CHAPTER
30

“So . . .” Rosalind’s singsong voice tickled Abigail’s ears as her sister swept through the connecting door from the shop to the kitchen. The last of the breakfast crowd must have cleared out. “Are we moving you out of my room today?”

“Rosie!” Abigail, face aflame, yanked off a piece of yeast dough and threw it at her sister’s chest. It splatted with satisfying force but proved an ineffectual deterrent, for her sister simply peeled it off and threw it straight back. The dough ball smacked Abigail on the left cheekbone and stuck there like some kind of unnatural growth, which set Rosie to giggling.

Abigail only managed to hold her disapproving big-sister scowl for a moment before cracking a smile herself as she wiped her face clean.

“Come on, sis. Spill the details,” Rosalind urged as she came around the worktable, grabbed Abigail’s hand, and dragged her to the table where Abby and Zach shared breakfast in the mornings. She held out a chair for Abigail. “I want to know everything,” she said as she waited for her sister to sit. “The two of you were out awfully late last night.”

Abigail ducked her head, knowing the teasing joy dancing in her sister’s eyes would dim when she learned the truth. “The marriage is still unconsummated.”

“What? What happened?” Rosalind moved to the vacant seat and flopped into it with an unladylike thud. “I thought for sure . . .”

“So did I,” Abigail admitted. Yet she couldn’t be disappointed. Not really. Their evening might not have gone according to plan, but something important happened nonetheless. Something that might do more to bond them as a couple than the physical intimacy she had anticipated. For what good was physical closeness without emotional and spiritual connection? Better to take the time to lay the proper foundation than to rush to build on shaky ground.

Rosalind’s face turned mulish. “Tell me.”

Abigail sighed. “He took me to the old oak.”

Rosalind drew back, her jaw loosening. “Not the—”

Abigail nodded.

“Oh, Abby. How horrible! But surely he couldn’t have known.”

Abigail’s lips twitched at the memory of Zach’s consternation as she tried to climb over him in the saddle in her irrational need to get away from that tree. “He had no idea, poor man. He’d just been on the hunt for a pretty spot to eat and watch the sunset. He probably thought he’d hitched himself to a loon by the time we finally stopped.”

Rosalind leaned forward again and clasped Abigail’s hands. “Did you explain?”

Abby nodded. “I almost took the coward’s way out, but he deserved to know the truth.” She met her sister’s gaze straight on. “I didn’t want secrets between us.”

Rosalind nodded, her eyes conveying her keen understanding of how secrets could wreak havoc with relationships. “How’d he take it?”

“You should have seen him, Rosie.” A full smile stretched Abigail’s cheeks wide. She probably looked like a lovesick calf, but she didn’t care. “He never left my side. He stood at my back, hands on my shoulders, through the entire retelling. He cast no blame at my door, yet he didn’t sweep things under the rug either. He understood, Rosie. Understood my feelings of responsibility, my regret.” Because he’d felt them himself. But that story wasn’t hers to tell.

Tiny creases appeared across Rosalind’s forehead. “If he didn’t turn away from you, why did you leave him to sleep alone?”

Abigail quirked a brow. “Why do you assume I was the one to leave?”

“He’s a man.” Rosalind rolled her eyes. “And I’ve seen the way he looks at you. Zach has wanted you in his bed since the day you wed him.”

“Rosie!” Goodness. She might as well just paint her face red and be done with it, as often as she’d blushed lately. “What would you know of men and their wants?”

“More than I should.”

The wry comment stabbed Abigail with guilt. How could she be so careless with her words? After all the trouble with scoundrels her sister had endured?

Rosalind must have read the regret in Abigail’s expression, for she smiled and waved a hand above the table as if sweeping the thoughtless words away. “I’ve had to deal with men’s stares since I turned fifteen. Even before the whole photography debacle. I know how to distinguish polite interest from the less noble variety, and I recognize admiration when I see it. Zach is crazy about you, Abby. There’s no way he turned you away.”

