Courting Emily (A Wells Landing Book 2) Read online

  “Is Elam always that . . . stern?” She tried to pick a word that didn’t sound so negative.

  “I prefer to think of it as thoughtful,” Becky chirped. It was amazing to Emily that Becky was so bubbly while Elam was not.

  “Thoughtful then,” Emily amended.

  Becky shook her head. “Only since the accident.”

  How had she forgotten the terrible accident that had rendered James Riehl practically helpless? Or maybe she had thought in the year since he had been kicked in the head by a cantankerous milk cow that he had somehow become whole again.

  “How is your dat?”

  “The same.” Becky shrugged, though her dancing blue eyes dimmed just a bit. Was her perpetual joy just a front to hide the stresses at home?

  Regret swamped Emily. She had been so caught up in her own problems that she hadn’t given the trials of others a second thought. Her father would be so disappointed if he knew. Just one more thing she needed to pray about. The Amish always cared for their neighbors, always looked after the community. That philosophy went double for a bishop’s daughter. She had fallen down on both accounts.

  Emily bit back a sigh as she turned the buggy into the packed dirt drive that led to the Riehls’ dairy farm. She didn’t know how many cows they kept, but she knew their property stretched almost into the next county. Was Elam taking care of business by himself? There were no other Riehl sons, but surely a cousin or two came around to help from time to time.

  She pulled the horse to a stop. Surely . . .

  “Danki for the ride, Emily. That was sure gut of you.”

  “Gern gschehne,” she replied though her attention was centered on the rambling farmhouse and its peeling paint.

  She hadn’t realized the Riehls had fallen on to such hard times. Did anyone in the district know? She’d have to ask her father about it the minute she got home.

  “Becky,” she started. “Can I stay and help you gather the eggs?” She wasn’t sure where the words came from, but once they were said, she was thankful for them. She had been wallowing in her own problems for far too long.

  “You’d do that?” Becky’s eyes sparkled, then her smile faded. She shook her head. “Danki, Emily. That is a kind offer to be sure, but the chickens are my responsibility.”

  As if they had tarried too long, Elam emerged from the milking barn, a scowl marring his handsome features.

  The thought drew Emily back. Elam was a handsome man, or at least he would be if he didn’t look like he’d taken a big bite from a green persimmon.

  “Becky, time to work.”

  The young girl gave a quick nod, then turned her gaze back to Emily. “Thank you again.”

  “Becky.” Elam propped his hands onto his hips, his impatience evident. “Mamm needs you inside.”

  “Jah, bruder.” She turned as if to go into the house, but not before Emily saw the shine of tears in her blue eyes.

  “Some potatoes for you?”

  “Huh?” Emily turned as her sister Mary nudged her shoulder to get her attention. “Oh, jah. Danki.” She took the bowl from her sister though her thoughts were still on Elam’s stern frown and the glitter of tears in Becky’s eyes.

  “Have you heard from Luke?” Mary leaned close as she handed off the bowl full of mashed potatoes, her voice so soft only Emily could hear. “Jonah Miller said he called his uncle yesterday.”

  At the mention of his name, thoughts of all others fled from her mind. “He did?” It was hard to temper her response to a whisper when she really wanted to shout with glee. Luke had called!

  “Jah.”

  Her heart thumped hard in her chest. “Who told you that? Aaron?”

  “Girls.” Their father glared at them from the head of the table.

  “Jah, Dat,” Emily murmured, passing the potatoes on to her sister Susannah. She’d have to talk with Mary later, after supper, maybe during chore time.

  As the oldest, Emily was expected to oversee her sisters, but surely she and Mary could sneak a minute or two to talk. She had three more sisters, after all.

  Rose was perhaps the most demure and motherlike one of them all, even though at eighteen Mary was two years older. At twelve years old and the baby, Bea hadn’t quite figured out where she fit into the family. Not as gingery as middle child Susannah nor as retiring as Rose and Mary. She was more like Emily than any of the others.

