Pursued (8 page)

****

“Hello?”

“Hi, Abby. How are you today?”

“Hi, Levi! I’m doing pretty good. How about yourself?”

I released the phone and held it with my shoulder as I stirred the chicken soup and reached for the salt.

“I’m doing fine. How are the boys?”

I grinned at his question. If the way to a man’s heart was through his stomach, then the way to a woman’s heart was through her children.

“They’re good, playing trucks in the living room. Oh, wait.” I heard Chase scream in anger and assumed that Javan had stolen his truck, again. I placed the phone on the counter and ran to the living room. It only took a moment to fix the issue, but I wondered how Levi would respond.

“Sorry, Javan stole the truck.” I explained once I picked up the phone.

“Ahh, yeah. I remember my little brothers doing the same thing. My mom used to say that if she made it through one phone conversation without being interrupted, it would be a miracle.”

“I can relate.” I chuckled.

“Well, I was calling you to find out if you were busy Saturday?”

“Umm, no, I don’t think so.”

“Can I talk you into taking another walk with me?”

“Fond of your walks, aren’t you?” I teased.

“Only when they involve chatting with a cute little blonde.”

I blushed. He thought I was cute! Before I could answer he chimed in.

“And I can come too. My sister won’t mind at all.”

“Hey!”

He choked on his laughter, and I couldn’t stop my own giggle.

“Funny.”

“Oh, I thought so. Don’t worry, I was talking about you.”

“Thanks, I think.” I rolled my eyes and went back to the soup that now was boiling a little too rapidly. The heat was turned down, and I pulled a spoon out of the drawer.

“What are you cookin'?”

I paused. Did I say something about cooking?

“I can hear the clanging of the pan and spoons and things. I was just curious.”

“Chicken soup.”

“Oh.”

“I take it you don’t like chicken soup?”
Who didn’t like chicken soup?

“Uh, yeah. It’s probably the one thing I can’t stomach. It reminds me of being sick. I hate being sick.” He sounded like an eight-year-old boy.

“I’ve yet to meet someone who did enjoy being sick.” I added wryly.

“True, but yeah, that’s probably the one thing I try to avoid eating if possible.”

“Okay, memo to self, if Levi ever comes over for dinner, do not make chicken soup.”

He laughed for a moment. “So you can go Saturday?”

“I’d love to.”

“Good. I’d love to see you.”

My face split into a grin, and I bit my lip.

“Where?”

“Do you want to go to your parents again? It seemed really easy for you with the kids.”

“True, sounds good. I’ll see you Saturday.”

“Ten-thirty?”

“Yes, thanks Levi.”

“No Abby, thank you. Have a good day. Enjoy your soup.”

I giggled on the phone. “I could save you some and bring it Saturday.”

“No, no thanks.” He chuckled, and my heart warmed.

“Bye, bye Levi.”

“Bye Abby.”

****

Levi arrived promptly. The rain was gentle, and the breeze strangely warm for early spring. Levi waved at me from the cab of his truck and got out, walking around the back of the truck bed. I couldn’t help but smile as I watched his eyes dance as he gazed at me. One hand was tucked behind his back as he walked toward me. The curiosity burned my chest as I leaned to the side to try and see around his broad frame.

“No peeking.” Levi scolded jokingly.

“Why not?” I rose up on my tiptoes as he got closer, as if that would help. He was easily almost a foot taller than I.

“Close your eyes.”

I eyed him dubiously before I made a show of closing my eyelids. I jumped as I felt his warm hand cover my eyes as well.

“Don’t you trust me?” I teased, inhaling the scent of diesel mixed with antibacterial soap on his hand.

“Nope.”

“I’m crushed.” His laugher was deep and rich, and my heart sighed. There was a rustle of what sounded like tissue paper and then Levi cleared his throat.

“Okay, you can look now.”

I opened my eyes and pushed his hand away with a saucy grin. In front of me was a beautiful bouquet of tiger lilies, daisies, sunflowers, and greenery. The flowers were arranged with pink tissue around them and inside was a card almost hidden by a large lily. The gesture left me speechless. With wide eyes I glanced up at Levi, who was studying my reaction.

“The, um, lady at the florist said that lilies were one of her most popular requests. I was going to call as ask what your favorite flowers were, but I was afraid I’d give away the surprise.” He watched me, waiting.

The corner of his lip was lifted in a half grin that was completely disarming.

“Thank you.” I managed to say with a hitch in my voice. The flowers demanded my attention with their strong fragrance, and I closed my eyes to inhale the scent. “They are perfect. Utterly perfect and I am so grateful. Thank you.”

Levi’s grin split his face, and his eyes sparkled. “You’re very welcome. Ah, and one more thing.” He loped back to the truck and opened the passenger door and took out a long stick.

