When he looked over his shoulder, Alphonso was too busy defending himself to the Bountiful police officers that he wasn’t even looking.
Thank you, Gott, Solomon prayed silently.
He’d gotten out of this without a fight . . . Would he be able to next time? Alphonso knew where he was staying. But another realization chilled his blood. Alphonso also knew where to find Elizabeth.
Chapter Nine
When Solomon returned to pick up Elizabeth, she pulled herself up into the buggy next to him. It had been a nice visit—she’d missed her brother’s family. Solomon glanced down at her and gave her a tight smile, then flicked the reins. His knee bounced with repressed energy.
“How did it go?” Elizabeth asked.
“Good.” Solomon’s voice was terse.
She smiled hesitantly. “You sure? You look tight enough to snap.”
“Yah. It was good.” He glanced over at her. “I’m fine.”
He leaned forward to look in the side mirror, then checked the other one. He leaned back with a sigh.
“Are you looking for someone?” she asked.
“I saw that Englisher in town.”
Her stomach sank. “The one you fought?”
“Yah, and he tried starting a fight in town, too. The police saw it and questioned him a bit and let me leave.”
Somehow she’d hoped that those Englisher troublemakers would simply go away and it would be over, but they did live in the area obviously. So it wasn’t going to be so simple, was it? She felt a shiver run up her arms in spite of the heat of the day.
“The police could see that you were trying to be peaceful?” she asked.
“What they saw was an Amish man,” he replied. “And they assumed I was peaceful because of these clothes. If they knew my record—”
“But they didn’t,” she cut in quickly. And that was something to be thankful for right now.
“No, they didn’t.” His knee kept jiggling and she put her hand on it, meaning to point out his nervous tick. As her hand touched his knee, he stilled, and she felt the warmth of his leg move up her arm. Solomon took the reins into one hand and put his warm palm over her fingers. She didn’t move. Her touch had stilled him, and it seemed that his touch had done the same for her.
“We were taught that Gott would give us protection, blessing, even,” he said softly.
“Yah.” It was a fact.
“Does that still count for me?” he asked. His fingers closed around hers and he pulled her hand farther up his leg to a more comfortable position.
“If you’ve come back—” she started, but the words evaporated on her tongue. He’d already told her this wasn’t permanent. “If you’re doing what Gott wants of you, I think you’ll have His blessing.”
“I think I’ve gone so far away from what Gott wanted for me that a simple sidestep isn’t going to get me back to it,” he said, and she heard the sadness in his voice.
As they rode together toward Bridget’s house, she allowed herself the luxury of leaning against his strong shoulder. He was warm and solid, and as a grass-scented breeze blew through the buggy, she felt a wave of sympathy for him. They said that when people went English, they no longer cared what Gott wanted, but Solomon seemed to care still.
“I asked Bethany about a job at her daet’s bookbinding shop for you,” she said.
He looked down at her, and for a moment they were so close, his gaze locked on hers, then he looked back to the road. “What did she say?”
“She said she’d talk to my brother,” she replied.
“Hm.” He nodded, and she felt his grip on her hand tighten ever so little.
“And I’ll talk to my brother myself tomorrow at service Sunday,” she said.
“Thank you,” he said, but she heard the doubt in his voice. “I have a backup plan, too.”
“You do?” She straightened, but he kept her hand firmly in his. Should she pull back? She didn’t want to. His strong grip was as much comfort to her as it was to him, it seemed.
“I’m going to finish high school,” he said. “I can start next month, the parole officer says. After that, there could be more job training. There are more jobs available for a man with a diploma.”
“But Amish don’t do that,” she said weakly. “We stop at the eighth grade. It’s best that way—we have enough.”
“Amish don’t tend to spend time in prison either,” he replied.
“Are you really wanting to do things the English way?” she asked.
“Do I want to go back to school?” he asked. “No. I don’t. But I do want a job that I can count on. I don’t need anything too fancy. I need to pay my bills, and buy my food, and maybe have some friends in my life.”
