All of their eyes widened. Clara and Reece exclaimed as one, “Cuddle monster?”
Helen nodded. Olivia’s shoulders rose in anticipation at the playfulness in Helen’s voice as she began to count. “One...”
Clara slowly backed her chair out from under the table and edged toward the living room, whispering loudly, “Reece, you’d better get Olivia out of her chair.”
“Two...”
Reece jumped out of his chair and removed Olivia from her high chair then urged her toward the living room. “Trent, run!”
Trent just stared at her with a serious look on his face that pulled at Helen’s heartstrings. Lord, please let him play. He needs it as much as the others, if not more.
“Three!” She rounded the table, reaching for Trent. He slipped beneath the table and crawled to safety. She laughed with relief. “Clever boy! I’ll get you yet, but first...”
Olivia was toddling toward her rather than away from her, so Helen lifted the girl into the air then kissed and tickled her until she screamed with laughter. Setting Olivia down, she managed to catch Reece next. He was too big for her to pick up, but she hugged him tight then blew a raspberry into his neck before tickling him until he went limp with laughter and ended up on the floor.
“What is going on in here?” Quinn’s voice made everyone freeze. They’d been so noisy they hadn’t even noticed him come inside for supper.
Clara rushed over to hide behind his leg. “Save me! Aunt Helen turned into the cuddle monster.”
“She did?” Quinn lifted an eyebrow at her. Helen blushed and was ready to explain herself, when he gave her a quick wink. “That’s funny. So did I.”
Clara squealed as Quinn lifted her into his arms, spun her around, dipped her backward then kissed her cheeks. He set the girl down but kept ahold of her so she could regain her equilibrium. “Who’s next?”
“Trent.” Helen turned to find him slowly crawling toward the door. At the sound of his name, the boy picked up his pace. She was closest to him, so she hurried over to him. He tried to evade her grasp by wiggling like a little worm. “Oh, no, you don’t.”
She sank to her knees and dragged him back toward her. Trent let out a screech of laughter. She barely had time to pull in a silent gasp before Quinn was on his knees in front of her. Their eyes met, sharing a wealth of hope, desperation and disbelief in an instant. Quinn began tickling the boy, whose hoarse laughter echoed through the otherwise silent room. Then an equally hoarse little voice said, “Stop! Stop!”
Quinn froze at the sound then sat Trent up. Helen couldn’t resist taking the giggling little boy’s face in her hands to plant a few kisses and raspberries. When she let go, he turned his bashful face into Quinn’s chest as his uncle wrapped him in an embrace. Helen felt a small hand on her shoulder and glanced up to find Reece staring down at his little brother. Clara sat beside Quinn, pulling Olivia down to sit in her lap. Trent peeked out curiously as if wondering why everyone was so quiet. Reece sat down beside Helen and captured his brother’s gaze. “Trent, you talked!”
Trent froze. His eyes widened in shock then filled with fear. He buried his face in his little hands and began to sob. Helen reached over to touch his knee. “Don’t cry, honey. That’s a good thing. A very good thing.”
Clara inched closer, disturbing Olivia enough for the girl to seek out Helen’s lap. “Yeah, Trent. It’s good. Say something else. Say my name.”
“No, say mine,” Reece insisted.
Quinn hushed them both before gently asking, “What’s wrong, Trent? Why haven’t you been talking to us?”
Between the hoarseness and the crying, it was hard to understand him. “I wasn’t supposed to make a sound.”
“Why?”
“Mr. Jeff said so.”
Helen looked to Quinn. “Who is Mr. Jeff?”
Reece answered instead, clearly in full-on protective big-brother mode. “Jeffery Richardson. He was Pa’s assistant. He’s the one who brought us here. Why’d he tell you that, Trent?”
“I heard him talking about our inherance.”
“Inherance?” Helen narrowed her eyes. “Do you mean inheritance?”
Trent nodded. “He said not to make another sound unless I wanted my brothers and sisters to go away like my parents did. So now...now, you’re all going to die!” The last word ended in a wail.
Quinn frowned. “No, we aren’t. He can’t hurt you—any of you. I won’t let him. Besides, he’s long gone and good thing, too, because if he wasn’t, I’d teach him a lesson he’d not soon forget.”
Helen sniffed at the funny smell wafting through the room then gasped. “The rolls!”
She set Olivia on the floor then jumped to pull the baking tin from the oven. Grimacing at the burnt rolls, she set aside the few worth saving as Quinn joined in the kitchen. “What do you make of all of this, Quinn?”
“I don’t know anything about an inheritance. It’s never been mentioned before. Not by Richardson or the children.”
“I hate to say this, but my first thought was that this Mr. Richardson might have stolen it.”
He grimaced. “Mine, too. Why else would he want Trent to keep quiet about it?”
“What should we do?”
“I don’t know yet.” He watched the children with a furrowed brow. His expression was so fierce, so protective, so loving that she couldn’t look away. He glanced at her and his eyes widened before he reached into his pocket to pull out a thick envelope. “Oh, I almost forgot. I stopped by the post office today. They had this for you.”
