CHAPTER
8

Providence must have taken pity on Abigail, for she ran across Elmer Beekman in the lane outside his boardinghouse, giving her the chance to conduct her awkward interview in the relative privacy of the outdoors instead of the overheated parlor where any of the other residents might overhear.

“Mr. Beekman,” she called, lengthening her stride as she came up behind him. When he turned, she plastered a smile to her face and waved. “Just the man I wanted to see. Might I have a word?”

He dipped his chin as she closed the remaining distance. “Of course, Miss Kemp. How can I be of service?”

The potency of his breath apparently didn’t wane during the course of the day. Unfortunate. She’d hoped . . . never mind what she’d hoped. She’d just invest in mint tooth powder or something. She would not be deterred from her course. Though it might be prudent to put a bit more distance between herself and her intended.

Abigail leaned back slightly, careful to keep her smile in place. “I find myself in a rather difficult predicament,” she confided, “but you have the power to set it all to rights, Mr. Beekman.”

His eyes widened. “Me?” He looked bewildered and not a little alarmed.

Botheration. She’d been hoping to inspire heroism, not terror.

Abigail took hold of his arm. “Don’t worry. There are no actual dragons to slay, but I do find myself in need of your assistance.” She tried to look as helpless as possible and even batted her lashes once. Desperate times called for desperate measures, after all. “Is there someplace we can speak? Privately?”

He blinked as if he couldn’t quite make sense of the woman before him, but his kind heart took over. He patted her hand, then offered his arm for her to take in a more conventional manner. “Of course. There’s a bench here, around the oak. Why don’t we sit?”

“Perfect!” Abigail allowed him to lead her toward the slender oak that shaded the side of the boardinghouse. Someone had built a circular bench around the base of the trunk, creating a quiet place for reading or conversing.

She swept her skirts beneath her and took a seat, trying not to notice the way the buttons on her companion’s vest strained as he sat. She could make him new ones that fit better, emphasizing his stature instead of his girth. Well, maybe not his stature. He was actually an inch or two shorter than her. Maybe she could simply let out the side seams. She knew firsthand how uncomfortable clothes that were made with average measurements in mind could be. They pinched in all the worst places and pooched in others. Thankfully, she had a sister who was a whiz with a needle and who had taught her the art of fitting clothes to the body she had instead of trying to stuff her body into patterns made for someone else’s shape. Abigail could do the same for Mr. Beekman.

Feeling a renewed comradery with the man at her side, Abigail smiled with genuine warmth.

“How can I be of help to you, Miss Kemp?” His brown eyes had a lovely softness to them. Perhaps if she focused on his eyes, hers would be less likely to water when he spoke.

She pulled her satchel across her lap to retrieve her papers. Hoping he wouldn’t notice their slightly crinkled state and realize he wasn’t the first would-be rescuer she’d approached, she slid them out of the bag.

“You might not be aware,” she began, “but the city council has chosen to enforce an outdated law prohibiting women from—”

“There you are, Miss Kemp.” A shadow fell over her. A large shadow with considerable stature and a broadness to its outline that made her words stick to the roof of her mouth. “Not trying to give my contract to another fellow before I have the chance to read all the details, are you? That’s not very sporting.”

“Mr. H-Hamilton!” Elmer Beekman lurched to his feet and backpedaled as if the papers the lumberman reached for were a pair of loaded six-guns.

Abigail bristled, snatching the contract out of Zacharias Hamilton’s grasp. “You already made your position on this matter quite clear, Mr. Hamilton.” Did he have to look so handsome and heroic standing there? He made poor Mr. Beekman look like a mouse in comparison.

A mouse with kind brown eyes, Abigail reminded herself firmly as she gained her feet and pushed her way past the boulder in her path. Not that the boulder moved so much as an inch. She had to contort herself around the bench to squeeze by and chase down her prospective groom. Because a mouse with kind brown eyes was infinitely better than a kitten with a bobcat for a mother. She’d rather not spend her days dodging Mrs. Ormandy’s swiping claws and sharpened teeth. Holding one’s breath to avoid halitosis was definitely the lesser of two evils. And her lesser evil was getting away.

“Please, Mr. Beekman, ignore him. I just need a few minutes of your time to explain my predicament.”

But he was already shaking his head and backing toward the boardinghouse. “I’m sorry, Miss Kemp, but I really don’t think I’m the one to assist you. Mr. Hamilton seems better suited to your needs.” He tripped over an empty milk bucket that had been standing by the back door. The clanking of tin echoed loudly in the charged atmosphere. Elmer reddened but didn’t slow his retreat. He latched on to the door handle and, without much more than a hasty dip of his chin, disappeared into the boardinghouse.

Abigail’s shoulders drooped as the door closed on her best hope for a peaceful marriage.

“So, can I look at those papers now?”

The deep, masculine voice stiffened her spine faster than ice hardened butter.

She spun to face him, snapping the contract behind her back. “What are you doing here? Was rejecting my offer not enough humiliation for one day? Did you decide to heap on a second helping by chasing off my best chance at an actual acceptance? I know I’m not the kind of woman men like you want, but I might have convinced Mr. Beekman that a wife with extra padding and a business to keep her out of his hair wasn’t such a bad deal. Just because I couldn’t tempt you with the offer doesn’t mean no man would be interested.”

He stood there like the boulder he was, stony-faced, hard, and implacable. Then he raised a single brow. “You finished?”

Abigail scowled, wishing she had more charges to harangue him with, but she couldn’t come up with anything at the moment. She lifted her chin. “For now.”

“Good.” He advanced a step, bringing him nearly toe-to-toe with her.

She had to crane her neck back to see his face, then regretted it, as his dark blue eyes sparked with an indignation that made her rethink the wisdom of challenging him.

