Katie: Bride of Virginia (American Mail-Order Brides 10)

by Sylvia McDaniel

  Christmas was only three weeks away and she couldn't help but think how wonderful it would be if she conceived during the holidays. Time would tell.

  Pulling off her coat and scarf, she hung them up in the closet and pulled on her apron as she walked into the parlor.

  The thump thump thump of the wheelchair let her know her mother-in-law was headed in her direction. Katie sank on the sofa to await her. She picked up a stack of Daniel's shirts she wanted to repair before he came home tonight.

  “You're back,” she said rolling into the room a disgruntled expression on her face.

  With trepidation Katie realized, the woman was not in the best of spirits.

  “Yes, I just came in a few minutes ago. Would you like some hot tea?”

  “No, I'm fine. I thought maybe you could read to me this afternoon.”

  Certainly. Let me finish this piece of mending,” she said.

  The woman became exasperated and yelled. “Hurry up, girl. I've been waiting all day for you.”

  Everything centered around this woman and Katie wondered if it had been this way all her life or only since the accident. If she had ever acted this way with the nuns, they would have taken the rod to her and made her go to confession. She knew her mother-in-law was lonely, but still there was no point in acting so selfish.

  Katie smiled and continued to work on sewing the rip in a shirt. “I realize you have nothing to keep you occupied. I was thinking maybe you could help me with the mending. Two hands make the job go by faster.”

  “I hate sewing.”

  That was obvious. It was the one household duty her mother-in-law could have easily done and yet she refused to even consider helping. Instead she preferred other people to take care of her.

  “I enjoy taking a piece of material and creating something new and exciting from the cotton. When you finish it gives you such a feeling of accomplishment,” Katie responded trying to remain positive and not let her destroy the warm feelings from the morning.

  How wretched to spend the last years of her life unhappy and doing everything she could to make everyone around her miserable.

  “Hrumph. I don't need a feeling of accomplishment. I'm an old woman, just waiting to die.”

  Setting her sewing down, Katie looked at her mother-in-law. “How can you say that. That's so wrong.”

  “But it's true.”

  Misery loves company and somehow Katie felt like her mother-in-law wanted everyone around her to be unhappy.

  “Only because you make yourself be this mean, nasty woman people don't like. Since the day I walked into this house, you have been disrespectful and hateful to me. I've put up with your disposition thinking it would eventually change, but it hasn't.

  “I thought maybe it was because you didn't like to share Daniel, but I don't believe that anymore. I think you like being considered a snide, mean old woman, it keeps people away. They don't have to see the hurt and the pain inside you, just waiting to die.”

  Daniel's mother stared at her in shock, her mouth wide open.

  Katie rose from the sofa. She'd gone too far. She shouldn't have been so truthful with her mother-in-law and somehow kept her mouth shut. But she'd had enough.

  What started out as a great morning, celebrating their party and seeing the vineyard had quickly become frustrating. “Excuse me, but I think there are more pressing matters for me to do this afternoon. I don't feel like being yelled at any more.”

  Walking out of the room, wanting only to escape and prepare herself for her evening with Daniel, she heard her mother-in-law crying.

  Whirling around, she stared in disbelief as the old woman bent her head and sobbed.

  “Oh my God,” Katie realized she’d lost her smile. She let the woman's meanness get to her instead of smiling. She ran to her chair. “I'm so sorry. I was wrong to say that to you.”

  The old woman sniffed. “No, you were right. I know I'm mean and nasty, but...it's not the physical pain that troubles me. I've learned to live with that. It's the fact that I lived in that horrible buggy accident and my dear, sweet husband, Bartholomew didn't.”

  She started crying again, big heaving sobs that tore at Katie's heart. “Would he want to see you suffering like this? Would he want to hear you being so crass with everyone? Daniel misses his sweet mother. He's told me so.”

  “I know, but why didn't I die with Bart or why isn't he here sitting in this chair?”

  “I understand why you wanted to die with Bart, but would you want him to suffer like you?”

  Katie could see the pain on the woman's face. She could see the guilt of living while her husband had died. Her chest ached with the knowledge of how that must pain the woman.

  “Of course not,” she said with a sniffle.

  “Do you think he would want you to live your life this way?”

  “That's too easy,” she said with a laugh. “I know he wouldn't because he always took me aside, when he thought I was being too critical.”

  Katie smiled. “It can't be easy losing your husband in an accident. I can't begin to imagine the pain. I lost my entire family in the yellow fever epidemic of 1880.”

  Betty reached out and grasped her hand. “I didn't know.”

  “After they died, I was sent to an orphanage where the sisters told me I should feel blessed to be alive. I had lived because God had a purpose for my life.

  “Every time I cried to feel pity for myself or them, Sister Katherine would make me work. Not to forget my loved ones, but to keep me busy. The sisters taught me to work through my grief. You, dear Mother, have no work. We need to get your hands and your mind working.”

  Looking back, Katie knew she would have died if she hadn't been sent to the orphanage. Not because she was a child, but because she grieved her family so much, she would have been consumed by the sorrow.

