Love and Marriage

by Alexandra Ivy

  Humbly lifted his brow in surprise. It was all too rare that he had company now that he had left the vicarage. “A guest? Who is it?”

  Her smile only became more sly. “I believe that you should see for yourself.”

  Humbly cast his housekeeper a startled gaze. It was entirely unlike Mrs. Stalwart to be coy. Indeed, she was without a doubt the most bluntly spoken woman he had ever encountered. “Goodness, you are being rather mysterious.”

  “Why do you not go along? I shall bring a nice tray of tea.”

  Wondering who on earth could have caused that distinct twinkle in the older woman’s eyes, Humbly gave a slow nod of his head. “Very well.”

  More than a little intrigued, Humbly made his way toward the back of the house. He did hope whoever it was intended to remain for a few hours. It would be good to have a nice chat with an old acquaintance. Perhaps he could even convince them to stay for dinner and a game of chess over a nice glass of port.

  Reaching the narrow door that led to the garden, Humbly pushed it open and stepped into the warm sunlight. For a moment he was too blinded by the sudden light to notice more than a number of large shadows about the garden. Then, as his eyes slowly adjusted, his jaw dropped in shock.

  “Oh,” he muttered. “Oh.”

  The three couples quietly talking beside his prize rosebushes abruptly turned at his incoherent exclamation.

  Addy was there with her husband Adam, Beatrice with her devoted Gabriel, and, of course, Victoria with Claredon.

  As if on cue, the three women linked arms and moved forward to greet him with wide smiles. Not quite able to believe his eyes, Humbly regarded the vibrant, lovely women he had come to love as his own daughters—Addy with her irrepressible spirit, Beatrice with her quiet intelligence, and Victoria with her glorious beauty. All three so different, and yet so much alike with their kind hearts and generous natures.

  “Mr. Humbly,” Addy greeted as they came to a halt directly in front of his shocked form.

  “Addy, what on earth is going on?”

  She gave him a saucy grin. “We wished to welcome you to your new home.”

  “And to thank you for all you have done for us,” Beatrice added, a deep sense of contentment about her that greatly relieved Humbly’s spirit.

  “But . . .” Flustered by this unexpected treat, he found himself blushing like the veriest schoolboy. “You need not have traveled all this way to see me.”

  Addy gave a click of her tongue. “We would have traveled to the colonies, if necessary. Besides, we wished to see your lovely cottage.”

  For once in his sixty years, Humbly found himself without words. Just the knowledge that these dear women would come all this way to visit him made his heart glow with pleasure. “Oh, well, it is not much,” he warned.

  “Nonsense. It is just as comfortable as you said it was.”

  Turning toward the titian-haired maiden, he offered a small smile. “Victoria, my dearest. How are you?”

  “Very well,” she replied, with a glow that was almost tangible.

  “Really, you should not have gone to such trouble to come all this way,” he chastised, well aware that she and Claredon were no doubt anxious for some time alone.

  She reached out to pat his arm. “I assure you that it was no trouble. We wished to be here with you.”

  “Do you suppose we could have a tour of your new home?” Beatrice demanded.

  “Certainly, though there is little to tour,” he warned.

  Addy gave him a mysterious smile. “Oh, you might be surprised.”

  Not certain what she meant by the odd words, Humbly turned to lead them back into the house, rather surprised when the three maidens followed him on their own. Coming to a halt, he regarded the gentlemen still standing in the garden with a raised brow. “Surely you do not intend to leave your husbands behind?”

  “I believe they will be able to entertain themselves,” Beatrice assured him.

  Victoria gave a soft chuckle. “Indeed, they appear to be enjoying each other’s company.”

  “No doubt they are busily discussing the wondrous qualities of their wives,” Addy said with a smile.

  “Or perhaps they are debating who is the most stubborn,” Beatrice suggested.

  “Indeed.” Addy gave a shrug, then linked her arm with Humbly’s. “We will leave them to their fun. Come along, Mr. Humbly.”