“English friends,” she breathed.
“I need people, Lizzie,” he said softly. “I’m on my own.”
Her heartbeat sped up. He had a point here—he needed a job, and he needed a community.
“I’m here,” she said, and her voice sounded strange in her own ears.
“Yah—” He looked over at her and smiled. “You are.”
“If you’re patient, maybe things will get better here,” she pressed on. “People might need time, but you might find a job yet.”
Solomon didn’t answer, but he tugged her closer to him again and she leaned back against his shoulder.
Solomon wasn’t a regular Amish man anymore, and his future was with the English. She could feel it in the pit of her stomach. He was going to be forced to find a job somewhere, and if the Englishers were willing to help him, give him solutions, even hire him, and not his Amish brethren, he’d have little choice.
People would talk—they always did. They’d retell the story of the boy who jumped the fence and ended up in an Englisher jail. They’d tell how he came back for a little while, and they’d say that he’d given up on Gott because they wouldn’t see any other way to explain it. In the kitchens across the county, and maybe even all the way to Indiana, people would talk about the destructive choice Solomon made, and they’d never once take responsibility for their own part in pushing him out.
* * *
The next morning dawned cool and overcast, and after chores were completed and breakfast was eaten, Solomon drove his grandmother and Elizabeth to service Sunday. He’d told Seth that he wasn’t going to attend, but then his grandmother had asked him so sweetly if he’d drive them there and Elizabeth had looked at him in silence, but there had been hope in those dark eyes . . . and he couldn’t turn them down.
It was different being in the buggy with his grandmother between him and Elizabeth. He’d hoped to have Elizabeth beside him. He wouldn’t be able to hold her hand, but to have her next to him, her arm brushing against his, would have been a simple pleasure in the midst of a difficult morning.... Apparently, his grandmother had thought of that, however, and she’d tactfully inserted herself between them.
“I’d best sit in the middle,” she’d said gently. “You know . . . appearances.”
This Sunday’s service was being held at a neighboring farm owned by Hezekiah Beachy, one of the local elders. It felt good to be back in an Amish role again this Sunday, reins in hand, driving his family to service. The morning was overcast, giving them a break from the heat of the last few days, and he was grateful for that.
The horses plodded along at a leisurely pace, and the closer they got to the Beachy farm, the tighter the knot in his stomach grew. He’d be judged today—there was no getting around it. People who hadn’t heard he’d returned yet would find out, and there would be talk—most of it behind his back if he was lucky. The last thing he wanted was a lecture or three from older men who thought he could use a dose of wisdom.
“Word is going to spread when people see me,” Solomon said.
“Yah,” his grandmother agreed. “Someone is bound to write to your mamm, too . . . gossip being what it is.”
Solomon sighed. “Should I have written to her myself?”
It wa
s what his grandmother had wanted him to do from the start. But the thought of it still put his teeth on edge. What could he tell her without sounding pathetic? What could he say that was worth a stamp that wouldn’t end with giving her yet another opportunity to tell him that he was a disappointment?
Bridget angled her head to the side in a half shrug. “I don’t know, Sol. But she’ll know soon enough that you’re back. And she’ll be angry with me for not having told her.”
He hadn’t considered that—his grandmother’s relationship to his mamm. He’d taken the pair of them for granted growing up—their bickering and their solidarity. Mamm and Mammi had butted heads at times, but they’d always been there for each other.
“Sorry,” he said quietly.
“It’s all right.” She leaned back and folded her hands in her lap. “The Lord works all things out for good for those who love Him. And He’s working now.”
“She’ll understand, if you tell her that I didn’t want you to write to her,” he said. “Won’t she?”
His grandmother gave him a rueful look. “No. She won’t.”
“She’s the one who turned her back on me,” he countered. “She doesn’t really have a right to be offended.”
