Simon watched them walk away, not sure whether he was pleased or annoyed. Of course he was happy to see his shy daughter willing to reach out to someone in what was a strange place to her, if not to him. But if she was ready to warm up to someone, did it have to be Lydia Stoltzfus?
He remembered Lydia. The pesky little kid next door, she’d been twice as much trouble as any of his younger siblings. She’d been an expert at leading the others into mischief, but she’d always come up smiling, no matter what. Everything had been a game to her.
Following them into Great-aunt Elizabeth’s shop, he reminded himself that she was an adult now, but he wasn’t quite convinced. Not when his first glimpse had been of her sprawled face down in the snow at the side of the road.
Aunt Elizabeth rushed to greet him, and he forgot Lydia in the warmth of her welcome. It had been too long, he thought. Too long since he’d been surrounded by people of his own blood, tied to him by unbreakable bonds of kinship. He and Rebecca had made good friends out west, but with her loss the longing had grown in him to return to Lost Creek, back where he could raise his daughter in the midst of family to love and care for them.
When he finally emerged from the hugs and exclamations, it was to find Becky installed at a table near the counter, with a mug of hot chocolate topped with whipped cream in front of her. With Lydia’s help, she seemed to be trying to decide between a cruller and one of Aunt Elizabeth’s cream horns.
“I think you’d like this one,” he told her, pointing to the cream horn. “Aunt Bess fills the whole thing with yummy cream.” His old name for his much-loved great-aunt came automatically to his lips.
Becky looked at him, then seemed to look at Lydia for approval. When she smiled and nodded, Becky’s hand clasped the cream horn, squirting out cream as she put it on her plate. She seemed confused for a moment, and then she carefully licked the cream off her fingers. Something in him eased at Becky’s enjoyment, and his gaze met Lydia’s for an instant of shared pleasure that startled him.
“Ach, this is our little Becky.” Aunt Bess beamed down at the child. “Lydia is taking gut care of you, ain’t so? She takes care of everybody, even me.”
Before he could wrap his mind around this unexpected relationship between Aunt Bess and Lydia, the older woman surged on. “Lyddy, why don’t you show Simon the extra storeroom? He’s going to put some things there until his new house is ready.”
Lydia, busily putting mugs of coffee on the table, looked up and nodded, while Simon’s daad sat down next to Becky with every appearance of settling in for a bit. Before Simon quite knew what had happened, Lydia was leading him behind the counter to the cluster of rooms that made up the back of the building.
“I don’t want to take you away from your work,” he said. “This could wait.”
Lydia shook her head. “Don’t you remember? It’s always best to listen to what Aunt Bess says. Otherwise she’ll just keep after you and after you.”
He couldn’t help smiling at the accurate description of his great-aunt. “From what she said, it sounds as if she must listen to you. What did she mean about you taking care of her?”
“Ach, that’s nothing.” A flush that reminded him of peaches came up in Lydia’s creamy cheeks. “She had a bad bout with pneumonia this winter, and since she insisted on staying in her apartment upstairs, everyone had to gang up on her to keep her out of the shop. That’s all.”
She opened one of the doors off the kitchen. “Here’s the room she was talking about. We didn’t know what you might need, so I just cleaned it out and left it empty.”
A quick glance told him there was more than enough space for the furniture and belongings he’d had shipped home. “Denke, Lydia.” He felt a bit awkward, as if he’d lost his footing in trying to fit back into the life he’d left behind. “I wouldn’t want to trouble you. I could have taken care of it.”
“It’s my job,” she said simply, but there was a twinkle in the deep blue of her eyes that suggested she understood his discomfort.
There didn’t seem to be anything else to say. “Denke,” he repeated. This new, grown-up Lydia confused him. At moments she seemed to be a calm, poised stranger, and then he’d get a quick glimpse of that giddy, naughty child. He could only hope that everyone he met wouldn’t be equally confusing.
He discovered he was not only returning her smile, he was appreciating the effect of eyes more deeply blue than the depths of a pond and the honey gold of her hair, whose tendrils, loose from her kapp, were drying in tiny curls.
Oh no. He backed off those thoughts abruptly, turning away so sharply that he feared it must look rude. Still, that was better than any alternative. He had lost Rebecca only a year ago, and he had no thoughts to spare for another woman, even if he had room in his heart. His goals were clear in front of him—to raise Becky among his own people, to build a home for them on Daad’s farm, establish his clock-and watch-repair business so he could run it and look after Becky at the same time.
No, he had no time to spare for women. And especially not for one who still contained sparks of the frivolous, pesky child she’d been.
Copyright © 2021 by Martha P. Johnson
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ISBN-13: 9780369702227
The Amish Teacher’s Dilemma and Healing Their Amish Hearts
Copyright © 2021 by Harlequin Books S.A.
The Amish Teacher’s Dilemma
First published in 2020. This edition published in 2021.
Copyright © 2020 by Patricia MacDonald
Healing Their Amish Hearts
First published in 2020. This edition published in 2021.
Copyright © 2020 by Lora Lee Bale
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
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The Amish Teacher's Dilemma and Healing Their Amish Hearts Page 36