Page 21 of Smoke River Bride

He jerked his mind away from that kiss. “Then there’s my field of winter wheat, the one I told you about last night. I worry about what the snow and the rain will do to my crop. Can hardly think about anything else.”

Except her, he admitted to himself. He knew he wasn’t paying much attention to her, but he sure as hell thought about her. How good her hair smelled, like some spicy rosewater with a hint of lemon. How small she was; how physically strong she was in spite of her delicate build. How surprisingly frank she could be. She’d made him laugh more in one day than he had in the last month.

He’d like to take time to talk to her, tell her more about the wheat field he had so much riding on, but so far he couldn’t bring himself to do it. He guessed he was afraid she wasn’t going to like what he was trying to do. Or him.

But he’d married her, hadn’t he? The pain of losing Hattie still sliced at him when he least expected it, but he was not sorry Leah had stumbled into his life. And he wasn’t the least bit sorry he’d brought her to his home and into his son’s life.

And his own. At the moment he felt both disloyal to Hattie and intrigued at the new prospect before him.

“I am a stupid man,” he said against her temple. He let his hand rest on her hair for a brief moment. “Can’t see what’s right in front of me.”

He’d seen her underwear hanging on the clothesline yesterday evening when he went to do the milking. The little scraps of fabric looked small and dainty—not like a farm wife’s duds. For a moment he’d felt a stab of guilt at admiring them because they weren’t Hattie’s, but they were downright pretty, anyway. So pretty he couldn’t take his eyes off them and he’d tripped over a gopher mound. Dammit, what was right in front of him was…Leah.

They ate in silence, punctuated by the snap of the cracker bread as Leah broke it into chunks. Thad stared at it, then at her. Leah thought the butter and the blackberry jam would help, but it did not seem to. Thad broke the chunks into tiny bits.

Heaven help her, she did not belong here. She did not belong anywhere. In China she was an outcast because of her white skin; here she was not accepted because she had straight black hair and tilted eyes. She hated not belonging, always being on the outside.

Being outside was a cold place. And it was so lonely she wondered if she would survive.

Chapter Eight

That afternoon Leah swept the floor, dusted the sewing cabinet, laid a fire in the fireplace and straightened the sparse shelf of books. She recognized all the titles; thanks to Father’s supervision of her schooling, she had read every one.

But being well educated had not prepared her for life on an Oregon ranch. What should she cook for Thad’s supper? Beans, perhaps. And more biscuits? She hoped she could remember how to make biscuits.

In the pantry she found the bag of potatoes and a braid of onions and one of garlic; she used both to flavor the beans. Finally she cut up a double handful of apples, loaded the slices into an iron skillet and sprinkled a mixture of flour, sugar and butter over the top.

Later Ellie stopped by to take Leah to the dressmaker in town. She had made a list of things she needed at the mercantile. Dried beans. Mustard and cinnamon. And green tea. But more than buying supplies, it was the visit to the dressmaker that made her uneasy.

The minute Leah climbed into the small black buggy, Ellie reached over and laid a book in her lap. “Miss Beecher’s Domestic Receipt-Book,” she read aloud. “Recipes!” She opened the book at once.

Potato soup. Scalloped potatoes. Strawberry shortcake! “Oh, thank you, Ellie.”

“My mother sent it from Boston,” Ellie said drily as she flapped the horse’s reins. “That is the third cookbook she’s sent since Matt and I were married last summer. It’s yours.”

Leah devoured the book until the buggy pulled up in front of the seamstress’s shop. The painted sign over the display window read Verena Forester, Dressmaker. Suddenly Leah’s stomach knotted.

With the recipe book Ellie had given her she could learn to cook the American way. Now she must calm her jittery nerves and learn to dress herself like an American woman. With Western-style garments, she prayed she would fit in.

At the first tinkle of the bell mounted over the door, Leah felt a surge of hope.

Ellie approached the eagle-eyed woman behind the Butterick pattern stand. “Verena, this is Mrs. Thad MacAllister.”

The woman’s thin eyebrows rose. Her once-dark hair was gray-streaked, and her pinched face was white as flour paste.

“How-do,” she said in a toneless voice.

Leah attempted a smile. “How do you do, Mrs. Forester?”

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