Saving Susannah
Page 26
“Keep going. You might find a few if you work real hard at it.”
“I’ll give it my best,” he assured her.
He would. He always did.
They didn’t fall onto the bales together until they were naked. The hay was old and dry now, scratchy and unyielding. Joe grabbed the quilt off the shelf and spread it out.
As he rolled and took her on top of him, he watched the cold air pebble her skin. He slid his hands over her, warming her with the friction. Her head dropped back, her hair spilling behind her shoulders. He watched her breasts as her nipples hardened, and he thought he was the luckiest man in the world.
She moved to take him inside her, but he wouldn’t let her. She snapped her head forward to look at him again. And, as always, his eyes were steady, watching her, as though to take in every move she made.
She was thinking about that when his strong fingers found home, sliding inside, then teasing and circling. A hungry sound ripped from her throat, somehow both high-pitched and throaty. He sat forward suddenly, and his lips covered her nipple, sucking hard.
The pleasure shattered something inside her. If she had had any defenses left against him, they would have been gone then. Though he had touched her like this a hundred times, somehow he left more of his healing love with her each time he did it.
She cried out and drove her hands into his hair to hold him in place. He tumbled her back onto the hay and moved to her other breast, his mouth just as demanding, the touch of his tongue in gentle counterpoint. Then he was inside her.
He never gave her time to give. He was an assault on her senses that sent her spinning out of control whenever he touched her. Still he kept kissing her, until she could no longer think. He moved inside her with slow, delicious rhythm, the same way he kissed. Her body rose to meet his and they tangled together, rolling again, the hay bristling beneath the quilt. She was hurtling now with no time for breath. Sensation built in her.
He watched her eyes, seeing it, knowing just when to thrust deeper, harder.
So she clung. And she cried out with pleasure, with need, with the pure impact of his giving, until the tension spiraled and shattered and shuddered inside her.
He followed her over the edge, and dropped his head onto her shoulder as his breath steadied. He pulled hay out of her hair, though his hand still shook with release.
She laughed huskily. “Do you honestly think no one knows about this?”
His mouth quirked. “The Amish are masters at looking the other way. And as I’ve always said, they consider me a heathen here anyway.”
“Tolerant,” she said. Their civil marriage hadn’t helped. A few people had left the gemeide, unable to accept it from one of their deacons. But the bishop, Sarah’s father, surprisingly gave his full support. He said times were changing, and they had to learn to bend with the wind. The key was not to break from one’s faith.
“We’re nonresisting,” Joe corrected. “That’s different. If something is going to bother you, don’t acknowledge it.”
“No one’s mentioned that I ought to make an honest man out of you?”
“I’m as honest as the day is long.”
“We’ll have to make adjustments soon, though.”
He sat up, pulling her with him. “There’s no rush, Kimberley.”
“You’re not hearing me.”
He looked at her. Really looked at her. Then he knew she’d decided it was time.
There were those chickens, for one thing. She’d offered to make roast today. He’d told himself it was for Susannah’s homecoming, but Susannah still steadfastly refused to eat the stuff, also.
And Kimberley had gone to services last Sunday. She’d stayed far in the back, with a fierce look of concentration on her face. She hadn’t been permitted to take part in either the hymns or the prayers, because she hadn’t yet been baptized. But she’d been there.
“We need to find new middle ground, Joe,” she continued.
“Uh, okay.” He got a grip on himself. “Not that I’m unhappy with this ground,” he assured her quickly. Then he chose his words with great care. “What, precisely, are you saying?”
“I’m pregnant.” She waited, her breath lodged hard and hot in her chest.
Joe could have sworn the hay moved beneath him. Or maybe it was the earth. This he had not foreseen.
“How did I miss it?” he asked slowly, tenderly. “I know these things.”
“You were carefully looking the other way, good Amish man that you are.”
“Uh... possibly.”
“Are you afraid?” Her voice changed, and it took on a little fear of its own. He was, she thought, probably as shaken as she’d ever seen him.
“You’re not Sarah,” he said, his voice haggard.
“No, Joe. I’m not.”
“You never had a problem with Susannah.” He said it as though trying to convince himself.
“Not a one, except fainting that time. I trust you won’t make me work two eight-hour shifts without a break.” She tried to smile. She failed when he looked so horrified at the thought. “Maybe it’s God’s will,” she suggested. “You’ve always been big on that, Joe. I’m about three months along.” It had happened one of those first two times they were together. She had known for a while now. She had just wanted to wait to...be sure. Of the pregnancy. And of the faith she would embrace.
He met her eyes. “Do you believe that? About God’s will?”
She felt a quick shiver. “You’ve got to admit that things have a way of happening here in this settlement that boggles the mind.”
“Like that giant hand pushing you along,” he said cautiously.
“I mean, maybe He didn’t abandon us—the Wallaces, I mean. One way or another, He got all three of us here to the settlement when it didn’t appear that we were going to accomplish anything on our own.” She had finally learned the full story—of Adam’s first wife leaving Be here, here, of all the places in the world she might have put him for safekeeping. And how the same man who had been responsible for that twist of fate had then begun to slowly and systematically abduct the settlement’s children until Adam had called Jake here to find them.
“I was the hardest sell,” she murmured. “Maybe I required drastic measures. If Jake had found me through ChildSearch when he was looking, I probably would have slammed the door in his face. I’m willing to concede that the only thing that could have brought me here was me needing him. And this place does seem to have a sort of... well, a unique way about it. I’ll even go so far as to say maybe it’s not something in the water.”
