The Beekeeper's Son (The Amish of Bee County Book 1) (36 page)

“Butch has proven he can take care of himself.”

“And Leroy’s horse and wagon?”

“He’ll understand.”

He might, but the loss of an expensive horse and a wagon wouldn’t sit well, regardless. Deborah prayed both would be recovered. “What do we do now? We’re out in a hurricane.”

“This is just the spin-off storm from a hurricane. It’s nothing. We’ve seen plenty worse around here. We need to get to the store to call the sheriff.”

“Don’t you think we should get to a basement first, until the storm passes?”

“This wave is passing.” Phineas coughed, his hand over his mouth for a few seconds, his breathing ragged. “There will be more, probably one after another all night.”

They couldn’t spend the night in the basement together, just
the two of them. Better to go to the store. Deborah lifted her face to the sky. He was right. The rain had lessened, but thunder and lightning still warred in the heavens. Phineas’s hand gripped hers. Rivulets of rain ran down his face, but he didn’t seem to notice them. His face contorted in pain. “I’m sorry.”

“Sorry about what?”

“That you’re in the middle of this. Why did you come?”

“I came to warn you about the storm.”

“You thought I wouldn’t notice the wind and the rain?” He shook his head and snorted. “I’ve lived here my whole life. I know the weather. I saw it coming. Why did you come?”

“I came to make sure you were all right.”

His blue-green eyes flamed with the same heat as the lightning overhead. “You risked getting caught in the storm to make sure I was all right? Why?”

“Because I love you.”

The words came out of her mouth with no warning from her head. No taking them back.

She didn’t want to take them back.

For better or for worse, she’d declared herself.

She waited.

No words echoing hers filled the air around her.

THIRTY-FIVE

Deborah stared up at Phineas. His face was inches from hers. His rain-soaked hair hung in his eyes, making him look like a little boy who needed a haircut. The emotion in his eyes did not belong to a little boy. The thought caused a hitch in her already-ragged breathing. Despite the rain on her skin, heat coursed through her. Phineas had the look of a man not sure he could contain himself.

They faced each other, on their knees, the deluge of water pelting them, soaking them to the skin, tree branches bending and dancing overhead. Deborah didn’t care about the rain or the lightning or the thunder. She didn’t care about escaped prisoners with rifles or what was right or wrong. This moment belonged to Phineas and to her. This was their moment, their showdown.

Take it or leave it.

“I said I love you.”

“I heard you.” The edge in his voice could’ve cut glass. “I’m not deaf.”

“That’s it? I heard you?”

“We need to get to the store before Joe finds us.” He pushed back from the scant protection of the tree. Rain pelted his face.
He halted, the raindrops running in rivulets over his scarred face. “I can’t . . . You don’t . . . How could you?”

“I do.”

He turned and stared at her, his lips twisted in a strange, sardonic smile.

Deborah refused to look away. She stared back at the man who stood before her, his need and his aloneness naked on his face. She fisted her hands and clutched them against her sodden dress. He had to take the next step. He had to take the chance. He had to trust that she would not reject his touch or his love. They would never have anything unless he believed she wanted him exactly as he was. She leaned back on her haunches, her dress twisted and muddy around her, and waited. He would have to come the distance to her.

His gaze faltered and fell to his scraped, bloody hands resting on the knees of his torn, wet pants.

Nee, come on, Phineas, come on. Don’t run away. Don’t hide. You can do this. Trust me. Please trust me. Gott, please let him trust me.

His gaze came up and met hers again. His hand crept out and touched her fist with one hesitant finger. Her throat tight with tears she would never let him see, Deborah opened her hand so his fingers could wrap around hers. She swallowed, afraid to breathe, afraid any sudden movement would frighten him away, like a wounded creature who didn’t trust his would-be rescuer.

His gaze traveled from their clasped hands to her face again. With his free hand, he reached out. His fingers, their skin the rough texture of a working man’s, touched her cheek. She leaned into his touch, never taking her gaze from his face.

Please.

Phineas leaned forward. Deborah couldn’t restrain herself
then. She stretched to meet him. His gaze begged her to reassure him. She managed a quick jerk of a nod.

His Adam’s apple bobbed and his ragged breath caught. Deborah tightened her grip on his fingers and willed him to understand.

