Falling for the Amish Bad Boy, page 2
“Beth, please.” He glanced around uncomfortably. The store was full of people. “Lower your voice.”
“You cheated on my sister!” she responded even louder.
He frowned, drawing back. “I did not—”
“I knew she should never have walked out with you,” Beth went on, taking a step toward him. “Everyone in Honeycomb knows you’re not to be trusted.”
He took another step back, staring at her. That was such an awful thing to hear that he didn’t know how to respond.
But Beth didn’t wait for an answer. “Don’t talk to her. Ever again.” She pointed once more. “Don’t even look at her!”
He watched with disappointment as Willa disappeared from his sight around the corner of the building. It upset him that Willa felt like she should have to run from him. He hadn’t wanted their relationship to end this way. All he wanted to do was to make sure she was all right. He hadn’t seen her in weeks, not since their breakup. Our second breakup.
Pushing the brim of his straw hat up, Jack returned his gaze to Beth. He didn’t know her well. She was as pretty as the other Koffman girls, though some might say not as pretty as Willa. There was something sturdy about Beth and...intimidating. That was the word. “Beth, I only want to make sure she’s okay. We didn’t part on the best of terms—”
“You think?” Beth interrupted. She narrowed her gaze angrily. “How could you hurt her like that? She cared for you. She trusted you.”
Jack still wasn’t sure what to say. Obviously, the Koffman family had a different notion of what happened between him and Willa than what actually happened. His first impulse was to tell Beth that she didn’t know what she was talking about. But he thought better of it, out of respect for Willa. What had passed between them was private, wasn’t it? Unless Willa chose to share.
“Well?” Beth demanded. “If you have something to say, say it. Otherwise, step out of my way.”
“You’re the one in my way,” Jack accused. Then he saw Lavinia Yoder dressed head to toe in a black cloak and bonnet coming up behind Beth and groaned. Of all the people to overhear this conversation. He reached out to touch Beth’s shoulder to move her aside, afraid that Lavinia would bowl them both over in her eagerness to see what was going on.
“Don’t touch me!” Beth flared, swatting at him.
“Jack,” Lavinia said.
Jack nodded and Beth swung around, startled. “Lavinia.”
Lavinia was a widow who lived across the street from the Koffmans. Her only son, Elden, would marry Beth’s and Willa’s sister Millie in a few months.
The tall, slender woman looked from Jack to Beth, then back to Jack. “Everything all right here?”
“Fine,” Jack managed, embarrassed that Beth was making such a fuss in front of people they knew. He felt like everyone in the shop was staring at them. Both Zook brothers had gotten off their stools, where he thought they were permanent fixtures, and stood side by side, watching them intently.
“Beth?” The widow looked down her long, sloping nose.
Beth drew a tight-lipped smile. “Goot,” she murmured. “We’re goot here, Lavinia.”
The older woman lifted her gaze, obviously looking at something or someone. Jack turned around to see that the customers waiting in line near the front counter were staring at them. The owner, Jessop Raber, had stopped bagging for an Englisher in a ball cap and was watching, too. Jack turned back to the women, looking at Beth who, unlike Willa, was tall enough that he could gaze directly into her eyes.
Beth gritted her teeth seeming to keep her ire barely in check. “Jack and I were just talking.”
Lavinia circled them, staring as she passed. “Were you, then? I would ask about what, but you know me, I mind my own knitting. Of course it doesn’t take much to put two and two together, what with Willa and her waterworks.”
Neither Jack nor Beth responded.
Seeming disappointed, Lavinia walked away, and Beth met Jack’s gaze again. “Now look what you’ve done. She’ll tell everyone in the county about this.”
“Me?” He touched his chest between the straps of his leather suspenders. “I’m the innocent one here. I just came to get some radish seeds for my mother.”
“And made my sister cry!”
“I did not—” Jack caught himself when he realized he had raised his voice. He didn’t want to be that kind of man. Not ever. What was it about these Koffman girls that made him behave poorly? He knew he hadn’t handled his relationship with Willa well, and he regretted it. All he wanted to do was to tell Willa that he was sorry. And now here Beth was, putting herself in the middle of it.