  With a firm purpose, Addy led Humbly back through the cottage, surprisingly steering him straight toward the tiny library set off the parlor. Opening the door, she stepped aside and waited for him to enter first.

  Sensing that the three maidens were up to something, Humbly cautiously entered the room and came to a startled stop.

  Wide-eyed, he glanced about the bookshelves that had been suddenly filled with leather-bound books. Just that morning, they had appeared nearly barren beyond the few volumes he had taken from the vicarage. It was like a miracle.

  “Oh, my.”

  Victoria chuckled as she stepped up beside him. “We each chose our favorite books to buy. I chose a number of the classics and philosophers, Beatrice found a large number of travel journals, and Addy bought every gothic novel and book of poetry she could lay her hands upon.”

  “My dears.” His voice broke as he battled tears of joy. “This is too much.”

  “It is just a small way of telling you thank you for all that you have done. Not only for us, but the neighborhood as well,” Addy told him in firm tones.

  “And to ensure you are never bored in your retirement,” Beatrice added.

  Just the fact that they would go to such an effort made Humbly feel as if he were the most fortunate gentleman in all of England. “I do not know what to say,” he at last muttered.

  “There is nothing to be said,” Beatrice informed him with a tender smile. “Just be happy.”

  “Nothing could make me happier than having you three here.”

  Addy gave a sudden laugh. “Well, I do hope you mean that, since we intend to visit quite regularly.”

  “Yes, indeed,” Beatrice chimed in. “We have no intention of neglecting our own private Cupid.”

  Humbly smiled widely, suddenly far more pleased with his tiny cottage and simple life. “You will always be welcome here.”

  “Well, just to make sure, we have one more surprise,” Victoria told him, moving across the room to pull a large basket from behind the desk. “We have all discovered the way to your heart.”

  Clasping his hands together, Humbly breathed in the scent that suddenly filled the air, his eyes closing with delight. “Lemon tarts . . .”

  Please turn the page for an exciting sneak peek of Alexandra Ivy’s next novel of romantic suspense PRETEND YOU’RE SAFE coming soon wherever print and e-books are sold!

  Chapter One

  First came the floods. And then the bodies...

  Jaci Patterson was running late.

  It all started when she woke at her usual time of four a.m. Yeah, she really and truly woke at that indecent hour, five days a week. On the weekends, she allowed herself to sleep in until six. But this morning, when she’d crawled out of bed, she discovered the electricity was out.

  Again.

  The lack of power had nothing to do with the sketchy electrical lines that ran to her remote farmhouse in the northeast corner of Missouri. At least not this time. Instead, it could be blamed on the rains that had started the first day of March and continued to hammer the entire Midwest for the past three weeks.

  When the lights at last came on at five, she had to rush through her routine, grateful that she’d baked two dozen peach tarts and several loaves of bread the night before.

  As it was she’d barely managed to finish her blueberry muffins and scones before she had to load them into the back of her Jeep. Then, locking her two black labs, Riff and Raff, in the barn so they didn’t destroy her house, she headed toward Heron, the small town just ten miles away.

  Predictably, she’d driven less than two mil
es down the muddy lane that led to the small farm that’d once belonged to her grandparents, when she discovered the road was blocked. Crap. Obviously the levee had broken during the night, releasing the swollen fury of the Mississippi River.

  It was no wonder her electricity had gone out.

  Grimacing at the knowledge that her bottom fields, along with most of her neighbors, were probably flooded, she put the Jeep in reverse. Then, careful to stay in the center of the muddy road, she reversed her way back to the lane. Once she managed to get turned around, she headed in the opposite direction.

  The detour took an extra fifteen minutes, but at least she didn’t have to worry about traffic. With less than three hundred people, Heron wasn’t exactly a hub of activity. In fact, she ran into exactly zero cars as she swung along Main street.

