His brows went up, making her realize that there probably weren’t too many people in his life who talked about God like she did.
But then he relaxed. “You know, a couple of weeks ago, I might have disagreed with you, but now I feel the same way. God is good.”
She smiled at him before looking back at Christopher. As he continued to breathe softly, his little chest pumping up and down, and his mouth open into a tiny O, Hannah realized that if Paul had lived, she probably wouldn’t have ever made the decision to get this job. Now she was getting paid to spend her days with a sweet baby and even a few minutes visiting with Rob. She was doing things she’d never imagined but managing to find joy in them. She couldn’t deny that she’d been able to find a little bit of happiness.
“Hey, Hannah?”
“Jah?”
“Even though I’ve already been sitting here for thirty minutes, would you mind if I just sit here with you for a few minutes longer? We don’t even have to talk.”
“I don’t mind.” She leaned back on her elbows and closed her eyes, enjoying the warmth of the sun on her face and the faint scent of Christopher’s baby lotion in the air.
And the quiet presence of Rob sitting next to her. He’d become her friend.
And now that she knew that he, too, had loved and lost so much, she thought that he might just be the best friend she’d ever had.
SHE WAS STILL thinking about Rob and their easygoing conversation when she walked home from work that afternoon. After stopping in the market to buy a bouquet of fresh flowers they had on sale for her mother, Hannah practically ran into Aaron Kurtz.
He held out his hands to steady her. “Whoa,” he said with a light smile. “Are you all right?”
“Jah.” Looking a little sheepish, she said, “I fear I was thinking more about these daisies than where I was going.”
“What’s the occasion?”
“For the flowers? Oh, there is no occasion. I simply thought my mother might enjoy them. She loves daisies.”
Something in Aaron’s face altered, the relaxed expression he wore hardening. “It’s a blessing you have a mother still. We lost ours when Daed perished in the fire.”
Hannah didn’t want to be unkind, but she was beginning to think that every single conversation with him centered on the fire and his father’s passing. “I worked all day. It’s past time that I headed home.”
“Jah. You had better do that. Your parents will no doubt be worried about ya.”
Slipping past him, she clutched the flowers against her chest and started back down the sidewalk. For a good fifty yards, she walked briskly, anxious to put some distance between herself and Aaron’s hurt and pain. Unfortunately, the distance didn’t make her brief interaction with him any easier to bear. One five-minute conversation with him had removed her happy mood and the optimism she’d been feeling.
Right then and there she made a vow to keep her distance from Aaron Kurtz. Something felt off about him.
Since she couldn’t help him, she had to help herself.
Chapter 13
It was almost becoming a habit. For a week now, Lukas had worked late, walked out of the mill’s office a little after four in the afternoon, did what little errands needed doing, then proceeded to the post office.
Once there, he would either wait on one of the wooden benches lining the sidewalk in front until Darla finished serving customers or would come inside. Whether he stayed inside or out depended largely on who was inside being helped. If they were friends, he might stop in and say hello, but Lukas was discovering that he didn’t always feel like socializing with the whole community at the end of his workday.
Instead, he liked simply being around Darla and enjoying their quiet conversations. It seemed Rebecca was right; Darla Kurtz really did mean a lot to him, maybe more than he’d ever imagined. However, instead of being distressed by this, the notion entertained him. He liked that he was still getting to know a woman he’d known for the majority of his life.
That was why he couldn’t help but smile when he peeked in the window and realized that, today, she was completely alone.
She was in one of the mismatched chairs that decorated the small post office lobby, her legs stretched out in front of her. The late afternoon sun was streaming in through the sparkling front window, and Darla had her eyes closed, obviously enjoying the warm rays of light shining on her skin. He was suddenly reminded of a cat lounging in the sun.
As he watched her, Lukas was struck by her innocent beauty. Darla’s personality was so attractive to him it was easy to overlook her auburn hair and flawless skin. He certainly had. He’d always thought she was cute, and she was.