  Excitement filled Emily as she thought of news from Luke. It had been months since he’d left, nearly four to be exact, but this was the first she had heard from him.

  He had promised to call, but she knew how difficult that would be. It wasn’t like he could call the shanty out in front of their house. Her father was as sure to get that message as any one of the Ebersol family. Nor was Luke big on writing letters. He was more into action, living, breathing, having fun.

  But he had called. Emily ducked her head and smiled down at her plate lest her father see the joy she could not contain. Luke had called. He had gotten a message to Jonah Miller. He hadn’t forgotten about her after all.

  Chapter Two

  After supper, it was Mary’s turn to help with the dishes and their mother’s cheese making, while Emily and their other sisters headed out to the barn to help their father.

  The goats they used for their mother’s business had been milked at four-thirty as was their usual custom, but now the horses had to be fed, the stalls mucked out, the few cows they kept for personal use needed to be milked.

  Yet all Emily could think about was Luke.

  “You are very quiet tonight, dochder.” Her father didn’t look up from his milking, but Emily was the only one around.

  Susannah and Rose had gone to see to the stables, while Bea had stayed in with Mary to help their mother. Dat was talking to her.

  “Oh, jah?” She tried her best to sound offhanded and casual, like she wasn’t exploding inside from the gut news about Luke.

  “Not so much at supper though.” Again he didn’t look at her, just kept his head down close to Sadie’s belly.

  His tone made Emily’s heart stop in her throat. She knew she wasn’t going to like what he had to say next. The fact was further confirmed as he grabbed the milk pail and stood. He handed it to Emily and slapped the cow on the rump to send her back to the pasture. Then he replaced his brimless “milking” hat with his regular one and leveled his serious blue gaze to hers. “It does not look good for the bishop’s daughter to be pining after someone who has left our faith.”

  She opened her mouth to protest, but her vatter continued. “Luke Lambright has brought shame onto his family. Onto his community. It’s time to move forward.”

  “But he’ll return.” Even as she said the words, she doubted them. She wanted to believe them. After all, so many who left the Amish quickly came back. It was just a matter of time, was all. Soon Luke would tire of the competition in the Englisch world, the strange customs, and unfamiliar faces. When that happened he would come running back, and she would be there waiting for him.

  Her father’s mouth twisted into a frown above his dark beard. “You don’t know that he will.”

  “You don’t know that he won’t.”

  At her sharp tone, Dat raised one brow, a sign she had gone too far.

  “I’m sorry, Dat. I just—” She stopped as he shook his head.

  “Do I have to remind you that you have already bowed your knees and joined the church?”

  Emily lowered her chin to her chest. “No, Vatter.” Her words were apologetic and humble. But she wanted to remind her dat that Luke hadn’t joined the church. He was not shunned in the community. He could get this out of his system and come back, kneel before everyone, and state his intentions. He could still join the church, and then they could be married, just like they’d always talked about.

  “Hear me.” His voice dropped and the bishop became her father once again.

  Emily raised her gaze to meet his.

  “You are not the only one who has been left wit
h a broken heart. It is an uncomfortable place, but it is where you find yourself now.”

  She blinked back her tears. She would have been better off with his stern frown rather than his caring tone. She didn’t want to cry, she didn’t want Luke to be gone, and she surely didn’t want what she knew was coming next.

  “It is time to move forward. Time to think about someone who has joined the church.”

  It was the very last thing she wanted to do. Yet what choice did she have?

  “I will not tell you who you should consider, but only that you need to leave your heart open for the new.”

  She nodded and sniffed. She would not cry. She would not cry.

  “I do not tell you these things to hurt you.”

  “I know,” she whispered.

  “There’s always Elam Riehl,” her father said. “He seems to be in your thoughts a lot lately.”

  True, he had been on her mind. Or at least his family had. But for no other reason than she had realized someone in her community was suffering and needed help.