He might not have turned her away, but he didn’t extend an overt invitation either, and she’d been too unsure about where they stood to make a move on her own.

They’d managed to resurrect their evening to some extent. She’d taken him to a pretty little spot north of town. They’d eaten their supper on a grassy knoll, surrounded by a smattering of red and yellow firewheels still in bloom despite the summer heat. Conversation had been minimal. Zach had seemingly exhausted his store of words, and she’d felt silly feigning interest in the weather when all she could think about was his lack of response to her accidentally telling him she loved him.

Well, that wasn’t entirely true. He’d responded. Everything about him had sharpened, heightened. His voice had even quaked slightly when he’d said her name. For one glorious moment, she’d thought he was going to share his heart with her, to reciprocate in kind. But then the words died in his throat, and the fire in his eyes dulled to an apologetic ember.

Evie had warned her. Explained that Zach wasn’t one to talk of feelings, but Abigail wanted the words. Or at least some words. He didn’t have to speak of love, but he could have said something. All he’d needed to do was ask, and she would have gone to his room. But he’d held his tongue, and she’d lost her courage.

All she’d needed to do was take one step, and he would have swept her up in his arms and made her his wife. But her feet had rooted themselves to the floor. And when they finally moved, it had been in the wrong direction. Away from him.

Zach unloaded fresh lumber from the sawmill’s train car, welcoming the pinch of the planks against his neck and the weight on his shoulder as his piled the load twice as high as usual before tromping the twenty yards to the wagon near the depot platform.

What had he expected? That she’d just ignore all he’d told her and fall into his arms? Him being such a Romeo, and all. He’d grunted more than talked after they left the giant oak. It was a wonder she’d managed to stay awake until the sun went down.

Zach heaved the heavy load from his shoulder and dropped it into the wagon with a loud clatter. The heads of nearby rail hands swiveled to stare, but he ignored them. So what if he was handling the job with less finesse than usual? If they’d been living with a kindhearted, beautiful woman for five weeks without a single night of wedded bliss to alleviate the ever-increasing want, they’d be cranky too.

He’d known there would be a price to pay for telling her about his past, but the price she’d asked of him wasn’t the one he’d been prepared to pay. He’d expected withdrawal or anger or accusations of betrayal. Even disappointment. Evie had given him practice with that one. Watching the light go out of his sister’s eyes when he admitted to cheating and scheming a man out of his home had nearly killed him. She’d eventually forgiven him, and while Evie might not look upon him with hero worship any longer, she loved him, accepted him, and even respected him. He’d hoped that with time, the same would hold true for Abigail—that she’d move past the hurt and disappointment to a place of acceptance and love.

But she’d gotten everything out of order. She already accepted his past, even sympathized with it. And she loved him—a circumstance he still had trouble wrapping his mind around. Yet her love and acceptance didn’t absolve him from his sin. Instead it demanded an even higher price than he’d expected. He’d been prepared to reconcile with her, but she’d asked him to reconcile with God.

“There he is,” a male voice boomed behind Zach. “Just the man I was looking for.”

Zach shoved the last two rough-hewn planks from his load to lay flush against the driver’s end of the wagon bed, then pivoted to face Honey Grove’s mayor.

“Longfellow.” He offered a nod but not his hand. For one, his work glove was covered in sap and dust and all manner of ungentlemanly debris that the dapper mayor in his fine suit would no doubt wish to avoid.

However, the second reason was the more compelling of the two. Longfellow’s wife had hurt Abigail. Repeatedly. And while that crime belonged to her and not her husband, Zach had a hard time respecting a man who willfully turned a blind eye to his wife’s cruelty, or worse, allowed her to manipulate him into doing her dirty work for her. Because Zach was fairly certain, now that he knew the history between Sophia and his wife, that Mrs. Longfellow had been the one pulling the city council’s strings to enforce that ridiculous law against women owning businesses in town. She was the only one with anything to gain from Abigail losing the bakery.

