The Heirloom Brides Collection (21 page)

It meant that meals were humble, but no one minded. It wasn’t delicate food they all missed. It was the man who had once sat at the head of the table. The man who had walked these woods and this garden. How Wren missed her father. She missed his deep laugh, his Londoner accent, and the way the whole world felt safe because he was in it.

Her hands stilling in their work, Wren clutched the edge of the workbench when she was hit afresh with the memory of gathering bulbs with her father. A naturalist from the first day he’d toddled through his mother’s English garden, he always loved working with the soil and what grew from it. He had cultivated everything from remedies to vegetables. For that which grew wild, he set out, walking stick in hand. Wren would trail along, swinging an empty burlap sack even as they chattered about what they might discover. One of his favorites—American ginseng.

It had been his specialty and the very reason he’d landed in the Appalachians where they cut through eastern Virginia. To carve out a humble life far from the grandeur he was raised with. Straying from the expectations of his prestigious upbringing, he’d married Mama, a barefoot mountain woman. And never went back. Years later, Wren had knelt beside him, learning all she could even as Mama did the same.

Some seeds and roots he collected himself. Others he had brought with him from the south of England or purchased through other botanists. Never would Wren forget the time he’d planted hundreds of heirloom pansy seeds all over the front yard, right up to the door, in honor of Mama’s birthday. One of his most prized varieties, he’d saved them for years, and though Wren had only been a wee thing, she’d known no gift could hold more value as he slipped them into the earth a few weeks prior to the special day. Wren had been his ally in the secret scheme. For days, she crouched in the yard, watching the earth—awaiting the little shoots that would one day blossom into Mama’s surprise.

The shoots took a week or two, and the buds didn’t bloom on her birthday as Papa had hoped. No. They began to open two days before. His wife just stood there, making a fuss over the blossoms, pretending to be stunned. White, purple, yellow, and burgundy glinted everywhere one looked—like magic. With mischief in her eyes, Mama confessed she hadn’t noticed them growing. Papa had laughed and swung Wren up in her arms. They’d done a little dance among the pansies, and with his arms outstretched and Mama’s belly blooming with two babies at once, they’d turned in a slow circle. It was the best birthday party Wren had ever known.

Tears pricked her eyes from the memory as she toted the pot of bulbs around to the front of the house and crouched in the shadow of her favorite dogwood. With some effort, she buried all the bulbs, then patted each little mound of soil with her spade. She was just wiping her fingers on her apron when something dipping in the sky drew her attention. Wren sat back on her heals, realizing it was a hawk. The great bird swooped along the sky that was tinting the softest shade of pink—like a baby’s blush. With her hair pulled back loosely, several wisps tickled her cheek in the rising breeze. Wren brushed them away.

Mama toted her sewing basket up to the house and slipped inside, no doubt to start supper. Tate would be awake soon, if he wasn’t already. Knowing his dressing would need to be changed, Wren nearly took a step in that direction. But she paused, thinking perhaps it would be best—easier—if Mama tended to him from here on out. Though her heart pulled her toward him more strongly than she wanted to admit, Wren made herself linger in the yard. She stood fast and still, watching the mountains with their smoky grays and purples promising sunset. Then she lowered her gaze to the garden and wished the state of her heart could be labeled as easily as the thin sticks she’d plucked from each pot of soil.

Though chilled without the sun’s warmth, she stood fast because she feared it would be better to shiver in this spot than to sit beside Tate just now. His nearness, the very thing she’d yearned for all those years.
Still
yearned for. She’d been reckless with her heart the first time. And though it pained her, she was determined to be wiser.

When three knocks sounded on the wood below, Tate lowered the boot he was oiling and peered over to the opening in the loft. “Uh… come in?”

Mrs. Cromwell appeared. Her hair was done up just like Wren’s, except wisps of gray tinted what she had swept back and pinned.