  Elam Riehl was about as opposite to Luke as one could imagine. Luke was just a little taller than she was, slim and trim with laughing blue eyes and a permanent smile on his lips. Elam was large, solid looking, taller than most men she knew, and as serious as a wake.

  If she was remembering correctly, Elam was three or four years older than she and Luke, which would put him close to twenty-five. If her father needed to wonder about something, it should be why Elam had never married. Thankfully she managed to keep that question to herself.

  “I’ll give it some thought.” Emily said the words solely to appease her father. What more could she do?

  He gave her a quick nod, then pointed to the milk pail at her feet. “Best get that on in to your mudder.”

  “Jah.” Emily picked up the pail and carted it to the house.

  “Are you asleep?” Mary’s quiet voice floated on the darkness to Emily.

  “Nay.” She hadn’t been able to settle down enough to close her eyes, much less fall asleep. All she could think about was Luke and Elam and Elam and Luke.

  Her father expected a lot to assume that Elam would even want to court her. Not that she would give it any more thought than she already had. But it seemed she was going to have to do something to keep her father from out and out finding her a husband.

  She heard the soft patter of Mary’s bare feet as she padded across the wood floor.

  “Scoot over.” Her sister lifted the covers and slid into the bed beside her.

  In the darkened room, Emily could just make out Mary’s sweet face so like their mother’s. “You should be asleep,” she said even though she was grateful to have her sister near.

  Emily was the only daughter with her own room. Mary shared with Rose while Susannah and Bea occupied the bedroom right across the hall. Still she would miss nights like this when Mary married Aaron Miller, Jonah Miller’s younger brother.

  “So should you.”

  Four-thirty came early. But the goats had to be milked before the younger Ebersol girls headed to school.

  “I heard about what Dat said to you tonight in the barn.”

  “Who told you?”

  “Susannah.”

  “She is a gossip,” Emily grumbled.

  At fourteen, Susannah was a little more . . . spirited than the rest of them, a little more like Luke Lambright than their father would have preferred.

  Mary found Emily’s hand under the covers and gently squeezed her fingers. “She loves you as much as we all do.”

  “She is probably the one who told Dat Luke called and started this whole mess.”

  “You don’t believe that.”

  “Nay. I don’t.” Emily sighed into the darkness. “What am I supposed to do? Now Dat has this in his head about me and Elam . . . he’ll never let it rest. I’ve already said I would go help at their house. Dat will probably do everything he can to make me known to Elam. How embarrassing.”

  “I am certain everything will work out just fine.”

  “I hope so.”

  They lay quietly in the darkness, each absorbed in her own thoughts.

  “I miss him so much,” Emily finally said. “I just want to talk to him, hear his voice, know that he’s allrecht out there among the Englisch.”

  “He will call when he can,” Mary said, her tone reassuring and so very much like their mother’s. She didn’t even ask who Emily was talking about. She knew right away it was Luke.

  “Do you really think so?” Emily hated the urgent quality in her voice. She had always been so confident when it came to Luke, never once doubting his love for her. Now everything was different, changing, and she wasn’t sure what to do about it. Or if there was anything she could do.

  “You know he would never call here,” Mary said, her words referring to the phone shanty that sat just across the road from their farm.

  “Jah. I know.” But it didn’t lessen her disappointment.

  “Be strong, shveshtah.”

  She would be strong, for her, for Luke. And she would pray. Pray that soon the lure of the Englisch world would dull, and Luke would return to Wells Landing once again.

  “Jonah.” Emily raced down the sidewalk behind her friend’s beau. After the conversation with her vatter the night before, Emily knew it was time to do something. If she sat back, her life would blow right on past her, taking Luke and all her dreams along with it. She didn’t want to court anyone else; she wanted Luke, plain and simple. “Jonah Miller,” she called again.

  He finally heard her, stopping to allow her to catch up with him. She was breathless by the time she did.