I held the flowers close to me and bit my lip, thrilled to receive such a thoughtful gift.

“I thought we might need this.” He held up a large umbrella. With a flourish, he opened it up and tossed it over his shoulder, striking a ridiculous pose.

I couldn’t contain my laughter and snorted, to my humiliation.

“You snorted!” Levi’s eyes were huge as he relaxed his posture and pointed at me, wearing a huge grin.

“I did not.” I covered my mouth with my hand after speaking, and my face flushed.
Shoot!

“Oh yes, you did.” He began to chuckle.

“So?” Mustering up my courage, I straightened my shoulders and gave him a defiant glare, although all I wanted to do was hide behind my flowers. I hated it when I snorted.

“Ah, nothing, nothing. It’s just… entertaining.”

“What’s that mean?”

“Ahh, nothing.”

With a knowing smirk, he took my shoulders and turned me around to face the house.

“Let’s go before I get myself into more trouble,” he teased as I followed him to the door. The umbrella was closed up, and he shook it to remove the rain before he opened the door for me and waited to enter.

“Honey! What beautiful flowers!” My mom gushed as I carried them to the cabinet that held vases and picked one large enough to hold my precious gift.

“Aren’t they?” I murmured while I arranged them and lovingly caressed a flower with the tips of my fingers. The petals were so soft. When I glanced back at Levi, he met my gaze, clearly pleased that I was enjoying his gift. “Thank you, again, Levi.”

“Believe me, the pleasure was all mine.” He nodded, and I lost myself in his blue eyes.

The sound of my dad clearing his throat startled me. I collected myself and went to go say goodbye to Javan, who was playing with his train in the living room.

“Baby I’ll be back soon, okay? If you need anything, ask Grandma.” I kissed his soft hair and squeezed his solid little body tightly. He squirmed after I held him for what he determined was too long and I sighed, letting go with a grin.

“You’re a good mom.”

“Oh, I have my days, but thanks. I appreciate the compliment.”

“You’re welcome, but I’m not just saying that.” His eyes were serious as he considered me.

The truth about Levi was that he didn’t just say anything. No, when Levi said something, it was because he meant it. Sincerity was apparent in his tone when he spoke, and already, I had come to respect him for that particular trait.

“C’mon, let’s go.” I nodded my head in the direction of the door, and he grabbed the umbrella.

“Bye, Mom, Dad. We’ll be back after a while.”

“Have fun, honey!” My mom called as Levi opened the door for me.

The rain had let up slightly, and the sun had broken through the clouds in patchy bursts of light.

“So tell me about your family,” I asked as we walked along the grass toward the sidewalk.

“Ah, so you want to take a long walk, huh?” Levi teased.

“That bad, huh?” I teased back.

“No, just that much information. Although I wanted to wait till later to tell you all my dirty little secrets, but if you want to know…” He trailed off, grinning at me.

“Spill.”

“Well I don’t know how much Sam told you about my family…” He trailed off, watching me for a response.

“Nothing, actually. Oh, wait. Your dad’s a pastor, right?” I offered, remembering that one detail.

“Yes, Dad’s a pastor, and I’m the oldest of the bunch.”

“Oh? How many brothers or sisters?” I asked, glancing at him.

He tossed me a sheepish look before answering. “Twelve.”

I tripped. So, though I had grown up in farming community where the families tended to be larger than the average, I hadn’t ever known someone to have more than eight children.

“Yeah…” His response was drawn out as he chuckled. “That’s the reaction I’m used to seeing.”

“Wow, I’m… impressed. Your mom is an amazing woman.” I hadn’t met the woman, but anyone who had borne and raised that many children deserved sainthood.

“Yes, she is.” Levi nodded and grinned at me, seeming to wait for something.

“What…”

“Aren’t you going to ask me something?”

“Ask you… what exactly? If you liked being a part of a large family?” My guess made him laugh.

“No, I mean yes, I loved being part of a huge family. Someday I hope you’ll get to meet them all. They’re amazing. But no, that’s not what I was thinking you were going to ask.”

“Okay then…” I trailed off, waiting for him to clue me in.

“Usually, the first question a woman asks me when they find out the size of my family is if I plan on having that many children as well.”

“Oh.” The thought hadn’t struck me, but now I found myself concerned. Okay, two was great and yes, I did want more maybe, someday. But twelve? My heart began to pound thinking about it.

“Yeah, oh.” Levi teased, no doubt seeing the potency of the question rock my world.

“Do you?” I asked, half curious and half afraid of knowing the answer.

“No.”

Whew.

“Why?” I asked as I recovered.

“Oh, well lots of reasons actually. Don’t get me wrong. I wouldn’t trade my family for the world, but I just don’t see myself having that many children. There’s nothing wrong with it, more of a personal thing rather than a choice I made because of experience.”

