His Most Suitable Bride

by Renee Ryan

  With her arm around the little girl, Callie had to sing the hymn from memory. Obviously sensing her predicament, Reese held out his hymnal so Callie could see it, too.

  She breathed in slowly, restraining a sigh. He smelled so good, clean and fresh, soap mixed with pine. She took another short breath, leaned in closer and began singing the selected hymn in earnest. Her voice melded with Reese’s. They sounded good, as if they’d been singing together all their lives.

  Despite her efforts to stay focused on the song, her thoughts turned fanciful. She imagined her and Reese together like this every Sunday, with their many children beside them, taking up an entire church pew.

  Shocked at the direction of her thoughts, Callie shook away the image.

  Out of the corner of her eye, she glanced at Reese, only to discover he was watching her. Something quite nice passed between them, a feeling that instilled utter contentment.

  The singing came to an end. There was another round of jostling for position, whereby the children ended up in the same places they’d started.

  Reese shared a smile with Callie over their heads. He then nodded to his father and Mrs. Singletary as they passed them on their way to a pew closer to the front of the church.

  Pastor Beau took his place behind the pulpit amid more than a few female sighs. It was the same reaction he received every Sunday. Not only was the preacher on fire for the Lord, but he also had the trademark O’Toole tawny hair, classically handsome features and mesmerizing eyes.

  As was his custom, he began with a bang. “The scandals of our lives can become the story of God’s redemption. But only if we allow Him full access to our pasts.”

  Callie nearly gasped. It was as if Pastor Beau was speaking directly to her, giving her permission to release the shame of her past once and for all.

  “Today is a new day, meant to be lived under grace.”

  Heads bobbed in agreement, Callie’s among them.

  “Ah, but living under grace is not as easy as it sounds.” He lowered his voice and nearly everyone in the congregation leaned forward. “We often let our pasts hold us back from living a victorious life. We cling to the memory of our mistakes and wallow in the pain of our broken dreams.”

  Reese stiffened. Callie slipped a glance in his direction, surprised to find he looked as though he’d been punched in the face.

  She reached out and covered his hand. He remained rigid under her touch.

  “God is the God of our todays and tomorrows,” the preacher continued. “But He’s also the God of our yesterdays. He reaches into our pasts, forgives our offenses and settles all claims against our conscience.”

  Reese shifted in his seat. Cleared his throat. Mumbled something under his breath.

  “The Lord’s goal is not to condemn us, but to heal us. But God doesn’t do any of this without our permission. We must be willing participants in our own redemption. I ask you this...” A pause. “Do you have the courage to put the pain of your past into His hands?”

  Reese leaned over and said something in Daniel’s ear. The boy nodded, then moved in beside Callie as Reese slipped out of the pew.

  The sermon continued, but Callie couldn’t concentrate on the rest of the message.

  She desperately wanted to go after Reese, but she couldn’t up and abandon the children.

  What seemed an endless amount of time later, the sermon came to a close. “Let us pray.”

  Callie bowed her head, lifted up her own silent prayer for Reese, for whatever trouble haunted him enough to exit the church in the middle of the message.

  “Lord,” Pastor Beau began, “help us forget those things which are behind us, and reach forth unto those things which are before us. Teach us to forgive ourselves as You have already forgiven us. We ask this in our Savior’s name, Amen.”

  After the closing hymn, people began shuffling out of the church. Though Callie wanted to run out of the building and seek out Reese, she stayed with Gabriella and Daniel until one of the older children promised to see the two back to Charity House.

  “But we want to stay with you, Miss Callie.”

  Smiling down at Gabriella, she smoothed a hand over the glossy dark head. “I’ll stop by the orphanage later this afternoon. We’ll bake cookies.”

  “Will Mr. Reese be with you?” Daniel asked.

  Since she didn’t know where he’d gone, Callie hedged. “I’ll see what I can do, but no guarantees.”

  When she was outside and once again alone on the steps, Callie’s gaze roamed the immediate area. People lingered, clumped in groups, but she saw no sign of Reese. Driven by a strange urgency, she walked around the side of the building, where the cemetery was located.

  Her gaze landed on a tall figure nearly hidden in the shadow of a large ponderosa pine tree. Reese. Head bent, he was staring down at a grave. A second later, he sat on the ground beside the weathered headstone.

  The pang in her heart was fueled by sorrow. Sorrow for Reese, for the evident loss he suffered of a loved one.

  Callie watched him several minutes longer before setting out in his direction.

  * * *

  Reese had no idea how long he sat beside Miranda’s grave. He figured not long, maybe only ten minutes. The final strains of the closing hymn still quivered on the air. People were only just spilling out onto the church steps. He didn’t want anyone seeing him here in the cemetery. No one would, unless they came looking for him.

  Callie would come. He’d seen the worry in her eyes as he’d shifted around her in the pew. A part of him wanted her to find him so he could share his burden with her.

  Another part wanted her to stay far away.

  Of all the days he’d chosen to return to church, he had to come when Beau gave a sermon about forgiveness and letting go of the past. One line had hit Reese especially hard. God reaches back into our pasts, forgives our offenses and settles all claims against our conscience.

