Page 2 of A Dangerous Heart
David stood in the open doorway, guilt written clearly on his expression. The kid had no poker face. He was trying to edge away unobtrusively, but Drew’s focus was legendary.
“Why don’t you come in here and tell us what you know about this letter.” There was no room for disobedience in the command.
David hung his head, barely stepping inside the room. “Jo made me do it,” he mumbled.
“Do what?” Ed asked.
Isaac’s skin prickled at the sideways glance David shot him.
“Write a letter,” the boy said hesitantly. He rubbed the back of his neck. “To get Uncle Isaac a wife.”
Kaitlyn choked on her coffee.
It seemed that once he’d started, the words just tumbled out. “We heard you all talking at Uncle Ed and Aunt Rebekah’s wedding. About Uncle Isaac. I told Jo it was a bad idea, but she—” His gaze flicked to Isaac. “We don’t want Uncle Isaac to be sad anymore. So we picked one of the extra letters and wrote back to the lady who sent it.”
Isaac’s skin stretched too tight over his bones. No one in the family knew what had happened. There was no way David and Jo could know the well of darkness he’d descended into. But their innocent desire to help him—when he didn’t deserve it one whit—hit like a punch to his solar plexus.
Isaac saw the guilty looks his brothers exchanged and Drew’s glittering gaze.
“How many letters did you write?” Kaitlyn asked.
“Only two. Back and forth. They were good, long letters though. She’s a really nice lady from a farm in Missouri. We paid for her train ticket from Jo’s egg money and my savings.”
“Why would you do that?” Drew demanded.
Ed had color high on his cheeks. Rebekah was hiding a laugh behind her hand.
David tilted his chin stubbornly. “Well, it worked for you and Uncle Ed.”
Isaac turned to leave. He wanted no part of this.
But Ed said, “You’d better stay.”
Anger flared. His brothers were still meddling in his life.
“I don’t suppose you want to meet this woman?” Rebekah asked quietly.
Isaac ignored her completely.
Drew spoke to David. “Apologize to your uncle.”
“You can’t just mess with people’s lives.” Kaitlyn’s words overlapped with her husband’s.
David’s chin was still jutting out. “Pa and Uncle Ed did.”
Drew placed his hands on his hips and glared at his son. But he couldn’t quite put any heat in his argument. “You’re gonna have to fix this,” he said. “You’re gonna ride to town tomorrow and tell this woman to go back home.”
“What? But Pa, she’s coming to marry Uncle Isaac!”
The outburst was so unexpected from the usually even-keeled David that for a moment, the room went still.
Isaac felt the weight of the look Drew and Kaitlyn shared, the careful way Ed averted his eyes, Rebekah’s hand on his arm.
“I’m not marrying anybody, kid,” Isaac’s voice grated. “Not ever.”
David spun and ran from the room. The banging door punctuated the awkward silence that permeated the room.
Drew cleared his throat. “We’ll make this right.”