  “Goedemiddag,” he said as she gasped for air. “Are you allrecht?”

  Emily gulped and nodded. It had taken three blocks of running as fast as she could, but she finally managed to catch him. “I heard . . . you talked . . . to Luke.”

  “Oh, jah. He called a couple of days ago.”

  A couple of days? Why had no one told her? “How is he?” She was so desperate for news that she forgot herself and clutched Jonah’s arm.

  He looked down at her hand.

  She let him go and twisted her fingers together as she waited for his answer.

  “He’s gut.”

  “Did he”—she paused—“did he mention me?”

  Jonah rubbed the back of his neck with a grimace. “Nay, Emily. But I figured you had already talked to him.”

  She shook her head, doing her best to hide her disappointment. “My dat would have a fit if he called the phone shanty. You know how he can be.”

  Jonah nodded.

  Luke Lambright had brazenly left the community. He’d walked out on the promises he’d made to Emily and the people who had known him his entire life. Cephas Ebersol did not take such abandonment lightly.

  “Did he say when he was coming back?”

  Jonah flashed her that pained face once again. “He’s really busy right now, Emily.”

  “Jah, I know.” She said the words as a pang of something she couldn’t name settled in her heart. Longing? Worry? Fear?

  Was Luke out there in the Englisch world having so much fun that he hadn’t thought about her even once?

  She shook her head. There was nothing to worry about. Luke himself had told her how special they were together. She was his girl. Whether they were miles apart or next door to each other, nothing would change that.

  “I miss him,” she confessed in a whisper. So much so that she had left her booth at the market unattended. That wasn’t unheard of. Oftentimes, they put up a collection box and trusted the customers to pay the correct amount and take only what they bought. But she ran his best friend down on the street to find out any news. Her mother would be ashamed if she knew.

  Emily smoothed her prayer kapp and ran her hands down the sides of her dress to gather herself back.

  “I’m going down to meet Lorie. Want to walk with me?” Jonah asked with a nod toward the park.

  She
shook her head. So much had changed this fall. Now that Caroline and Andrew were married, Caroline only worked part-time at the bakery. Gone were the days of meeting in the park for lunch. Lorie and Jonah seemed to be getting along better. At least they had gone for a couple of months without a breakup.

  With Luke away, she felt . . . lonely.

  Jah, that was the word. Lonely. Alone. It was all the same.

  “Have fun.” She started back toward the market, but turned and caught Jonah’s attention once again. “If you talk to him . . .”

  His tawny eyes filled with understanding. “Jah,” he said. “I will.”

  Emily trudged back up the sidewalk. It was a beautiful October day, still early enough in the month that the Indian summer remained in control of the temperatures. But it wouldn’t be long until the market closed for the season. Once the pumpkins were all harvested and the weather turned cold, her job would be over until the spring.

  She sighed and collapsed onto the stool behind her booth. She missed teaching, more than she could have ever dreamed.

  “Why so sad on such a beautiful day?”

  Her head jerked up and her heart pounded as she shaded her eyes. “Ach, Elam Riehl. You scared me half to death.”

  “I did not mean to.” He rapped his knuckles on the wooden stand. “I just wanted to say danki for bringing Becky home after the singing Saturday.”

  “It was the least I could do.”

  He seemed to mull that over. “So why are you?”

  “Why am I what?”

  “Sad on such a beautiful day?”

  She shook her head, unable to say the words. To do so would make the reality all the more real.

  “I am guessing Luke Lambright.”

  It was no secret that she and Luke had been intended for years. They hadn’t announced anything, but everyone just assumed that one day they would marry. Then Luke learned to drive a car, and the rest was still being written. She didn’t understand his need to see the world, but she tried to. She could not fathom why he wanted to drive a car in circles. She had tried. She really had. In the end, she knew she had to let him go. Yet the fact he had chosen the world over her . . . it made her feel a little like the last puppy left in the litter, the one no one wanted.