by Jillian Hart
"And let me guess." He dragged the coffee table over and sat down on it, propping his elbows on his knees, chin on his hands, watching her. Just watching her. "You started working two jobs too."
"Yes. We were able to get Abby out in less than a year, then Callie and finally Dee." Memories fled across her face, the content of which he couldn’t guess at, but the beauty of them, the emotion in them, plainly showed. Love, hardship, devotion. Clearly, her sisters had been worth it.
It was hard not to like her. Real hard. He couldn't imagine Bethleigh or Sylvia working so hard for those they loved. His chest cinched another notch tighter.
"Those must have been hard times for you." He cleared his throat but the emotions stuck there, caught just below his Adam's apple. "You gave up so much when you were young."
"Oh, I didn't give up anything, not really." She shrugged, her forehead furrowing, the sincere truth written on her face, gentle in her eyes. "It was a hardship living in the orphanage. It wasn't a bad place, just financially strapped. There simply wasn't enough of anything to go around. I wanted to help Emma get the rest of our sisters out, so they wouldn't have to live that way."
"Most young ladies I know would be thinking of new dresses and parties and social events, not trying to help someone else." Miles remembered his youth—those last few years of school, the parties, the pretty girls, rolling up to Bethleigh's family's summer estate in a new buggy, driving the finest horses in the entire state of New York.
"Social events? Parties?" Maggie laughed at that and waved away the idea with the flip of her elegant hand. "I've never cared about those things, unless you count birthday parties and Christmas. Now, I love Christmas. As for new dresses? Those are a luxury in my family. We've only been able to afford the fabric to sew our own dresses recently. Before that, they came from charity barrels."
"Right." He felt humbled by her easy smile. He'd always known the best of everything.
He'd grown up privileged, the first son of a very wealthy and respected family, and while he'd done his best to honor his good luck in life with hard work, he'd never known the type of poverty Maggie had survived and worked hard to climb her way out of. He respected her for that, and maybe that's why she looked even more beautiful to him.
She sat there luminous in the lamplight, softly glowing with a beauty that came from within, with down-to-earth goodness that he'd forgotten could actually exist in a beautiful woman.
Yes, she was beautiful, he thought, reaching out without thought—his hand seemed to move of its own accord—and he brushed his knuckle against the silken curve of her face. So soft, so lovely. Unexpected softer emotions cinched around his chest and yanked hard, squeezing his heart unbearably. More emotion lodged in his throat and seemed to swell, cutting off his windpipe, but he didn't care. For that instant, he didn't need to breathe, he didn't need his heart to beat.
There was just her sweetness, the warmth of her skin. His inability to feel anything other than bitterness shattered. His defenses tumbled down and he was left open to her, heart unguarded.
He ran his knuckles gently along the line of her cheekbone, across silken skin, to fold a lock of golden hair—gleaming almost strawberry red in the lamplight—behind her ear. Tenderness welled up, spilling into his veins. He didn't pull back, gazing into her eyes, seeing the uncertainty in hers.
She dug her top teeth into her full bottom lip. His gaze slid downward to her mouth, rosebud shaped, rich and full, made for kissing. Heat thudded in his groin, fired his blood. Desire hit him hard, like a runaway train charging into him.
Struck dumb, reeling from shock, his pulse gave an extra beat, lurching into a fast and crazy rhythm. In his mind he leaned forward, caught her face with his hands and kissed her, claiming her soft mouth with his. He wanted to haul her against him, wanted to feel her soft curves against his hardness. His entire body shook with the urge to lean in and act on his thoughts—
"Supper's ready." Pops sauntered in, boots drumming hard against the floor.
Miles grimaced, dropped his hand but not fast enough. He launched off the coffee table, determined to put lots of distance between him and Maggie, but that hadn't been quick enough either. He stared into the grinning face of his grandfather and his blood went cold. Pops had seen more than Miles wanted. Damn. He'd seen that calculating look before.
