Page 9 of A Secret Heart
“He’s not a dangerous criminal. He’s a rancher.”
If Kaitlyn hadn’t asked the McGraws not to spread word of what Michael had done, Ed would have more than enough to tell of Heath Quade’s entanglement in it all. The details perched on his lips, about to spill. But he couldn’t. Not even to put Rebekah in her place.
She turned in a huff, gripped the side of the bench, and lowered herself to the ground. Ed jumped from his side of the wagon, hurrying to help her, but she spun around as she landed, nearly losing her footing. Her eyes flashed before she twisted back around to grab up the work she’d brought home. Her hands trembled. From finding Quade here? Or from her frustration with him? Maybe both.
“I can handle Mr. Quade without your help.” With a sidestep, she dodged around him in her flurry to get to the house.
One of the horses whinnied, stomping its hoof with impatience.
Ed lifted her satchel from the back of the wagon. “I made a promise to your uncle, and I intend to keep it.”
“You may have promised to help with the livestock and take me to and from town, but no one asked you to speak for me. Even with Mr. Heath Quade.” Rebekah snatched her satchel from his hand. One fiery curl snapped from its pin to float down her back as she ascended the stairs to the porch.
“You know what he did to Drew.”
She spun to face him.
“What does Drew say he did?” The blaze in her blue eyes took him back to the schoolroom. Everything he wasn’t supposed to say stuck in his throat.
“Don’t you have the good sense to let me help you deal with Quade?” He flung the words out there, half expecting another retort.
Rebekah’s face went red, then drained of color. She stomped across the porch to let herself in. The door slammed behind her.
Ed worked his jaw as he averted his gaze from the closed door. He was here. Why not let off steam by tending to the confounded animals? Not to mention checking to be sure Quade hadn’t left a man here. Or conveniently unlatched a gate. He stopped to grab the rifle from the wagon.
Once in the barn, he hurried to complete the barest necessities while he poked around for any trace of Quade’s meddling. Ed would be back to finish things in the morning. For now, he needed to toss in some feed, check all the latches and outbuildings for intruders, then get home.
Finished in the barn, he made one last circle of the outbuildings, then rounded the house. The front door creaked.
“What are you doing?”
Why did every word from her sound like a demand?
He spoke through gritted teeth. “Checking everything before I go.”
“Go home.” She cocked her head in anI said soattitude.
He cocked his head right back at her as he stepped up onto the porch. “I’ll leave as soon as I finish making sure you’re safe. I made a promise, remember?”
“Drew. My uncle. They think Quade’s a danger, so you’re out here peeking around every corner.” She made a motion with her hands to encompass the ranch. “It’s all about what they tell you to do.” She took one step closer. “Do you even have an original thought in your head?”
Anger stirred inside him. Nose to nose with her, he tried to grasp for a witty reply, but nothing came. He turned. In three long strides, he reached the wagon. No original thought in his head? He climbed back on his wagon perch and flicked the reins. Only doing what others told him?
Almost to the drive for Drew’s place, he had it. The perfect reply to little Miss Rebekah Edwards’s words. He had half a mind to turn the wagon around so he could face her with them. But a nagging voice inside him wondered if she’d been right.
Chapter3
“What was it like? Deciding to come west in answer to Drew’s ad.” Rebekah stirred the wooden spoon around the pot as the mixture of mashed up raspberries and sugar began to boil. She was working in Aunt Opal’s kitchen alongside Kaitlyn the day after Ed had dropped her at home to find Heath Quade waiting.
A long night of wrestling with the placement of mail-order bride ads, one in particular, had left her full of questions this morning. Who better to ask than Kaitlyn? Living on neighboring farms had brought them together, and it hadn’t taken long for them to become friends.
“I wasn’t looking for a husband. I needed a way to escape my circumstances. But God knew better than I did.” Kaitlyn’s head tilted to the side, and her eyes became unfocused, like she was lost in a memory. She shook herself out of it. “You’re getting a nice rolling boil. It won’t be long now.”
“But what about meeting Drew? Was it love at first sight?” Rebekah’s real question bounced off the back of her mind. How would Isaac react if she dared to answer his ad?
“I did like him. But there were rough edges to file down.” Kaitlyn darted a glance at her stepdaughter Tillie, who was happily playing with a doll in the corner of the room. The other two children had begged to stay with Drew and his brothers as they worked on repairs to the corral, or so Kaitlyn had told Rebekah.
“It must have been a big adjustment to marry into the McGraw family.” Rebekah continued to stir the bubbling mixture of fruit and sugar. Four bachelors and three ornery kids couldn’t have been easy to manage. After all, once Drew’s first wife had passed, there hadn’t been a woman’s influence near the place until Kaitlyn had come. And since all the brothers had kept busy working the land and trying to prove everything up, well, things had been hard for them.