“First off,” he said, “I’ve never intentionally humiliated a woman in my life. Scared more than a few and riled more than my share over the years, but never humiliated them.”

Abigail’s forehead scrunched. Was he admitting to purposely frightening females? That didn’t fit what she knew of him at all. Of course, neither did her charge of humiliation. Just because she’d felt humiliated didn’t mean he’d set out to embarrass her.

“Second, what’s this nonsense about you not being the type of woman men like me want? What do you know about what I want, anyway? You talk about yourself as if you’re some kind of penalty or consolation prize. Any man who has to be convinced of your value is an imbecile and not worth your time.”

Abigail blinked. Had that been a compliment? It was hard to tell amid all the grouching and lecturing, but the way her heart fluttered made her suspect there might have been one tucked in there. Her pulse gave a little leap.

“And speaking of fellas not worth your time, if Elmer Beekman can’t even stand up for you during a friendly discussion, how in the world do you expect him to stand up for you with the city council? He’s not the man for you.”

“Neither are you,” she murmured, “according to your response earlier today. I believe your exact words were, I’m not your man.”

The intensity of his features softened slightly, and for a moment she swore she saw a touch of red beneath his swarthy skin. “Yeah, well, I might have misspoken.”

Might have . . . ? “What exactly are you implying, Mr. Hamilton?”

“The name’s Zach.” He grabbed the back of his neck and shifted his weight. Then he blew out a breath—one that did not smell of garlic and onions, she was happy to note—and met her gaze. “Can I look at that contract you got hiding behind your back or not?”

Hands trembling, Abigail handed over the papers. He took them from her and started reading. His lips moved slightly as he read, like a young boy not terribly confident in his ability. The unexpected vulnerability in one so fierce utterly enchanted Abigail, leaving her more bemused than bewildered.

She had no idea why Zacharias Hamilton had changed his mind or how he happened to find her outside Mr. Beekman’s boardinghouse, but she wasn’t so foolish as to look a gift horse in the mouth. He was here. Reading her contract. And scaring off the competition. If God could part the Red Sea and lead his people across, she supposed he could send a reluctant bachelor across town. She wouldn’t question the how or why. She’d just pray that the miracle continued.

After he’d finished the second page, Zach sought her gaze. “I don’t see anything in here about relations.”

Relations? “You mean my sister?” Rosie was her only living relation and not yet at the age of her majority. “She’d live with us, of course. Continue working in the bakery.”

He shook his head. “Not those relations.” He cleared his throat. “Marital ones.”

Marital . . . ?

Oh.

Fire lit Abigail’s cheeks. She’d been so concerned about preserving her business, she hadn’t stopped to consider the more personal aspects entailed in marriage. “I, ah, hadn’t given it much thought.”

“Well, it’s a pretty big piece of this whole arrangement, so I need to know what I’m getting myself into.”

Good grief. What had she gotten herself into? Discussing marital relations in the middle of a public thoroughfare? All right, in a private yard several feet away from the public road, but still. Not exactly a topic of conversation young ladies received training in.

Yet she couldn’t dismiss his concerns. Uncomfortable they might be, but they were also legitimate. And really, his desire to get things out in the open at the start boded well for how the two of them would get along. No guessing and tiptoeing around. Just a practical, straightforward addressing of pertinent issues. She could do this.

Abigail stiffened her posture. This was her chance to set ground rules, boundaries her mother never had the chance to establish. “I’m a businesswoman first and foremost, Mr. Hamilton, and this arrangement is of a practical nature.”

“Speaking from a purely practical perspective, Miss Kemp,” he interrupted, “a man can’t be expected to live like a eunuch when the woman he’s married to looks like you.” His gaze scanned her from head to toe, lingering ever so briefly on the places where her curves were most prominent. Curves she’d always believed defined her as fat. Yet under his regard, she suddenly wondered if voluptuous might be an adjective that could apply. “Too tempting by half.”

He actually found her attractive? The ground beneath Abigail’s feet must have shifted, for all sense of balance abandoned her.

“I’m willing to sign your contract, but only if you agree to include marital relations in the bargain.” His face looked as soft as granite at that pronouncement. Not a touch of romance or sentimentality to be seen. But then, she was the one who had emphasized the practical nature of their arrangement. And it wasn’t as if they were truly courting.

Nevertheless, she couldn’t agree to his demands with nothing but cold practicality between them. To do so just felt . . . wrong.

Besides, she’d sworn not to repeat her mother’s mistakes, and this might be her only chance to negotiate terms that would allow her to uphold that vow.

Abigail nibbled on her lower lip. The bakery had to come first. Her livelihood. Her passion. The key to Rosie’s future. Perhaps it would be better to give him the agreement he wanted. They could work out the details later.

Abigail discarded that idea as quickly as it had formed in her mind. She respected Zach too much to trap him into a lifelong commitment without full honesty between them. If he’d been content with a marriage of convenience, things would be different. They could simply go on as friends, their separate lives only intersecting at meals and social occasions. No need to go into more personal matters. But such an idealized plan had been woefully naïve.

Zach seemed willing to sign the contract—to relinquish his freedom and save her bakery. All he asked for in return was a real marriage. The one thing she wasn’t sure she could give. As much as she loved the bakery, she couldn’t forget what had happened to her mother. Either she would forfeit her vow and come to resent her husband, or she would hold firm and earn his resentment instead. Neither boded well for a lifetime of cohabitation.

She needed to tell him, to explain. If they could somehow find a middle ground, maybe they could both get what they wanted.

Glancing at the bench, Abigail dredged up her courage, then forced herself to meet Zach’s gaze. “Can we sit for a minute?”