Page 23 of Mail-Order Bride Secret
Dare he believe his dreams would be fulfilled?
6
Madeline brushed her hair again. For the third time. She’d coiled it in a roll around her head. Decided she didn’t care to wear it that way. Next, she’d pinned it into a loose bun. It began falling out even before she finished. This time she braided it and loop the braid at the back of her neck. Before the evening was over, strands would escape and hang around her face.
Jonny toddled over to her. At least his earache seemed to have gone away.
She picked him up and kissed him. “Guess you can blame me for your uncontrollable hair.” Although she’d wet it and smoothed it down, it now stuck up.
Her dress was gray with tiny blue flowers scattered along the bottom of the skirt. It was her favorite gown.Wearing it would grant her confidence to face the Shannon family.
The twins sat at the kitchen table waiting for her. She’d called them in earlier and had them wash. The clothes she’d made for them were the best they had, and she’d sponged them clean.
“Remember what I said?” she asked them.
Ivy nodded. “Say please and thank you.”
“Don’t interrupt.” The weary note in Otis’s voice made Madeline smile. “And don’t eat too much or too fast.” Ivy looked at Otis as she spoke.
Otis rolled his eyes. “I only do when I’m hungry.”
“That’s always.”
He exhaled loudly. “Guess maybe it is.”
Madeline looked from one to the other and down at her little son. “I have the feeling none of us will want for food here.” Yet another reason to make sure this arrangement suited Wally. She looked at the bedroom door. The door to the room she was meant to share with him. Heaviness churned in her lungs, clogging her airways. In her mind, the door creaked open. The floor whined a protest. A weight crushed her.
Breathe. Breathe. In. Out. Slowly she forced herself to calm down. Wally was not Delroy. Wally was her husband. He had every right to share her bed. And she had an obligation…a promise to keep.
Cold air slapped across the room. A door closed. Jerked her gaze in that direction.
Wally.
His smile faded as he looked at her. Had her expression given away her fears?
She pasted a pleased look on her face. “We’re ready to go.” Supper with the Shannons was a mixed blessing, saving her from facing the evening alone with Wally but only delaying what must happen. Yet she’d gladly accept that.
“I’ll wash up and then we’ll go over.” He crossed to the washstand, filled the basin, and bent over to splash water on his face.
Madeline studied his broad back. She thought she knew him fairly well after their letters. She knew his dreams for a family. Her arrival had given him that. She knew his desire for a loving marriage. Steel spun cords around her heart locking tightly any sense of love but somehow, she would give him what he sought from their arrangement. A dark spot on the table held her attention and she rubbed it as if she could erase it even though she knew it was part of the wood grain.
“I’m ready.”
At Wally’s announcement, Madeline pushed to her feet, Jonathan perched on her hip. The children ran for the door. He waited for her to fall in step with him and they crossed the yard toward Andy and Della’s house.
“Are you nervous?” he asked.
“I feel like I know them from what you’ve written. But they don’t know me and will see me and judge me for themselves.”
He cupped her elbow as if to assist her. A perfectly reasonable thing to do and, pleased to realize his touch was comforting, her tension eased.
“You’ll find them welcoming and accepting.”
Before she found words to answer him, they arrived at the house. Wally strode in without knocking. The twins followed them.
“We’ve already met,” Della said, drawing her forward. “And you saw Andy and Matt earlier.”
Madeline looked to where Wally stood. Was he not going to stick by her side?