But really, she was more than that.
Or maybe it was just that his heart now realized she was so much more?
Not wanting anyone to see him staring at her through the window, he opened the door and walked inside.
Darla started. Her eyelids popped open and she jerked her head to the side meeting his gaze with a guilty flush. “Lukas, please don’t tell me that I’ve been sitting here with my eyes closed while you’ve been standing there.”
Crossing the empty room, he smiled. “You haven’t been sitting here with your eyes closed. I haven’t been watching you sit in the sun like you were lounging on a towel at Siesta Key.”
She squeezed her eyes shut. “I’m hopeless.”
He chuckled. “You’re human. It’s a nice day and the sun feels warm. I’m glad you were letting yourself relax for a minute or two.”
“Or ten,” she corrected, looking embarrassed. After darting a glance at the clock on the wall, she got to her feet. “You’re early today. Do you have plans for later?”
“Not really. It was kind of a slow day at the mill. I decided to get out of there and bother you until you got off work.”
“Obviously, it’s been kind of slow here, too.”
“So, you won’t mind if I keep you company for the next hour?”
“Not at all.” Her puzzled expression warmed. “Guess what? Patsy baked this morning. I brought in two slices of chocolate zucchini bread. Want a slice?”
“Of course.” Patsy was a flirt and flighty but she could bake better than just about anyone else in Charm. “What was the occasion?”
“Oh, I don’t know. She made the bread because it’s my favorite.”
He was glad about that, he really was. But Patsy didn’t do things for Darla without a reason. He began to study Darla more carefully. He hated that he was doing it, but he started looking for bruises and marks. He watched her turn to the white wicker basket she sometimes carried to work and carefully pull out two slices wrapped in waxed paper.
Then he saw her wrist.
Lukas was a man who’d worked all his life in a lumber mill. Accidents were common; it was the nature of the job. But little in life had prepared him for the sight of her delicate wrist swollen and marked with dark bruises. “Darla,” he bit out, hardly trusting himself to remain in check.
“What? Oh.” After noticing what he was staring at, she awkwardly pushed her sleeve down.
His temper flared and the only way he was able to contain himself was to remember that his anger wouldn’t make her feel any better. “What happened?” he asked, though he felt foolish even uttering the question.
Her averted gaze told him everything he needed to know. Everything he already had known. Now all he had to do was figure out how he was going to be able to stop himself from going directly to her house and giving her brother a piece of his mind. Or worse.
He’d never believed in violence. He’d always believed in turning the other cheek and seeking to solve problems in a peaceful manner. But right now, at that moment, Lukas knew if Aaron Kurtz was standing in front of him, he’d hit him.
He’d hit him hard, and without a bit of remorse.
“THIS CAN’T CONTINUE, Darla,” Lukas said through clenched teeth. “I promise you, I’m going to put a stop to this today.”
Feeling the anger emanating from him, Darla had visions of Lukas throwing open the post office door, racing out to her farm, and attacking her brother.
Fearing that would happen, she hurried to his side. “Please, Lukas. Calm down.”
“I don’t know if that’s possible.”
Even though his body was fairly trembling with his anger, she rested her palm on his bicep. “Please?” she asked.
Her touch seemed to do what her words couldn’t. With a shiver accompanied by a ragged sigh, he attempted to regain his composure. Gently, she squeezed his arm when he closed his eyes.
A second passed. Then two. Three. After taking another deep breath, he opened his eyes again and stared directly at her. Now his expression filled with concern instead of anger. “When did he do this? When did he hurt you?”
“I’m not hurt,” she blurted automatically. When she saw his eyes flare, she realized she was now used to denying that she’d ever been hurt. It made her wonder who she was protecting—Aaron or herself? Did it even matter?