Joe laughed quietly.
“Will you marry me, Joe? Make an honest woman of me? As long as I don’t have to eat roast at the wedding.”
No, he thought, she didn’t follow him unquestioningly. She’d never be meek or quiet. But they had come through the fire together, and their bond was perhaps one of the strongest ever forged.
“The way I’ve got it figured,” she continued, “is that you and Susannah and this baby inside me are the most important things in the world. I just want to draw you all around me and keep you close and be secure.”
“It’s called Gelasseneit.”
“What?” she asked suspiciously.
“Peace and happiness and contentment with your world.”
The barn door opened. Adam’s voice boomed over the stalls.
“The least you guys can do is wait until cover of darkness and use your own bedroom!” Adam shouted.
“He and Mariah got caught in a buggy by the cops,” Joe said in an undertone against Kim’s ear.
Kim’s eyes widened. “Can you actually make love in a buggy? How does the horse feel about it?”
Joe’s grin was wicked. “Now, why do you think we train them so well?”
She laughed, muffling the sound against his chest.
“Anyhow,” he continued, “from the way I hear it, Adam almost managed it. As for Jake, he more or less just shut the bedroom door with Katya
in the bedroom and thumbed his nose at all of us, Adam in particular.”
“Sounds like him.”
“In the meantime,” Adam interjected again, “when you’re through whispering, Mariah wants to borrow some of those disposable diapers. We can’t find them. She wants to know where Kimmie put them.”
The door closed again. Joe rummaged around in the hay and handed her her bra. “Time to go back.”
“Speaking of diapers,” she began, “the rules don’t change with our second wedding.”
“You don’t wash diapers, you don’t eat roast, and if I don’t rig up some kind of generator-run clothes dryer soon, I’m a dead man.”
She grinned. “You’re so smart.”
He studied the matching piece of lace and satin he held. “Open-minded,” he corrected. “Flexible. These can stay, too.” He held up the panties. “All in the interest of middle ground, of course.”
“Of course.”
She folded the quilt and put it back on the shelf, giving it a fond little pat. “Guess we won’t be needing this anymore.”
Joe laughed suddenly. “God only knows who I should pass it on to. It didn’t turn out to be so safe with me after all.”
Kim frowned. “What are you talking about?”
Joe ran a finger over the edge of the quilt. “Have you ever noticed the pattern?”
“No, I can’t say I was paying much attention to it when we used it,” she said dryly.
“Wedding rings.” He lifted a corner of it to show her.
“So?”
“So it’s centuries old, and it’s magic.”
She raised one brow skeptically. “Right.”
“It’s true. There’s this Amish custom called bundling. Essentially it’s when two people sleep together—just sleep together—during rumspringa, that time when we’re all running around getting to know each other before getting married.”
“Getting to know each other in an intimate sense,” she said.
“Just sleeping,” Joe repeated.
“That leaves us out.” She watched him closely, but his face didn’t change.
“Who’s to say those other folks who used it were just sleeping also? I mean, it’s said they were...until Adam and Mariah used it, and so did Jake and Katya. And I’m reasonably sure neither Adam nor Jake had any inclinations toward getting married at the time. But everyone who...bundles with it, so to speak, seems to end up that way.”
“You’re absolutely serious.”
“It’s true.”
“Well, the Wallaces certainly can’t prove it wrong. Magic,” she said. “Like some sort of a spell? Is that what happened to us, Joe?”
He kissed her again. “That’s the legend. We’ve got to pass it on now, you know.”
“Uh...we might want to give some thought to that.”
“It’s been given a great deal of thought before.” Joe laughed aloud. “It started out in Mariah’s possession—it was her family’s. She gave it to Katya, because Katya was technically married to Frank then, at least in our Amish faith, though she was separated from him. That meant she couldn’t marry anyone else, so Mariah thought it would be safe with her.”
“Surprise,” Kim murmured.
“Exactly. Then Katya handed it on to me—while Sarah was still alive.”
Kim’s skin pulled into gooseflesh. “The attic?” she suggested. “Mothballs? Maybe that’s what we should do with it.”
“I’d almost hate to end its reign.”
“But—”
“Wherever it’s been, things have worked out for the best. In the long run.” His voice changed. “Kimberley, the quilt had nothing to do with Sarah’s passing. It just saved me once she was gone.”
Her eyes misted. “Or it saved me.”
“Maybe it saved both of us.”
They went back to the house, hand in hand. When they got through the front door, they found Matt chasing Bo down the staircase by way of the banister. Susannah and Dinah were in the living room, showing Mariah how to work the little tabs on the diapers—they’d found the package. Jake and Adam were arguing about something in the kitchen, but Jake, at least, was grinning. The back door slammed nearly off its hinges as Levi and Sam came inside, and Joe took Hannah from Gracie so she could play with Delilah and Rachel.
Gelasseneit? Kim thought. It had a nice ring to it, but she thought she’d just call this place “home.”
ISBN : 978-1-4592-7252-1
SAVING SUSANNAH
Copyright © 1997 by Beverly Bird
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Table of Contents
Table of Contents
“I want to go into that barn and make love to you,”
Letter to Reader
Books by Beverly Bird
About the Author
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Epilogue
Copyright