Phineas closed his eyes and lowered his head until his lips met hers. They were soft, so soft and tentative, and warm, despite the cold rain. After one or two fleeting seconds, he groaned and tried to jerk away. Deborah threw her arms around his neck and held him close, forcing him to remain within this tight circle she’d created for the two of them. She felt his heart pounding in his chest under his soaking-wet shirt, pounding so hard she feared it would burst through his skin and collide with hers.

She drew away a fraction and turned so she could whisper in his misshapen ear, “Open your eyes.”

“Nee.”

“Open your eyes and look at me.”

“If I do, I’ll find out this is only a dream.” A clap of thunder almost drowned the hoarse words. “I’ve dreamed this a hundred times and it’s never been real.”

“It’s not a dream. This time it’s real. I’m real. Open your eyes.”

He did as she demanded. The firestorm of emotion in his eyes was almost too much for Deborah to bear. She raised both her hands, letting them stop just short of touching his face. She waited. A battle waged in his eyes. Still, she waited. The decision belonged to him. His gaze dropped, but he nodded.

“You are beautiful to me,” she whispered as she let her hands travel the rest of that short distance to his face. She touched the scars and let her fingers brush his bruised cheeks in soft, gentle strokes. He held still, his gaze never leaving hers. She bestowed
tiny kisses on his swollen lips, his cheeks, forehead, and his crooked nose. “So beautiful.”

A sound like a half laugh, half sob brushed against her. His arms tightened around her waist and pulled her to his chest. “Because that’s what a Plain man wants to hear.”

She laughed, a wet hiccup of a sound. “You know what I mean. You’re perfect in my eyes.”

“Lying is a sin.”

She tried to pull away. His arms were like a steel band, holding her in the exact place she longed to be. “I don’t kiss a man and then lie to him.”

“It’s dark, we’re in the middle of storm. You’ve been through a terrible ordeal—”

“And you think I’ll change my mind on a sunny day when I can see you better? You forget that day at the beach? I loved you then. That day at the lake? I loved you then. That day sitting on the curb in town? I loved you then.” She pushed back just enough so she could look him in the eye. “Most days the sun shines on us and I see you. I love what I see.”

“How could you?” His whisper ached with wonder and near despair. “You’re just out of your mind with fear.”

“Is this the kiss of someone out of her mind from fear?”

This time
she
kissed him. She let him feel all the pent-up emotions of months of drought and uncertainty and loneliness. She let him see the future she wanted. The future that included no other man but him.

His response spoke of the longing of a man who had waited for a woman to love him as she did. To see him for who he was. To see through the damaged hulk of an exterior to a man who wanted only to be loved and to love.

The kiss lasted so long, Deborah thought she might collapse onto the muddy earth, but she didn’t care. Should she fall, Phineas would catch her.

He pulled away first. “I love you.”

Finally. Three words. The three most beautiful words one person could say to another. She cleared her throat. “I’m glad we’ve finally managed to sort all that out. I love you. You love me.”

“I’ve waited so long . . .” He had the shell-shocked look of a man still trying to figure out how he’d arrived at this moment. Then he nodded, his smile still tentative. “You’re sure?”

“Phineas.”

“No going back.”

“I don’t want to go back. Ever.”

He stood and pulled her to her feet. “We need to get to the store now. After this is over, I’ll talk to Leroy.”

She slid her arm around him and they left the shelter of the trees. The rain had eased a little, but it still soaked them. It didn’t matter. “Tell him we don’t want to wait.”

“I’ll tell him we have a life to live.”

“Together.”

“Together. Right here in Bee County.”

Phineas made it a statement, not a question. Deborah knew then that he trusted her to love him exactly as he was physically, but also who he was as a man. A beekeeper who worked the land in this place, this beautiful place, made so by a God who created it, who loved it, and who inspired those who lived in it.

“It’s a beautiful place to raise a—”

Barking interrupted her words. Butch bounded across the field and hurled himself at her.

“You made it, you brave, silly dog. You made it!” She sank to
the ground and embraced a wet, muddy, stinky dog who came at her so hard he knocked her back. He proceeded to lick her face from forehead to chin. “Butch! Butch! Kiss Phineas, he’s happy to see you too. Butch, go on.”

