Chapter Three
Q uinn pulled a pair of wire snips from a nail on the wall of his barn and handed them to Sam Carpenter. They were neighbors and regularly lent each other tools or helped make repairs to each other’s houses, barns, or fences.
“Did your woman arrive yesterday?” Sam asked.
“Mm-hmm.”
Sam nodded. “Must not have given you over for someone else. Otherwise you’d be mad as a nest of hornets.”
“She didn’t.”
Sam chewed on a bit of straw. He leaned against a post, the hand holding the wire cutters hanging at his side.
“How is she working out?” Sam asked.
There was no good answer for that question.
Mirabelle wasn’t at all what he’d expected.
It was more than the initial shock of her size.
She had dictated the course of nearly everything since arriving.
The dinner hour was moved, as was the furniture in the parlor.
She’d declared her intention to hang new curtains and replace the tablecloth.
She’d turned their lives topsy-turvy with an unwavering smile on her face.
He’d never met a more cheerful despot in all his life.
His silence must have said something. Sam gave him a commiserating look. “She's platter-faced or something?”
Quinn shook his head. Mirabelle was a fine-looking woman, more so than he’d expected, in fact.
“A nag, then?” Sam tried again.
Quinn suspected she might be, but he didn’t mean to say as much to someone who hadn’t yet met her. He hardly knew her himself, but he’d vowed just the day before to care for her. Insulting her in front of the neighbors felt like breaking that promise.
“How is Tiernan taking to her?” Sam asked.
Da hadn’t said a word. He’d come to the table the night before, ate his meal in silence, then left without a word to his new daughter-in-law.
When she’d set to moving things about in the parlor, Da had held firm in his chair, glaring at her as if challenging the newcomer to move his chair from its spot.
“We’re adjusting,” Quinn said.
Sam worked his jaw so the sprig of straw in his teeth fluttered in the air. “That, my friend, is why you ain’t gonna see a woman at my house. Too much fuss and folderol.”
Quinn felt a smile tug at his mouth. “Face it, friend. That’s not the reason at all. No woman would have you.”
Sam laughed. “Not even a mail-order bride, I’d guess.”
“Aye, there’s not one among even that lot who’s desperate enough to marry you.” Quinn sat on a tall stool near the cow stall.
Sam’s gap-toothed grin grew. “I swear, for a man who never set foot in Ireland, you sure sound like it sometimes.”
“Blame my da and ma for that,” Quinn tossed back. They’d been near about his only companions for much of his growing up years. He was well into his teens before he realized most people in America didn’t sound like his parents.
“I knew your mother, Quinn. I’ll not let even you say anything unflattering about that fine woman.”
Sweet, darling Ma. Everyone who knew her had loved. Saints, he missed her.
Mirabelle stepped inside the barn the very next moment.
Quinn was on his feet in an instant, watching her approach with wariness.
Was her whirlwind of upheaval expanding from the house now?
She was a tiny wisp of a thing who hadn’t even been there an entire day, yet she seemed destined to take over the running of everything.
“You didn’t return for lunch,” she said. She held in her hand what looked like a plate with a kitchen towel draped over it. “So I’ve brought your meal out to you.”
Without the slightest wobble of the plate, she set it on the stool Quinn had been sitting on and pulled the kitchen towel off with a bit of flourish.
Sam eyed Mirabelle. “Tiny thing, ain’t she?”
Mirabelle looked Sam up and down before declaring, “Mouthy thing, ain’t he?”
Her quick and candid response clearly caught Sam off guard. Though Quinn had known his bride not quite twenty-four hours, he wasn’t at all surprised by her take-charge manner.
“Mirabelle”—he took up the introductions—“this is Sam Carpenter, our nearest neighbor. Sam, this is my wife.” The last two words felt horribly awkward, but he managed them.
She held her hand out to Sam exactly the way she had to Quinn when they first met. Though women out West were often just as straightforward and imposing as the menfolk, he’d never before seen such a tiny, delicate-looking woman be so completely unintimidated.
“Pleased to meet you, Mr. Carpenter,” she said as she firmly shook Sam’s hand.
“Call me Sam.” He looked very unsure of her.
“I suppose that’s better than what I had planned to call you.” She dropped Sam’s hand and turned to Quinn. “Your father says he doesn’t care for cold beef sandwiches, but when I asked if he preferred the beef hot, he told me to quit being cheeky.”
Da had likely said exactly that. Would Quinn have to play peacemaker between the two?
“So which is it?” Mirabelle asked.
“Which is what ?”