Instead of arguing, Lukas reached for her hand on his arm. As if she were made of spun glass, he gently slid up her sleeve until most of her forearm was bare. Then, just as methodically, he held up her wrist to the fluorescent light shining above them. In the unforgiving light, the dark marks shone on her skin like angry symbols. Representations of all the pain that was in her house. In her family’s lives. She could hardly look at them. Not because they were so painful, but because the stark blemishes made her finally accept that she needed help. Lukas’s help.
She’d really hoped to be stronger.
Though his grip on her arm was still gentle, his voice was gravelly when he spoke again. “If you ain’t hurt, what do ya call these marks then, Darla?”
She couldn’t answer him. Instead, she continued to stare at her arm.
At her continued silence, he rotated her wrist a bit. “If this ain’t bad, what is?”
“Shtobb.”
“Nee, I ain’t gonna stop.” He continued to push her. “If this isna him treating you roughly, what do you call it when you get marked up like this?”
His words embarrassed her. “Lukas, please . . .”
“Manhandled?” he asked sarcastically. “Nee? Hmm. What description sounds better?” he persisted, his voice thick with sarcasm. “Did he merely forget himself? Yet again?”
Tears pricked at her eyes. “Stop, Lukas,” she said again.
Immediately, he did stop. He exhaled, and there before her eyes, the anger in his expression ebbed away. “I’m sorry,” he said as he pressed both of his palms against her cheeks, cradling her face like it was dear to him. “I’m sorry. I . . . It’s just that you have to know how hard it is to realize that you are getting hurt when I’m not around. It makes me want to keep you by my side twenty-four hours a day.” Now, gently caressing her cheeks with his thumbs, he whispered, “It makes me want to do whatever it takes to keep you safe and protected.”
Her breath hitched. She hated Lukas’s anger. Hated how her wrists looked. Hated the memory of how she’d received them last night. But most of all, she hated knowing that it had happened many times before and would likely happen many times again.
As a single tear escaped and trailed down her cheek, she pulled away. As she had known he would, he released her easily. Part of her yearned to run from his sight but there was nowhere for her to go.
Instead, she remained where she was, breathing hard, as if she’d run a race.
Lukas, too, was breathing heavily. His gray-blue eyes were stormy and it was obvious that he was determined to not frighten her. “This needs to stop, Darla. He could have broken your wrist,” he said at last. Each word sounded as if it were being pulled from his soul.
She couldn’t look at him any longer. “I know.”
As if he couldn’t resist touching her, he wiped her tears with a thumb. His callouses were rough against her skin, yet they didn’t feel bad. Instead, it reminded her of how much she liked his touch. She shivered.
He noticed. There was a new awareness in his eyes that had nothing to do with anger or worry and everything to do with the new intimacy that was forming between the two of them. “Do ya? Finally?” he asked.
She nodded.
Dropping his hand, he spoke. “I’m going to talk to him tonight, and this time I’m gonna make him listen. If necessary, I’m going to bring Levi with me. Or Simon.”
She couldn’t bear to let anyone else know. “Please, don’t bring anyone with you.”
Lowering his voice, he said, “We can contact the police, you know.”
She shook her head. “Nee, we cannot. I am not going to involve the English in my problems.”
“They could help you.”
“I don’t want them.”
He sighed. “I know you don’t want anyone else to know, but you may not have a choice.”
“Not yet.”
“All right. But then you need to let me speak to him.” Looking somber, he added, “Darla, I want to make sure he understands that I’m not fooling around.”
“He won’t think that.” Lukas was over six feet, had to weigh almost two hundred pounds, and was heavily muscled. His current expression was rather murderous.
“I’ve already talked to him once. He ignored me. If we don’t put a stop to this now, Aaron could hurt someone else. What if he harms Gretel or Maisie?”
Even imagining Aaron taking out his frustration and anger on them made her feel sick. “He would never touch my little sisters.”
“Are you sure?”
She nodded weakly because she was unable to tell him the truth. Aaron’s behavior was so erratic, she wasn’t sure what he would do next.
