Katie's Way (9 page)

She stared blandly back at him. “Bishop Mose said that I can share the stable behind the building with you. After all, you only use it during the day.”

A muscle twitched in his jaw. “I'm sure your cousins would be happy to take you anywhere you need.”

“Ja, they would, but I'm used to getting myself where I want to go.” She hadn't particularly looked for such independence, but it had found her.

“If you were my cousin, I would not want you to have to do things like that.” His voice grated on the words.

“Then it is a gut thing you are not my cousin, ain't so?”

He didn't bother answering, just turned in at the farm lane behind several other buggies, all headed for the barn where they'd worshipped that morning. A small white sign announced the presence of RACHEL'S GARDEN, NO SUNDAY SALES.

Katie clamped her lips shut. She'd said too much, no doubt about it.

If Rhoda were to be happy here, she needed friends like Becky. For Rhoda's sake, Katie should make an effort to get along with Becky's uncle. Too bad he had the ability to bring out all the worst aspects of her nature with just a look.

Caleb drew into the row of buggies parked along the lane, and a couple of boys ran to help. Rhoda and Becky slid out in a hurry, obviously eager to get to the fun, and Katie followed more slowly.

“We want to join the volleyball game. All right?” Rhoda said, nodding to where a net had been set up on the lawn near the barn, a safe distance from the greenhouse where Rachel obviously grew the plants she sold. A fair-sized group of boys and girls, maybe thirty or more of them, milled around the net, probably more interested in each other than in the game.

“Of course.” Katie bit back the impulse to remind Rhoda to behave properly. Rhoda wouldn't appreciate it, and no wonder. Katie certainly wouldn't have at that age. “I'll go and see if Rachel needs any help in the kitchen.”

The two girls darted off. As Katie turned toward the house, Caleb clasped her hand to stop her.

“Katie . . .”

Whatever he was about to say seemed to vanish from his lips. His fingers warmed against her skin, and that warmth began to spread up her arm. She stared at him for a brief, disorienting moment, seeing his eyes darken, feeling the ground seem to shift under her feet.

He surely could feel her pulse pounding against his hand. She should . . .

Caleb dropped her wrist as if he'd touched a hot stove. He took a step back, bumping into the buggy. He shook his head, maybe denying that anything had happened between them.

“I'll keep an eye on Becky,” he said abruptly. “I hope you'll do the same for your sister.”

For an instant Katie felt like bursting into tears, but a flare of anger came to her rescue. “My sister is fine. She doesn't need anyone to keep an eye on her.”

The fact that Katie had come for just that purpose was none of Caleb's business.

His jaw clenched. “Yesterday—”

She'd known he'd bring that up sometime. “What happened yesterday was a misunderstanding. It was between me and my sister. No one else.”

“You mean it's none of my business,” he said, clearly not agreeing.

“It's not.” She gave him back look for look. He could make of that what he wanted.

Finally he turned away, making a small gesture with his hand that seemed to dismiss her and her sister entirely.

Clearly he didn't approve of the way she'd handled Rhoda yesterday. But then, there didn't seem to be anything about her that didn't draw that same reaction from him, did there?

That moment when they had touched was different, a small voice in the back of her mind said. Very different.

“So
some of Becky's friends are going to get together to go shopping on Saturday, and they invited me.” Rhoda's tongue had been running faster than her hands as she and Katie got ready to open on Monday. “I can go, can't I?”

The efforts Becky had made to introduce Rhoda into Pleasant Valley's teenage society were obviously working, but that left Katie with one challenge after another.

“That is ser gut of them, but I'll need to know a bit more about it. Who is going, and how are you getting there, and—”

“And, and, and,” Rhoda interrupted her. “You sound like Mammi. Can't you trust me?”

Katie reminded herself that she'd been just as impatient to grow up at sixteen. “Mamm and Daadi left you in my care. I have to do things the way they would. I didn't say no, just that I must have more information. That's not too much to ask, ain't so?”

“If I find out all that, will you say yes?” Rhoda was nothing if not persistent.

“If it sounds appropriate,” she said cautiously.

“Ach, you'll see. They are all nice girls, Becky's friends.” Her good humor restored, Rhoda seized the end of the sheet Katie had put over the quilts on the display bed and began folding. She paused, sheet in her arms. “Should we put a different quilt on top?”

Katie touched the Tumbling Blocks quilt Caleb's mother had made. “Let's leave this one on top a bit longer. There hasn't been much traffic in the shop since I put it out.”

And there was the crux of her problem. How long could she keep going if sales didn't pick up? Of course, Saturday had been the Mud Sale, so people hadn't been out shopping in town. And she couldn't expect to have fantastic sales the first week. Things would get better.

She kept telling herself those same reassuring words. They were beginning to sound a little hollow.

“Thomas Esch is awfully nice-looking, don't you think?” Rhoda asked the question with such studied casualness that it was obviously important.

“Thomas?” Katie mentally scanned the faces of the young folks she'd met at the singing. “Tall? Kind of gawky?” Of course that described at least half the boys there.

“He's not gawky,” Rhoda said, her tone indignant. “I think he's handsome, with those brown eyes and light hair.”

“Ach, ja. I was thinking of the wrong boy.” Katie tried to make amends. “Thomas is good-looking, for sure.” Rhoda thought so, and that was the important thing. “Did you talk to him?”

Rhoda shrugged. “A little. He's in the same gang as Becky, and they said I could be, too.”

“I'm glad.”

