4

Fleeta examined the little bag, creased and with a pale stain in one corner. She worked the string in the neck loose and pried the top open. She turned it up and tilted what was inside out into the palm of her hand. A piece of jewelry glinted back at her. Two overlapping hearts were joined with a purple heart-shaped stone, the whole topped with a crown. It was pretty, but Fleeta wasn’t sure what to make of it. She’d never been overly fond of jewelry, and the family couldn’t afford such things anyway.

“Did it belong to my mother?”

“It did. And to her mother, and her grandmother, and so on all the way back to England if Marion’s tale is true, and I don’t see why it wouldn’t be.” Aunt Maisie took the bag and turned it over, showing Fleeta initials embroidered there. “These are supposed to be the initials of each woman who’s had it along with the year each one married. There’s your mother, MEB for Marion Evans Brady. I can’t remember your grandma Naomi’s maiden name—her momma married twice.” She tapped the brooch. “Probably valuable with that amethyst in it, but the main thing is, Marion wanted me to give it to you when the time was right for you to find true love.”

Fleeta choked and nearly dropped the bauble. “True love? You mean like in romance novels?” She slid her eyes toward a bookshelf with a dozen or so well-worn paperbacks. Aunt Maisie claimed to have few vices, but reading tawdry romances was definitely among them. Fleeta had tried to read one with a picture of a woman being swept into the arms of a man who looked like a pirate, but couldn’t stomach all the roiling emotions and breathless embraces. She preferred The Spirit of the Border by Zane Grey or The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas.

Aunt Maisie blew out a little puff of air. “Oh, I suppose more like your parents had—they just doted on each other, and although I saw them get mad a time or two, they never stayed that way for long.”

“So why are you giving this to me now?” Fleeta held the brooch as if she were afraid it might bite her.

“Because you’re a young woman, and it’s high time you found a young man. This last . . . illness has made me realize I won’t be around forever and I need to see you settled. I don’t know what Marion had in mind as far as timing goes, but it feels right to give this to you now.”

“What am I supposed to do with it?” Fleeta heard her voice rise with emotion.

“You could wear . . .” Aunt Maisie looked Fleeta up and down, from her scuffed boots to her flannel shirt and dark hair in a messy braid down her back. She laughed. “No, I don’t suppose you would. Put it on your dresser in your room. Look at it and remember your mother wanted you to fall in love one of these days.” She slid lower on the sofa. “Now let me rest. I’m about wore in two. I’d tell you to go on in there and help Elnora with supper, but I expect you’ll be on kitchen duty for a while. We can’t expect Elnora to keep up two households, and I’m afraid . . .” She closed her eyes and exhaled long and slow. “Well, this is the weakest I’ve ever felt. I’m afraid I may not be up and about as quickly as I’d like.”

Fleeta slid the brooch back in its pouch, trying not to look at the initials of all those women who must have been content with finding true love instead of pursuing some other dream. She slipped out of the room as silently as she would slip up on a turkey the day before Thanksgiving. She blinked back tears, a wild mix of emotions disturbing her spirit. She wanted to be a gunsmith. To take care of her family. And now she was supposed to fall in love too?

Aunt Maisie didn’t mean to mess up her plans by losing the baby, but how could she follow her dream and take over Bud’s business while she was so desperately needed at home? And this falling in love business was absolutely out of the question. Her mother supposedly died from grieving over her lost love, and Aunt Maisie was surely suffering for loving Uncle Oscar. What was her aunt thinking? Obviously, all these plans were incompatible. She had to choose. And for now, that was simple enough. She would have to put her dreams on hold until Aunt Maisie was well again, and she would not fall in love. Ever.