He lifted up her hand again. “What would you do if little Gretel’s wrists looked like this? Would you tell her that they were only bruises?” His voice hardened. “Would you tell her that the pain didn’t matter?”
She flinched. “Of course not.”
“If he hurts you, he’s going to eventually hurt Maisie or Gretel or Patsy. It’s the way of abusers. If you stand up to him, he’ll find someone who won’t. Maybe he’ll even harm Hope.”
She shook her head. “He wouldn’t. He loves Hope.”
“He loves you, too. But, Darla, do you see we’re out of options?”
Wearily, she nodded. “All right.”
For the first time since he’d spied her wrist his body relaxed. “So, what brought it on?”
She closed her eyes. “We argued last night. He got tired of it.”
“What were you arguing about?”
She didn’t want to admit that Lukas had been the subject, but it was too late to try to hide anything now. “Our renewed friendship, Lukas. Aaron wanted me to stay away from you. When I told him that wasn’t going to happen, he . . . well, he got upset.”
Immediately, the tension in the small room heightened again. “He has a lot of nerve.” Looking at the door, he said, “I’m tempted to go to the mill, get Levi and Simon and face him this minute.”
What could she say? She had wanted to solve things herself. She had promised Lukas that she would tell him if Aaron harmed her again. Instead, she’d hidden her wrist under a long-sleeved dress and pretended her wrist wasn’t marked.
“I understand your reluctance to get other people involved, but he needs to be stopped. It might be better if we have witnesses, too.”
The idea of Lukas swooping in to help her was as appealing as it was scary. But then she imagined the further pain it would cause. “The three of you acting as my avenging angels isn’t the way to handle Aaron.”
“Patsy making you chocolate zucchini bread ain’t gonna make things better, either.”
She felt frustrated and tired. Oh, so tired. He was right, but sometimes she just wanted to forget everything. She wanted to go back to sitting in a sunny spot in the room with her legs stretched out.
“Darla, honey, you know I’m only pushing because I care about you.”
“I
care about you, too. You know that. But we need to come up with a better way to handle Aaron. Maybe we should speak to the bishop.”
“The bishop will feel sorry for ya, but I don’t think he’s going to interfere right away. We need to do something tonight.”
She could just see what was going to happen. He would walk her home, stewing and fretting. Then, the minute Aaron showed up, Lukas would say too much and possibly even threaten her brother. Aaron would lash out, lose that argument, and later, take it out on her.
She needed to put a stop to it before things got worse. “Please, Lukas. Don’t be so pushy. Maybe . . . Maybe I should go home on my own today instead of you accompanying me.”
He flinched as if she’d slapped him. “I’m trying to help you—I’m pretty much the only person trying to help you—yet you’re still pushing me away?”
It didn’t matter that his words were true. They still hurt.
She needed to think about that and about what to do next. Most of all, she needed time to think about what he was offering and what it would mean to accept his help, as well as how it would affect Patsy, Maisie, and Gretel—and even Hope.
“If that is what you wish to call it, then yes.”
Disappointment clouded his features. “I thought we were friends again.”
He was more than just a friend to her. After all, she was fairly sure that friends didn’t caress each other’s cheek the way he’d caressed hers. “Friends don’t interfere with each other’s life the way you are doing.”
“They do, Darla,” he countered. “At least, they should. No one can do everything. Not Aaron. Not you and not me.”
He sounded so frustrated, so betrayed, that she admitted what she most feared. “If you come over and threaten Aaron, it won’t make him afraid. He’ll simply be angry. Then, after you go home, I’ll have to deal with the consequences.”
“Then . . . Then come home with me.”
“Go home with you.” He might as well have asked her to begin work in the lumberyard. “What then, Lukas? What would you want me to do next? Move in with ya?” She rolled her eyes. “Now, that would go over well. What am I going to do? Be Rebecca’s new best friend?”
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