by Merry Farmer
He shifted in his bedroll, settling Callie closer against him. With one hand, he brushed a lock of hair away from her face, then placed a tender kiss on her cheek. Waves of heat radiated through his chest. Somewhere in the last few wild, wonderful weeks, his heart had begun to open to his accidental wife. She felt so right riding beside him on the wagon during the day and tucked against him through the night. She had responded so freely and passionately when he’d lost his head and teased her to pleasure the other night. Every little look or smile or laugh pulled him under. He loved her.
Which was why he needed to get her off the trail and away from the likes of Elton Finch as soon as possible. The temptation to pull out his gun and shoot the man where he stood when he’d bothered Callie before the crossing yesterday had been too great. The man was up to something. He had a definite object in mind while talking to Callie. John needed to figure out what it was so he could take care of it.
Callie stirred, wriggling against him as she awoke. Her backside ground against his groin. He swallowed a growl of pleasure, all thoughts of Finch blown away, and let himself enjoy the sensuality of it. He was no longer worried what she would think of him if she found him hard. In fact, he hoped she felt every aching inch of him against her and saw it as the sign of appreciation that it was.
“Good morning,” he whispered, kissing the soft skin beneath her ear.
She twitched into a smile. Her fingers slid along his arm to close over his hands on her belly. “Good morning,” she replied.
They were silent. Outside of the wagon, the camp was coming alive. More voices speaking softly mingled with the rattle of pots and the thump of wood being laid for fires. The wagons were in two lines now, one that would lead to Denver City and one on to Oregon, but the bulk of the camp was set up between the lines. Though they were still quiet, their neighbors felt closer than when the wagons were arranged in a circle or kept in a line as they had been on the prairie. If they had been just a little farther away, John would have considered ending at least one journey he and Callie were on that very moment.
He couldn’t help but entertain that thought and tease both her and himself by brushing a hand up Callie’s stomach to cradle her breast. She caught her breath, then let it out in a laugh that sent his temperature soaring.
Half a heartbeat later, Callie tensed and inched away from him. “Today is a big day.” She spoke quickly, sitting up and reaching for his glasses to hand them to him as she did every morning. “We should get up and get dressed.”
Confusion flew in to replace the heat of John’s desire. He accepted his glasses with a grateful, “Thank you,” but couldn’t keep the frown off his face. What had just happened? Had he done something wrong?
He was tempted to ask outright, but Callie crawled out of the bedroll and opened the trunk where she kept her clothes. “What time to you think Mr. Evans will have us leave here?”
John sat and rubbed his face. “I don’t know.” He didn’t know what was going on in her head either or what had made her go from warm and tempting to skittish so quickly.
Callie nodded and put all of her focus into getting dressed. John had no choice but to follow suit. He needed a bath, preferably a cold one. He had to make do with a jug of water and a rag.
“Did you notice the bandage on Lynne Tremaine’s neck yesterday?” Callie made conversation as they washed and dressed as best they could in the cramped space.
“No, I didn’t,” he replied. “Did she hurt herself?”
“She must have, but she’s been very close-lipped about it. I should find out more. It’s been so long since I’ve had a chance to sit down and talk to her. My thoughts have been so….” She paused and cleared her throat. “Lynne’s been preoccupied with Mr. Lawson. I think she was wearing that bandage the other day underneath a high collar.”
She was talking to talk, to avoid saying something to him. Why now, when everything had been going so well between them?
“I’m sure Miss Tremaine would like a visit,” he said instead of asking everything he wanted to.
They finished dressing and climbed out of the wagon to see to breakfast. The day was cloudy, with the feel of rain in the air. John stared at the sky as he rounded the back of the wagon.
“Good morning, Mrs. Rye.”
The greeting by Reverend Joseph startled John. As he looked down from the sky, the young reverend was halfway through popping up from where he had been sitting just outside his and Callie’s wagon. John was more grateful than ever that he hadn’t taken things with Callie any further than he had.