  She splashed through the center of town that was lined with a small post-office, the county courthouse that was built in the eighteen hundreds, a bank, and a beauty parlor. Further down the block was a newly constructed tin shed that housed the firetruck and the water department. On the corner was a small diner that had originally been christened the Cozy Kitchen, but had slowly become known as the Bird’s Nest by the locals after it’d been taken over by Nancy Bird, or Birdie, as she was affectionately nicknamed.

  Pulling into the narrow alley behind the diner, Jaci hopped out of her vehicle to grab the top container of muffins that were still warm from the oven. Instantly, she regretted not pulling on her jacket as the drizzling rain molded her short brown hair to her scalp and dampened her Mizzou sweatshirt and faded jeans to her curved body.

  With a shiver she hurried through the back door, careful to wipe the mud from her rubber boots before entering the kitchen.

  Heat smacked her in the face, the contrast from the chilled wind outside making the cramped space feel smothering.

  Grimacing, she walked across the floor to set the muffins on a narrow stainless steel table that was next to the griddle that was filled with scrambled eggs, hash browns, sausage and sizzling bacon.

  The large woman with graying hair and a plump face, efficiently flipped a row of pancakes before gesturing toward the woman who was busily washing dishes. Once the helper had hurried to her side, she handed off her spatula and made her way toward Jaci.

  Nancy Bird, better known as Birdie, was fifteen years older than Jaci. When she was just seventeen she’d married her high school sweetheart and dropped out of school. The sweetheart turned out to be a horse patootie who’d fled town, leaving Birdie with four young girls to raise on her own.

  With a grim determination that Jaci deeply admired, Birdie had bought the old diner and over the past ten years and turned it into the best place to eat in the entire county.

  At this early hour her clients usually consisted of farmers, hunters, and school bus-drivers who were up before dawn.

  “Morning, Birdie.” Jaci stepped aside as the older woman efficiently began to place the muffins on a large glass tray that would be set on the counter next to the cash register. Many of the diners liked to have a cup of coffee and muffin once they were done with breakfast.

  “Thank God you’re here.”

  “I’m sorry I’m late. The electricity didn’t come on until almost five.”

  Finishing, Birdie grabbed the tray and bustled across the kitchen to hand it to her assistant.

  “Take this to the counter,” Birdie commanded before turning back to Jaci with a roll of her eyes. “The natives have been threatening to revolt without their favorite muffins.”

  Jaci smiled, pleased by Birdie’s words. She’d learned to bake at her grandmother’s side, but it wasn’t until she’d inherited her grandparents’ farm that she considered using her skills to help her make ends meet.

  Leaning to the side she glanced through the large open space where the food was passed-through to the waitresses.

  She released a slow whistle. The place hadn’t changed in the past ten years. The walls were covered with faded paneling that was decorated with old license plates and a mounted fish caught from the river. The floor was linoleum with a drop ceiling that was lit with fluorescent lights.

  There was a half dozen tables arranged around the square room with one long table at the back where a group of farmers showed up daily to drink coffee and share the local gossip.

  At the moment, every seat was filled with patrons wearing buff coveralls, cammo jackets, and Cardinal baseball hats.

  “Damn, woman. That’s quite a crowd,” she said, a rueful smile touching her lips. The rains meant that no one was able to get into the fields. “At least someone can benefit from this latest downpour.”

  Birdie sucked in a sharp breath, her hands landing on her generous hips.

  “I hope you’re not suggesting that I’m the sort of person who enjoys benefitting from a tragedy, Jaci Patterson,” the older woman chastised. “People want to get together to discuss what’s happened and I have the local spot for them to gather.”

  Jaci blinked, caught off guard by her friend’s sharp reprimand. Then, absorbing the older woman’s words, she lifted a hand to her lips.

  “Tragedy?” she breathed. “Oh no. Has something happened?”

  Birdie’s features softened. “You haven’t heard about the body?”

