The Kitchen Marriage

by Gina Welborn

  “What is ze basket for?” Zoe asked with equal amounts of caution and curiosity.

  “Lunch.” Mrs. Hollenbeck moved the basket closer to Zoe, as if it were imperative that she take it. “Go on, dear. It won’t bite.”

  “Am I to fill zis?”

  “That is the plan.”

  Zoe looked to the table which had held food donations for the baskets. Nothing remained save for dusty burlap potato sacks. On her way home, she could stop at the grocer and bakery. The cost was little in light of helping a needy family.

  The moment Zoe accepted the basket, Miss Bloom called out, “Miss de Fleur, you’re going to regret not listening to me. Never feed a tiger. Oh, I hear the door knocker.” At that, with her head held high, she sailed past the opened patio doors and into the mansion as if she owned it.

  “One of these days, I shall relieve that girl of her employment with me.” The flicker of amusement in Mrs. Hollenbeck’s eyes belied her words.

  Zoe smiled warmly. “I believe you like her . . .” She paused, trying to think of the right English word. “Cheek? Nerve? Oh, how do you translate le toupet?”

  “Cheekiness?” Mrs. Hollenbeck offered. “Sass?”

  “Yes! You like her sass.”

  “Like? No, I tolerate her sass because I don’t wish to train another paid companion.” In a softer voice, Mrs. Hollenbeck said, “You may be on to something, but let’s keep that our secret.” Her attention shifted to the crates of food. “All we need now are our delivery men.” She grasped the pocket watch she wore on a pearl chain around her neck and clicked the cover open. “They should be arriving about now.”

  Zoe held up the basket. “For whom do I need to fill zis?”

  “Oh, dear child, this isn’t for a needy family. In two Sundays, on April 29, the Widows and Orphans Committee is hosting a lunch basket auction at our church. Unmarried ladies are to provide a lunch for men to bid on.” At the sound of people talking, Mrs. Hollenbeck glanced toward the opened patio doors before refocusing on Zoe. “I’ve raved to everyone I know about the welcome-home breakfast feast you cooked for me. During past auctions, men have bid on baskets to secure the attentions of the lady who provided the basket. This year I intend to cause a bidding war for your food.”

  “A bidding war?”

  “Indeed, Miss de Fleur. Jakob will obviously counter every offer.” She chuckled. “This will serve him right after all these years of running up bids.”

  Zoe hoped he would bid on her lunch basket. Yet a tiny part of her wished otherwise. After five days of focusing on nothing but Jakob’s courtship, she was now doubting her decision to give him another chance because, after five days of renewed courtship, Jakob again had no time for anything save The Import Company.

  Why did her heart fight against committing to him?

  She sighed. Falling in love should never be this complicated.

  She understood when he said he needed to give his full attention to stocking The Import Company because his parents were returning in a short seven days. Shelves needed to be arranged and stocked. Merchandise had to be priced. Decorations had to be hung. But did he have to work more than nine hours each day? Jakob had canceled Monday’s picnic trip to watch the construction of the new Broadwater Hotel. He was late to Tuesday’s coffee-and-cake social with the Snowe family, and he forgot about dinner with the Forsythes entirely, even though Mrs. Forsythe repeatedly reminded him that Judge Forsythe wanted to talk to Jakob after eight days of travel.

  At least, Jakob’s brother had been at the Snowes’ social and the Forsythes’ dinner to carry the conversation, so Zoe could contentedly watch and listen. Mr. Gunderson was kind enough to include her in the discussion and not demand she speak. He was considerate enough to change the topic of conversation when Miss Snowe’s brother embarrassingly goaded Miss Snowe about thinking she could steal Jakob away from Zoe, who, according to Miss Snowe’s brother, was “a more swell girl” than his sister was.

  With all the lovely young women in Helena, with ones like Miss Snowe chasing after Jakob, it made no sense why he had placed an advertisement for a bride by mail delivery. A man besotted with a girl would wish to spend time with her. Zoe wanted to believe Jakob was besotted. Nothing testified to it. Could he be using this courtship to dissuade the attentions of marriage-minded females in town?

  Zoe tensed. He could be using her to make someone else jealous. Yancey? Carline? Both ladies were close friends with Jakob. Almost every time Zoe had stopped by The Import Company in the morning to see Jakob, either one or both had been there.