“Hello, Mrs. Cromwell.” Finished with his second boot, Tate set it on the floor beside the other, then the rag as well.

“I have your things. Freshly mended.”

He shifted his hips farther back on the bed. She made quick work of unfolding the shirt, which she handed to him. Gaze falling, she cleared her throat a little and fiddled with the odds and ends in her basket.

Tate slid into the shirt and buttoned it up. “Thank you.”

When she looked at him, her smile was warm. “My pleasure. I’m sorry you woke to find it missing.” She slipped him a kind wink. “I’ve come to check your bandage again. It should only take a few minutes.” Stepping away, she nudged the curtains farther apart, letting in more light.

Tate squinted.

“How did you sleep?”

“Good. But I’m kinda tired of lying here.”

“Well, you’ll just have to be tired of it for a while yet. Wait. What are you doing?”

Having risen, Tate steadied himself on the edge of the bed when his head went light. Fortunately, his legs felt less like jelly than he’d expected. “Oh, I thought I’d go fetch some water from the well. Then maybe chop a cord or two of wood.”

Alarm filled her voice. “Truly?”

He chuckled as he went to go sit on the windowsill. She tossed a hand at him, but laughed herself.

Settling down on the cushioned seat felt good. The bed was awfully comfortable, but after spending a handful of days in it, he was more than a little stiff in the joints. Kicking one leg out, Tate leaned against the wall and savored the coolness of the wood and the way it filtered through his shirt. Part of him wanted to close his eyes because he was still that tired. But with Mrs. Cromwell here, he was glad for a reason to stay awake. If he slept too much, he’d grow soft altogether.

She brought over her basket and removed a fresh bandage roll. Next, she took advantage of his unbuttoned cuff by rolling it back to his elbow. Tate did everything he could to hold still for her.

Her face was gently lit by the pink sky glowing through the window. A pensive slant to her brow made him wonder if she hadn’t come up for something more pressing than herbs and strips of torn linen.

“It’s healing nicely.” She tipped her head to the side and studied the cut as she unwound the bandage. “The infection is all but gone.”

He could see how pleased she was by that.

“All thanks to you and Wren. I could have used your help a great many times over the last few years.”

“Are you saying this wasn’t your first run-in with a fish hook?”

He chuckled. “No. That was the only fish hook. But there were other accidents, and most of them were the same kind of lousy timing.” He showed her the thin scar on the side of his neck and relayed the story of how a piece of rigging had come loose while he was hoisting sails. He’d walked away fine enough, but her eyes were still wide when he finished the story.

“And what of this one?” Using her littlest finger, she pointed to the small scar living on his palm, just at the base of his thumb.

Spreading his hand, Tate studied the thin line a moment. “This one…” Other memories swelled to the front of his mind. “This one was on purpose.”

“On
purpose
?”

“It’s quite a tale.” Probably a fool-headed one.

Still beside him, she drew a bowl of water near and began to flush his wound, rinsing away the herbs. Finally, she peered over at him as if waiting to hear the story. When Tate hesitated, she lowered her head, urging him on.

“I promise not to interrupt,” she said.

“That’s Wren’s job, isn’t it?”

Mrs. Cromwell’s eyes crinkled, for they both knew that one couldn’t tell Wren a story without her interjecting something at least a dozen times.

“All right, then.” But uncertain of how to explain the scar, Tate searched for where to begin. “Are you familiar with Norse mythology?”

She scrunched her nose. “Not entirely.”

“It’s sort of their legends. Or folklore.” Stories he had learned at sea when spoken words were the only thing to chase away the bleakness of black, frost-covered nights. “As the tales go, there was supposedly a great battle between two enemies. Warriors. A Norwegian and a Swede.” He peered over at her to see if she was following that.

“Two warriors—two different lands.”