  Could it be that simple? Could it be a matter of releasing the pain of his past to the Lord, asking for healing and then...what? What came next?

  Did he boldly reach for a different kind of future than the one he’d been pursuing for fourteen years?

  Reese lifted his gaze to heaven, a wordless prayer forming in his mind. He was tired of remembering Miranda’s death, instead of celebrating her life. Tired of the lingering grief that hit him when he least expected it. He wanted...

  He wanted...

  Freedom.

  He wanted to set the past firmly behind him. That, he realized, was why he now sat at Miranda’s grave. He needed to settle the past, to finally let his wife rest in peace. Not because he wanted to be free of his memories of her, but because he wanted to be free of the broken dreams that kept him from living fully in the present.

  Where did he start? What words did he use? His heart felt numb in his chest.

  He and Miranda had been so young when they’d married. Her recklessness had fueled his impulsiveness. Fire to fire, flame to flame, they’d burned bright, too bright.

  Frowning over the memory of their shared impetuousness, their foolish thoughts that they were immune to misfortunes, he picked up a stone and rolled it around in his fingers. The dirt covering the rock felt hot and dry against his skin, much like his long ago dreams of a happy marriage with the beautiful Miranda Remington.

  A shadow blackened the sun overhead. “Reese?”

  At the sweet familiar voice, the riot of emotions swirling inside him calmed. Callie had found him, perhaps thinking she’d come to his rescue. And maybe she had.

  In that moment, Reese knew he would tell her about Miranda, and he would do so today. But at what cost? Callie would want to know the truth, all of it, and that would require giving her a piece of his soul.

  She lowered to a small wrought-iron bench situate
d between him and the tree, but said nothing.

  From his position on the ground, he looked up at her. Her gaze was fastened on Miranda’s headstone, sweeping quickly over the etchings. Reese didn’t have to follow the direction of her gaze. He knew every word, every line by heart, including the final three. R.I.P. Miranda Remington Bennett. 1863 to 1881.

  Callie’s brows pulled together, as if calculating the dates in her mind. Reese saw the exact moment she made the connection.

  Her eyes filled with a hundred unspoken questions. She spoke but one of them aloud. “Miranda was your—” her gaze returned to the headstone “—sister?”

  “My wife.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Despite her shock over Reese’s astonishing revelation, Callie did not push him to explain himself further. Not yet. He needed time to gather the words that would best tell his story—a story she doubted few people had heard. Perhaps only his father knew the full tale. And maybe not even him. Maybe Reese carried his terrible loss deep within him, where no one could know the magnitude of his pain.

  Oh, Reese.

  Wanting to ease his suffering, but not sure if he’d welcome her interference, Callie patted the empty space on the bench beside her. He gave one firm shake of his head, clearly preferring to sit on the ground beside his wife’s grave.

  Callie’s heart took a tumble at the obvious implications. She did not try to coax him away again. However, a few moments later, he joined her on the bench, after all.

  Holding silent, he stretched out his long legs and rolled his shoulders, but he didn’t look in her direction. She studied his profile. Enveloped in shadows cast by the tree overhead, his face appeared pale and gray.

  Callie’s heart took another tumble.

  Whatever had happened to Reese’s wife was clearly a tragic tale. When he continued staring straight ahead, she could stand his silence no longer. “Your wife died, back in—” she cut a glance at the headstone “—1881?”

  “That’s right.” At last, his eyes met hers. “Miranda and I were married September of that same year.”

  Fourteen years had come and gone since his wedding, more than half of Callie’s life. Reese’s wife had died the same year they’d married, when Reese had been no more than—Callie calculated the years in her head—eighteen years old. So young. It explained much about his current approach to finding a bride.

  “I’m sorry, Reese.” She reached out and covered his hand with hers. “I’m truly sorry for your loss. There aren’t words for what you’ve suffered.”

  “None that have been invented, at any rate.” His stilted tone hinted at a storm of pent-up emotion held firmly in check.

  “Will you tell me about your wife?” As soon as she asked the question, Callie realized she was quite possibly asking him to bare his soul. “Unless, of course, you’d rather not.”

  “I want to, Callie. I really want to tell you about Miranda.” He clutched tightly at her hand. “But I don’t think I can do it without your help. Ask me whatever you wish and I’ll try to answer honestly.”

  “All right.” The muscles in her stomach quivered as she cast about for her first question. “How...how did you meet?”

  His brows pulled together in concentration, as if he was following the memories back through time, all the way to the beginning. “I met her at a party at the Carlisles’. What prompted the occasion doesn’t matter. I remember being furious at my father for insisting I attend. Because I had other plans that evening.”

  He went quiet as he drew his hand free of hers and set it on the arm of the bench. “Plans, I have no doubt, that would have landed me a night or two in jail.” He let out a wry chuckle. “It wouldn’t have been the first time.”

  “I shudder to ask.”

  “Probably for the best.” He shifted a bit, released another laugh, this one self-deprecating. “I was an outrageous rebel in my youth. Impulsive, bone-stubborn and determined to find trouble wherever I could.”

