Chapter 6 #2
“I’ll take a hot meal any time you’re willing to cook one.” He pulled out the closest bench at the table and pushed aside the odds and ends to clear an empty spot. “As long as you promise to eat the meal with me. I’m not the type of man who expects his wife to wait on him like she’s a servant.”
She stilled.
Had he said something wrong? Maybe the mention of being a servant had come across as critical. “Not that I have anything against young women who are servants. It’s just that I believe marriage should be a place where both the husband and wife serve each other.”
She flipped another griddle cake. “That’s very sweet.” Her tone held a note that said she didn’t believe it.
“But . . . you don’t think it’s possible?”
“It’s idealistic and hasn’t been my experience.” She scooped the eggs onto two plates.
He knew he shouldn’t pry, but since she’d opened the door to talking about her previous marriage, he wanted to know what it had been like. “Would you tell me about your experience?”
She forked the bacon onto the plates, then added the griddle cakes.
She hesitated before turning around and approaching the table with the plates.
She set one down before him and the other at the spot across from him.
Without a word, she returned to the stove, poured two mugs of coffee, and brought them back to the table.
She sat down, picked up her fork, and took a bite of eggs.
He shrugged and reached for a piece of bacon. “It’s all right. I can tell you’re not ready—”
“My husband was a loan shark.” She ate another forkful of eggs.
Thatcher didn’t know much about loan sharks other than that they were known for their shady and often illegal dealings.
She swallowed and then used the edge of her fork to cut off a piece of griddle cake. “I was married to him for less than two months when he was found murdered in his office.”
“Murdered?” Thatcher nearly choked on the piece of bacon he was swallowing.
She paused in her eating but didn’t look up from her plate. “He was found stabbed in the neck and slumped over his desk.”
Thatcher took a sip of coffee to wash down the bacon, then pushed aside his plate, his appetite suddenly gone.
Amelia fiddled around with the food on her fork, then set the utensil down and scooted her plate away too.
He tried to read her face, wanting to see beyond her expression to how she was really feeling. But she was a closed book.
“I’m sorry for your loss,” he said tentatively. “I’m sure it was difficult to lose him so soon—”
“Charles wasn’t a kind man.” The words held a note of bitterness. “Not to me or to anyone.”
Thatcher could feel his muscles tightening. “Did he hurt you?”
She hesitated. “He didn’t ever hit me. But he was cold and heartless.”
Her words should have made him feel better, but they only made him despise the fellow even more. “Why did you marry a man like that?” Charles must have had some redeeming qualities that had attracted her to him.
She took a sip of coffee before finally looking up at him with her hazel eyes. The sadness there nearly took his breath away. “He was planning to foreclose on the farm because my father couldn’t repay the loan or the interest. Charles said if I married him, he would forgive my father’s loan.”
“Did he follow through on that?”
“Yes, at least he honored his word and Father was able to keep the farm.”
“Even so, you made a difficult sacrifice.”
She set her mug down and twisted it back and forth. “The sacrifice ended up being for nothing. My father died not long after I was married, and Charles sold the farm against my protests.”
“Really? That’s a horrible thing to do. I’m sorry, Amelia.” Thatcher had the urge to stretch across the table and take hold of her hand, but it was too soon to touch her like that, so he reached for his coffee instead.
She focused on her mug, fingering the handle. “My father thought I would be better off with Charles since he was wealthy and had a nice home. He just wanted me to have a safe and secure future.”
“He didn’t care about Charles’s reputation for being cold and heartless?”
“Charles put on a good show for my father and me during those early days of courtship. I had my doubts about Charles but didn’t really see him for who he was until after we were married. But I don’t think my father ever learned of it—at least, I tried to keep it from him.”
“That was noble of you.”
She gave a slight shrug. “It didn’t work out the way I’d hoped, because without me there to worry about, I think he just gave up.”
“What about your mother? And siblings?”
Amelia released a scoffing sound. “I’m an only child. And my mother left my father and me when I was about five.”
“Died?”
“No, she went back to New York City, where she was from, said she hated living in the country and wasn’t meant to be a mother.”
He couldn’t relate to that. His own mother had always been sweet and motherly and hadn’t wanted him to move so far away. “She sounds selfish.”
“To say the least.” Amelia took a sip of coffee. “She never once came back. I wrote several letters to her and asked if she would visit. Finally, she responded and told me I was better off without her and not to write to her again.”
Thatcher’s body was already tense with the indignation over Charles, and now it grew tighter with anger toward this unknown woman. How could any mother be so uncaring and callous? “I guess selfish is way too kind of a description.”
Amelia’s lips quirked into a small smile. “That’s true.”
He liked that he’d been able to lighten her mood just a little. Maybe Providence had brought her into his life so that he could not just lighten her mood but lighten her life.
“Enough about me and my sad story. Tell me about you.” She drew her plate back, picked up her fork, and put a piece of griddle cake in her mouth. As she started to chew, she watched him, clearly waiting for him to share something about himself.
She’d been vulnerable about her past, had been open about her heartache. Could he do the same?
He drew his plate forward and took a bite of eggs. He couldn’t tell her about the disastrous end to his veterinary practice in Iowa. Not yet. It was too mortifying. But he could talk about other difficulties he’d experienced, particularly with his family.
“So I told you in one of my letters that I’m from Iowa.”
She paused in her chewing and lifted a brow in question. Didn’t she remember?
“I wrote that I grew up on a farm outside of Cedar Rapids, the second oldest of five siblings.”
She swallowed. “I’m sorry, Thatcher. I don’t remember. And I meant to reread your letters when I reached Fairplay, but I lost them somewhere during the journey west.”
Something in her tone set him on edge. “Were you in a hurry because you were in trouble?”
She pushed her eggs around on her plate, then met his gaze directly. “I didn’t feel safe anymore.”