  Mrs. Hollenbeck rested her hand atop Zoe’s arm, putting an end to her wayward thoughts. “May I ask what troubles you?”

  I want to love Jakob, but my heart refuses. What do I do?

  She yearned to say the words. She yearned to talk to someone about her heart’s struggle, but everyone would say she needed to give the courtship time, at least follow it through to the end. Jakob was a good man. A hard worker. Someone worth waiting for. Mrs. Hollenbeck adored Jakob too much to understand Zoe’s dilemma.

  Truth was, maybe she did not really want to love Jakob. Maybe she wanted someone else, someone she could rely on to help her not feel so alone.

  “Whatever it is, you can tell me,” Mrs. Hollenbeck prodded.

  Something about her expression comforted Zoe. Maybe the older woman would understand. “How does a woman know if she should—”

  The arrival of a quartet of men prevented her from finishing her sentence. Miss Bloom stepped out onto the patio, followed by Misters Gunderson and Buchanan, Deputy Alderson, and Dr. Abernathy’s son, who had recently returned to Helena after medical school. John? James? Oh, she could not remember.

  “This is a first,” Mrs. Hollenbeck whispered to Zoe.

  “What is?” she whispered back.

  “The first time I’ve been disappointed at someone’s promptness.” Mrs. Hollenbeck turned toward the men. “Gentlemen, we have a dozen crates. Once you each load three in your wagons, I will give you a list of where to deliver them.”

  “I already distributed the lists per your earlier instructions,” Miss Bloom put in. “And I exchanged the Nolans with the Bumgardens because Deputy Alderson told me the Nolans moved out to Mr. Fisk’s old cabin this morning. Switching makes the deliveries more efficient.”

  For the barest second, Mrs. Hollenbeck looked unsure of how to respond. “Thank you for the insight. Mr. Gunderson, you should have the Ziegler family.”

  “I do,” Mr. Gunderson answered. His gaze flickered from Mrs. Hollenbeck to Zoe. Was it her imagination or did he look somewhat uncomfortable?

  “I should leave,” Zoe said, because her work here was done.

  Mrs. Hollenbeck gripped Zoe’s arm, stopping her from leaving, and said to Miss Bloom, “Escort Mr. Gunderson to the stable. The brown goat with the yellow ribbon around her neck goes to Mrs. Ziegler. I need you to accompany Mr. Gunderson and help manage the goat. She doesn’t like wagons.”

  Miss Bloom smiled brightly at Mr. Gunderson. “We’re partners! Isn’t that—oh!” Her smile fell. She grimaced, then gave Mrs. Hollenbeck an apologetic look. “Miss de Fleur needs to go in my place. Deputy Alderson asked for my advice in planning his marriage proposal to Miss Rigney. Discussing this with him while making the deliveries would look less suspicious to his soon-to-be fiancée.”

  “Indeed it would,” Mrs. Hollenbeck muttered.

  Misters Gunderson, Buchanan, and Abernathy all looked at Deputy Alderson, who looked caught in a trap.

  “It’s going to be the best,” Miss Bloom said in that dramatic way of hers, “the most romantic proposal any woman has every received. I’m so honored Deputy Alderson asked for my help.”

  He nodded, like a man with no choice but to comply.

  Mrs. Hollenbeck gave Zoe’s arm a little squeeze. “I know this is asking a lot for someone of your tenderhearted nature, but could you help Mr. Gunderson manage a feisty goat?”

  Zoe’s chin rose a half-inch in offen
se at Mrs. Hollenbeck’s pronouncement. She could outwit a feisty goat just as easily as Miss Bloom could outwit her I-vowed-to-f ind-youa-husband-by-year’s-end employer. “Certainly, madame. It is but a goat.”

  * * *

  Miss Bloom leaned close to Isaak, shielding her mouth with her hand. “Miss de Fleur is a charming girl but a bit too malleable. I don’t know what your brother sees in her besides a pretty face, excellent cooking skills, a sweet spirit, and a willingness to help others.”

  Isaak pressed his lips together. Miss de Fleur was all that and more—including being concerned for widows and orphans. He could practically hear his pen scratching a check mark beside “shares some of my interests” on his list.

