only because I’ve loved you for as long as I can remember.”
Tucking her hair behind her ear, he studied her lovely face. “Have I won you over yet? Like the good doctor and his compliments?”
Tears sparkled on her lashes. “You won me and my heart a very long time ago, Rex Montgomery.” Some of the moisture dripped onto her cheeks, but she was smiling. The kind of smile that made him want to sing and shout and kiss her until they both ran out of breath.
Rex touched her forehead with his. When he spoke his voice broke with emotion, but he didn’t care. Not when he was holding the woman he loved. “Then I will cherish both forever.”
“You mean that? No changing your mind this time without letting me have a say?”
“No changing my mind.”
He didn’t wait for her to initiate the kiss this time. Mistletoe or no mistletoe. Several minutes later he eased back, cupping her face between his hands. “I love you, Sammie. And I want to marry you. This instant. But I think our families, particularly your sisters, would likely never forgive me if we woke the pastor now and had our own private ceremony tonight.”
Her soft laughter filled his heart with joy. “I think you’re right.”
“So instead, I’d like to ask your father for permission to court you.” He caressed her cheek with his thumb, already anticipating the day when they would no longer have to bid one another good night. How had he ever thought he could forge through life without her at his side? “Would that be all right? I can come by first thing tomorrow.”
“It’s more than all right. And it’s already tomorrow, Rex.” She scooped up his hat and pulled him toward the house through the swirling snow.
“Do you think he’s still awake?” He glanced at the upper-story windows, where a single candle glowed.
Samantha laughed again, the sound as joyful as sleigh bells. “I know he’s still awake.”
“How?”
Leading him into the house, she pointed to the top of the door frame. Another sprig of mistletoe hung there.
“That wasn’t . . .”
“No, it wasn’t.” She started toward the stairs, but Rex tugged her back toward him.
“He did go to such trouble on our behalf, especially being sick and all . . .” He winked at her. “It would be a pity then not to take advantage of his handiwork.”
Samantha placed her hands against his coat, her mouth curving upward. “A pity indeed.”
Happiness he hadn’t felt in years filled him as he covered her hands with his own. God had granted them a Christmas miracle, a chance to mend their hearts and renew their deep and abiding love. It was a gift he would never take lightly.
“Merry Christmas, Sammie,” he murmured, leaning close.
She matched his stance, her gaze tender and warm. “Merry Christmas, Rex.”
Then they sealed their words with another long kiss.
Spring
“A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak”
—Ecclesiastes 3:7
An Unlikely Spring Courtship
Chapter 1
Idaho City, Idaho Territory, April 1867
“Where is that confounded ledger?” Tempest Blakely placed another stack of receipts and papers on the counter above her. If people didn’t know better they might mistake her mercantile as a paper shop, given the mess she’d made this morning. But she was sure she’d placed the ledger under the counter next to her tin of pencils after closing up last night. And yet the book was nowhere to be seen.
The bells on the door tinkled as a customer entered. “I shall be with you in a moment,” Tempest called out.
“I’ll just look around,” a male voice responded.
She blew a puff of air to dislodge one of her springy auburn curls out of her eyes and sat back on her heels, her wide skirts ballooning around her. Why couldn’t she remember something as simple as where she’d placed the ledger? Squeezing her eyes shut, she attempted to retrace her steps from last night. Old Mr. Seymour had been her last customer—she could remember that because she’d finally succeeded in coaxing a smile from the ornery miner. A victory indeed, since he typically grumbled the entire time inside her store about it “not bein’ right for a female to be runnin’ this place like a man.”
Then she’d made supper, though she’d come down before eating it to look through the crate of combs and hairbrushes she’d ordered. They were a bit of an experiment to draw more female customers to her store. She’d needed a hammer to pry open the box and she’d found the tool . . . under the ledger.
Tempest leapt up to find the hammer sitting innocently on top of the ledger at the far end of the counter. “Aha.” She lifted the tool off the account book and brandished it in the air in triumph. She’d remembered after all.
“Do you greet all of your customers as if you mean to bash them over the head?”
Whirling around, she found a rather nice-looking man standing there, watching her, his hazel eyes lit with a hint of amusement. His blond hair stood attractively on end and his shirtsleeves had been rolled back to reveal muscled forearms.
“Only the impatient ones,” she countered in jest.
When his gaze widened in surprise, Tempest blushed. Her scattered brain wasn’t the only thing she had to try to rein in. “My apologies. I was simply looking for . . .” She exchanged the hammer for the ledger and waved it as proof. “For this. How may I help you?”
She moved serenely to where he stood opposite the counter. A look of hesitation crossed his handsome face. “I . . . um . . . could use . . .”
“Are you here to work in the mines?” His clothes suggested otherwise, but he might be newly arrived from the East, eager to make a fortune in gold from the Boise Basin. She’d seen fewer of these men since opening her store last year, but still they came. “My store has everything you need in the way of supplies.”
He shook his head. “I’m not a miner. I’m . . .” Stepping forward, he extended his hand. “My name is Bram Wakeman.”
Tempest leaned forward to shake his hand. “Tempest Blakely.”
“Tempest?” His eyebrows rose along with the corners of his mouth.
She pulled her hand away. “Yes, Tempest,” she said with a frown as she began gathering up the strewn pap
ers and receipts from off the counter. She knew what he would say next; she’d heard it all before. Even at twenty-five years old, she still couldn’t escape the comments regarding her name.
Tempest is your given name? How very unique and original . . . and a bit strange. What prompted your parents to choose that?
“I like it.” The statement came out definitive, without a hint of insincerity.
She let her mouth drop open before she managed a strangled, “You do?”
“Yes. I like the name.” Bram smiled and for a moment Tempest forgot what they’d been discussing. “Or rather, I like the play by that name.”
“The Tempest by Shakespeare,” she said at the same time he did. They both laughed.
“I hadn’t thought of it as a first name per se, but it fits you.”
Her pleasant shock dissipated like smoke in a windstorm. “It fits me?” She drew herself up to full height—all five feet six inches, though it was nowhere near his tall frame. “And how would you know it fits me? You’ve only been in my store for five minutes.”
“Well, you know.” He waved a hand at her as if it were obvious. “The wild hair, the mess on the counter . . .” He had the decency to look embarrassed as he added in a low voice, “Sort of like a tempest?”
She slapped her pile of papers back onto the counter, no longer feeling the need to clear away “her mess.” “Perhaps you’d like to find a different mercantile to shop in, Mr. Wakeman. There’s another about twelve miles from here. Good day.”
“I’m sorry, Miss Blakely.” He splayed his hand on the papers and bent forward. “I’m new in town, as of yesterday actually, and I’ve made a real blunder of my first official introduction. Can you forgive me?”
Those green-brown eyes regarded her with what appeared to be earnestness. And she didn’t wish to drive away a paying customer. Business-wise things were going decently, but there was always the niggling fear that running her own store wouldn’t work out in the end. Then she’d be forced to return home and throw her lot back in with one of her brothers and their large families. She’d be the pitied spinster aunt once again, spending her days overseeing someone else’s children. Tempest shuddered. She liked her nieces and nephews and a part of her still held out hope for having children of her own. And yet she adored her freedom and her store and the life she’d made for herself right here.