Gabriel's Bride (25 page)

Gabriel found himself wanting to cross the room and wrap her up in his arms. He shook the thought away. Perhaps he had teased her too much about the television. “I believe that Rueben Beachy would say that we made the best of the situation. After all, we had to use the electric lights,
jah
?”

She nodded.

“And there were no chores here for us to see to. No family needin’ to be fed, or be put to bed.”

“I still think I should read.” She pulled the book from the nightstand drawer and tucked her feet up under her skirt.

Sitting there, in her blue dress, her light hair spilling around her shoulders, and a book open in her hands made him think of another tale he’d read long ago—
Alice in Wonderland
. He supposed that Rachel might feel a bit like Alice, thrown for a time into a magical world. He felt a little like that himself. What with the dinner at a restaurant and without the
kinder
. Staying the night in a hotel room, electric lights, and fancy television. But tomorrow they would return to the real world.
Their
world. Hopefully by then, this urge he had to hold her close would disappear right along with the
Englisch
magic.

Rachel was not sitting on the bed when he finished his shower. He hadn’t needed to take a shower as much as he needed some reason to get out of the same room with his wife. The thought was beyond ridiculous. No man should have to avoid his wife.

But he did.

There was something entirely too intimate about sitting on a bed not two feet from her and being so caught up in her profile that he longed to throw their agreement out the window.

He’d hoped when he poked his head into the room some twenty minutes later that she would have turned out the fancy
Englisch
lights and slipped beneath the covers of her bed. That would have been the perfect ending to a not-so-fortunate day.

Instead he saw her small silhouette standing out of the room on the balcony.

He should make his way to his bed, pull back the covers, and crawl inside. She was twenty-six years old. She didn’t need to be told it was time to sleep. She was in no danger outside their room on the tiny rectangle of concrete surrounded by wrought iron rails.

But his feet didn’t listen to his brain. Instead they marched out, their steps slowing as they neared where she leaned against the rail.

She sucked in a breath as he came up beside her.

“Sorry,” he murmured. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“You didn’t.” She said the words but didn’t bother looking at him. “I guess I should go back in. I hadn’t planned on standing out here so long without . . .” She waved a hand toward her uncovered head.

“Now that’s something to tell the bishop.”

She jerked her chin upward, watching him. “Don’t joke about such things.”

“Were you out here praying?”

“
Nay
.”

“Then you should be fine.”

She shook her head. “I just wanted to see the swimming pool. It is so beautiful.”

Gabriel looked down at the patch of bright aqua-colored water. It was beautiful, shining like a jewel into the night.

“I would love to go swimming. I haven’t been in years.” Her voice turned quiet. “I grew up Beachy Amish. Did you know that?”

“I have heard something of the sort,” he said.

“My parents and my
bruders
were killed in a buggy wreck.”

He took a step closer to her, rubbing the pad of his thumb across the scar underlining one big, dark eye. “And that’s where this came from.”

“
Jah
.” She whispered in return.

He should step back, take his hand from her face, but he couldn’t move. Wasn’t able. Didn’t want to. The Oklahoma wind stirred the strands of her long hair, brushing it against the backs of his fingers. Silky, soft hair the color of a doe’s hide that framed her big, luminous eyes.

He took another step closer when everything in him told him to step back. But she kept sucking him in, drawing him closer to her, as if he were drowning and she was the only salvation in a churning sea.

He used his thumb to tilt her face to his.

Her gaze snagged his, and he looked at her for a moment. Just looked. She was his wife. His life partner, though they had set out terms of their relationship that most would find unacceptable. He had done that for her. Told her their marriage would be in name only. A piece of paper to stop the gossiping tongues from waggin’. He fully intended to keep his promise.

Just after this one kiss.

Her eyes fluttered closed right before his lips touched hers.

He shut his as well, preferring to enjoy the experience from the feeling alone.

One hand held her chin, kept her steady for his kiss, while the other arm snaked around her and drew her even closer to him.

Gradually, she returned his caress, kissing him back almost hesitantly. Sweetly. Innocently.

She was a strange combination of woman and girl, and he found that he wanted to know more about her. How old her brothers had been when they died, how it felt moving into a new, more conservative district.

And how she had managed to be twenty-six and kiss him as if she was as innocent as . . .

He wrenched himself away from her. “Forgive me.” His voice rasped, as if the devil himself had him by the throat. Perhaps he did.

What had he been thinking, kissing her like he did? Of course she was innocent, and he had married her, but he had promised not to touch her.

“It’s . . . it’s okay.”

“I’ll . . .” He didn’t know what he was going to say. Only that he needed to get away from her. And quick. “I’m going to get a cup of coffee.” He rushed back through the room and was halfway out the door before he realized he’d forgotten his shoes.