  “That's a touching story, but Bartholomew was the better person. I should have died and he should have lived.”

  “Who are you to doubt why the good Lord took him away? Or maybe you're being given a second chance to be the kind of person Bartholomew was?”

  The question of why her brother and little sister died had troubled Katie for years, they were younger, they were so sweet and yet they were in heaven and she was here on earth. But she believed their presence lived on through her. “Christmas is coming. What if we make cookies and mail them to the orphanage, where I grew up. The kids love baked goods and seldom get them. You need to focus on helping other people. You lived for a reason.”

  Silence filled the parlor and Katie feared she'd said too much. Her mother-in-law wiped the tears from her face and then gazed at Katie, but she couldn't tell what the woman was thinking.

  “Katie O'Malley, I've done everything I could to run you off and you refuse to go. Instead, you've made my son a fine wife and now you're helping me. I'm glad you're my daughter-in-law.”

  Relief filled Katie. She knew there would still be times they disagreed, but maybe, just maybe, they would now get along and have peace.

  “Thank you. Now, would you like to have me finish Tom Sawyer?”

  She dabbed her eyes and smiled. “Yes, and hand me some of that mending. I could sew while you read.”

  Katie felt warmth rush into her chest. It had taken longer than she'd expected, but she thought her mother-in-law had finally accepted her. She smiled and picked up the book.

  #

  After dinner, Mother O'Malley retired to bed, pleading she was tired, leaving Daniel alone with Katie. At the table, his mother had been friendly, even cordial, and he'd wondered what had transpired during the day to make his mother be nice for a change.

  His wife glanced out the window and then turned to him, her green eyes wide with excitement. “It's snowing.”

  Laughing, he stoked the fire in the fireplace, throwing another log onto the blaze. Katie oozed happiness and giddiness at the same time. She was a breath of fresh air in a stale room. “It's December. It usually snows.”

 
“We're going to have a white Christmas,” she said excited, a smile on her face, dancing around like a child.

  He had to go into town and pick her up something special for Christmas. He didn't know what, but it would be their first holiday together and he wanted her to remember it fondly. He'd never gotten around to giving her a wedding ring, so he'd look to see if there was one he could afford.

  Rising from the fireplace, he took her by the hand drew her to the sofa. Sinking down, her skirts billowed around them. “What did you do to my mother today? She's different.”

  “What do you mean?” Katie said with that impish grin that drew him to her. He wanted to kiss her dimples, her lips, her eyes. He wanted to carry her up to bed, but he was going to do things the right way this time. Slow and steady with her right beside him every step of the way until they both received satisfaction.

  “She smiled during dinner. She talked.”

  Katie took his hand and brought it to her lips. “It was amazing. When I came back from being with you, she was her usual mean self and I stood up to her. I had planned on reading to her this afternoon and when she was ugly, I told her I'd had enough of her being nasty to me.” Katie sighed. “Did you realize your mother feels guilty for living while your father died in the accident? Did you know she was just waiting to die?”

  Daniel stared at his wife, his chest tightening with gratitude. “I had no idea. But it wasn't her fault. And it's been years ago.”

  Thinking back he always believed she'd turned ugly because she was in pain and suffering because of the injuries she sustained when the buggy flipped. He'd thought her pain was physical, not mental. And he knew there was no way to cure the mental anguish except with time and love.

  “She's felt remorseful all this time for living, while your father died. She pushes people away so they won't get close to her. I told her about my parents dying and how the nuns made me believe I had been blessed to live through the epidemic that took my family.

  “They told me I was to do good. And I recommended she get busy helping others. After the tea with the ladies from church, we're going to send cookies to the orphanage. I want your mother to realize how blessed she is to still be living and that your father lives on through her.”

  Daniel swallowed, overcome that this little sprite of a woman had helped his mother. He felt like kicking himself because he'd never thought of her feeling guilty for the death of his father. The accident had been while he was away at college.

  His father's death had devastated him and his mother, but he'd never realized she hadn't gotten over the tragedy of that terrible day.

  He reached down and covered her mouth with his, kissing her with all the pent up passion that had built the last few weeks for this woman. Watching her standing on that platform he'd made the decision to marry her and it'd been the best decision he'd ever made.

  She broke away from his kiss and smiled at him that sly grin that he adored.

  “Thank you, Katie,” he said.

  “For what?”

  “For coming into our family. For marrying me,” he said, feeling his chest tighten with an emotion he'd only felt once before. The urge to carry her up the stairs and into their bedroom overwhelmed him, but he had to take his time.

  Standing she held out her hand. “We should go to bed,” she whispered. “I'm cold and want my husband to warm me like only he can.”

  Warmth spread through Daniel like a raging fire.

  Daniel knew he was being given a second chance and he intended to use this opportunity to make his wife realize just how much he craved her touch. If she wasn't smiling in the morning, then he needed to give up. But he had no doubts that tonight, he would make certain she experienced pleasure.

  Chapter Nine

  At breakfast, the next morning, Katie smiled at her husband, who sat at the head of the table. Last night had been absolutely incredible. For the first time in her life, she felt like a desirable woman all because her husband had showed her how good it could be between the two of them.

