Mail-Order Christmas Brides Boxed Set. Jillian Hart

as she grabbed a pot holder and opened the potbellied stove’s door. Reddish-orange flames raged inside the metal belly. “Nope, there’s plenty of fuel. You know, I have no interest in learning to knit and stuff, but Pa says I have to learn. I suppose it would be okay if you taught me, but I want you to know my feelings.”

      “I hear you loud and clear.” Mercy reached out to smooth a stray strawberry-blond lock of the girl’s hair. What a sparkle she was, full of life and light. “It might be a nice way for you and me to get to know each other. My ma and I would sit for hours on a Sunday afternoon knitting or sewing away, just talking.”

      “What was your ma like?” Amelia tilted her head to one side, curious. “Was she like you?”

      “Goodness, no. She was very refined. Very cultured. She was the youngest daughter of a very wealthy man and ran away from home to marry someone her family didn’t approve of. She became a farmer’s wife, but she never regretted it. She said love was the greatest treasure in this life.”

      “Pa says children are.” Amelia grinned, full of mischief. “Except for me. He says I’m nothing but trouble.”

      “Is that so? I’m dying to know what kind of trouble you are.” While she waited for the girl’s answer, the motherly side of her couldn’t help wondering about George. Or the man with him, the tall and tough-looking store owner. Was that the rumble of Cole’s baritone through the floorboards? And why was she straining to listen?

      “Well, you know about the sledding.” Amelia scrunched up her face, most adorably. She rolled her gaze toward the ceiling, thinking. “I tend to get in trouble at school for whispering or writing notes to my friends on my slate.”

      “I have a hard time imagining that,” Mercy gently teased.

      “I know! I try to be good, I really do, but I’m naturally bubbly.” Amelia didn’t seem all that troubled by it. “I have snowball making down to a fine art. No one can make a better one than me. The trick is to spit on it just a little. It ices up, so it holds together better when you throw it.”

      “Good to know.” Mercy wondered just exactly what kind of influence Amelia might be on poor George. An aspect she hadn’t considered when she’d been in North Carolina, trying to decide which newspaper advertisement to answer.

      A tap of footsteps caught her attention. A floorboard squeaked as a man’s heavy gait marched closer, accompanied by the patter of a boy’s. Her attention leaped, eager to gaze upon her son and see how he was doing, but her senses seemed focused on the tall, shadowed man pausing outside the open door to grip the fallen satchels.

      Oh, my. His thick dark hair swirled in a thick whirl around his crown and fell to his collar. As he straightened, hauling the satchels with him, muscles bunched and played beneath the material of his shirt. He strode powerfully into the room like a man more suited to the wild outdoors, hefting a rifle at a bear, perhaps. He dominated the room and made her pulse skid to a stop. He looked immense with his broad shoulders and muscled girth. When he caught her watching him, he jerked his gaze away, staring hard at the floor.

      “I’ll put these in the bedroom.” The smoky pitch of his tone came gruff and distant. As if he didn’t want to talk to her. He said nothing more, crossing behind the couch, where she couldn’t see him, where his step drummed in the room like a hollow heartbeat. “George, did you want to come along?”

      “Yes, sir!” The boy hurried after him, disappearing into the shadowed, narrow hallway.

      Mercy didn’t know why her chest ached so much it hurt to breathe. Her husband-to-be was doing his best to avoid her. He was courteous and responsible toward her, but she felt a vast distance settling between them. It felt lonely.

      “Pa?” Amelia hopped to her feet with a flat-footed thud. “What about supper? We are gonna have Ma and George over, right?”

      “She’s not your ma yet.” His voice thundered from the far room, sounding muffled and irritated. Something landed on the floor. Likely the satchels. “It’ll be best to let Mercy and George settle into their rooms. They’ve traveled a long way. They must be tired, right, George?”

      “Sorta.” The boy’s thin response sounded uncertain. “I was kinda hopin’ to see your horses.”

      “I have tomorrow set aside for that.” Cole’s tone warmed and he strode into sight with the child at his side. What an image they made. Towering man, little boy. “You want to be rested up because it’ll be a big day. A good day, I promise you that. Besides, I’m going to bed early to be set and ready to go come morning.”

      “Then I will be, too.” George nodded, his face scrunching up determinedly. “Will I really get to ride tomorrow?”

      “My word of honor.” Cole ran his big hand lightly over the top of the boy’s head, a fatherly gesture. “But there’s more to riding horses. You also have to learn how to take care of them.”

      “I know. I’m good at sweeping the steps whenever Ma tells me to. That’s sorta like cleaning a barn. Do I get my own pitchfork?”

      “I got one especially for you. I’ll teach you everything you need to know.” Cole stepped away, and for an instant a father’s longing flashed across his face. When he glanced her way, the look had vanished. He squared his shoulders, his reserve going up. “Eberta is finishing with the last customer downstairs. When she’s done, she’ll head over to the diner next door. Amelia’s going with her. George can go, too, if you wish. They can fetch your meals, while you and I talk.”

      Talk. Her chest tensed up so tightly her ribs felt ready to crack. “I suppose that sounds like a wise plan.”

      “Good.” Cole nodded in his daughter’s direction before turning to warm his hands at the stove.

      “C’mon, George. Let’s go.” Amelia hopped forward, skirts swishing, and held out her hand. “The diner has the best cookies. If Eberta is in a good mood, and something tells me that she might be, we can talk her into getting us dessert.”

      George quietly took the girl’s hand, hesitating to glance across the room. Mercy recognized his worried look, so she nodded reassuringly, letting him know it would be all right.

      “I’ll be right here waiting for you,” she told him, her good boy. He blew out a breath, perhaps shrugging off his anxiety, and took Amelia’s hand. The two trotted off, Amelia chattering away, as if determined to make them friends.

      The room felt lonelier without the children in it, with only the two of them and their marriage agreement. Mercy’s palms grew damp as the silence stretched. She didn’t know if she should stand up and join Cole at the stove or continue to wait for him to speak. Since she wasn’t a meek woman, she scooted farther up on the cushion, poised on the edge of it and studied the man with his back to her, rigid as stone.

      This wasn’t easy for him, either. That realization made it easier to break the silence.

      “George already adores you.” She folded her hands together, lacing her fingers, staring at her work-roughened hands. “Thank you for being so welcoming to him, for being everything you promised in your letters.”

      “Why wouldn’t I keep my word?” His tense back went rigid. His wide shoulders bunched. Then he blew out an audible huff of breath. “We agreed to be honest with one another.”

      “We did.” She could sense an old hurt in the air, maybe something from his marriage. Heaven knew she had issues from hers. “Amelia is delightful. Everything I knew she would be.”

      “Even rambunctious?” A slight dollop of humor chased the chill from his words.

      “I suspected from her letters that she had a zest for life.” Slowly, she stood. Uncertain, she bit her bottom lip, wanting to reach out to the man, to her husband-to-be. “I was less certain what you would be like from your letters, although I read so many of them.”

      “Likely I disappoint.” More of that humor and something else, something