“It’s from my parents. Maybe they sent my dowry.” She opened the letter to find that a check had been included. She glanced at it before handing it to Quinn so she could investigate the rest of the contents. “It’s made out to both of us, so you should be able to deposit it without any problems.”
She heard him suck in a quick breath. “Helen, this is too much. Surely your father can’t spare this.”
“Nonsense. I told you they’ve been saving it for me.” She was surprised to find one sheet of the letter was addressed to Quinn individually while the rest was intended for her. She spared a quick glance at her husband and seeing he was still somewhat dazed by the amount of the check, she scanned his page to make sure her parents hadn’t given away her secret. She was relieved to find it was simply a newsy letter welcoming him to the family. They expressed the hope that he would correspond with them so that they could get to know their new son-in-law. It also asked if it would be possible for the family to come to Austin for a reception in Helen and Quinn’s honor. “Quinn, they wrote to you.”
“They did?”
“Yes, here. They want us to come for a visit.” She handed him the page and realized there was another sealed envelope inside the original one. Her name was written on the front of it. She froze as she recognized the handwriting from the myriad little notes they used to exchange despite living in the same city. It was from Thomas Coyle, her ex-fiancé. Why would he write to her after all of these months and why would her parents include his letter with their own? She glanced at Quinn, who seemed engrossed in his own letter. “I’ll be right back. I just want to read this really quickly.”
“Go ahead.” He tucked his part of the letter into his pocket. “I’ll get the children to wash their hands and move their schoolbooks for supper.”
“Thank you.” Moments later, she closed her bedroom door and leaned against it to read her parents’ letter for some explanation. She found it toward the end.
I know you will be surprised to find the other letter we’ve included here. Thomas came to us quite desperate to explain himself and begging for your address. We did not feel it wise to give it to him. However, we promised to include his letter with one of our own. You are, of course, under no obligation to read the letter, but I thought it might help on the off c
hance you needed closure as much as Thomas seemed to. If not, forgive us for interfering.
Helen set her parents’ letter on the desk then sat in the chair to stare at her name printed in Thomas’s succinct handwriting on the outside of the envelope. Were her parents right? Did she need to hear from Thomas to be able to put the past behind and move on? She broke the seal on the letter.
A knock sounded on her bedroom door. A hoarse little voice called from the other side of it. “Aunt Helen, we’re hungry!”
She smiled. Tossing Thomas’s letter in the desk drawer, she closed it firmly. She didn’t need closure. The past was over. Her future was on the other side of that door and she wasn’t about to ignore it.
Chapter Eleven
Anticipation thrummed through Quinn’s veins as he watched Helen flip through the thin leaves of her Bible later that evening. He leaned forward in his chair by the fireplace when her finger trailed down one of the pages and stopped. She glanced up with a hint of nervousness in her smile. He returned it and, though he knew he was on shaky ground when it came to getting through this with his secret and his pride intact, he wanted to ease her mind. “No need to be nervous about this. I want to hear what you have to say.”
Relief lowered her shoulders. “Thank you. It’s just—I’m no expert here, so I may not have all the right words or the right answers.”
“You don’t have to.” He gave her a supportive nod. “Go on now.”
“First, I want to make sure that I understood you correctly when we spoke earlier. It seemed to me that you were saying God had punished you for taking advantage of a blessing not meant for you by sending that hailstorm.”
“That’s about right.”
She nodded. “Well, then. Punishment only comes after someone is condemned, or in other words, judged to be guilty. Right?”
He frowned. “What do you mean?”
“Wouldn’t you make sure that one of the children really did something wrong before punishing them for whatever they were accused of?”
“Of course.”
“Keep that in mind as I read this. It’s from John 3:17. Jesus is speaking and he says, ‘For God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. He that believeth on Him is not condemned...’ Now, you believe that Jesus is the Lord, don’t you?”
“Yes, I do.”
“Then God is not condemning you, which means you won’t experience the consequences of condemnation.”
His brain had a bit of trouble wrapping around that. “Why did the hailstorm happen right after I kissed you, then?”
“Quinn, that hailstorm would have happened whether we’d kissed or not. I’m sure the storm had more to do with the season changing from autumn to winter than anything else.” Helen tapped the Bible. “God’s word, on the other hand, never changes. It says He isn’t trying to punish you. In fact, I think He’s trying to show how much He loves you.”
He gave her a doubtful look. “By allowing our crop to be ruined?”
“Perhaps.” She lifted one shoulder in a shrug. “After all, it did bring you here to this moment where you could hear the truth.”
He tried real hard to think that through, but he couldn’t help being distracted by the vision sitting across from him. There was something so beautiful about Helen in this moment. Perhaps it was the eagerness on her face, the soft upturn to her lips or the way her pink dressing gown brought out the same shade in her cheeks. Was it talking about the Bible that had put that sparkle in her eyes, or had it always been there?
“Oh, and by the way, Quinn...” She lifted an impervious brow. “I kissed you first.”
He tensed as Helen moved from the settee to sit on the footrest in front of his chair the way she had the night of the storm. He really needed to move that thing. He tried not to stare at the Bible in her hands. Surely she wouldn’t make him read it. “What does that have to do with anything?”
