by Jo Ann Brown
Who are you trying to fool? nagged a tiny voice inside his head. The one that spoke up when he was trying to ignore his own thoughts.
Like thoughts of how right it had felt to put his hands on Annie’s shoulders as he kept her from falling in the barnyard. He didn’t want to recall how his heart had beat faster when her blue-green eyes had gazed up at him.
He must keep a barrier between him and any attractive woman. Getting beguiled as he had with Verba, who’d claimed to love him before she tried to change everything about him, would be stupid.
“Do you and your sister try to confuse people on purpose?” Caleb asked to force his thoughts aside.
“We did when we were kinder. Once we realized people couldn’t tell us apart, we took advantage of it at school. I was better at arithmetic and Leanna excelled in spelling, so sometimes I’d go to the teacher to do Leanna’s math problems as well as my own. She’d do the same with spelling.”
“You cheated?”
“Not on written tests or desk work. Just when the teacher wasn’t paying attention.”
He laughed, “The other scholars never tattled on you?”
“They wouldn’t get any of Grossmammi’s delicious cookies if they did.”
“I didn’t realize we had a pair of criminal masterminds in our midst.”
“Very retired criminal masterminds.” She smiled. “Our nice, neat plan didn’t last long. A new teacher came when we were in fourth grade, and she kept much better track of us. Our days of posing as each other came to a quick end.”
“So you had to learn to spell on your own?”
“And Leanna did her arithmetic problems. She realized she had a real aptitude for it and surpassed me the following year.” Annie hesitated, then said, “I’m sure the whole thing was my idea. Leanna always went along with me.”
He glanced at her. She was regarding him as if willing him to accept her words. He wondered why it mattered to her. For a moment, he sensed she was struggling with something big.
Again, he shut down his thoughts. Annie was his employee, and it’d be better to keep some distance between them.
“So you’re now the better speller?” Caleb asked, glad his tone was light.
She laughed, “I don’t know. We haven’t had a spelling bee in a long time.”
“Maybe we should have one. I read somewhere that Englisch pioneers used to hold spelling bees for entertainment.” He gave her a grin. “Something we could do in our spare time.”
“When we get some.”
Miriam had told him how much fun she had with the Wagler twins, but he hadn’t known Annie possessed a dry sense of humor. She wasn’t trying to flirt with him, either, and he’d heard several of the community’s bachelors saying Leanna was eager to marry. Maybe asking Annie instead of her twin hadn’t been such a mistake after all.
When they reached the main road, Caleb held Dusty back. Traffic sped past. Most cars were headed to ski resorts in Vermont, and the drivers couldn’t wait to reach the slopes. Local drivers complained tourists drove along the uneven, twisting country roads as if they were interstates.
Two minutes passed before Caleb felt safe to move onto the road. They didn’t have to go far before he signaled a left turn. He held his breath as a car zipped by him, heading east, but he was able to make the turn before another vehicle, traveling as fast, roared toward Salem.
“Everyone’s in a hurry,” Annie said as she turned her head to watch the car vanish over abandoned railroad tracks.
“I hope they slow down before they get hurt.” Pulling into the asphalt parking area behind the building where ghosts of painted lines were visible, he said, “Here we are.”
“Your bakery is going to be here?”
“Ja.” He was still amazed he’d been able to buy the building in October.
It had served as a supply depot for the railroad until the mid-1960s. The parking area and the pair of picture windows on the front were perfect for the shop he had in mind. Its wide eaves protected the doors. The building needed painting, but that had to wait for the weather to warm. As a few stray snowflakes wafted toward the ground, he couldn’t help imagining how it’d look in May, when he planned to open.
“Why a bakery?” she asked.
“My grossmammi taught me to bake when I was young, and I enjoyed it.” He didn’t add he’d been recovering from an extended illness and had been too weak to play outside.
She glanced at him, and he suspected she wanted him to explain further. He didn’t.
Walls. Keep up the walls, he reminded himself. Getting close was a one-way ticket to getting hurt again. He wasn’t going to do something that dumm again.
Not ever.
* * *
The wind tore at Annie’s coat and shawl when Caleb opened the door on his side and got out. When she reached for her door, he called to her. She had to strain to hear his voice over the wild wind.
“Head inside. Don’t wait for me.” He grabbed a wool blanket off the floor. “I’ll tie up Dusty. I want to put this over him to keep him warm while I give you the nickel tour.”
She nodded, but she wasn’t sure if he saw the motion because he’d already turned to lash his horse to a hitching rail. The building would provide a windbreak for the horse.
After hurrying through the back door, she paused to cup her hands and blow on them. She wore heavy gloves, but her fingers felt as if they’d already frozen.
It was dusky inside. Large boxes were stacked throughout the cramped space. She wondered what was in them. Not supplies, because the room didn’t look ready for use. Paint hung in loose strips between the pair of windows to her left.
She stood on tiptoe to look for writing on the closest box. She halted when she heard a quiet thump.
It came from beyond the crates. She peered around them. A door led into another room.
Was someone there?
Should she get Caleb?
A soft sound, like a gurgle or a gasp, was barely louder than her heartbeat. If someone was in trouble in the other room, she shouldn’t hesitate.