“Good morning, Reverend Joseph,” Callie greeted him. She tried to smile, but John could see she was as puzzled about the young man’s sudden appearance as he was.
After the trouble with Elton Finch yesterday, John wasn’t about to have Callie handle whatever this was by herself. “Good morning,” he greeted the reverend. “How can we help you, Reverend Joseph?”
“Um.” The reverend hesitated, shifting his weight from one foot to the other and rubbing a hand through his overlong hair. He watched John with wary eyes. “I… I came to speak to Mrs. Rye.”
“I see.” John crossed his arms. In that moment, another tornado couldn’t have moved him from his wife’s side.
Callie inched toward him, her expression guarded. “What can I do for you, Reverend?” She stood rested a hand on John’s arm. A burst of pride spun through him.
Reverend Joseph’s gaze flicked back and forth between the two of them. At last he let out a breath. “I had an idea, is all, and I wasn’t sure about coming to you with it.”
“An idea?” Callie blinked, checked with John, then faced the reverend again. “What kind of idea?”
“It’s just that we’ll all be parting soon,” he said, wringing his hands in front of him and not meeting Callie’s eyes. “I thought it might be nice, for the ladies, you know, if there was some sort of something so you could all say goodbye. Like, like a tea party.”
“A tea party?” Again Callie glanced to John.
John shrugged. “A tea party sounds like a fine idea.” It did. If only he didn’t have a strange itch running down his back at the thought of the suggestion coming from Reverend Joseph.
“Yes,” the reverend brightened. “A tea party with everyone bringing out their finest dishes and baking special things to share. We could do it this afternoon.”
“What’s this about a tea party?” Mrs. Weingarten had emerged from her wagon just in front of Callie and John’s and perked up at the conversation she overheard.
“Reverend Joseph suggested that we have a goodbye tea party so the two halves of the wagon train can make proper goodbyes,” Callie explained.
“What a splendid idea.” Mrs. Weingarten beamed and strode over to join the conversation.
Reverend Joseph winced as though he’d dropped a shiny penny in the gutter.
Callie’s shoulders relaxed as her older friend reached them, eyes aglow. “It would be a good way for everyone to visit one last time, exchange mailing addresses if they’d like to,” she said.
“Why, yes. And we must ask Lynne to help us.” Mrs. Weingarten clapped her hands together. “I have a special recipe for sweet rolls all the way from Prussia, and I might even have enough of the ingredients to make them.”
“I don’t have any special recipes, but I could serve,” Callie suggested.
“That would be splendid.”
John kept his eye on Reverend Joseph as the two women spun plans, growing more and more animated. The reverend drooped with every new idea Callie or Mrs. Weingarten had. His eyes narrowed and he clutched his Bible closer to his chest. The strong sense that he had to protect Callie from something rose in John’s gut. Why would the reverend suggest something so enthusiastically only to look so crestfallen when the women agreed with him?
“And I could use my mother’s tea service,” Callie added.
Instantly, Reverend Joseph brightened. “Yes,” he said. John arched an eyebrow as the r
everend cleared his throat and said, “Well, if you ladies want to plan the rest of it, I’ll just go spread the word.”
“Thank you, Reverend Joseph,” Mrs. Weingarten said. “It was kind of you to come up with this.”
Kind? John wasn’t sure. Whether the women saw it or not, to him it was clear as day that the reverend was after Callie’s mother’s silver tea service. But why would a man of the cloth turn thief near the end of his journey west?
Then again, he thought, shrugging and blowing out a breath, why did anyone turn thief?
Callie and Mrs. Weingarten spent the next half hour preparing breakfast while discussing plans for the tea party. John listened carefully, plotting how he could keep the silver tea service out of the hands of Reverend Joseph or any other potential thief. Kyle had already tried to make off with the teapot once. John contemplated telling Callie to keep the service locked up as he sipped his coffee. He thought about sharing his suspicions with her as well, but something held him back. She was so happy, planning away with Mrs. Weingarten. He didn’t want to spoil that based on a suspicion.