“And she’s still your mother,” his grandmother replied. “Besides, when have you found that to work on people—telling them that they have no right to be upset?”
Solomon remained silent. His mamm hadn’t come back to see him again behind bars. She hadn’t cared to check on him to see if he was okay, if he was eating, if he was alive or dead. She’d treated him like a little boy being punished. She’d done that once when he’d complained that he didn’t want to go to a prayer meeting with her and Mammi. She’d reined in the horses and ordered him out of the buggy about a mile from home and told him he could walk back, then, but they were going without him.
He could still remember that heartbroken feeling of watching the buggy carry on and knowing he’d go back to sit on the step alone, because they’d locked the house before they left. He’d been angry, and a little frightened, and he’d ended up spending the time waiting in the stables with the horses.
“There are codes between women, my dear boy,” Bridget added, “and you don’t know the half of them.”
Solomon looked past his grandmother to Elizabeth on the other side of her. Elizabeth seemed to feel his eyes on her because she glanced toward him and gave him a small smile.
“Is it true?” he asked. “Is there a whole code here that I’m missing out on?”
“Yah, it’s true,” Elizabeth replied.
Well, maybe it was a good thing that his mamm would know he was home. At least when she found out, it wouldn’t be because he was pleading with her for anything. He hadn’t asked her for a thing this time around—not her forgiveness and not her love. Maybe she’d come home for him—come face him. And maybe she wouldn’t . . . but it wouldn’t be an outright rejection this way, at least.
An Amish family walked along the side of the road—a husband and wife and six kinner trailing along behind. They strolled along, and Solomon had to look a little closer to recognize them. He knew them—Thomas Hertzberger was a few years older than him and had married a girl from another community when Solomon was a young teen.
Another buggy was coming up behind them, moving faster than they were, but it wouldn’t overtake them. The Beachy farm was coming up on the left, and an oncoming buggy was already turning in. Solomon guided the horses past Thomas’s family and stayed back, his face shielded from view. But the oncoming buggy was driven by an older couple who had been kind to him when his daet died—and the old woman did a double take, staring at him in surprise. Her mouth silently formed his name, and then she disappeared from sight as the buggy went around the corner.
She was the first one to recognize him . . . and there would be more to come.
Solomon guided the horses down the drive. The field was already filled with gray buggies nestled in lush, green grass.
“Maybe you’d let me write a letter to your mamm now?” his grandmother asked, putting a hand on his arm. “I do care what she thinks of me, Sol. Maybe my letter can beat some of the others with a little blessing to speed it along.”
“Yah,” he said. “Okay.”
Bridget smiled. “Good. Now, let’s worship. Gott is still working among us, Solomon. I can promise you that.”
* * *
When they parked the buggy and Elizabeth got down, she waited and gave Bridget a hand down, too. Bridget was spry for her age and didn’t need much help as she came down to the soft grass at their feet. Solomon stood by the horses, ready to release them to graze for the day, but his gaze was locked on her. He looked nervous, and his usual cocksure bravado had faded. Why was it that facing down a massive Englisher bully looked like it took less bravery from him than facing down his own community?
“It’ll be okay,” Elizabeth said.
“Yah.” He dropped his eyes and started undoing some buckles.
Elizabeth looked over to find Bridget eyeing her speculatively. Elizabeth looked down uncomfortably. It was Bridget’s idea that she be friendly with him, wasn’t it? Was Bridget changing her mind on that now?
“I need to find my brother,” Elizabeth said. “I wanted to talk to him, and now is probably better before the service starts.”
“You go on,” Bridget said. “We’ll be fine.”
Elizabeth looked over at Solomon again, but he hadn’t looked up again, his lips pursed as he unhitched the horses. She hesitated for a moment and then turned and headed out across the grassy field used for parking and toward that familiar old farmhouse.
She didn’t know what she’d been doing lately. She felt a powerful draw toward that wounded ex-con, and it didn’t make sense! She knew she had no future with him. Elizabeth was a pragmatic woman. She’d turned down better men than him over the years because she had an image in her mind of the life she wanted.