"Oh, sorry to get you at an inopportune moment," Pops said, but he didn't look sorry. He wore the maid's white ruffled apron and a wide, wide grin. "You kids come on to the table when you're finished here. And Miles, I didn't overcook the potatoes this time."
"Great." Miles planted his fists on his hips, cursing his own stupidity. Hell, he hadn't been just stupid, he'd been weak. His pulse still thrummed, his breath kept coming fast and shallow. He was attracted to the woman. It ran deep, deeper than lust, and that troubled him.
Good thing she was leaving on the first eastbound train. He held out his hand to help her from the chair. The contact of her gentle hand turned his blood to lava, but no matter. He could handle it. He was in charge, not his libido, and that's the way it was going to stay. He was not going to trust another woman with his heart. Never again.
"Maybe I should warn you about Pops's cooking," he said, escorting her from the room.
"No need," she said moving away from him, making it clear. She wanted to keep her distance, too. "I've already figured out John isn't the best cook. The smell wafting through the house is burned roast, isn't it?"
"I wish I could deny it, but I can't." Miles took a step back, feeling more comfortable now that was a lot of physical space between them. That was the way it was gonna stay.
Chapter Four
Miles's stomach grumbled hungrily, but one look at the meal smoldering in platters and bowls told him supper was going to be unsatisfying (once again). He sat straight up in his chair, doing his best to ignore the woman across the dining room table.
"Tell us a little bit more about your plans, Miss Maggie," Pops said as he added several generous slices of scorched roast beef to a plate and handed it to her. "What are you gonna do now that Chester Collins turned out to be an ass?"
"Yes, it's not like you can marry him now," Pa added from the foot of the table, looking innocently devious. "You can stay here as long as you like, dear. You may need time to get over the emotional blow and decide what to do."
Heaven forbid, Miles thought, reaching for his napkin. Did his father think that all it would take was having a pretty woman around for his broken heart to mend? No, it would take a good deal more than that because him falling for another woman was never going to happen. Over his dead body. Women were too hard on a man's heart. He cleared his throat. "That's a generous offer, Pa, but not necessary. I'm sticking to the promise I made her. I'm sending Maggie home when the trains are running again. She needs her family right now."
"Son, that's your plan." Dark hazel eyes twinkled at him cheerily. "But have you asked Maggie what she wants? Maggie, I'm sorry about Miles. He forgets he doesn't run the world."
"I don't think that, and you know it." Miles rolled his eyes. Clearly Pa knew that too, but he was pulling out every argument he could think of to keep Maggie here. So wouldn't it be wise to get her out of this house fast? "If the storm is over by morning, I'll take her to the depot. Is that all right with you, Maggie?"
"Yes, that's exactly what I was hoping." She sounded like she was smiling warmly, but he didn't look up. He kept his gaze trained on Pops dishing up another plate with more charred and overcooked food. "I don't know what else to do but to go back home."
"You could stay here and work for us. I'd hire you." Pops added a good pile of charred roast beef slices to another plate and passed it down. "Laundry day's coming up soon and frankly, I could use help. A lot of help. I can't ask Winston to lend a hand. Son, remember the shirt you scorched with the iron?"
"How did I know it would burn the shirt if I left it on for too long?" Winston shrugged. "I know horses, I know law. I do not know laundry. All I
can say is that I gave it a good try."
"Yes, you did. Miles can do it, but he won't." Pops winked at Maggie, friendly and charming, trying to soften her up to his employment offer.
"Why not?" Maggie's rosebud mouth twitched, and Miles cursed himself for noticing.
"Well, that would be all my fault," Pops confessed merrily. "He did just a spitfire job, and I made a comment that he was as good as any woman when it came to housework. I meant it as a compliment, but he took it the wrong way. He still hasn't forgiven me for it."
"That's right, and I won't." Miles took the full plate his grandfather passed to him and set it down in front of him. "Guess I could start and save you a few pennies."
"Well, that does appeal to me. I am thrifty." Pops dished up his own plate, considering. "A penny saved is a penny earned. Now if you and Winston both found wives, we wouldn’t need to worry about hiring someone."