  Gazing at him this morning, her heart swelled with an emotion that could only be love. She loved this man who had been so eager that first night that he'd forgotten to take his time.

  After they'd made love the first time last night, they'd cuddled and laughed about how uncomfortable that first night had been. They hadn't known each other and the experience had been clumsy and awkward.

  But now, now she could hardly sit beside her man without wanting him to touch her in some small way. And she couldn't wait for tonight when they'd be alone and once again she'd find herself wrapped in his embrace.

  Daniel said very little this morning, but he kept staring at her, a big smile across his handsome face. One that she wanted to trace with her fingertip.

  His mother gazed at her and then at him. “You guys rest well last night?”

  “Great,” Daniel said gazing at Katie.

  If the man didn't stop looking at her like that, his mother was going to know what they were thinking. A blush rose in her cheeks and she quickly looked away, but she couldn't stop gazing at her man.

  “Wonderful,” Katie said smiling at her husband. “What do you have planned for today in the vineyard?”

  “I'm going to repair more of the damage to the vines from the cattle and then we're going to build racks for the new barrels I'm expecting. What about you?”

  “I was going to have your mother help me. I thought we could bake some cookies. Later we might put them in tins and take them to town and give them to shut-ins. Plus the ladies from church are coming for tea tomorrow, so it will be good to have fresh cookies for them.”

  It would be hard to work today without dreaming of being with Daniel again. She wanted to spend time with her husband, her lover and no one else.

  His mother looked at Daniel a questioning look in her eyes. “You seem happy, son.”

  Katie almost giggled out loud and Daniel shot her a laughing glance.

  “I am. Why wouldn't I be, Mother. I have a beautiful wife who pleases me very much, the vineyard is doing well, and things seem to finally be going my way.”

  She nodded. “It seems that way, son.”

  Katie stared across the table at her husband and knew in that moment, she'd fallen in love with this handsome man. Tears pricked her eyelids and she quickly swallowed trying to hold back the flood of emotion.

  Coming to Charlottesville, she'd been afraid, but at this moment, even with the question of doubt hanging over Daniel's head, she knew she loved Daniel O'Malley. Sometime during the last six weeks she'd fallen in love with this man.

  Early on they'd both made mistakes in the relationship but still his words filled her with warmth and made her realize, he was a good man and she loved him. For Christmas, she wished she could clear his name somehow, but if that wasn't possible, she would do everything she could to help him with the vineyard.

  She'd lost her family at such a young age, and now, she had a husband and a mother once again. The season would be perfect if they were to learn they were going to have a child.

  Tonight she'd tell him she loved him.

  #

  After Daniel left for the vineyard, her mother-in-law and she started on the cookies. Katie mixed the dough and Betty rolled her chair to the table and cut the flattened dough using the cookie cutters Katie had found in the kitchen.

  “My son seems very happy with you,” she said, not looking up at Katie.

  “Good, he makes me happy,” Katie said, her thoughts drifting to last night. Her husband had more than made up for her disappointing wedding night. “I wonder about him and Eloise. Why wasn't she happy here?”

  “She wanted Daniel to sell the vineyard and go to work for her father. Her daddy was wealthy and she expected Daniel to give her a big fancy house with servants. She didn't help my son. Not like you.”

  “Did they fight?”

  “She liked to scream at Daniel, but he would go outside until she was ready to talk.” Betty leaned back in
her wheelchair and gazed at the cookie cutouts. “I haven't done this since Daniel was a little boy. It's kind of fun, but tiring.”

  “Did the law think Daniel killed Eloise?” Katie asked.

  His mother stiffened. “Yes, but they couldn't prove it. There was not enough evidence to convict him. Don't ever believe it if someone tells you Daniel killed her. I don't know what happened to Eloise that night, but she was cheating on my son. I saw her.”

  How hard for her prideful man to learn from his mother that his wife had a lover. And she was dead.

  Katie sighed and continued to roll out the dough. “Who was she cheating with? It would seem that would be who the sheriff should have gone after, not Daniel.”

  “The sheriff thought I was protecting my son.” The older woman shook her head. “I don't know who she was with that night, but I've always suspected our foreman.”

  “Jack? No,” Katie said. “He's married.”

  A shiver passed through her. Maybe the foreman was a really nice guy, but something about him scared her.

  “Doesn't matter to some men,” Betty said, shaking her head. “I've never liked that man since that day.”

  “Well, I can't say I've been impressed with him. First the way he came into the house when Daniel was gone. The way he wasn't here when the cattle came through the fence into the vineyard. Daniel says he knows wine, but he doesn't know how to run a vineyard.”

  Betty laughed and Katie turned toward her. “What's so funny?”

  “You, my dear. You're very protective of my son. It's one of the things I like about you,” she said.

  “Well, of course, I am, he's my husband,” Katie said. “There's something you said to me, when I first arrived that disturbed me.”

  “I've said a lot of bad things since you arrived.”

  “Yes, but this one was about cheating. You said I would cheat on Daniel. I want you to understand, I will never do that to my husband.”