He dipped his head in a nod. “So as the story goes, this Norwegian by the name of Örvar-Oddr had fewer ships than his Swedish rival, Hjalmar.” Tate scratched the back of his head, wondering if Wren’s mother really wanted to hear all this. “But Hjalmar, too proud to have the upper hand that way, well, he sent some of his ships away, equaling the balance. I don’t know, maybe he didn’t feel like a man if he had an unfair advantage.”

She smeared a pale green salve onto his skin, then unraveled a length of bandage, her gray eyes fixed on his face.

“So as it’s told, the two warriors fought for days. It must have been quite a fray. Lots of blood-spilling, which I’ll spare you.” His arm growing tired, he was relieved when she lowered it to his lap. “But the moral of the story is that finally, realizing that they were equals, the two men took an oath. Formed a bond. They became not only friends but blood brothers.” As if holding an invisible blade, Tate made a small swipe across that side of his palm. He looked down at his scar when Mrs. Cromwell did.

“Blood brothers?” Slowly, she added, “So this is a true story as well.”

He nodded.

She eased the tip of her finger against this skin where the blade had pierced by his own will. “And you and the other man… were enemies?”

He nodded again. “A Norwegian fella who was born in the States. Not too far from here, actually. Maybe we had too much in common. I don’t know. But I wanted to wring his neck. He probably felt the same.”

“What made you dislike him so?”

Tate fell quiet a moment, not sure how much he should relay. While he was certain Wren’s mother knew more about the ways of men than her daughter, it still felt improper to color in any kind of picture. “Let’s just say that he wasn’t the most moral person.”

“And you hated him for that.”

Tate tipped his head to the side. “I wouldn’t say that I hated him. I was angered by him. The way he treated others in his past. Then hid from it. Not all men go to sea because they are brave.” He glanced sideways at her. “Some are there because they’re cowards.”

She set her mouth, eyes searching the ground beside her small black boots. “Yet you befriended him?”

“Strangely, yes. I saved his life once.” Brow furrowed, he shifted himself so she could more easily knot the bandage. “Awhile later, I suppose you could say that he saved mine. It was then that we knew it was time to call a truce.”

Her smile was soft. “And you became friends.”

Tate nodded. “There’s more to it than that.” In all honesty, he didn’t really care to burden her with any of this, but it was an easy way for her to know where he’d been the last four years since he’d left them with no word of his whereabouts. “It came to the point that it was time for us to stop wanting to kill each other and realize that who we were both angry with was ourselves. That there were things that we both needed to turn around and face.” Tate glanced over at Wren’s mother. “It seems trite to use a ship analogy—but we were each like a vessel without a sail. Because of that, I think we spurred each other on. First in the wrong ways and then in the right ways.”

Feeling the pain of the scar afresh, Tate smeared his hands together. He missed the sea. Missed Timothy. And now he missed his Norwegian brother.

But he remembered the promises they’d made when sealing their brotherhood. The one that sent his friend back home and Tate back across an ocean to return to the place where he’d left his heart. “Mrs. Cromwell?”

“Yes.” Glassy eyes searched his own.

“I missed her. I missed Wren terribly.”

She slipped her bottom lip between her teeth and slid her gaze away. He watched her swallow once and then again. He wondered how much heartache he’d put upon them with his leaving the way he had.

Finally, she looked back at him. “Have you told her?”

“I don’t know that I’ve done the best job of it. I think she may be unhappy with me.”

Mrs. Cromwell glanced toward the window where the last traces of day were nearly gone. The collar of her white blouse was tinted gray—as was her skin in the failing light. Someone ought to light a candle, but neither of them moved.

“Sometimes we’re separated—even from those we love. At times, it’s not by choice.” Her voice was heavy with sorrow, and he could only imagine that she was thinking of the doctor. “Other times, it is by choice.” Her eyes found his. “Each one brings a different kind of pain.”

Getting his mouth to move proved difficult, so he simply nodded.

She patted his hand, then slipped her own into her lap. “But I know why you left. At least, I believe I do.”