Page 222 of Conveniently Wed
She must get back there, for her sake as well as the children’s. Before she lost it all.
Mrs. Kinsley stepped from the house, carrying a pot of broth.
Stella jumped up. “I’ll help you.”
“I don’t want you going into the sick rooms. If this is contagious…. Miss Rivers isn’t the only one I’d like to see safely away from this risk.” Mrs. Kinsley’s gaze went to the children.
Stella’s throat tightened so she couldn’t swallow. “I need to take them back to the farm.”
“Think about our suggestion.” Mrs. Kinsley went into the addition. In a few moments Stella could hear her speaking to those who were ill.
Stella’s attention returned to her children. Bruce now leaned his back against the fence, Blossom and Donny on each side of him, perched on the top rail. They talked.
If she married him…
Why was she even thinking it?
She called the children. “Bedtime.”
They said something to Bruce and jumped down. They paused halfway across the yard to wave at him then went into the house with Stella. She took them upstairs and prepared them for bed.
Mrs. Zimmerman and her girls had not returned. Perhaps they’d found Mr. Zimmerman and would be able to move into their home.
Home. Oh, how she longed to give her children that stability.
“Let’s say our prayers.” She knelt at the bedside, a child on either side.
Blossom went first. “Dear God, thank You much for today. I like that man. He take us home. Amen.”
Donny began praying before Stella could tell Blossom that wasn’t possible.
“Dear God,” Donny said. “I been asking You to let us go home. I miss the farm. Thank You for sending Mr. Reynolds so we can go home. Help Mama do it. Amen.”
He scrambled into bed and gave her a demanding look while she tucked Blossom in beside him.
“Donny, Blossom, I can’t marry a man simply so we can all go home.”
“Why not? Maybe God sent him here so you could. You ever think of that?”
“Yeah,” Blossom echoed. “You ever think that?”
“No, I haven’t.” She bent to kiss them goodnight. “Now you go to sleep.” She might have considered staying in the room with them, but she feared they would not sleep but rather continue to watch her with accusation in their eyes. “I’m going downstairs. I’ll be close if you need me.”
“We could sleep in your room. His aunt could have one room, and he could have the other,” Donny said before Stella could make her escape.
She paused at the top of the stairs. Donny was too innocent to understand what marriage meant.
The preacher sat at the kitchen table, studying his Bible. Thankfully, he did not say anything further about his suggestion. She cast a glance at him. Was he praying she would see the value of marrying Bruce?
Outside, she breathed in the still-warm evening air, inhaling the scent of the trees along the river. An ache the size of the mountains to the west filled her, pushing aside everything else. She longed to go home.
Bruce stepped from the shadow of the wagon and crossed the yard. “You look weary,” he said.
She swallowed back the emotion clogging her throat. “I’m homesick.” Why must her voice shake, revealing the depth of her longing?
“Donny is too.”
“I know.” It was one more source of pain.