The word
gang
probably had a different meaning in the outside world. To Amish teens, it was a loose group of friends who did things together. For sure it was important to a newcomer like Rhoda to belong to a gang, and Katie could be confident that Becky's group would be an appropriate one.

She felt a surge of gratitude toward Becky. Despite Caleb's attitude, Becky had gone out of her way to welcome Rhoda.

Not that Caleb was always so judgmental. Katie uncovered the quilt rack, letting her hand rest on the smooth curved wood for a moment, and glanced into his shop. No one was there, but from the second floor came the rasp of a saw. Caleb was obviously getting in some work time before he opened up.

Rhoda, humming something Katie suspected was a popular song, began sweeping the floor. Despite Caleb's unbending attitude toward her sister, there had been moments when she'd almost thought they might be friends.

When Caleb had helped her out with that Englisch dealer, for instance. She might very easily have given in to his ridiculously low offer for the crib quilt, just for the sake of selling something, if not for Caleb's timely warning.

She touched the fine feather stitches of the quilting. The piece was worth every penny of the price she'd put on it, and she'd be foolish to take less.

Thanks to Caleb she hadn't. And when he'd brought the quilt rack in to display, she'd thought surely they were done with disagreeing.

Not so. Caleb's disapproval of how she'd handled Rhoda set her back up. Unfortunately, it made her question her judgment, as well. What did a maidal like her know about raising a teenager?

Still, Caleb was no more a parent than she—

Katie cut that thought short. Caleb
was
a parent, if Molly's story was true. Somewhere out there in the Englisch world, he presumably had a child. It was inexplicable.

“Katie, someone's here.” Rhoda, picking up the broom and dust pan, scuttled behind the counter.

She was right. Lisa Macklin approached the door, and in a moment she'd entered, a smile crinkling the fine lines around her eyes, her short gray hair ruffled from the spring breeze.

“Good morning, Katie. I said I'd stop by, and here I am.”

“Wilkom, Mrs. Macklin.” She handed the sheet she held to Rhoda, brushing a thread off her skirt. “You are out early.”

“I don't open my shop until ten on Mondays, so I thought I'd stop by. And you're going to call me Lisa, remember?” She approached the counter, turning her smile on Rhoda. “And who's this?”

“This is my sister, Rhoda, komm from home to help me with the new shop. Rhoda, this lady is Mrs. Macklin. She has the gift shop down the street—the one with all the candles in the window.”

Rhoda nodded politely, still clutching the broom. “I have seen your shop.” She glanced at Katie. “Shall I sweep in the back room, then?”

“Ja, do that.” Had Lisa come to buy, perhaps? Katie fervently hoped so.

Rhoda and the broom disappeared into the back room, and Katie returned to her visitor. “Can I help you find something?”

“I'll just look around a little,” Lisa said. Katie's heart sank. People who said that were seldom serious about buying.

She tried to think of something to say that wouldn't sound as if she were pushing Lisa to buy. “Have you had your shop for a long time?”

Lisa shook her head, a tinge of sorrow in her eyes. “No, only about two years. It was a retirement dream of my husband's—to run a little gift shop in a small town like this. Mark was so enthusiastic about it. He had so many ideas for the place. But he passed away after we'd only been open a few months.”

“I'm so sorry.” Katie's heart went out to the woman, whose dreams had been shattered so quickly. “Yet you still run the shop?”

Lisa tilted her head to the side, as if she were considering the question. “It does seem strange, in a way. The shop was Mark's dream, not mine. At first I suppose I found the routine comforting, and the idea of selling the place was overwhelming when all I could do was get through one day after another. Then one day I woke up and realized that I was enthusiastic about it, too.”

“So your husband's dream became yours.”

“I guess so. Mark would laugh about that.” She smiled, though a hint of sorrow touched her eyes. “Running the shop suits me, and I want to make it a success.”

Success
was not a word an Amish person would use readily in that regard. A business should pay its way and provide a living for its owner and a means of supporting the community.

The trouble was, Katie had begun to worry that her place would not even do that. “Tell me,” she said impulsively, “do you make enough sales here in Pleasant Valley to . . . well, to be worth it?”

“Not as much as I'd like,” Lisa said. Her gaze sharpened on Katie's face, as if she'd said something insightful. “It's not easy to make a go of a shop in a small farming community unless you're selling something lots of people need. Like Bishop Mose and the harness shop, for instance.”

Katie nodded. What the woman said was true enough, and folks here didn't need quilts.

“That's why I've been trying to organize the shop owners to try and increase the number of visitors to town,” Lisa said, her eyes sparkling with enthusiasm. “We need people coming to Pleasant Valley who will want the unique things we have to offer, like your quilts and Caleb Brand's furniture.”

“Ja, I see. But how would you get more people to come?”

“That's not as hard as you might think. We need to reach the people who would stop by if only they knew about us. For instance, a website on the Internet would draw people's attention.” She gave Katie a questioning look, and Katie nodded.

“Ja, I understand about that.”

“Good. And I thought if we ran some special promotions it would help. For instance, say we all had sales at the same time. Or we could have an outdoor sidewalk sale on a particular Saturday. Or place an ad in the tourist booklets they put out in Lewisburg. Or—”

Lisa cut herself short, laughing a little. “Sorry. I do run on, but for someone who wasn't that enthusiastic about running a shop, I suddenly find I have too many ideas. I can't go into anyone else's shop without thinking what I'd do if it were mine.”

“Ja?” Lisa's enthusiasm was infectious. Katie found she was smiling back. “So if this shop were yours, what would you do?”