“Stay away from her,” Beth hissed, leaning closer to him. “If you see her, walk away.” She gestured broadly and turned around to go.
“Beth, you’re not listening to me.” Jack didn’t know what had possessed him, but he followed her onto the loading dock. “I only want to talk to her. To make sure she’s all right. That we’re all right. I didn’t mean to hurt her. I—”
“Who’s the one who’s not listening now?” Beth asked, swinging back to face him. “What do you not understand? She doesn’t want to talk to you.”
The Zook brothers now stood close enough that there wasn’t any way they couldn’t hear every word that was said.
“She doesn’t want to see you again. Ever,” Beth said firmly. She started down the concrete steps and then threw over her shoulder, “And neither do I, Jack Lehman!”
Jack just stood there, dumbfounded as he watched Beth stride away. How had he got himself into these kinds of situations with girls?
“Which one?”
The question startled Jack and he looked at the Zook brothers. “What?”
Amos, the older of the two, crossed his arms over his hollow chest and leaned back thoughtfully. “That’s what Bert and I are wondering.”
Jack frowned. He had no idea what Amos was talking about. “Which one what?”
Amos shot a look at his brother and flashed a toothless smile. “Which one of the Koffman girls are you going to marry? I got my eye on the pretty little one, but Bert says it will be the tall, loudmouthed one.”
The older men cackled with laughter, and Jack walked down the steps without his mother’s radish seeds.
Chapter Two
The horse and wagon had barely rolled to a stop in the barnyard when Willa jumped out and hurried toward the front porch of their white clapboard farmhouse. There, Eleanor was sweeping and Jane, their youngest sister at nearly seventeen, was weeding their mother’s flower bed. Henrietta, in a pair of their father’s breeches beneath her green dress, stood on a ladder, replacing shingles that had come loose on the porch roof.
“You’re not going to believe who we ran into at Raber’s,” Willa called to them.
Beth watched Willa go, glad her sister had recovered from her encounter with Jack. Beth hadn’t. She was still upset, oddly even more upset than Willa. But Willa was always one for a bucket of tears that could turn into laughter in a moment.
“Who?” Jane asked, coming to her feet. She dusted dark, rich soil from her hands by rubbing them together. “I knew I should have gone with you.” She shot Eleanor a look. Jane had wanted to go to the feedstore, too, but their eldest sister had insisted she stay home to help with chores. Jane was at that age when she desperately wanted more social interaction and was always up to go anywhere or do anything, even it was to walk to a neighbor’s farm to deliver cookies.
As Beth took their horse by his halter, Cora came out of the barn, their father trailing her. He wore his good black felt hat meant only for church Sunday, but Beth didn’t say anything.
When he’d first begun to experience memory loss and odd behavior, they’d assumed it was because their mother was dying and he was overwhelmed. They’d gently reminded him of things he’d forgotten or was supposed to do in those days. But after their mother’s death and his diagnosis of early-onset dementia, they’d learned to choose carefully when to speak and when to hold their tongue. Nowadays, his safety was their priority, and after that, the rules got a bit murky, often depending on which sister was keeping an eye on him.
Cora let him wear or eat whatever he wanted, but she was a stickler for making sure he was groomed properly, which included daily shaving. Amish men did not have mustaches, and Cora wouldn’t tolerate one. On the other hand, Beth didn’t mind if his beard got a bit unruly or he had the shadow of a mustache, but she wouldn’t let him eat as many cookies as he wanted, no matter how hard he begged. His doctor had warned them that he was a borderline diabetic, which meant he needed to limit his sweets and carbohydrates.
“Back already?” Cora asked. “I thought you would see Rosie after you picked up the feed. We were hoping you’d bring some ice cream home, weren’t we, Dadi?”
He didn’t respond.
“Ya, we were going to go,” Beth said, “but then—” She exhaled, as annoyed with herself as she was with Jack Lehman. Why had she let him rile her like that in front of all those folks at the feedstore? Before the day was over, how many times would Lavinia repeat what Beth had said to him? “We ran into Jack,” she said, lowering her voice.
