The Heirloom Brides Collection (52 page)

How could she have been so gullible? Still? Had she not learned anything about men in the past four years?

Zachary had left the boardinghouse that morning in a disrespectful huff because he didn’t get his way. She had to have been wearing blinders to think she’d seen a future in what they’d once shared. A kiss. A touch. Mere physical attraction. Well, his flattery might have been enough in her teenage years, but she was no longer the girl who swooned at a man’s notice. She wanted more. Love. Commitment. A relationship that ran deep.

A barrage of images flashed in her memory. Nicolas. The contentment on his face watching her play checkers with his girls. Sitting across the supper table from him. Waking up in the rocker to the sound of his voice. Seeing him outside walking toward the stoop. He’d endeared himself to her with his quick wit, grace in the shadow of sorrow, strength in the midst of pain, tenderness toward his dear daughters, and attentiveness to her. She’d allowed herself daydreams about the possibility that he could see her as more than his nurse. That he could care for her.

But everything had changed the day her past showed up at the company house with a load of coal. Nicolas apparently knew Zachary’s reputation as a lothario. And because of her association—past and present—with him, Nicolas had decided she wasn’t a suitable companion for his daughters, let alone someone he could ever care for in a romantic sense.

He’d told Jaya and Julia she wasn’t coming back, making it crystal clear he meant to break all ties with her. If they’d had any chance for a deeper relationship, it was gone.

Darla stopped at Golden Avenue to catch her breath. She pulled Hattie’s handkerchief from the pocket in her uniform skirt and blotted her face. After the way she and Hattie had dismissed Zachary that morning, she didn’t expect him to come around anymore. And now she didn’t have to waste any energy pondering how Nicolas felt about her. Saturday, she’d have her chance to retrieve what she’d squirreled away under the parsonage kitchen and put some of her shame where it belonged—in flames.

If only she could still see herself rising out of the ashes like the triumphant phoenix Nicolas had carved.

J
ust after eleven o’clock on Saturday, Darla stood three blocks away, watching the gravel walkway between the church and the parsonage, and pressed the carpetbag of tools to her side. The day of Mrs.

Wahlberg’s luncheon had finally arrived.

Within the hour, she’d have the diary in which she’d recorded her flights of fancy along with the schemes and the lies she told while trying to win Morgan Cutshaw’s heart from Kat Sinclair. Not long after that, she’d recorded her impure feelings and lurid thoughts toward Zachary. She would also hold in her hand the cameo her grandmother had bequeathed her, the heirloom she hoped to wear on her wedding day.

After this week, a wedding day seemed an irrational and distant dream. The only man she could see herself with had fired her.

Movement outside the kitchen door of the church returned Darla’s attention to the present and quickened her pulse. Was she ready? Could she really sneak into someone’s home and take up a floorboard? Someone she’d met and liked. Someone who had invited her in, and offered to show her the place.

She was only reclaiming what was hers.

Ida’s husband stepped out of the shadows and walked to the house. It wasn’t time yet. Darla drew in a deep breath, willing herself to calm down.

Three long days had passed since she’d last seen Nicolas, Jocelyn, Jaya, or Julia. Sitting in the rocker at his bedside that night, she’d actually wondered if maybe God had brought her back to Cripple Creek to find true love with Nicolas. Apparently not.

Ten minutes later, Reverend Raines strolled the gravel walkway past Mother’s roses and out to the street with Ida at his side, pushing a red pram. Darla moved closer to the church property, watching the parson and his wife walk down First Street with their baby son. Satisfied they were well on their way to the luncheon and no one was watching her, she took quick steps across the side yard and onto the porch.

She pressed her shaking hand to the knob. She hadn’t thought about what she’d do if the door wasn’t open. Aunt Cora and her neighbors in Philadelphia had started locking up their homes. But the knob turned freely, and she pushed the door open. Fortunately, the folks in Cripple Creek hadn’t yet adopted the habit.

Darla hurried inside and clicked the door shut behind her. She thought to indulge herself with a quick look at the parlor and the other rooms she’d occupied most of her growing-up years, but not knowing how long her task would require, she didn’t dare take the time. This was her chance to seize her past and put it behind her.