  Had Zoe de Fleur arrived in Helena in any other manner than as his brother’s mail-order bride, Isaak would revel in the way she made him feel. Over a long period of time—six months, at least—if her character still matched up with what it now appeared to be, they could have a romance that was a perfect balance of practicality and sentiment. But she had come as Jakob’s bride, and Isaak would never betray his brother. When the time was right, Isaak would find another Zoe de Fleur who would fill his life with sweetness.

  At least he hoped that was the lesson God was teaching him.

  “The Widows and Orphans Committee needs your help.” Mrs. Hollenbeck picked up a small basked and—were she any woman other than the most revered widow of his acquaintance—Isaak would describe the way she thrust a basket at Miss de Fleur as rude.

  Miss de Fleur took it, but she seemed unhappy about it.

  He took a step forward to discover why, but it wasn’t his place to ease her burden. To protect her. Or to sit beside her for the next two hours delivering food as Mrs. Hollenbeck had decreed, although he would do so rather than be rude.

  Fifteen minutes later, he had three food crates loaded into the back of the wagon and the goat tied to the wagon wheel to keep it from running off. Miss de Fleur placed her small basket onto the spring seat. She frowned at the wagon’s side, then looked up at him.

  “How do you climb into zis?”

  “May I?” He moved his hands to Miss de Fleur’s waist, close but not touching. “It’ll be easier if I just lift you into the wagon. Then the goat. You can hold it while I climb in. Between the two of us, it won’t go anywhere.”

  “Zat sounds like a good plan.” She smiled at him with such trust in her eyes that his heart began to pick up speed.

  His reaction when she’d caught him listening to the finches sing in the greenhouse was nothing compared to this moment. Against all logic, his determination to overcome his attraction to her was replaced by a fierce desire to kiss her until she admitted her life would be incomplete without him.

  Isaak choked on air. He coughed into his hand until he could swallow. “Sorry, I—” His mind went blank, so he focused on putting her and the goat into the wagon. He’d helped a woman into a wagon before, but this felt entirely different. Private. Intimate. And—heaven help him—splendid. Doing his best not to think about how his hands had encircled her waist, he hurried around the wagon, climbed in, and set off down the road with the goat standing between them.

  His attraction to Zoe was madness. Madness! It would pass. It had to. In the meantime, he just needed to keep himself from saying or doing anything stupid. He had to get the food and goat delivered then get Miss de Fleur back to her boardinghouse before he did something he would enjoy but definitely regret.

  She sat on the spring seat, petting the goat’s head as she spoke to it in French.

  They traveled another block before Isaak gave in to his curiosity. “What are you telling it?”

  Miss de Fleur gave him a tentative smile. “What it knows but is afraid to believe.”

  “Which is?”

  “She is a good goat. She does not fear where ze wagon is taking her because she is going to her new home. She will have a family who loves her and who she can love.”

  Isaak shifted the reins to his left hand so he could pet the goat. “How do you know this goat so well?”

  “She is a girl. I am a girl.”

  Girl was too simple a word to define Zoe de Fleur.

  Isaak drew the wagon up to the first home on their route, a two-room house on the outskirts of Chinatown. He left Miss de Fleur to charm the goat while he gave the food crate to Miss Marie Ying and her younger brother. After accepting hugs from the Yings, Isaak climbed into the wagon and turned the wagon in the direction of the Zieglers’ house

  Miss de Fleur patted his arm. “I am glad we are friends, you and I.”

  Isaak called on every ounce of self-restraint and honor to keep from confessing how her touch affected him. For a man to pursue another man’s woman was treachery enough; for a man to betray his own brother in the same way was the deepest level of perfidy imaginable.

  He gave her a steady look. “Everyone needs a friend.” He motioned to the basket. “I take it Mrs. Hollenbeck wants you to contribute to the lunch basket auction.”

  She grimaced, her nose scrunching, something he’d never seen her do before. Something he never wished to see again because of how endearing she looked. “Mrs. Hollenbeck wishes for a bidding war—not for romance, but to raise money for ze Widows and Orphans Fund.” She sighed. “Jakob will feel obligated to buy my basket. In no good conscience can I ask zis of him.”

  Isaak couldn’t stop a burst of laughter. “It’d serve him right after all these years of running up bids.”

  “Zat is what Mrs. Hollenbeck said.”

  Which made him think of the way she’d thrust the basket at Miss de Fleur. “Instead of donating a lunch basket, you could make a monetary donation to the fund.”