Her eyes were on him as he marched back in and grabbed them up, not stopping to put them on before closing the door behind him.

He’d go get a cup of coffee at the pancake house, get himself back together. Maybe a couple of cups and he would remember that theirs wasn’t a traditional marriage.

He sighed and raked a hand through his hair. But it would take more than coffee for him to forget the smooth texture of her skin under the pads of his fingers, and the sweet taste of her lips beneath his.

14

B
ill Foster called first thing the following morning. The surgery had been a success. His niece would not lose the eye, but any damage to her sight was still unknown. The girl’s mother had returned home, and Rachel breathed a sigh of relief. Their prayers had been answered.

Before ten, they were on their way back to Clover Ridge.

This time Rachel couldn’t sleep on the trip, still wide awake from her adventure. She and Gabriel had come to the city to buy goats and ended up spending the night in a fancy hotel. Quite an adventure for an Amish girl.

And his kiss.

She shivered from the memory. If kissing was always that wonderful, she couldn’t understand why people didn’t kiss all the time. Or maybe they did. Maybe couples in more traditional relationships kissed all the time. There was no way for her to know, though, unless she asked someone.

The thought brought a blush to her cheeks. She couldn’t do that. She couldn’t ask Katie Rose or Ruth. No, that would be too embarrassing by far.

But maybe this was what Ruth had been talking about when she told Rachel she should take opportunities as they presented themselves to her. She stared out the window, confused. She just didn’t know what to do next.

Well, she knew there was more than kissing when it came to romantic love, but she had no idea of the next step in the process—or even if Gabriel wanted more from their relationship.

Perhaps that was the reason he had stayed out half the night. She had looked at the shiny red lights on the alarm clock between their beds when he slipped back into their room some time later. By then, it was nearly two o’clock in the morning.

That accounted for the dark circles and bags under his eyes and the return of his surly manner.

Still, kissing was an enjoyable endeavor, and she hoped against hope that she might get the chance to kiss Gabriel once again.

She gazed out the window at the landscape whizzing by. If she kept her eyes ahead, she could make out things before they zoomed past: huge signs, cars and trucks of all kinds, the occasional stray animal. They even got to see a transfer truck hauling an enormous blade thing that Bill Foster said would eventually make its way onto a wind turbine.

But no sight was as welcome as the big white and green sign that welcomed them back to Clover Ridge. ’Cept for maybe the mailbox and driveway belonging to Gabriel.

When they pulled up in front of the white two-story house, Katie Rose and Samuel immediately peered out the windows and came to stand on the porch to greet them.

“
Guder mariye
,” Rachel said, waving as she got out of the car, while Gabriel stayed behind to settle the price of the trip with Bill Foster.

“
Goedemiddag
,” Katie Rose corrected with a dimpled smile.

Rachel took a quick glance at the sky. “So it is afternoon,” she said, holding her arms out for Samuel. “And a
gut
one at that.”

Samuel raced toward her, and Rachel scooped him up in her arms. Oh, she had missed him so. If the way he squeezed her was any indication, he had missed her as well.

Rachel gave Samuel one more squeeze, then set his feet back on the ground. “
Danki
, Katie Rose. For staying with the boys.”

Katie dipped her chin in a quick nod. “Did you have a good trip then?”

“
Jah
, we got the goats, and Bill Foster’s niece is healing just fine. All in all, a
gut
trip.”

Katie watched Rachel with those jade green eyes of hers, saying nothing. Rachel suspected that her question had meant something more.

Or maybe she was just imagining things.

Katie Rose nodded again. “Something about you seems different.” She turned her head this way and that as if studying Rachel from every angle. “I do not know what it could be, but
jah
, different.”

An involuntary blush stole its way into her cheeks. “There is nothing different about me, Katie Rose Fisher, except that I am a day older.”

Katie smiled. “If you say so.”

“I do at that.” Even as she said the words she knew them to be a lie. At the very least, they were not the truth. Something was different, but she was as stumped as Katie Rose as to what it could be.

“
Dat. Dat
! Slow down!” Simon squinted up into the hay loft where his father was pitching down bales of hay.

“
Ach
.” His father propped his arm in the handle of the pitchfork and wiped his brow. “That’s enough?”

Simon looked around at the two dozen bales of hay scattered across the barn floor. “For now,” he replied dryly.

Something was wrong, but Simon couldn’t figure out what it was. Ever since the auction his
dat
had been acting strange. And Rachel . . . well, Rachel always acted a little odd, but she was acting weirder than usual.

Something happened on that trip to Oklahoma City, but for certain he didn’t know what it could be. Maybe they had argued about the goats . . .