God, guide me.
She took a single step toward the other room, keeping her hand on the wall and trying to avoid the big crates. Her eyes widened when she saw a silhouette backlit by a large window. She edged forward, then froze as a board creaked beneath her right foot.
The silhouette whirled. Something struck the floor. A flashlight! It splashed light around the space. A young woman was highlighted before she turned to rush past Annie.
“Wait!” Annie cried.
A boppli’s cry echoed through the building.
“Stop!” came a shout from behind Annie.
Caleb!
“There’s someone here,” she called as she spun, hoping to cut off the woman’s escape.
She ran forward at the sound of two bodies hitting each other.
Caleb yelled, “Turn on the lights.”
“Lights?”
“Switch...on the wall...by the door.” He sounded as if he was struggling with someone.
She flipped the switch and gasped when she saw the person trying to escape from Caleb.
It was a teenage girl, holding a boppli. Blonde and cute, the girl had eyes the same dark green as Caleb’s. The boppli held a bright blue bear close to his cheek and squinted at them in the bright light.
Annie started to ask a question, but Caleb beat her to it when he asked, “Becky Sue? What are you doing here?”
Chapter Two
Becky Sue?
Caleb knew this girl and the boppli?
Annie wondered why she was surprised. Caleb knew everyone who came to Harmony Creek Hollow. Was this young woman part of a new family joining their settlement? There was one empty farmstead along the twisting road beside the creek.
Annie faltered when she saw the shock on Ca
leb’s face. His green eyes were open so wide she could see white around the irises, and his mouth gaped.
Then she remembered what he’d said after calling the girl by name.
What are you doing here?
He wasn’t shocked to see Becky Sue. He was shocked she was in his bakery.
What was going on?
As if she’d asked that aloud, Caleb said in a taut tone, “Annie, this is my cousin, Becky Sue Hartz. She and her family have a farm a couple of districts away from where Miriam and I grew up.” He closed his mouth, and his jaw worked with strong emotions.
The girl shared Caleb’s coloring and his height. Annie wondered how alike they were in other ways.
Stepping forward with a smile, she tried to ignore the thick tension in the air. “I’m Annie Wagler. I should have guessed you were related to Caleb. You look alike.”
“Hi, Annie.” Becky Sue’s eyes kept cutting toward Caleb. Her expression announced she expected to be berated at any second.
Why? For being in the bakery? It wasn’t as if she’d broken in. The door had been unlocked. However, even if Becky Sue had jimmied a window and climbed in, her cousin would have forgiven her.
“And who is this cutie?” Annie tapped the nose of the little boy in the girl’s arms, and he chuckled in a surprisingly deep tone.
For a moment, Becky Sue lost her hunted look and gave Annie a tentative smile. “This is Joey. He’s my son.”
Her son? The girl didn’t look like much more than a kind herself. If Annie had to speculate, she would have guessed Becky Sue was sixteen or seventeen. At the most. The little boy, who had her flaxen hair, appeared to be almost a year old.
Shutting her mouth when she realized it had gaped open as Caleb’s was, Annie struggled to keep her smile from falling away. Though it wasn’t common, some plain girls got pregnant before marriage as Englisch ones did. Or had Becky Sue been a very young bride?
As if she’d cued Caleb, he asked, “Is your husband with you?”
Becky Sue raised her chin in a pose of defiance. A weak one, because her lips trembled, and Annie guessed she was trying to keep from crying.
“No,” the girl replied, “because I don’t have a husband. Just a son.” When Caleb opened his mouth again, she hurried to add, “I’m not a widow, though that would be convenient for everyone, ain’t so?”
“Everyone?” He frowned. “Do your parents know where you are?”
“Ja.” When he continued to give her a stern look, she relented enough to say, “They know I left home.”
“But not where you’re going?”
She didn’t answer.
“Where are you going?” Caleb persisted.
Again the girl was silent, her chin jutting out to show she wasn’t going to let him intimidate her. Though the girl was terrified. Her shoulders shook, and her eyes glistened with unshed tears.
Knowing she should keep quiet because the matter was between Caleb and the girl, Annie couldn’t halt herself from saying, “I’m sure you and Joey would like something warm to eat. It’s cold here, ain’t so? Though I was here last winter, I can’t get used to it. Caleb, we need to get these two something warm to eat.”
Caleb aimed his frown in her direction. She pretended she hadn’t seen it. Didn’t he understand they wouldn’t get any information if the conversation dissolved into the two of them firing recriminations at each other? Once the girl and her boppli weren’t cold and hungry—and exhausted, because Joey was knuckling his eyes with tiny fists and dark crescents shadowed his mamm’s eyes—Becky Sue might be willing to come clean about why she and her son were so far away from home.
But Annie’s comments were ignored as Becky Sue said, “I told you, Caleb. I left home, and I’m—we’re not going back.”
“And you decided to come to Harmony Creek Hollow?” Annie asked, earning another scowl from Caleb.
“I heard about the new settlement.” Though she answered Annie’s question, she glared at her cousin. “I didn’t know this was the one you were involved with, Caleb. If I had—”
“Well, isn’t it a wunderbaar coincidence, Becky Sue?” Annie hurried to ask. “And your timing is perfect.”