The entryway led to the dining room, past the furniture her father didn’t want to haul to New York. The walls in the small kitchen wore a new coat of pale yellow paint. But it was the flooring that captured her attention. The new parson and his wife hadn’t given in to the linoleum craze. Not only had the door not been locked and the flooring unchanged, but the board she’d buried her diary and the pendant under was still free of furniture.

A mixed sense of reverence and fear fueled her steps toward the corner between the sideboard and the wall. Kneeling in the corner, she pulled the claw hammer and the pry bar out of her bag. Hopefully, she wouldn’t need the latter. She bent over the board with the claw hammer and started to lift.

“Stop where you are!”

Jerking around, Darla dropped the hammer and raised her hands like the hooligans did in dime novels. “Ida.”

Her boss’s sister-in-law stood near the icebox, brandishing a closed parasol as if it were a cudgel. “You’re the one making all that noise?”

Darla nodded, searching for any words that could adequately explain her actions.

“I’d forgotten to get this.” Ida lowered the parasol to her side but didn’t take her gaze from Darla. “I heard strange sounds but didn’t, for the life of me, expect to find someone squatting in the corner of my kitchen.”

“I’m sorry.” Darla stood, smoothing her gray walking skirt. “I didn’t mean to—”

“I said you could come by for a look at the place, but…” Ida glanced from the bag on the floor to the hammer and the cockeyed board. “What are you doing?”

“When my family lived here, just days before I went to live in Philadelphia, I hid two things under a floorboard.” Darla pointed to the corner. “I didn’t think about my family one day moving out of the parsonage.”

“When we met the other day, why didn’t you tell me about this? I would’ve given you permission.”

“I should’ve, but—”

“I would’ve been nosey.” A smile warmed Ida’s blue eyes.

Darla released a sigh of relief. “It’s my diary and a cameo pendant my grandmother gave me.”

“Those are personal items. No wonder you kept quiet.” Ida walked over to the corner. “Did you find them?”

“Not yet. I was just starting to pull up the board. It seems there might be new nails in it.”

Ida knelt on the floor in her luncheon gown and set the parasol down. “We’d better see to it, then.” She picked up the pry bar and caught a corner of the board, enough for Darla to get under it with the hammer. The nails slowly surrendered, and the board peeled back.

Darla drew in a deep breath and reached down into the darkness. Nothing but dirt and cobwebs. “They’re not here.” She wiped the webs on her skirt.

Groaning, Ida bent over the hole. “This is where you buried them?”

“I’m sure of it.”

Ida shrugged. “I suppose my husband might know something about it.”

Darla’s stomach clenched.

“I’ll ask him. Another time.” Ida stood and glanced up at the wall clock. “Right now, I’d best go before he comes looking for me. I left him and the baby at the corner.”

“Mrs. Wahlberg will never let you hear the end of it if you’re late for her luncheon.”

“You know her well.” Nodding, Ida pulled her parasol from the floor. “You’ll fix the board before you leave?”

“Yes. And thank you.” Darla rose to her feet and gave Ida a hug before the gracious woman dashed out of the kitchen.

Darla sank to her knees. Now what?

Hattie believed God had a part in bringing her back to Cripple Creek. If that was the case, His plan didn’t coincide in the least with hers.

T
en days without having seen Darla Taggart had proven to be a challenge. Now it was day eleven. Friday. Nicolas glanced up at the wall clock, counting pencil taps. Twenty taps in the last ten seconds.

The replacement nurse looked up, her pencil pausing in midair. “Dr. Cutshaw is pleased with your progress, Mr. Zanzucchi.” She perched on the rocker, her sturdy black shoes barely touching the linoleum. “Now that the majority of the scabbing is gone, so is the risk of infection.”

Nodding, Nicolas couldn’t help but be distracted by the wrinkles in the woman’s faded white uniform. Mrs. Alexander had visited three times in the past nine days. She wasn’t sweet by any stretch of his imagination, but neither was she severe. Competent enough but not very engaging. And she’d made it clear the first day that she wasn’t there to visit with his girls.

She wasn’t someone Julia would mistake for an angel.

She wasn’t Darla.

That shouldn’t surprise him. He’d never met a woman like Darla. And he’d had the privilege of glimpsing the before and after. The impudent teenager who couldn’t wait to leave the Gulch and the compassionate grown woman who played checkers, noticed his carvings, and looked as if she belonged in the rocking chair snuggled beneath the patchwork quilt.