"But a wife is more expensive than a maid," Miles pointed out, mouth curving into a sardonic twist as he took his knife to the roast slices on his plate. "Pops, if you're so bent on a wife around here, why don't you get one?"
"At my age? I wouldn’t know what to do with one." Pops winked merrily. "Well, maybe I could figure it out after all. There are some things a man never forgets."
"Stop right there. I don't want to hear it." Pa blushed, at his end of the table. "What will happen to you, Maggie? When you go home, will you be all right?"
"I've got my sisters. I'll be fine." She tentatively cut a small piece of charred beef, sawing away as if it were shoe leather. "Well, fine, except for having to find another job. My life will go back to the way it was. Maybe my pride will be a bit wounded."
"Wounded? I'd say it has to be more than just a bit hurt." John's weathered face crinkled up with sympathy, deep grooves bracketing his mouth and eyes as he cut a large chunk of meat on his plate. "My guess is you got your heart hurt pretty good. We all know what that's like."
"Oh, I'll recover." Her dainty chin went up, she sat a little straighter, spoke a little firmer. So much strength for such a fragile, dainty woman. Miles would almost have believed her except for the pain shining in her eyes, a pain that came straight from her soul. Deep it was, and true.
He felt another tug of empathy, and he told his dumb heart not to go caring about her, even the slightest bit. A man who let a woman into his heart was betting on trouble.
"It's the chance you take when you want to fall in love." Her chin didn't waver but her voice did, betraying her. "You have to put your heart at risk if you want a chance at the real thing. Otherwise, you'll never find it."
"Truer words were never said." Understanding deepened Grandpop's voice. He stared at his plate, at the burnt roast, at the lopsided, browned biscuits and the dried out green beans. "Truth is, Elma broke my heart into pieces twice in my life, never to be the same again. Once when she said no when I proposed to her and again when she died three days before our fiftieth wedding anniversary. I've never been the same, it cut me down to the quick. But I wouldn't have traded the years we had together for anything. Not anything."
"She must have really loved you." Maggie plopped the small bite of meat onto her tongue, ignoring the stringy, leathery taste as she chewed.
Tears flooded the older man's eyes and he blinked them away so fast, she would have missed that unveiled, revealing instant of pure emotion if she hadn't been watching. John smiled, as if his heart wasn't still broken.
"Oh, Elma had her doubts about me, and rightly so." He bent forward, cutting the slices of beef on his plate intently, as if the job required all of his concentration. "I was trouble."
"No, not you," she gently teased, even as her chest twisted tight with caring for this good man.
"I won't lie." He chuckled, sadness still resonating in his deep voice, and kept slicing away at the tough meat. "I had trouble growing up, accepting responsibility, settling down. You see, my father expected me to take over the family business—shipping. Well, I wasn't interested in any of that. I didn't care about shipping, I didn't want to be a businessman. I was having too much fun spending my father's money, living a life without responsibility."
"What changed your mind?" Maggie paused chewing, shifting the tough wad of meat around in her mouth, trying to find a better way to chew it.
"Elma's rejection. I worshiped her, I thought the world of her, and she kindly but firmly said no. That I wasn't the man she needed." John finished slicing blackened roast and glanced around his plate, perhaps needing to stay busy while he revealed his soul. "Hell, that broke me right then and there. I remember standing in shock as the rain pelted down all around the gazebo as she walked away from me for good. It was like every bone in me cracked in two. I was so hurt I couldn’t move. That's when I realized I had to change. So I did, and I never looked back. I embraced a man's life of commitment and responsibility. Good thing I did too, as she was carrying Winston but didn't tell me at the time."
"Pa, did you have to go and say that?" Winston dropped his fork on his plate with a clink and reached for his wine glass. Heat stained his face. "Nice little Maggie doesn't need to hear that. She doesn’t need to know I was almost a disgrace to my mother and her family."
"Ah, but I married her in time, and most folks didn't say a word." John waggled his brows, setting in to cut the overdone green beans into pieces as he'd done his meat. Pain and grief still hung in his voice. "'Course, most folks likely counted that it was eight months not nine after the wedding before you came along, but that wasn't my fault. Your mother was a very passionate woman."