“It is?” Becky Sue seemed overwhelmed by Annie.
Gut! That was what Annie wanted. If the girl stopped thinking about defying Caleb, she might relax enough to reveal a smidgen of the truth; then Annie and Caleb could figure out what was going on.
No! Not Annie and Caleb. She shouldn’t use their names together in her thoughts. She had to keep her focus on helping Caleb see what a wunderbaar wife Leanna would make him.
Wishing she could think of a way to bring her twin into the conversation, Annie said, “Your timing is great because Caleb was giving me a tour of his bakery.”
“Bakery?” Hope sprang into the girl’s voice. “I didn’t see any food around here. Do you have some?”
“I’ve got soup in a thermos in the buggy.” Caleb’s face eased from its frown. “I meant to eat it for lunch, but I got busy and forgot.”
“Wasn’t that a blessing?” Annie hoped her laugh didn’t sound as forced to them as it did to her.
“It probably won’t be hot,” Caleb said.
Annie frowned. Didn’t he realize his cousin might be so hungry she wouldn’t care what temperature the soup was? “We can heat it up.”
He shook his head. “The stove isn’t connected. Nothing is yet. The gas company is supposed to have someone come later this week.”
Annie made a quick motion with her fingers toward the door. Did he understand that she hoped, when he was gone, Becky Sue would open up to her? Sometimes it was easier to speak to a stranger.
The boppli wiggled in Becky Sue’s arms and began crying. While the girl’s attention was diverted, Annie gestured again to Caleb. He gave her a curt nod, but his frown returned as he headed for the door. If he disliked her idea, why was he going along with it?
Focus, she told herself.
Pasting on a smile, Annie held out her arms to Becky Sue. “Do you want me to hold him while you have something to eat?”
“No, I can do it myself.” Her sharp voice suggested she’d made the argument a lot already.
With Becky Sue’s parents? Other members of her family? Joey’s daed? The girl had said she wasn’t a widow, but where was the boppli’s daed?
Wanting to draw Becky Sue out without making the conversation feel like an interrogation, Annie began to talk about the weather again. Her attempts to convince the girl to join in were futile. Becky Sue refused to be lured into talking. Instead she stared at some spot over Annie’s head as she bounced her son on her hip in an effort to calm him.
But Annie wasn’t going to waste the opportunity. There was one topic any mamm would find hard to ignore. “Becky Sue, do you have enough supplies for your boppli?”
Her face crumbling as her defiance sifted away, Becky Sue shook her head. “I’ve only got one clean diaper left for him.”
“Do you have bottles, or is he drinking from a cup?”
“I had a bottle.” She stared at the floor. “It got lost a couple of days ago.”
“My sister-in-law has a little one not too much older than Joey. I’m sure she or someone else will have extra diapers and bottles you can borrow.”
Bright tears clung to Becky Sue’s lashes but didn’t fall. The girl’s strong will astonished Annie. It was also a warning that Becky Sue, unless she decided to cooperate, would continue to avoid answering their questions.
“Gut,” the girl replied.
“I know it’s none of my business, but are you planning to stay here?”
“You’re right. It’s not any of your business.” A flush rose up Becky Sue’s cheeks, and Annie guessed she usually wasn’t prickly. In a subdued tone, she added, “I don’t know if I’m staying in Harmony Creek Hollow...beyond ton
ight.”
“I’m glad you don’t plan to go any farther tonight. It’s going to be cold.”
“I didn’t expect the weather to be so bad.”
“None of us did.”
Annie watched as the girl began to relax. Becky Sue was willing to talk about trite topics, but the mere hint of any question that delved into why she was in Caleb’s bakery made her close up tighter than a miser’s wallet.
A few admiring queries about Joey brought a torrent of words from the girl, but they halted when the door opened and Caleb walked in. Annie kept her frustrated sigh to herself as she searched for a chair Caleb said was among the boxes.
Somehow they were going to have to convince the mulish girl to let them help. Becky Sue must be honest with them about what had brought her to northern New York. Annie prayed for inspiration about how to persuade her to trust them.
Not having any ideas on how to solve a problem was a novel sensation.
And it was one she didn’t like a bit.
* * *
While Becky Sue sat on the floor and began to feed her son small bites of the vegetable soup from the thermos, Caleb watched in silence. The same silence had greeted him when he came into the bakery. He’d heard Annie talking to his cousin, but Becky Sue had cut herself off in the middle of a word the moment she saw him.
Annie edged closer and offered him a kind smile. He was startled at the thought of how comforting it was to have her there. She was focused on what must be done instead of thinking about the implications of his cousin announcing the boppli was her son.
But the situation was taking its toll on her, as well. Lines of worry gouged her forehead. She was as upset as he was about his cousin.
“I’m sorry,” he murmured.
“For what?” she returned as softly.
“Putting you in the middle of this mess. When I asked you to work for me, I didn’t think we’d find my cousin hiding here.” He gulped, then forced himself to continue. “Here with a boppli.”
“You didn’t know she was pregnant, ain’t so?”