Twice Blessed (12 page)

“Oh.” Sean's eyes grew round as he nodded. “I should have remembered that.”

“Good.” Standing, he smiled when he realized Sean's wide eyes were focused on the chocolate cake. “Do you want some more?”

“Yes, sir, Mr. Sawyer. I sure would.”

“Help yourself to as much as you'd like.”

“Thank you, Mr. Sawyer.” He reached for the knife.

“All the knives in this house are for cooking and eating. Do you understand?”

“Yes, sir, Mr. Sawyer.”

“And no guns here or in Miss Delancy's house or the store.”

“But what if some thief comes in and tries to steal from her?”

Noah shook his head. “Not even then. Sheriff Parker is in Haven to take care of such things. Do you understand?”

“Yes, sir, Mr. Sawyer.”

Noah suspected the boy would have agreed to just about anything if Noah would stop talking so Sean could have another piece of cake. He saw the boy set the knife to cut a huge slab. Sean glanced at him and shifted the knife to a more reasonably sized piece.

More than ever, Noah was certain Emma had absolutely no idea of what she had let herself in for with this kid. Had he when Belinda came into his life? But at least he had known her from the day she was born. He wondered how many more secrets Sean held in his past and how Emma would handle them.

Secrets …

He pushed through the door and back into the dining room before that thought could take form. This was not the time to let unspoken secrets intrude. He had worked too hard for too long to make a mistake now.

Emma knelt on the floor to tuck the blanket under the pallet where Sean would sleep tonight. On the bed set beneath the window that sliced through the slanted ceiling, Belinda was already asleep. On the bottom of her bed, the puppy was sleeping with its head on its paws. The bandage on its back leg glowed like an angel's wings in the light from the hallway.

In a whisper, she said, “If you need anything, Sean, I'll be in the room right across the hall.”

“Miss Delancy?”

“Yes?” She wished he would call her Emma as Belinda already did, but she must wait until he was comfortable enough to believe he could live here in Haven for as long as he wanted.

“If we stay here tonight, Cleo and Queenie and Butch won't have anyone to look after them.”

“Alice Underhill always comes over to check on them when she sees that the wagon hasn't returned. Sometimes my deliveries take even longer than today's.”

His nose wrinkled. “The schoolteacher?”

“One and the same. She's a good friend.”

“Why would anyone have a teacher for a
friend
?”

Emma heard Noah's muted laugh from the doorway. She hoped Sean did not, because he needed to learn to fit in at school and to do his lessons. Alice had told her that, for now, Sean was the only one off the orphan train who was attending the village school. Maybe the situation would be easier when some of the other children from the train came to school.

“Miss Underhill will check on the animals,” she replied, “so you can get some rest. If you need to get up for any reason, don't wake Belinda.”

“I know how to be quiet. I could tiptoe in and out of any crib without anyone being the wiser.”

“Crib?” she asked.

Noah cleared his throat before saying, “He's speaking of a bordello, Emma.”

“Don't worry,” Sean went on. “I'll be quiet, and I'll be here to let Belinda know that the thunder won't harm her. Just as I did for Kitty Cat in New York.”

“You had a kitten?” she asked.

He grinned. “Kitty Cat is a little girl. Her real name is Katherine Mulligan, and she came here with me on the train. Me and Brendan Rafferty took care of all the little ones on the way here.” His smile wavered, and tears rose up into his eyes. “I hope Kitty Cat is all right.”

She brushed a stubborn cowlick back from his forehead. “I can ask Reverend Faulkner which family she is with. Then maybe you can go and see her.”

“I know where she is. I saw her today.”

“At Mr. Hammond's farm?”

He shook his head. “At the last place we stopped.”

Emma stiffened, but kept her smile from vanishing. The last place they had stopped was the River's Haven Community. Although she did business with the residents there, she did not approve of their odd ways of having what she had heard described as ever-changing marriages.

“Why don't you go to sleep now?” She came to her feet and slipped out of the room.

