LITMIR.BIZ

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from the hayloft in a drunken stupor?

      No! She wasn’t going to think about that awful moment again, a moment when only her faith had kept her from giving in to panic. The certainty that God would hold her up through the horrible days ahead had allowed her to move like a sleepwalker through the following month. Her son and the discovery she was pregnant again had pulled her back into life. Her kinder needed her, and she wouldn’t let them down any longer. It was important that nobody know the truth about Lloyd, because she didn’t want people watching Sammy, looking for signs that he was like his daed.

      “I know Rose’s death must be extra hard for you,” Joshua murmured beneath the steady thump of rain on his umbrella, “because it’s been barely half a year since you buried Lloyd. My Matilda has been gone for more than four years, and the grief hasn’t lessened. I’ve simply become accustomed to it, but the grief is still new for you.”

      She didn’t answer.

      He glanced down at her, his brown eyes shadowed, but his voice filled with compassion. “I know how much I miss Lloyd. He was my best friend from our first day of school. But nothing compares with losing a spouse, especially a gut man like Lloyd Burkholder.”

      “That’s true.” But, for her, mourning was not sad in the way Joshua described his own.

      Lloyd Burkholder had been a gut man...when he’d been sober. As he had never been drunk beyond their home, nobody knew about how a gut man became a cruel man as alcohol claimed him. The teasing about how she was clumsy, the excuse she gave for the bruises and her broken finger, hurt almost as much as his fist had.

      She put her hand over her distended belly. Lloyd would never be able to endanger their second kind as he had his first. Now she wouldn’t have to worry about doing everything she could to avoid inciting his rage, which he’d, more than once, aimed at their unborn kind the last time she was pregnant. Before Sammy was born, she’d been fearful Lloyd’s blows might have damaged their boppli. God had heard her desperate prayers because Sammy was perfect when he was born, and he was growing quickly and talking nonstop.

      Joshua started to say more, then closed his mouth. She understood. Too many sad memories stood between them, but there were gut ones, as well. She couldn’t deny that. On the days when Lloyd hadn’t been drunk, he had often taken her to visit Joshua and Matilda. Those summery Sunday afternoons spent on the porch of Joshua and Matilda’s comfortable white house while they’d enjoyed iced tea had been wunderbaar. They had ended when Matilda became ill and was diagnosed with brain cancer.

      A handful of gray buggies remained by the cemetery’s gate. The horses had their heads down as rain pelted them, and Rebekah guessed they were as eager to return to their dry stalls and a gut rubdown as Dolly, her black buggy horse, was.

      “Mamm!” Sammy’s squeal of delight sounded out of place in the cemetery.

      She whirled to see him running toward them. Every possible inch of him was wet, and his clothes were covered with mud. Laughter bubbled up from deep inside her. She struggled to keep it from bursting out.

      When she felt Joshua shake beside her, she discovered he was trying to restrain his own amusement. She looked quickly away. If their gazes met, even for a second, she might not be able to control her laughter.

      “Whoa!” Joshua said, stretching out a long arm to keep Sammy from throwing himself against Rebekah. “You don’t want to get your mamm dirty, do you?”

      “Dirty?” the toddler asked, puzzled.

      Deborah came to a stop right behind Sammy. “I tried to stop him.” Her eyes filled with tears again. “But he jumped into the puddle before I could.”

      Rebekah pulled a cloth out from beneath her cape. She’d pinned it there for an emergency like this. Wiping her son’s face, she gave the little girl a consoling smile. “Don’t worry. He does this sort of thing a lot. I hope he didn’t splash mud on you.”

      “He missed me.” The girl’s smile returned. “I learned how to move fast from being around Aenti Ruth’s kinder. I wish I could have been fast enough to keep him from jumping in the puddle in the first place.”

      “No one is faster than a boy who wants to play in the water.” Joshua surprised her by winking at Sammy. “Isn’t that right?”

      Her son’s smile vanished, and he edged closer to Rebekah. He kept her between Joshua and himself. Her yearning to laugh disappeared. Her son didn’t trust any man, and he had gut reason not to. His daed, the man he should have been able to trust most, could change from a jovial man to a brutal beast for no reason a toddler could comprehend.

      “Let’s get you in the buggy.” Joshua’s voice was strained, and his dark brown eyes narrowed as he clearly tried to understand why Sammy would shy away from him in such obvious fear.

      She wished she could explain, but she didn’t want to add to Joshua’s grief by telling him the truth about the man her husband truly had been.

      “Hold this,” he said as he ducked from under the umbrella. Motioning for his daughter to take Sammy’s hand again, he led them around the buggy. Rain struck him, but he paid no attention. He opened the door on the passenger side. “You probably want to put something on the seat to protect the fabric.”

      “Danki, Joshua. That’s a gut idea.” She stretched forward to spread the dirty cloth on the seat. She shouldn’t be surprised that he was concerned about the buggy, because he worked repairing and making buggies not far from his home in Paradise Springs. She stepped back while Joshua swung her son up into the carriage. If he noticed how Sammy stiffened, he didn’t say anything.

      Once Sammy was perched on the seat with his two fingers firmly in his mouth, Joshua drew the passenger side door closed and made sure it was latched so her son couldn’t open it and tumble out. He took his daughter’s hand before they came back to stand beside her.

      Rebekah raised the umbrella to keep the rain off them. When he grasped the handle, she relinquished it to him, proud that she had managed not to shrink away. He smiled tautly, then offered his hand to assist her into the buggy.

      “Be careful,” he warned as if she were no older than her son. “The step up is slick, and you don’t want to end up as muddy as Samuel.”

      “You’re right.” She appreciated his attempt to lighten her spirits as much as she did his offer.

      Placing her hand on his palm, she bit her lower lip as his broad fingers closed over it. She’d expected his hands to be as chilled as hers, but they weren’t. Warmth seeped past the thick wall she’d raised to keep others from discovering what a fool she’d been to marry Lloyd Burkholder.

      Quickly she climbed into the buggy. Joshua didn’t hold her hand longer than was proper. Yet the gentle heat of his touch remained, a reminder of how much she’d distanced herself from everyone else in their community.

      “Danki, Joshua.” She lowered her eyes, which were oddly almost even with his as she sat on the buggy seat. “I keep saying that, but I’m truly grateful for your help.” She smiled at Deborah. “Danki to you, too. You made Sammy giggle, and I appreciate that.”

      “He’s fun,” she said, waving to him before running to another buggy farther along the fence.

      “We’ll see you back at Mamm’s house,” Joshua said as he unlashed the reins and handed them to her.

      She didn’t say anything one way or the other. She could use her muddy son as an excuse not to spend the afternoon with the other mourners, but she didn’t want to be false with Joshua, who had always treated her with respect and goodness. Letting him think she’d be there wasn’t right, either. She stayed silent.

      “Drive carefully,” he added before he took a step back.

      Unexpected tears swelled in her eyes, and she closed the door on her side. When they were first married, Lloyd had said that to her whenever she left the farm. He’d stopped before the end of their second month as man and wife. Like so much

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