After breakfast, when Mrs. Weingarten went off to invite Lynne and some of the other women to the party, John had made up his mind to be as supportive of his new wife as he could. A little support in one area could prompt her to tell him about whatever it was that bothered her.
“Callie,” he asked as they put away breakfast dishes. She glanced up at him, her eyes questioning. He put on his best teasing smile. “Can I come to your tea party?”
Callie let out a breath and chuckled, leaning closer to him. “Of course you can come to my tea party. That is, if you like sitting with a bunch of women sipping tea and talking about children and sewing.”
He wiggled an eyebrow. “You forget. I was raised by three older sisters who thought it was immensely amusing to dress me up and invite me to tea.”
“Dress you up?” She paused, looking as though she wasn’t sure if she should smile or not.
“Dress me up,” he confirmed with a grave nod. “In dresses.”
Callie laughed, snorted, and clamped a hand over her mouth to keep from bursting.
“Thank God I was only five at the time,” John went on, “but I do remember it. They had a trunk full of costumes Mother made for them, and I was routinely forced into a pink dress with ribbons in my hair.”
He could see the image of five-year-old John in a dress and hair-bows drinking tea with his sisters reflected in her eyes as she imagined it. She laughed loud enough to draw the eyes of the people walking near them.
“Please, John, please don’t come to my tea party in a dress!”
“I just might,” he threatened.
A light drizzle began to fall as the morning progressed. Callie tried to tell herself it didn’t matter, but drizzle on a day when she wanted it to be sunny reminded her too much of the way her mood had been bouncing through a thousand difficult emotions. It reminded her of her sudden, gloomy thoughts of Shannon. The sting of remembering the ghost that was her rival was still with her, hours later. Things had been so cozy between her and John until the niggling thought that he may still be thinking of Shannon had intruded. She didn’t want to believe it, but thoughts had a way of twisting and turning any which way they wanted, helpful or not.
“It’ll clear up.” John approached her at the back of her wagon as she sorted through a box of table linens. He kissed her cheek, and her guilt at her wayward, unhelpful thoughts pressed down on her.
She stared up at the threatening sky. “Are you sure of that?”
“Absolutely,” he grinned. “My Catholic ability to control bad weather say so.”
She dropped her gaze from the gray clouds to John’s dancing eyes. “Well my Quaker sense of impending disaster say otherwise.”
“I thought you were going to convert.” He winked.
Her heart lurched in her chest. Why couldn’t she just let the past go and move on? “If the weather clears up you can baptize me on the spot,” she said.
“It’s a deal.”
He swayed closer to kiss her again, a kiss that quickly turned into more than just a peck. It was bittersweet and beautiful. Was he kissing her or the ghost of Shannon? And why couldn’t she just stop herself from worrying? She sighed in disappointment when he broke the kiss.
“Now I need you to do me a favor,” he said.
“Oh?”
He produced a pair of shears from behind his back. “I need you to give me a haircut so that I look my best for your tea party.”
Callie had always been a fair hand with shears. She’d cut Greg’s and her father’s hair for years. Even though it was drizzling, cutting John’s hair in the open space beside their wagons reminded her of happier times, of family and home. It would feel so good to have a home again, a home free of ghosts.
John’s hair was another story. Long, it just barely managed to lie sensibly. Cut short, it felt the need to stick straight up on his head. She laughed as she tried to work with it.
“You have the hair of an unruly seven-year-old boy, John,” she told him.
“I know.” He laughed along with her. “It’s been that way since… since I was an unruly seven-year-old boy. That’s why I keep it short.”
She let her fingers linger along his scalp after she’d finished with the cut. “I think I like it,” she said.
“I’m glad.” He turned on the barrel where he was seated, tipping his face up, mischief in his eyes. He wanted a kiss, she could tell. Far be it from her to deny her husband. She leaned closer.