Noah left the door open a crack, then turned to her. The hall seemed abruptly too narrow, making her feel as if drawing in a single breath would be dangerous. He did not move, and she did not dare. Would her feet carry her toward the stairs or into his arms? She could not risk finding out.

She was unsure if he sensed her disquiet, but he motioned toward the stairs. When he stepped back so she could pass, she rushed down the steps, her petticoats whispering behind her. She paused at the base of the stairs. This was not her home, so she could not wander about without an invitation.

Again she wondered if he could read her very thoughts, because he said, “Let's go into the parlor where we can sit and talk more comfortably.”

“Thank you.” She entered the room and faltered. The furnishings were, like the ones in the dining room, an exact copy of a page out of a catalog. Every item was here, just as it should be, from the brass andirons on the hearth to the painting of a snowy winter hill on the opposite wall. The sofa and its matching chair were covered in burgundy fabric that was the perfect complement to the braided rug that reached nearly to each wall.

Only one thing was different. A photograph of a young woman was the sole item set on the mantel. Wanting to ask if that was Noah's late wife, she forced her gaze away from it as she sat on the sofa that was stiff with newness.

“I think the storm has passed,” Emma said to keep the silence from becoming overwhelming.

“The one outside? Yes, thank heavens.” He sat on the chair to her left, surprising her. She had thought he would sit beside her. Maybe he had his own reasons for being cautious so that what had happened by the creek did not occur again. He let his clasped hands dangle between his knees as he leaned toward her. “What about the one inside you?”

“Inside me?”

“You went as rigid as a tree trunk upstairs when Sean was talking about his friend.”

“It wasn't because of his friend. It was because he was speaking of the River's Haven Community.”

“Ah. When he told you that the little girl was at River's Haven, you were bothered more than when you heard about Sean's activities in New York.”

“His
activities
in New York are a part of his past now. What goes on out there is right here.”

He sat straighter. “That statement doesn't sound like you, Emma. You've always seemed to me to be the champion of the misunderstood.”

In spite of herself, she laughed. “Is that how you really see me?”

“That was my first impression.”

“Noah, I don't care what those who live out at River's Haven do. What I care about is Sean making friends and a home in Haven. If he pays calls out there, even to call on that little girl, he may be ostracized in town.”

“You care a lot about this boy, don't you?”

“Someone must. I don't think anyone else ever has. Maybe the folks at the Children's Aid Society, but they ripped him out of the city that has been all he's ever known.”

Something struck the window like a dozen small pebbles, and Emma flinched. Turning, she saw water washing down the glass. Pebbles would have been better than rain when the creek was so high.

Noah muttered something under his breath and stood. Going to the window, he put his face close to the glass to peer out into the night.

“Unless you have the eyes of a cat,” she said to his back, “you aren't going to see much.”

“You're right.” Walking back to the middle of the room, he added, “Gladys said she would leave the coffeepot on. Do you want a cup?”

“At this hour? I shan't sleep a wink all night if I drink coffee now.”

“Then sit with me while I have a cup.” He scowled at the window, where rain pelted the glass. “It may be a long night.”

She looked at the window. The lamp's glow made the night a solid black wall beyond the window. Rising, she went to the front door and opened it. She stepped out onto the porch and listened.

Beneath the patter of the rain that was quickly growing heavy, she heard the unceasing roar of running water. She gripped the back of a rocking chair set to one side of the door next to the porch swing.

Knowing Noah had followed her outside, for she had heard his quiet footsteps, she said, “The creek is probably halfway up the road to here.”

“I hope you're wrong. If the water has come that far, then all the wood I cut this week may be floating down into the Ohio. My only hope is that the logs will be caught by the standing trees downstream.” He walked toward the steps to the yard.

“I'm right.” She put her hand on his arm to stop him. “Don't go. The water is already too high and too fast for you to get back to your woodlot. I'm sorry, Noah, but I can tell by the sound of the water rushing past that it's about a quarter mile past the bridge.”