Phineas knelt and tugged the dog back. Butch showered him with kisses for a few seconds but then returned to Deborah as if he hadn’t finished the job with her. Laughing, Phineas tugged Deborah back into a sitting position. She leaned into him, breathless with laughter. “I don’t know, Butch seems to be staking his claim as well.”

“Nee, it’s my job to kiss you and no one else’s from this day forward. Starting right now.”

He proceeded to make good on that promise.

EPILOGUE

Smoothing the cotton of his best church shirt with shaking fingers, Phineas heaved a breath and tried to concentrate. If Leroy’s sermon over the first few verses of Genesis lasted much longer, he might keel over or throw up. The few bites of pancake he’d managed to eat for breakfast had swollen like balloons in his gut. His throat felt tight. Each breath he heaved made his chest ache. In a few minutes, he would stand and walk forward in front of every member of his district and all the visitors who’d gathered in his daed’s house to help celebrate this special moment. He would make Deborah Lantz his fraa. A few short months ago he would never have thought such a thing possible.

Gott
is
good.

So much better than Phineas deserved. Grace poured out on him, wave upon wave, like the mighty waters of the Gulf. The thought conjured up the smell of sea salt on a wet breeze. It came and went, overpowered by the sweet scent of bread and cake baking. His body relaxed and the anxiety ebbed like the tide on his beloved beach.

Deborah
loves
me.

Gott
is
good.

Much as he appreciated the kindness and joy of all the folks who’d come together to celebrate this special day, Phineas would’ve been much happier to be alone in this room with his bride and the bishop. To speak the words to Deborah and Deborah alone. This binding of two hearts involved the two of them.

Nee. Deborah deserved a public declaration of his love. Before God and family. He leaned forward to catch a glimpse of her seated between Frannie and her good friend Josie, who’d traveled all the way from Tennessee to serve as Deborah’s witness. The three had been inseparable for the last week, and he suspected a great deal of unsolicited advice had been dispensed by the two, who had become fast friends the second they stepped from their prospective vans. His bride-to-be looked beautiful in the blue wedding dress she’d finished stitching only the day before. But she always looked beautiful to him. Dressed in rags, she’d be the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen.

Her gaze caught his and she smiled. Her smile spoke the words he longed to hear.
Don’t worry. I won’t change my mind.
Even with all these folks surrounding them, they were alone in the room. She loved him. Just as he was. Scars and surliness and all. Deborah loved him. This plain-spoken woman who never backed away from an argument, who loved to probe his pain until she smoothed it away. No subject was taboo. No thought too scary to voice.

Gott had brought to Phineas the one woman in the world who could find beauty in his body and heal a pain that had nothing to do with injuries suffered long ago. Daed had been right all along. Gott knew what He was doing.

It had taken Phineas all of the past six weeks to get used to this
new reality and still he awoke each day to find himself speechless with the joy of it. Much had happened since that storm. Two Texas Rangers had found Joe—also known as Raymond Southerland—hiding in an abandoned barn about five miles from Beeville. He’d taken shelter there with Leroy’s horse and wagon. They found him curled up in some old hay, fast asleep, a nasty dog bite on one leg.

The sheriff had come out to the store to tell them and left, shaking his head at their decision not to press charges. Leroy had been clear. The man was forgiven, but that didn’t mean he shouldn’t go back to prison. The sheriff said Southerland’s sentence would be increased for his assault on the guard and subsequent escape.

Phineas had no problem with that. It had taken time for his wounds to heal and yet another scar graced his arm as a result of the gunshot, but what was one more? He and Deborah had survived. Not only survived, but found each other once and for all amid the chaos. The broken ribs, bruises, and cuts were long gone and nearly forgotten in the preparations for marriage and the company that flooded their tiny community for the wedding.

In the meantime, Daed and Abigail had taken to courting and pretending not to do so. They weren’t fooling anybody. One evening Esther and Adam had seen Stephen in his buggy with Ruth Anne Glick at his side. That news had made Daed and Abigail smile at each other, something they did quite often now. In a few days, Phineas and Deborah would help her mudder and the other kinner move into Phineas’s—and Deborah’s—house.