She gave him a look that made his heart ram against his rib cage. “It means ‘the blessing’ was not taken advantage of.”
“You weren’t?”
“No, and, if you insist on thinking of me that way, I won’t complain, but there is something you ought to know about God’s blessings.”
“What’s that?” Maybe if he kept her talking she’d forget about the book. Nope. She opened it and flipped a couple of pages over. His hand clutched the arms of the chair, his knuckles turning white. “Helen, you’ve given me a lot to think about. Maybe we should call it a night.”
“One more verse then I’ll leave you alone.” She angled the book toward the light from the fireplace and began to read. “‘Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will he give him a serpent? If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask Him?’ To whom does the Father give good things?”
“Huh?” He’d been too panicked to pay attention.
“Listen.” She read the verse again and asked the same question.
“He gives good things to them that ask Him.”
She closed the Bible, much to his relief. “Who asked God for a helpmeet, a mother for his children?”
“I did,” he said quietly.
She responded in the same volume. “So to whom did God give good things?”
“Me. He gave them to me.”
Silence stretched between them as they stared into each other’s eyes. He wasn’t at all sure at what point he’d leaned forward during their conversation, but his face was dangerously close to hers. Or, was it truly dangerous if God wasn’t out to get him? Yet, how did that new information or anything else that Helen said account for the misfortune that had fallen upon his father and brother? He suddenly realized it didn’t. They’d done it to themselves. It had been a consequence of reaching out for something they didn’t deserve. He would be doing the same thing if he closed the distance between him and Helen.
He leaned back in his chair. Her lashes swept down to cover her eyes, so if she was disappointed it didn’t show. Patting his knee, she stood and placed the Bible on the end table next to him. “Now I’m done. Good night, Quinn.”
“Night, Helen.”
She went to her room without looking back once, which left him free to try to rub at the warm impression her hand had left on his knee. His mind kept replaying that last verse, “how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things.” It was a nice idea even if it was contrary to what he’d thought he’d known. Imagine—God going above and beyond on his behalf. Was that why God had given him a princess for a helpmeet?
If so, it wasn’t fair to Helen or him. Quinn was no prince. Far from it. He’d lived much of his life dirt-poor. Now he made his living out of the dirt as a farmer who might not have made it to his next harvest without an influx of money from his wife’s wealthy parents. He was a Christian man who apparently knew very little about his faith. If that wasn’t enough, he was uneducated and illiterate.
He set the Bible on his knee. It opened to a place bookmarked by a thin red ribbon. His rough fingers smoothed over the delicate page filled with words. It was a code he’d never learned to crack. He’d always told himself he didn’t mind, that it didn’t matter. He could no longer pretend. It was torture having so much knowledge, life and truth at his fingertips yet totally unreachable.
At least he now knew that God wasn’t waiting to strike him down for his next mistake. That was a relief. However, it didn’t really change anything about who he was or what he should expect out of life. He would never measure up to the man he wanted to be—the man Helen deserved. That was the truth, too, and there was no changing it.
* * *
“Mama.”
Helen turned her mount toward the distant call. Peering through the thick forest surrounding her, she waited for it to sound again. This time it came as a terrified scream. “Mama!”
The horse leaped forward as Helen galloped through the trees, chasing the child’s cry. Low-hanging branches slapped against her face, painting angry red welts upon her skin. The cries grew louder. She was close. Suddenly, the ground disappeared before her. The horse reared backward, searching for stable ground and throwing her from the saddle. She sailed through the air.
Crashing through prickly bushes, she rolled to a stop at the base of a tall oak tree. Pain lanced through her body. She couldn’t move. She couldn’t breathe. She could only stare at the branches overhead that were wide and thick as they entwined to block out the sky.
Footsteps crunched through the dead leaves and stopped. Quinn stood over her. He was so tall, so strong. His gaze bored into hers with an intensity that made her shiver. His gaze trailed to her lips and stayed there as he knelt. She thought for sure that he would kiss her. Instead, his hands began to probe her abdomen with enough force to make her eyes smart with pain. His voice was rough, harsh, unyielding. “Damaged. Damaged. Damaged.”
“No,” she whimpered. “Help me. Please.”
His lip curled in disgust. “I can’t help you. No one can. You did this. You brought it on yourself with your own recklessness.”
She grabbed his arm as he stood. “Please, Quinn—”
“No.” His gaze was steady. “I don’t want you. I will never love you. Now, let me go.”
Stunned, she released him. He disappeared, leaving her alone and broken in the silence.
Helen jolted awake, gasping for breath. Her shaking fingers searched the night table for a match. Lighting the lamp beside the bed, she turned it up as bright as it could go to dispel the murky darkness surrounding her. The light couldn’t take away the memory of the dream as she lay in bed examining each aspect of it as one might pick at an old wound.
Mama. A child had called her “Mama.” Tears pooled in her eyes and spilled down her cheeks. Not even in her dreams had she been able to reach that which she so longed for. Then to somehow confuse the sentiments of her family’s doctor concerning her injury with Quinn’s face, form and unspoken words. It was too much to bear.
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