And yet there was something about Solomon Lantz that tugged at her . . . She’d held his hand, she’d kissed him, she’d talked with him outside in the darkness. She’d gone further with Solomon than she had with any other man who’d pursued her, and Solomon wasn’t staying. So why was she letting this physical draw between them keep going? The strength he exuded, the vulnerability in his eyes when he met her gaze, and the way he kissed her so that every inch of her body tingled . . . that wasn’t so easy to forget.
And she was realizing after all these cautious years that she was longing for some connection, too. Was that her problem—something as simple as loneliness?
Elizabeth spotted her brother out by the tent that had been erected for the service. His arms were crossed over his chest and he was talking with another man from the community. Bethany wasn’t anywhere to be seen—likely inside the house with the baby. If she wanted to speak to her brother without his wife present, she’d need to take advantage of this.
She headed across the farmyard, nodding at some friends—if she could even count these women as friends anymore—and a few acquaintances. It was easier to walk past on a mission than to stand around looking for someone willing to chat with her these days. There were a few who were warming up again, but it was different. She wasn’t the respected daughter of a powerful preacher. She was now a woman to be pitied. The shift had been palpable.
When she approached her brother, the man he was speaking with noticed her first. He gave her a nod, then reached out and touched Isaiah’s elbow in a farewell before heading off. Her brother glanced toward her looking tired.
“I saw Bethany and Mo yesterday morning,” she said, pasting a smile on her face. “Mo sure is growing!”
“Yah, he is.” Her brother took off his hat and rubbed a hand through his hair before replacing it. “Bethany said that she’d seen you—”
“It was nice to visit,” she said. “One of these days I need to come by when you’re home so I can see my big brother, too.”
Isaiah smiled at that, but it
didn’t reach his eyes. “She also said you wanted me to talk to her father about a job for Solomon Lantz.”
So her sister-in-law had mentioned it already. Elizabeth hadn’t been sure that she would. By the grim look on her brother’s face, she could tell how this was going to go.
“It’s hard for him, Isaiah,” she said. “Even Seth Stuckey won’t give him a chance. They used to be friends back in the day.”
“There might be good reason for Seth not to hire him,” her brother replied. “Solomon was involved in a violent robbery. People have to take care of their families. I wouldn’t be bringing him to work within a mile of my wife either.”
“He was tricked, though,” she said.
“So he tells the pretty girl working with his grandmother,” Isaiah replied wryly.
“It isn’t like that,” she said. At least not all of it was like that.
“Lizzie, I thought you knew what you wanted out of life,” her brother said. “I know it’s been hard lately, but I managed to fall in love and get married. And I’m the one who was helping Daet find investors! So don’t give up yet.”
“Your situation was . . . unique,” she said delicately.
His wife was already pregnant when he’d married her. Bethany’s family had good reason to let her marry him.
“Still,” Isaiah replied. “We said we’d help keep each other grounded, right? Well, I’m doing that for you right now. You’ve got to take a big step away from Solomon Lantz.”
Elizabeth sighed. “Isaiah, if you talked to him, I think you’d see that he’s still one of us. Or he should be. But if the community makes it impossible for him to stay, what choice will he have? Yah, we have to protect ourselves, but we also have to protect our own.”
“Wait—” Isaiah cast her an annoyed look. “You aren’t letting him court you, are you?”
“No, I’m not letting him court me!” she shot back. “I understand how complicated this is—trust me, I have my own future in mind, too, and it isn’t with him. But he’s staying at Bridget’s house, so I see him! Bridget wanted me to be friendly with him, help him settle back in. So this is all by Bridget’s request and with her blessing. Solomon and I have talked quite a bit. This is incredibly hard for him, and I know what it’s like to have my community turn their back on me. You know what that feels like, too. How is he supposed to get another chance if no one will give it to him?”
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