  Her countenance brightened. “I did not know I could do zat. Yes! Zis is a wonderful solution. Zen Jakob will not have to be in a bidding war.”

  “You’re more gracious to Jakob than he deserves.” Isaak recounted the time Jakob had misjudged how angry his bidding was making a man intent on wooing the basket’s owner, resulting in a round of fisticuffs before Sheriff McCall broke up the fight. “Your kindness in sparing Jakob retaliation is undeserved.”

  “If you were him, would you not wish for grace?”

  Unsure of what to say, yet confident of what he couldn’t say, Isaak turned the wagon onto the road leading to the Zieglers’ ramshackle home. He listened to the rattle of the wagon’s chains, the clomp of the horse’s hooves, and the bleet of the goat to keep from thinking about things he shouldn’t. Before he’d stopped the wagon and locked the brake, Mrs. Ziegler’s two girls dashed from the house, only to stop and gasp when they saw the goat.

  “Is that for us, Mr. Gunderson?” the older one said as their mother stepped outside.

  He climbed down. “It sure is.” After checking the rope around the goat’s neck, he placed it on the ground, then led it to Mrs. Ziegler and gave her the leash. “The food is—”

  Her gaze shifted to the wagon.

  Isaak looked over his shoulder.

  Miss de Fleur carried the food crate toward them. She placed it on the porch, spoke to the Ziegler girls about naming the goat, then shook Mrs. Ziegler’s hand. “May zis be a blessing to you and yours.”

  “Thank you.” Mrs. Ziegler’s gaze shifted between him and Miss de Fleur. If she wondered why Isaak wasn’t making the delivery on his own like usual, she kept it to herself.

  Isaak said goodbye to Mrs. Ziegler then walked with Miss de Fleur back to the wagon. “You shouldn’t have jumped out of the wagon. You could have twisted an ankle.”

  She laughed. “I am more clever zan you give me credit.” Instead of stopping at the front of the wagon, she continued to the back. She turned her back to the wagon, placed her palms flat on the bottom board, then sprung in that fancy blue dress of hers onto the wagon box. She scrambled onto her feet. “Voilà!”

  He folded his arms over the top boxboard. “You’re pretty pleased with yourself.”

  She stepped around the food crate and over the bi
cycle, then leaned down and lowered her voice, as if imparting a secret. “You will be a gentleman and praise me for my ingenuity.”

  Isaak took his leisure in admiring the mischievous glint in her chocolate-brown eyes. The last time he’d been told to behave like a gentleman he was twelve years old and it had been a reprimand, not a pleasant bantering that made him desire to lean close to her mouth. Warmth filled his cheeks. “You can count on me to be a gentleman.”

  “And?”

  And that needed to be the end of their repartee. With Yancey and Carline, he could tease because their flirtations weren’t personal. Yancey loved Hale. Carline loved Geddes, or so Isaak suspected. Playful bantering with Zoe—

  Miss de Fleur.

  Using her first name was a line he could not cross, not even in the privacy of his thoughts.

  With a shake of his head, he climbed into the wagon and slid onto the spring bench.

  She sat backward on the seat. With the lift of her legs, she swirled around. “Mr. Gunderson, zat was no compliment.”

  Not a compliment? The woman couldn’t be more wrong. Being on his best behavior around her was the highest compliment he could give her. He didn’t want mere friendship. Or playful banter. He wanted friendship and banter, plus her secrets, her hopes, and her future—the things she was dreaming about with his brother. Wanting what he couldn’t have was turning him inside out. He should never have made that list. He should never have compared it to her. He should have insisted he could make these deliveries on his own.

  She fit perfectly into his life. Too perfectly.

  “We should get on to the Wileys.” Isaak loosened the brake and flicked the reins, starting the wagon forward. “Sarah has four children from her first marriage—Alexander, Dante, Olivia, and Thaddeus. Did Sarah tell you she came to Helena as Hector Wiley’s mail-order bride? She wouldn’t marry him until he adopted her children.”

  When Miss de Fleur didn’t respond, he looked her way.

  She was watching him with a curious, studious expression, as if he were a puzzle she needed—dare he think wanted—to solve. How was it possible she grew more beautiful each time he looked at her? His heart pounded, urging him to touch her cheek. To discover whether her heart was beating as wildly as his. To—