The older man with gray at his temples and crow’s feet around his eyes smiled his politician’s smile. “Mr. Hamilton, I have an offer for you that I think you’ll find quite advantageous.”

Uh-huh. Zach knew that look—the look of a man holding three kings and trying to convince his opponent that the two pair in his hand could win the pot. Zach wasn’t buying, but he wouldn’t mind calling the bet to get a read on the mayor’s agenda. One could often learn more from a well-played loss than take-all win.

“What did you have in mind?” Zach lifted his hat from his head and rubbed the sweat from his brow with his shirtsleeve. Longfellow’s gaze followed the movement, but Zach’s remained locked on the mayor’s face, taking in the eyes, the tightness around the corners of his mouth, the too-smooth forehead of a man practiced in creating an illusion to instill confidence in others, whether or not that confidence was warranted.

“The Honey Grove City Council regrets having to take such a hard line with your wife upon her inheritance of her father’s bakery, and we wish to do something to make amends.”

Zach crossed his arms over his chest and stared down at the shorter man. If Longfellow thought Zach was going to fawn all over him in gratitude for the crumb he was offering, he was fixin’ to be disappointed.

The mayor cleared his throat, slightly nonplussed, but gamely continued on. “We’d like to add a last-minute float to our parade lineup. One specifically designed to honor the prettiest young lady in the city—the Honey Grove Queen Bee.”

“Not sure how that’s supposed to make amends to my wife, unless you want to make her the queen.” And if they did? Zach wasn’t sure he particularly liked the idea of other men ogling his woman, but having the town name her Queen Bee might go a long way toward proving to his self-conscious wife that she could compete with any female when it came to beauty.

Chester Longfellow cleared his throat. “No, ah, the council decided that only unmarried young women would be eligible for nomination. Your sister-in-law, Miss Rosalind Kemp, was unanimously voted in as our queen.” At Zach’s darkening glare, he hurried to spill more words, as if that would help matters. “We thought that if Miss Rosalind agreed to represent Honey Grove, we would show our gratitude by allowing the Taste of Heaven Bakery to sponsor the float she rides on. The bakery’s name would be printed on signs hanging over the sides of the wagon. And perhaps instead of tossing penny candy to the children, Rosalind could toss dinner rolls. Give them a taste of heaven, as it were.” He snickered at his play on words, but when Zach failed to crack even a hint of a smile, he cleared his throat and resumed his attempt at persuasion. “Your partner, Mr. Sinclair, has already agreed to donate lumber for the signs, and my lovely wife insisted on providing additional bunting. It would be great advertising, don’t you think?”

What he thought was that Rosalind would never agree. Not after the run-in she’d had with that clod in the alleyway. There was no way she would want to be the focus of hundreds or even thousands of staring eyes.

Zach kept his arms crossed and his scowl affixed. “You got a backup candidate if Rosalind’s not interested?”

The mayor’s brow crinkled. “Why would she not be interested? This is a huge honor. Her name in the paper, her face declared the fairest in the land. She’ll be the envy of every girl in town.”

Zach shrugged. “All that may be true, but Rosalind has a mind of her own. If she don’t want to stand around in the back of a fancified freight wagon and wave her arm off for an hour, I ain’t gonna force her.”

“Well . . .” Longfellow straightened his shoulders and jutted his chin. “I’m afraid that if Rosalind fails to agree, we’ll just have to postpone our first annual Queen Bee float until next year. We don’t have time to vote in a replacement.”

And whose fault was that? Dumb question. Zach knew exactly who was behind this sudden Queen Bee nonsense—Sophia Longfellow. What he failed to grasp was why. Had she finally realized that her unjust treatment of Abigail reflected poorly on her and was now making a last-ditch effort to repair her reputation? Or did she have something more malicious in mind?