“Ah, okay. I guess that makes sense.” But then I started to wonder, how many
was
he thinking? His idea of a small family would no doubt be different than my own.

“So um…” I blushed. “How many kids do you think you want to have… someday?”

His eyes never left my face as he answered, offering me a reassuring grin. “Oh, maybe four or six, something like that.”

Four or six, that’s okay.
I thought with a mental sigh of relief. If Levi and I were going to work out for the long run, we needed to be on the same page on important matters like this one. Oh, I had heard of many people waiting to decide on if or when they wanted children till much later on after they were married, but I didn’t see t
he point. Marriage was hard enough without having another issue to discuss or fight over.

“But it would really depend on the woman I married. If pregnancy were easy on her then that’s great, but if it’s tough on her, there’s no reason to risk her life or the life of the unborn baby. My mom had a rough go at it a few times, and I wouldn’t want that for my wife.” He added quietly.

“That makes sense.” I offered with a small smile that added to my lingering blush at my forward question.

“Your turn.”

“My turn?”

“Yeah, how many little ones do you want?” He continued down the dirt road, glancing at me every few steps with his clear blue eyes.

“Well, honestly, I’m thankful God’s blessed me with two, but if I were to be blessed with more that’d be great. Though I agree with you, six would be my limit.” My face heated again at the words.

“It’s good that we agree on that then.” He nodded. “Abby, I know this is not conventional conversation, but I’d like you to feel comfortable speaking about these things with me. I need to know what’s in your head and heart if I’m going to get to know you. I don’t want you to be embarrassed.” He spoke softly as he paused, turning to face me.

“I know. You’re right, it just seems, I don’t know, forward of me. And I’m not that type of girl.” I gazed up, imploring him to understand.

“If you were, we wouldn’t be here, Abby. Your character is clear. It’s one of the many reasons I’m attracted to you.” His eyes smoldered for a quick moment before he glanced away and began to walk, pausing for me to catch up.

“So.” I cleared my throat. “Tell me about your family.”

“I thought I changed the subject, pretty smoothly I might add.” He teased.

“No escape, spill, again.”

“Okay, I have eight brothers and four sisters. All younger than I and more mischievous.” He winked at me, causing me to laugh.

“My youngest sibling is fourteen and a cute little blondie. She’s in track and took State last year.”

“Wow.”

“We have long legs, a trait that’s prevalent in our family. As a kid I was nicknamed ‘stork’.”

“You were not.” I grinned.

“Oh yes, Abby, I most certainly was. Now, your turn. Tell me something your family would say trying to embarrass you.”

“Oh is that the game we’re playing?”

“Yes, you asked about my family. I spilled, telling you the first thing they’d tease me about if they met you. Now it’s your turn.”

“Well, you met my parents, and they didn’t say a thing—“

“No, na-uh. Parents do not count. Siblings. You have one or two, don’t you?”

“Yeah, Willi.”

“Willi?” Levi eyed me curiously.

“Oh, yeah please call her that, she’ll die.” I joked.

“So her name’s not Willi I take it.”

“No, it’s
Wilhelmina
Elenore and she hates,
hates
her name.”

Levi laughed loudly at my declaration, and I loved the way the blue in his eyes twinkled with merriment.

“Seriously, that’s her name. Ask my mom later. It’s actually not a long story, but you’d think so with a name like that. It belonged to my grandmother, and since Willi is the oldest, she got saddled with it. She still hasn’t forgiven me for being born second.” I teased. “She goes by Willow. I’m the only one allowed to call her Willi, which means you should do it just to make her mad.”

“I think I’ll stick with Willow, I don’t want her upset with me. So, what would Willow have to say about you?”

“Well…”

“Yes?”

“She’d tell you that I can’t watch children’s movies without crying. And when I was a teenager, my nose was too big for my face. So, to try and minimize it, I cut bangs.” I took some hair out of my ponytail and drew over my forehead and made a snipping motion with my fingers.

“Go on…”

“Well, I didn’t do it right, and Willi found me and tried to fix it. The result was very short bangs that did not minimize my nose, but rather just took the focus away from it, but not in a good way. What’s worse is that shortly after that my hair stopped growing.”

“What? Why?” Levi’s expression was concerned.

“It turned out it was a vitamin deficiency, but for about a year I had short bangs that refused to grow. I haven’t had bangs since. And Willi has made it her mission to get me over the fear and cut my bangs. I still won’t do it.”

Levi chuckled. “Nice. There wouldn’t happen to be pictures, would there?”

“Nope, burned them all.”

This earned me a belly laugh, and I couldn’t contain my own mirth either.

“I’m sure Willi saved one or two.”

“I’m sure she didn’t.” I added in a threatening tone.

“We’ll see.”