“Don’t see chicken mash.” Their father walked around to the back of the wagon. “And where’s the cracked corn?”
“No cracked corn or mash today, Dadi. I’ll go back tomorrow,” Cora said, then she returned her attention to Beth.
“He wanted to talk to Willa, but she got upset.” Beth worked her jaw, embarrassed now by her behavior. Well, maybe more regretful than embarrassed. “And then I sort of got into it with him.”
“Where’s the cracked corn?” their dat repeated, louder this time. It was something he did all the time. If he didn’t get the response he wanted, he’d simply repeat himself louder.
“We didn’t need cracked corn,” Cora told him. She looked back at Beth, crossing her arms over her chest. “Got into it with him? Why? What did he say to Willa?”
Beth worked her jaw. “He didn’t say anything,” she admitted. “She ran outside when she saw him. She didn’t want to talk to him.”
Cora arched her brows. “So...” She drew out the word. “Willa didn’t feel the need to talk to Jack, but you did?”
Beth nodded.
“And you got into it with him?” Cora asked using Beth’s words. She stared at her through her wire-framed eyeglasses. “I don’t understand.”
“I sent you girls for cracked corn and instead you got mash,” their father muttered, lifting one of the bags of feed from the back of the wagon to his shoulder. While his mind may have weakened, his strength hadn’t. “That’ll teach me to send you girls. I’ll go myself next time.”
Beth watched him carry the feed into the barn. It needed to go into the chicken coop, but she’d move it later. “He made Willa cry,” she explained to her sister. “And I got mad. Because he hurt her. He cheated on her and he hurt her feelings terribly. What kind of man does that? Willa thought he was going to ask her to marry him.”
Cora frowned. “He shouldn’t have cheated on her, but he wasn’t going to ask her to marry him. They weren’t a good match.”
Beth didn’t know whether Jack had intended to ask Willa to be his wife, but did that matter? Willa thought he would.
Cora contemplated a moment. “Well, nothing to be done about it now.” She walked around to grab Joe’s halter. “I’ll unhitch him for you. Get Dat to help. His hands always remember how to do it, even when his mind doesn’t.” She reached out and brushed Beth’s arm. “You could always apologize next time you see Jack.”
Beth narrowed her gaze. “I am not apologizing.”
Cora chuckled as she led the horse and wagon away. Beth crossed the barnyard. Willa was standing at the foot of the porch steps, telling their sisters how Beth had kept Jack from going after her and what Beth had said to him.
“How did you know what I said?” Beth asked with surprise. “You went to the wagon.”
“I could still hear you.” Willa turned back to Jane, who was listening in rapt attention. “Beth told him to stay away from me,” she went on as if it was the most exciting thing that had ever happened to her. “She told him he wasn’t allowed to talk to me.”
Nay, she didn’t.” Jane looked at Beth excitedly. “You were brave to take up for Willa.”
Beth exhaled from the foot of the steps. “Foolhardy is more like it. Lavinia was there and she heard every word.”
“And now everyone in Honeycomb will know about it,” Henry called down from the ladder, punctuating her words with the bang of her hammer.
“Oh, dear,” Eleanor said with a sigh. She had been sweeping cobwebs from the porch ceiling but lowered her broom. “I suppose that means I’ll hear about it. You know how Lavinia likes to tell me how we ought to behave.” She frowned. “How you all ought to behave. How I should make you behave.” She chuckled. “As if anyone could make any of the Koffman girls do anything.”
“I’m sorry,” Beth said, truly sorry if she’d made trouble for Eleanor. “It just sort of happened.” She climbed the steps that needed painting. “But Willa was so upset, and that Jack, he had it coming to him.” She stopped in front of Eleanor. “I don’t think we should have anything else to do with him.”
Eleanor arched an eyebrow and continued to sweep.
“It’s time to stop tolerating that kind of behavior with these young men. They think girls are so desperate to marry them that they can behave any way they please!” As she spoke, Beth could feel her face growing warm as anger tightened in her chest. “If we continue to let them act this way without consequences, their behavior will never change.”