“You can tell that just by the noise?”

She nodded. “I've been in Haven for over seven years now. I've seen the Ohio and the small creeks rise more quickly than you could believe possible. Here, along the river, anyone who doesn't pay attention to nature's signs is going to be in trouble. It would have been better and safer if the snow had melted more slowly.”

“The snow was gone here before we moved in.”

“But it takes longer to melt up in the hills and mountains east of here. All that water rushes down into the Ohio faster than the river can hold it.” She jumped back as wind blew rain onto the porch. “That's why Haven is built up on the hill, not along the shore. It got flooded out when it was first built, and folks were smart enough not to let it happen again.”

He stared through the darkness. “Something makes me suspect Collis sold this farm to me because he was tired of the water flowing out of the creek.”

“No,” she said with a soft sigh. “He left because his wife and baby sickened with measles and died last fall. I don't think he could bear to look at this place, because it was so full of memories. He told me he was moving out west, but I think he was running away.”

“Do you blame him?”

“Of course not. Lots of people run away for lots of reasons.” She wanted to bite back the words, but it was too late.

Noah turned to face her. In the light that filtered through the dining room curtains, she could see his expression—a mixture of amazement and wariness. Why would
he
be upset by her stupid remark? Unless … through the window she could see the obviously new furniture. She searched his face, looking for sorrow. When she found it in the lines threading his forehead, lines she had not taken note of before, her own eyes swam with tears. Were Noah and his sweet little daughter fleeing tragedy, too? Not even a whisper of gossip in Haven hinted at what had happened to his wife. Maybe she had died as devastatingly as Mr. Collis's wife and child.

She wanted to ask, but again halted herself. The simple act of inquiring might convince him to try to open the door to her own reasons for being in Haven. That must stay as closed and locked as the jail cell where Miles had spent his last night before his hanging.

Noah's hands on her shoulders turned her slowly to face him, freeing her from her own memories. Even with darkness enfolding them, her eyes were held by the shadowed intensity in his. His kiss burned into her lips with the power of the lightning. She pressed to him, unable to lie to herself any longer. She was intrigued by this dynamic, enigmatic man.

His hand swept along her back, bringing her closer to his hard muscles, which had been sculpted by long hours of work. The longings awakened beside the creek surged through her. She wanted to touch him, to be touched with the craving that swept all other thoughts from her head.

Yet even as she answered his need with her own, she slowly became aware of a sound. She turned her head, but his fingers against her cheek brought her mouth back to his.

“Noah!”

“Hush, sweetheart,” he whispered, his lips brushing hers with a bewitchment that surged through her.

“The water! The barn!” she gasped as he seared her neck with liquid fire, each touch of his tongue an effervescent ecstasy.

“Let the barn float away.” His fingers combed through her hair, loosening it to swirl around his hands. Capturing her anew with his compelling eyes, he tilted her lips beneath his.

Exerting all her strength, for she had to fight her own longing to stay in his arms, Emma broke away from his embrace. “Are you mad? Can't you hear the water is getting closer?”

Noah frowned. “It's getting louder. You were right, Emma. Lots of folks have lots of reasons for putting some miles between them and the past. I just hope we don't need to put some miles between us and the creek before daylight.” He slapped the railing and cursed as the water pooled there splashed him. “If this rain would stop, the creek would be certain to go down.”

“It may not be the creek you need to worry about if the Ohio climbs the hill.”

“Don't even say that!”

“You have to keep the bigger disaster in mind.”

“I've had enough big disasters to know they never can be out of my mind.” He cursed again and reached for the door.

“Noah, what are you talking about?”

“Don't ask tonight. We've got too much trouble on our hands now to worry about anything else.”

She was unsure whether to be distressed or grateful that he had put an end to this conversation inching toward dangerous territory that must be left unexplored. What she did know was that this man embodied a greater peril than anyone she had met in Haven, because he was tempting her to lower the walls she had built with such care after she fled Kansas.