  “Body?” Jaci felt a tremor of unease. She’d already lost her father to a drunk driver before she was even born, and then her grandmother when she was seventeen. Her grandfather had passed just two years ago. She still grieved for them. “Like I said, the electricity went out last night and as soon as it come back on I started baking. Has someone died?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  “Who?”

  “No one knows for sure yet,” Birdie told her.

  Jaci frowned. What was Birdie talking about?

  “How could they not know?”

  “The levee broke in the middle of the night.”

  “Yeah, I figured that out when I discovered that the road was closed...oh hell.” She tensed as her unease became sharp-edge fear. The levee had broken before and flooded fields, but her closest neighbor had recently built a new house much closer to the river. “It didn’t reach Frank’s home, did it?”

  Birdie shook her head. “Just the back pasture.”

  “Then what body are you talking about?”

  “When Frank went to move his cattle to higher ground, he saw something floating in the middle of his field.”

  Jaci cringed. Poor Frank. He must have been shocked out of his mind.

  “Oh my God. It was a dead person?”

  “Yep. A woman.”

  “He didn’t recognize her?”

  Birdie leaned forward and lowered her voice, as if anyone could overhear them with the noise from the customers, not to mention the usual kitchen clatter.

  “He said it was impossible to know if she was familiar or not.”

  “I don’t suppose he wanted to look too close,” Jaci said. If she’d spotted a body in her flooded field she would have jumped into her Jeep and driven away like a maniac.

  “It wasn’t that. He claimed the woman was too . . .” Birdie hesitated, as if she was searching for a more delicate way to express what Frank had said. “Decomposed to make out her features.”

  “Decomposed?” A strange chill inched down Jaci’s spine.

  “That’s what he’s saying.”

  Jaci absently glanced through the opening into the outer room where she could see Frank surrounded by a group of avid listeners.

  When Birdie had said a body, she’d assumed that it had been someone who’d been caught in the flood. Maybe she’d fallen in when she was walking along the bank. Or her car might had been swept away when she tried to cross a road with high water.

  But she wouldn’t be decomposed, would she?

  “I’ve heard that water does strange things to a body,” she at last said.

  Birdie tugged Jaci toward the back door as her assistant moved to open the fridge. Clearly there was more to the story.<
br />
  “The body wasn’t all that Frank discovered.”

  Jaci stilled. “There was more?”

  “Yep.” Birdie whispered, as if it was a big secret. Which was ridiculous. There were no such things as secrets in a town the size of Heron. “Frank called the Sheriff and while he was waiting for Mike to arrive, he swears that he caught sight of a human skull stuck in the mud at the edge of the road.” Birdie gave a horrified shudder. “Can you imagine? Two dead people virtually in his back yard? Gives me the creeps just thinking about it.”

  Jaci’s mouth went dry. “Did Frank say anything else?”

  Birdie shrugged. “Just that the sheriff told him to leave and not to talk about what he found.” Birdie snorted. “Like anyone wouldn’t feel the need to share the fact they found a dead body and a skull in their field.”

  A familiar dread curdled in the pit of stomach.

  She was being an idiot. Of course she was. This had nothing to do with the terror of her past.

  Still . . .

  She couldn’t shake the sudden premonition that slithered down her spine.

  “Is the Mike still out at Frank’s?” she abruptly demanded, referring to the sheriff, Mike O’Brien.

  “Yeah.” Birdie sent her a curious glance. “I think he was waiting for the Corp of Engineers to get out there so they could discuss how long it would take for the field to drain.” She wrinkled her nose. “I suppose they need to make sure there aren’t any other bodies.”

  More bodies.

  A fierce urgency pounded through her. She might be overreacting, but she wasn’t going to be satisfied until she spoke to Mike.

  “I need to go.”

  “You haven’t had your coffee,” Birdie protested.

  “Not this morning, thanks Birdie.”

  “Okay.” The older woman stepped back. “I’ll get your money and—”

  “I’ll stop by later to get it.” Jaci turned to pull open the back door.

  Instantly a chilled blast of air swept around them.

  “What’s your rush?” Birdie demanded.