A cobweb drifted downward, lighting on Eleanor’s headscarf and she absently brushed it off.
“I don’t think he should be welcome here and...and we shouldn’t be talking to him,” Beth continued. “Otherwise, next you know, he’ll be trying to charm her.” She lifted her chin in Jane’s direction.
Eleanor’s mouth twitched as if she was trying not to smile. “So you’ve taken it on yourself to decide who in our community should be shunned?”
Beth frowned, feeling that her big sister wasn’t taking this whole thing seriously enough. “Nay, I’m not saying he should be shunned, schweschter. I’m saying...we, the Koffmans, shouldn’t be talking to him. We should have nothing more to do with him.”
“I’m not sure that would be too easy,” Eleanor responded.
“I know.” Beth began to pace the squeaky floorboards, raising her voice to be heard above Henry’s banging overhead. “We’ve known him since we were children. Mam and Dat were friends with Sharar and Maree, but don’t we owe it to other single women to stand up to men like him?”
“You don’t think we should talk to Jack?” Eleanor repeated.
Beth crossed her arms over her chest with a nod.
“Well, that would be interesting.” Eleanor knocked down an old wasp nest and it fell at her feet. “Seeing as how Monday morning he’s going to start on the foundation for our store.”
“What?” Beth demanded. “You hired him to build our store?”
“I did.”
“This is the first I’ve heard of it,” Beth said, her ire rising again.
Eleanor began to sweep again, pushing the papery nest into the pile of cobwebs. “Well, Beth, it gets tiresome having to repeat every decision I make six times. I was going to tell everyone at supper. He gave me the best out of four estimates. I’m sure he bid low because he’s just getting his business up and running, but he was the only one who took the time to cost out the price of renovating one of our outbuildings instead of building a new one. And he pointed out that building on the road will bring us more business, especially from Englishers who might be hesitant to come up a private lane.”
Beth stood there, stunned. “You hired Jack Lehman to build the store. Here. On our property? Knowing what he did to Willa.”
Eleanor raised her brows, nodding. “With us being his only job, he says he can have it done in four months. No one else could promise its completion before winter. Everyone’s busy.”
“Nay,” Beth said, shaking her head. “He cannot be here. He can’t be the one.”
“Well, he is.” Eleanor pointed to the dustpan balanced on the rail of the open porch. “Would you grab that?”
Beth picked up the dustpan and placed it where her sister could sweep the pile of debris into it. “No,” she repeated. “I don’t want him here. Willa certainly doesn’t want him here either.”
“It’s got to be him, Beth.” Eleanor sounded impatient now. “I already signed the contract.”
“Then unsign it.” Beth tapped her sister’s shoe and Eleanor took a step back.
Eleanor had been born with a congenital malformation of her foot, which had been amputated. She wore a prosthetic that wasn’t visible beneath her skirt.
“I’m not breaking the contract.” Eleanor took the dustpan from Beth. “Not only because it’s wrong to break an agreement—” she strode to the screen door “—but we can’t afford the price everyone else was asking.”
Beth reached around her sister to open the door for her.
Eleanor carried the broom and dustpan into the mudroom and dumped the cobwebs into a trash can. “We’ve got to get the store up and running as soon as possible.” She hung the broom and dustpan next to a mop. “I try not to worry you girls, but with Dat no longer able to work, we need the income, Beth.”
“I know,” Beth said, following her into the kitchen. The wide bay of windows that overlooked the front porch was open, and a breeze drifted through, bringing in the scent of new grass. “But maybe someone else would be willing to come down in their price. Or...or... I don’t know. Take payments?”
Eleanor began to pull leftovers from the refrigerator. On weekends, they ate their largest meal of the day around one o’clock, the traditional time for dinner. But during the week, they ate like Englishers, having a sandwich or whatever was left over from the big meal the day before. “Dat never in his life took out a loan.” Eleanor’s voice quivered. “And I’m not doing it now.”