“Does your father not care for beef sandwiches or does he not care for cold beef sandwiches?”
Before he could answer, Sam spoke up. “I’ll just be on my way back to my place,” he said. “Thanks for the loan.” He held up the wire snips.
Quinn nodded his acknowledgment. Sam left with only one backward glance.
Mirabelle kept her expectant gaze on Quinn. He took a moment to remind himself what question she’d asked.
“Uh . . .” She’d asked about beef versus cold beef. “Da likes beef.” They were cattle ranchers. Of course he liked beef.
“He wouldn’t eat it.” Mirabelle leveled him a pointed look.
What could Quinn say to that? “Perhaps he didn’t want beef today.”
“He also didn’t eat the greens or the bread the beef was on. The only thing he accepted from me was water.”
Quinn took the plate off the stool and sat, setting the plate on his lap. “Da’s just getting used to you. Don’t let him fret you.”
“I don’t want him to starve.” There was just enough laughter in her eyes to convince him she didn’t actually think Da was going to die of hunger.
Quinn tucked in to the meal she’d brought him. If he ate quickly, maybe Mirabelle would be on her way and he could get back to work. He didn’t have time, or the desire, to sit around talking to a woman. Winter was coming. His list of chores was long.
She climbed up one of the stall walls and sat on the top rail, facing him. How she managed the feat in a dress and as small as she was, he didn’t know.
“I can’t tell if I’m preventing your father from doing whatever he usually does or if he simply doesn’t usually do anything.” Mirabelle leaned against the post next to her. The curl in her hair was a touch riotous just then, at odds with the calm of her expression and the casualness of her posture.
Quinn swallowed a large bite of the sandwich. If Da really had refused Mirabelle’s lunch, he’d missed out. The beef was sliced thin; the bread was sliced thick.
“Da’s an old man,” Quinn explained. “His days are quieter than they used to be.”
“Your father can’t be much more than fifty years old,” Mirabelle said. “He doesn’t exactly have one foot in the grave.”
Da was only fifty-five, in fact. But in a lot of ways, he was older than that. The past four years had aged him. “Just leave him to his own self. Everyone’ll be happier that way.”
“Do you know you sound a little Irish?” Mirabelle seemed to settle in. Apparently, she intended to have a cozy chat right there in the barn.
“Likely because I am Irish.”
“I like it.” Mirabelle nodded firmly. “There is something about an Irish accent that makes words sound musical.”
Was he supposed to thank her? Quinn had no idea.
He’d already finished his entire lunch. He discovered, between dinner the night before and breakfast that morning, that Mirabelle didn’t truly understand just how much food a man his size, who worked as long and hard as he did, actually required each day. Never mind Da; she’d starve him to death.
“Is there a local ladies’ society?” Mirabelle asked.
“I don’t know.” He slid off the stool and set the plate on it.
“A quilting circle, maybe?”
Quinn held his hands out in a show of ignorance. What did he know of quilting circles?
“Is there at least a watering hole where the local wildlife gather?”
He could match her dry tone. “Of course there is. It’s called The Golden Cup Saloon.”
She smiled all the way to her eyes. That was intriguing. He liked that she understood his humor. That boded well for eventually finding a comfortable peace together.
“Do you go to church on Sundays?” Mirabelle asked.
“No.” He had nothing against church; it just didn’t particularly appeal to him. He went now and then if it struck his fancy. He realized in that moment he didn’t know anything about his new wife’s religious leanings. “Are you a regular Sunday worshipper?”
“I think I’d better be,” she answered in all seriousness.
She had better be ? “Why’s that?”
“Otherwise, how will I ever find out about ladies’ societies and quilting bees and all those things you don’t know anything about?
It’s either church or The Golden Cup Saloon.
” The smallest twinkle of mischief shone in her eyes.
She was joking with him still? He didn’t quite know what to make of that.
“I’m afraid I never learned to drive a team. Is it a long walk to town?” she asked.
“Too far to walk, especially on your own. If you ever need to go into town, I’ll drive you.”
She gave a firm nod and offered a straightforward, “Thank you.”
“I’d best get back to my work.” He hoped the hint was enough to send her back to the house.
She started forward, but didn’t move more than an inch at the most. She copied the motion a couple of times, glancing behind her repeatedly. Her eyes settled on him.
“I’m stuck.”
“Stuck?”
She nodded. “My dress is caught on something, but I can’t tell what. A splinter, maybe. Or a nail.” She looked down at the slat. “I don’t know what it is, but I can’t get down.”