“Callie, I think we have a problem.” Mrs. Weingarten’s call interrupted them.
Callie sighed and settled for kissing John’s cheek before straightening and turning to her friend. “What is it?”
“Come and see.”
John stood and took the shears and the comb she’d been using from her. “Go on,” he said.
With a grateful smile, she turned and strode across the damp space between the wagons to where several men were setting up a tent while Lynne watched them and shook her head. Mrs. Weingarten motioned her to follow under the tent’s canopy to where a plain table stood. Her mother’s silver tea service featured prominently in the middle.
“I’m sorry, dear,” Mrs. Weingarten said, reaching for the silver teapot. “I hope I wasn’t the one who broke it.”
Callie’s heart sank as Mrs. Weingarten handed her the teapot. The lid was jammed closed. She pulled and wrenched, but nothing she could do would get it to open.
“I don’t think it was you. I think it was damaged when that miner, Kyle, tried to steal it, or maybe in the tornado,” she sighed, turning the large pot over and over. It rattled as if something was loose inside.
“Let me see, dear,” Mrs. Weingarten took it from her. She too turned it over. “Ah, it’s the hinge, see?”
She handed it back to Callie. The hinge on the lid was hopelessly mashed at one end. Callie sighed.
“Rain, a broken teapot. Some party this will be.”
“Cheer up, dear,” Mrs. Weingarten squeezed her arm. “Think of the sunny things. I heard earlier that we’re less than two weeks from Denver City. That counts for something. And you have a strong, handsome husband who makes you smile.” Callie could tell she meant more than ‘smile.’
“Yes, well.” She blushed and left it at that, then lifted the teapot and stared at the spout. “Maybe we could pour water down the spout and still use it?”
“How would you get the tea leaves in?” Mrs. Weingarten said, knowing Callie had changed the subject deliberately.
“I guess you’re right.” She moved to lower the teapot but something caught her eye. She raised it to look through the spout again. “There’s something in there.”
“Oh? Let me see.”
Callie handed the teapot to Mrs. Weingarten, who raised it to her eye. The older woman looked more than a little daft as she closed one eye and looked in the spout as if it were a telescope. She frowned then shook it.
; “Ah. I can’t see anything myself, but I hear something.”
She handed it back. Callie shook it again. That same slight rattling noise was definitely there.
“What on earth could have gotten inside a teapot?” she asked.
“When was the last time you used it?”
Callie shrugged. “Not for a year at least. We didn’t entertain much after Mother died. In fact, I don’t think she used it much either.”
“How exciting!” Mrs. Weingarten exclaimed, full of adventure as ever. “Imagine the surprise when you are finally able to open it.”
Callie grinned at the idea, and with a wistful sigh put the teapot back on the silver platter with its matching creamer and sugar. “Well, we might not be able to use it, but it will certainly look good.”
The party was set to take place after lunch, which meant entirely different things to different people. Some of the women showed up long before Callie and Mrs. Weingarten were finished making the Prussian rolls. Lynne was a big help, but a few others stood around chatting and getting in the way. When more than a handful gathered under the makeshift tent between wagons, Mrs. Weingarten shooed Callie away to change into a nice dress.
Callie skittered back to her wagon in an increasingly steady rain, glancing around to see if John would be able to help her with some buttons. He was nowhere in sight. Curiosity and anxiety helped her dress instead. She pulled her nicest dress out of her hope chest where it had been since the day she married John. She blinked as she looked at it. Smiled. She had been miserable that day, bereft, grieving. She had been marrying a stranger. If she had only known how things would turn out, she wouldn’t have been so gloomy.
She changed into the dress, grinning over how fine it seemed to her now, after weeks and weeks of nothing but cotton and muslin. It was slightly big on her after weeks on the trail, a fact that surprised her. She’d noticed that John had lost weight and gained muscle, but she had never imagined that she might have changed too.