  Callie could hardly imagine the person Reese described. He was such a deliberate man now, upright and straight, full of staggering patience. She couldn’t imagine him behaving in a manner that would land him a night or two in jail.

  “Go on,” she said softly when she realized he’d fallen silent again.

  His gaze lost somewhere in the past, he blinked at her in confusion.

  “You were telling me about the party where you met your wife,” she prompted. “Your father insisted you attend, and...”

  “Right.” He nodded. “The party. The moment I saw Miranda from across the room I fell completely, hopelessly in love. I know that sounds clichéd, but it’s the truth. I was smitten from the moment I laid eyes on her.”

  His own eyes shuttered to slits, his gaze once again somewhere faraway.

  After a moment, still glassy-eyed, he continued. “She was laughing when I walked up to her. I was captivated by her beauty.” He smiled softly. “She had unruly red hair and startling, pale blue eyes. I asked her to marry me that very night. She said yes. We were wed a week later.”

  A flood of surprise washed over Callie. “So quickly?”

  He smiled again, and Callie felt it deep within her soul, the pull of attraction she felt for him. Pray he didn’t see her feelings written on her face.

  “I was young, Callie. Impetuous. Miranda was equally spontaneous and untamed. We had one glorious, wild, uninhibited month together.” He bent his head. “Then she was gone.”

  One month? He’d only been married one short month? So little time for happiness, Callie thought, so few days to be with the one he loved. “How did she die?”

  He wiped a hand across his mouth. “Miranda loved horses. They were her greatest passion. She insisted we ride every day, sometimes twice a day, sometimes even more. I happily obliged her. It never occurred to me do anything else.”

  “Of course not. You loved her and wanted to make her happy.”

  “I did.” He ran his hand over his mouth a second time. “She found great pleasure in challenging me to race at the most unexpected moments. It didn’t matter where we were, in the heart of town, near an open field, in the midst of a crowded neighborhood. She died on one of our races.”

  There was sorrow in his eyes, unmistakable guilt in his voice. “Reese.” Callie turned slightly to face him. “I was raised on one of the largest ranches in Colorado. I know horses better than most. Accidents happen, no matter how careful the rider is or how skilled.”

  “Nevertheless,” he continued as if he hadn’t really heard what she said, “Miranda’s death could have been prevented.”

  “You don’t know that for sure.”

  “We were racing in a field we’d never ridden across before. Neither of us cared. We never cared. We were both that reckless.”

  You were both that young, she thought, remembering her own penchant for wild, spontaneous acts.

  “Miranda was winning, as usual, laughing at me over her shoulder. But then her horse stumbled and went down hard.” He tilted his head to the sky, released a slow breath of air. “After a series of rolls, Miranda ended up under the animal. It happened so fast. By the time I caught up to them, the horse was back on his feet. Miranda lay still on the ground.”

  “She... You...” Callie’s voice broke over the words. “When you found her, was she dead?”

  He shook his head. “Not dead, but nearly. She hung on for three days. Three endless days that crawled along at a slow, wretched pace. Yet when I think back to that time, those collective moments seemed to have passed in a single heartbeat.”

  “Oh, Reese.”

  “I willed her to live. I prayed unceasingly. I begged God to take me instead of her. To no avail. She breathed her final breath in my arms.”

  “I’m sorry.” The words felt so inadequate.

  “For months af
terward, I wanted to die, too.” He turned his haunted gaze onto Callie. “Maybe a part of me did die. The impulsive boy of my youth was gone for good, replaced by the man you see before you now.”

  A man who valued lists and structure above spontaneity and recklessness. So telling, Callie thought, so incredibly heartbreaking. Because after fourteen years, Reese still blamed himself for his wife’s death.

  In that, at least, Callie could ease his mind. “Reese,” she began, thinking the best route just might be to lead him to the truth, instead of simply telling him. “Whose idea was it to race across that field?”

  “I...I don’t remember.”

  “I think you do,” she said softly.

  Angry shock leaped into his eyes. “You know nothing about what happened that day. You weren’t there.”

  Knowing how badly he was hurting, Callie was tempted to back down. But no. This was too important. Lord, give me the courage to continue.

  She took a deep breath and repeated the question. “Reese, whose idea was it?”

  “Hers,” he hissed. “It was Miranda’s idea to race across that empty field.”

  “And yet—” Callie gentled her voice to a whisper “—you’re still blaming yourself for her death.”

  “Of course I blame myself. I didn’t have to agree to her challenge that day.” His chest heaved with the vehemence of his response. “I could have discouraged her. I should have insisted we turn around.”

  “Would it have mattered?”

  “I—” He broke off, lowered his head. “No.”

  Callie brought one of his hands to her face, pressed her lips to his open palm. “Maybe it’s time you forgave yourself for your wife’s death.”

  He continued staring at her, pressing his lips into a grim line. He looked down at his hand, at the spot she’d kissed, then folded his fingers into a fist.

  “Are you still in love with her?” Callie asked.

  “A part of me will always love Miranda. I’m who I am because of her.” He unclenched his fist, spread his fingers out wide. “But Beau’s sermon released something inside me, something that’s been coming on for some time, a need to put the past behind me, once and for all.”