The woman he’d pushed away.

Mrs. Alexander’s all-too-familiar throat clearing dragged his gaze to the permanent frown on her face. “From the looks of things”—she glanced from his shirt collar to his pull-on boots—“it seems you’re returning to your daily life.”

“Yes, ma’am.” This was his chance to prove that he no longer required her services. “I’ve been up and about doing light chores every day for the past week.” He glanced at the kitchen table, where the girls were seeing to their studies. “We all walked to the school yesterday.” Julia looked up, giving him a missing-tooth smile. “And come Sunday, we’ll be going back to church.”

Still smiling, his youngest daughter nodded.

“Very well.” Mrs. Alexander added notes to her paperwork. “Then it’s only a matter of days before you can resume your full duties in the mine.”

He squirmed on his spindle chair, straightening his legs, then bending them again. For six weeks, he’d been incapable of doing any more than lie around and need care. He was more than ready to resume his role as a healthy father and neighbor. But was he ready to return to the mine? The darkness, the heat, the constant danger?

Could he return?

The pencil tapping resumed, a miniature steam drill pounding at his temples. He’d only taken the job at the mine because, at the time, it was work readily available to Italian immigrants and he had a family and another baby on the way.

“Did you hear me, Mr. Zanzucchi?”

Nicolas straightened and pressed his shoes to the floor. “I apologize. I seem to have much on my mind distracting me, ma’am.”

“Indeed.” She sighed, her slate-gray eyes narrowing. “It might put your mind at ease to know that you’ll soon be earning your full wage again. I’m signing off on your rehabilitation.” She scribbled what he guessed was her signature, then looked up at him. “I expect Dr. Cutshaw will clear you to return to work on Thursday.”

“This coming Thursday?” He had only five more days aboveground?

“Yes. I will send notification to Mr. Gortner at the mine.” She gripped the chair arm and pushed herself into a standing position. “If you’ll excuse me, I’ll take my leave.”

“Of course.” He followed her to the door and held it open for her. “Thank you. Please pass my greetings on to Henri.”

Mrs. Alexander glanced back at the table where the girls watched with wide eyes. “The best of luck to you and your family.”

Luck had nothing to do with it. He stood on the stoop enjoying a breath of fresh air, watching his replacement nurse walk out to the road. It had been God’s grace that had seen him and his girls through losing Maria, the accident at the mine, the infection… all of it. And it would only be the grace of God that could power his next steps.

Nicolas turned toward the sound of wheels grinding the rocky spring soil. The coal wagon rolled toward his house with Zach in the driver’s seat.

Zach brought the horses to a stop in front of him and glanced up the road at Mrs. Alexander. “Your new nurse?” He swung out of the seat and down the wheel.

“She was.”

Letting out a low whistle, Zach lifted the wheelbarrow from its hooks. “Your decision? Or Darla’s?”

“And why is that your concern?”

“Because we’re friends,” Zach said.

Nicolas watched him unload a few shovels full of coal into the barrow. “My decision.”

Zach shook his head. “Then you’re not as smart as I thought.”

Something they agreed on. He met Zach at the coal chute and lifted the door with his boot. “You and Darla?”

“After she finished high school, we talked about getting married. Then she moved away.” Zach dumped the load of coal through the chute. “But anything we shared got lost in the growing up. You were right—she’s changed.”

Nobody had to convince Nicolas of that. He’d seen it for himself.

“And given the choice, Zanzucchi, she’d choose you.”

Nicolas chuffed out a breath. He’d sent her away, and she’d left with nary a word.
“Then I’d say it’s settled. I’m no longer needed here.”

He’d never felt so unsettled as he had watching her leave that day. She was needed. He needed her, and not as his nurse. Perhaps it was time he gave her the choice Zach talked about.

When Zach drove off, Nicolas turned back toward the house. All three of his daughters stood on the stoop, their armed crossed.

“We want to talk to you.” Jocelyn and Jaya spoke in chorus.

“And me, too.” A curl danced above Julia’s brown eyes.

Nodding, Nicolas made his way into the sitting room and slid onto the rocker. “I’m listening.”