Chapter Twenty-One
After the wedding, Jonathan pulled out his fiddle and began to play a lively tune.
While most of the men and women broke out into a dance, Grace sat in the driver’s seat of her family’s wagon, her feet dangling over the edge.
Richard was leading Emily through a dance, so Grace was alone.
She wondered if she had looked as happy as Kate on her own wedding day, and if Charles had been that deeply in love with her.
She leaned forward and let her arms rest on her thighs. Grace was careful to look content and happy; she did not want to dampen the festivities taking place all around her. It wasn’t anyone else’s fault that her heart felt bruised.
Ethan was watching her, a realization that made Grace’s face grow hot with embarrassment. His looks made Grace feel exposed and struck with a sudden fear that he might somehow know all about her uncharitable thoughts. Like Grace, he stood apart from the festivities.
Then he caught her gaze and seemed to take it as an invitation to join her. Her heart was in her throat. She marveled at his brazenness, and at her own heart, which leapt into her throat at his approach. Grace straightened her spine and attempted to make her smile appear more genuine.
“It was a beautiful ceremony,” she said without preamble.
Ethan frowned, as if he had anticipated a different reaction and had been caught off guard by the remark. “It was,” he said gruffly, shoving his hands into his pockets. “You seemed…very moved by it.”
“You mean I cried too much?”
Ethan snorted and shook his head. “There’s nothing shameful about being moved by something.”
She bit the inside of her cheek. Ethan had assumed that she’d cried because she found the ceremony to be beautiful and moving, which it had been, but it wasn’t the reason for her tears.
Grace had cried because the ceremony had reminded her of her own wedding.
No matter how hard she tried to make Charles the villain in her mind, an irredeemable monster who had never loved her, Grace couldn’t do it.
Once, he had been a good man. Once, he had cared about her, and a long time ago, she had cared about him in turn.
Her love had turned to ashes, and while she could not muster even a passingly charitable thought for the man who had ruined her life, neither could she pretend that there had never been any love between them.
“And were you moved?” she asked quietly, desperate to turn the conversation to anything but herself.
Ethan offered only a one-shouldered shrug. Then, seeming to think better of his reaction, he said, “It was nice. Kate and Benjamin both looked very much in love, and that kind of thing is always worth celebrating.”
“I suppose it is.”
An awkward silence settled between them, and Grace almost laughed. Out of all the things she and Ethan had talked about, how was it that a wedding managed to make the atmosphere between them so uncomfortable?
At that moment, Jonathan ended the song with a flourish. The dancers came to a stop, clapping and cheering to show their appreciation. Emily ran to Ethan, her face flushed and breathless.
“Dance with me!” she exclaimed as she wiggled around in excitement. She bounced on her feet, so full of energy that Grace marveled at it. Once, she’d been a young girl too, though it was hard to believe that she had ever been as carefree and lively as Emily was.
“Well, I’m afraid I’m not that good of a dancer,” Ethan drawled, though Grace swore she could see a faint smile tugging at the man’s lips.
Emily just laughed. “I can show you!”
Grace smiled. Her little girl did not know how to dance, and the thought of Ethan hopping about as Emily liked to brought a smile to her face. “
You can’t refuse a lady,” Grace informed him. “It’s bad manners.”
Ethan put a hand to his chest and looked at her in mock offense. “No one has ever accused me of having bad manners!”
Grace laughed. “I find that difficult to believe.”
She could admit that Ethan was a good man with a lot of redeeming qualities, but surely he must have slighted at least one woman in the past. Initially, Grace herself hadn’t even thought him especially nice, but she found herself warming to him a little more each day.
“Well…” Ethan wrinkled his nose and seemed to deliberate, but his gestures were so exaggerated that Grace suspected he was feigning the whole thing.
“Come on!” Emily exclaimed, jumping up and down as the first notes of the fiddle filled the air. “Let’s dance, please!”
Emily took his hand, and with an amused smile, Ethan let himself be pulled towards the ring of dancers.
Grace’s lips twitched in amusement as her little girl bounced up and down, her skirts billowing around her.
Ethan attempted something that might only charitably be called dancing, lifting and lowering his feet and letting Emily pull on his arms.