"I don't need to hear that either." Winston blew out a breath, shook his head. "Sorry, Miss Maggie, but my father gets going with stories about my mother and he can't seem to stop himself."
"Or censor himself," Miles added dryly, chewing on a bite of tough roast.
"It's all right. I'm glad to know you had a loving marriage, John." Maggie blushed, a little uncomfortable. This was not a topic of conversation she was used to in polite company, but she understood what the older man was trying to say. "You had the real thing. True love."
"Yes, I did, missy." John blinked again, not looking up even after he sawed the last green bean in two. "That's the kind of happiness I wish for you."
"Enough on this topic," Miles said as he continued to chew. "There are things I don't want to know about Grandmother, and that's one of them, Pops."
"Now your grandmother knew how to cook." John cleared his throat and reached for his wine glass. "She could make a roast that would melt in your mouth. Don't know how she did it."
"I know." Maggie couldn’t help but speak up. How could she keep quiet and let these men keep eating atrocious pieces of meat whenever a housekeeper got married? "Try coating the top of the roast with butter, cover it and check on it every half hour. Try using more salt and pepper and take it out of the oven before it turns black."
"That's some good advice," John said, perking up, and he took a sip of wine. "I ought to write that down so I remember."
"I'll do it for you," Maggie volunteered. Oh, this was certainly a dire situation, and she was determined to rescue them. She'd been chewing the same piece of beef for at least fifty bites and she'd had no effect on it. It was still as tough as it had been when she'd popped it into her mouth. "I'll write down some recipes for you. My grandmother taught us how to cook when we lived with her. In fact, she would roll over in her grave if she knew I left here without sharing her cooking secrets."
"Well, that's a relief," Winston spoke up, taking up his knife and fork again, contemplating the badly cooked food on his plate. "Maybe we won't have to keep eating like this while we wait for the next housekeeper to come along, although I keep hoping you'll stay and save us, Maggie."
"Well, I—" It was tempting, but she'd come here to find love before it was too late. And while she needed a job, she wasn't sure she should try finding another husband through the newspaper. Maybe it was a sign she wasn't meant to marry or have children. Maybe it wasn't her
destiny to have a family or to discover the joys of the marriage bed. And perhaps Chester's words had dug a little too deep—okay maybe a lot. She was desperate, and that had made her blind to a man and his lies. Maybe she was too emotional about the situation to make a good decision. "I really do want to go home."
"Well, now, I can't blame you for that." John's tone grew gentle with understanding as he spread butter on the potatoes steaming on his plate. "But would you consider letting us hire you to fill in until we get someone hired? We'd pay you well in the meantime and likely you'd be able to get home to your family in say, two or three weeks. Plus, you'd be helping us out too. What do you say, Maggie?"
"No," Miles answered, booming like a thunderclap, leaving no doubt about his feelings. "We're not hiring her."
"Oh, Miles is right. I couldn't work here." Maggie studied him across the table—the invincible line of his shoulders, the stubborn, powerful clench of his square jaw. He looked formidable and fierce, but he wasn't angry. She could feel the force of his pain. His heart had been truly decimated and he'd never gotten over it. That touched her, it really did. The last thing she wanted was to cause him pain—even if she did like the job offer.
"Forget Miles," John said, waving one hand at Miles like he didn't matter. Twinkles of amusement brightened his hazel gaze. "Think of me. I wouldn't have to cook."
"Think of me," Winston chimed in warmly. "You'd be saving my stomach. We'd love to hire you, Maggie."
"And I would love that too." That was the simple truth, but across the table handsome, gorgeous, masculine Miles was smoldering. That left her only one choice. She had to say no. "But if I worked for such handsome men—excluding Miles of course—I'd just fall madly in love with you, John and you, Winston. I'd be destined to be alone for the rest of my life because I'd never find a man my age who could compare with either of you. Sorry, but I just can't stay."