Her daughter was enamored with Ethan, and he clearly liked her as well, if the way he indulged her was anything to go by. Grace’s eyes stung with unshed tears. Charles had been so sure that no one would ever love her or her daughter, and here was clear proof that he had been wrong.
Her father leaned against the wagon beside her. There was an air of nervousness about him, as if he wanted to say something but wasn’t quite sure how to approach it.
“What is it?” Grace asked.
“I was just thinking that Emily looks particularly happy. I’m glad. The Bozeman Trail is a rough place for a child.”
Grace sensed that wasn’t really what her father had meant to say. “Are you upset that she’s so close to Ethan?” she asked him. “It might be, just—well, you know how little girls are. Emily has always been an affectionate girl, and it’s—Ethan is very kind to her.”
“He is,” Father agreed. “I just don’t like the thought of him leaving someday and breaking her heart.”
Grace winced internally. She could imagine that happening all too easily, and she found that the thought of their journey ending and Ethan leaving caused a dull ache in her chest.
“I don’t either. But…but what if he doesn’t?”
Grace wasn’t entirely sure if she was asking for Emily’s sake or her own.
Her father furrowed his brow and pressed his lips into a thin smile. “That’s the problem with people. You never know what they might do.”
Another song ended, and Ethan bowed dramatically.
Emily laughed and bowed back, nearly stumbling over her feet because of her enthusiasm.
She grabbed his hand again and pulled him along, talking excitedly.
Grace was too far away to hear the exact words, but as Emily pulled Ethan over to the wagon, Grace’s pulse jumped.
“You have to dance with Ethan!” Emily exclaimed.
A lump rose in Grace’s throat, and she curled her fingers into her skirts. The last time she had danced had been with Charles, before she was even pregnant. They had danced around the house together, swaying to music that wasn’t there.
Ethan rubbed the back of his neck and shot Grace an embarrassed look. “I don’t think your sister wants to dance,” he tried to tell Emily.
“I’m not very good,” Grace said.
She was good at dancing, actually. Once, she had even enjoyed it, and there was a small part of her that looked at Ethan and thought that…that maybe—
Maybe she might like to dance with him, to join in with all the merriment just a few feet away. Even if she would never let herself marry again, Grace wanted to feel like a woman once more, even just for a moment.
“But you are!” Emily exclaimed. “You dance great! Come on!”
Grace laughed anxiously, aware that her father and Ethan were both looking at her, waiting for her answer. “I shouldn’t…”
Emily seized Grace’s skirts. “Just one dance! Please!”
Emily looked at Grace with wide, imploring eyes.
Still, Grace hesitated. Her daughter was so insistent that it broke Grace’s heart to refuse her anything, but she also wondered if Emily had developed some childish fantasy about Ethan and Grace.
If Emily had perhaps gotten the idea that Ethan was going to be her father, Grace would be cruel to give her daughter false hope.
“I would like another dance,” said Ethan. He straightened up and smiled at her in what seemed to be an impersonation of a proper gentleman, a fa?ade which he was a little too rough and tumble to manage. Yet Grace found it oddly charming.
“If you would be willing, Grace.”
Her face flushed with heat, torn as she was between two conflicting emotions.
On one hand, anxiety hummed through her body at having this choice laid before her, and at truly wanting to dance.
On the other, she felt almost like a silly little girl experiencing desire for the first time.
A grown woman should not hesitate when asked for something as simple as a dance, even on the frontier.
“Very well,” said Grace.
When Ethan extended his hand, Grace gingerly placed her palm in his.
He led her to the throng of dancers, and Grace’s breath quickened even before she took the first step.
Ethan placed his other hand on her back once they joined the crowd.
She shivered, thinking of all the novels she’d read when she was young about intrepid young heroines who fell in love over a dance.
“I will try not to tread on your feet too often,” Ethan said, his eyes shining with good humor.
They began twirling around together in time with the lively music.
With each step, her worries melted away like dew in the light of a summer morning.
Ethan’s smile could have rivaled the sun in its brightness.
The music sped up and Grace stumbled over her feet trying to keep up with it, but at least Ethan struggled with it too.
Soon they were flailing more than dancing, and laughter bubbled from Grace’s throat. Ethan grinned, his eyes crinkling at the corners. “It certainly gets the blood pumping, doesn’t it?” he asked.
“It certainly does!” The words came out alongside bouts of half-breathless laughter.