The Keeper (27 page)

Menno rolled that over in his mind for a moment and let out a loud “Haw!”

Uncle Hank leaned back in his chair and crossed one big boot over the other. “The deer took off across a field and onto the lake, covered with ice. The deer slipped and one of the big boys—Mose Weaver—came very near to overtaking it. But just as he reached out to touch it . . .” Uncle Hank reached a hand out in the air as if he was trying to touch the buck “. . . the deer found its footing and set off again. Quick as a wink, the deer was on the north shore of the lake. We boys kept our sight on the deer and lit out after it.

“After a long hunt I found the deer in some brush, and gave vent to my gentle voice,” to which M.K. snorted and Uncle Hank nudged her with his boot, “and out it ran, well rested and as good as ever. By this time two of the boys had run home and returned with guns. As the deer passed within a few feet of them, they just stood in awe of this magnificent beast. Neither took a shot at it until it was well hidden in the thick bushes. Each blamed the other for not shooting the deer.”

“Did anyone ever get that deer?” Menno asked.

“Alas, Menno, none of us tasted venison from that hunt.”

“What ever happened to the buck?” M.K. asked.

“What became of the deer I never knew, but that winter, we were all seriously afflicted with buck fever, something only time and experience will cure.”

Fern gave a guffaw. “Hasn’t done much to cure you. You’ve got yourself a serious case of bear fever. You spend half your time trying to track that bear and cub!”

Uncle Hank looked offended. “That bear is going to hurt somebody soon. She’s getting bolder and bolder. Came right up to old Fannie King’s kitchen door last week. Scared Fannie so bad she dropped her choppers!”

Sadie gasped. It didn’t take much to scare Sadie, but even M.K. felt a tingle down her spine.

“Uncle Hank!” Amos said. A warning passed between the two. They all noticed. Well, maybe not Menno.

That bear and cub were starting to get everyone edgy. It was the top news of every gathering—who had seen them last, what damage they had caused, how crafty that mama bear was, if it was time to call the game warden in. Sadie shivered, though the night was hot.

Uncle Hank eased up out of his chair, stretched, and yawned. “It is a well-known fact that a buck’s tail is not very long, but this one will be an exception unless I come to a close.”

It had sprinkled a little in the morning, but now the clouds had broken up and the August sun was bearing down. Julia found Rome out in the pasture where Menno kept his small flock of ewes. She called to him and he waited for her at the top of the meadow. Before she reached him, he wiped the perspiration from his cheeks with his sleeve. He was pushing a small cart filled with clover hay. Menno’s ewes had crowded around the cart, trying to snatch hay, and made it difficult for him to move. As she walked toward him, the ewes looked up, regarded her with their sweet, blank faces, and then went back to the serious business of eating. She shaded her eyes from the late-afternoon sun.

When she reached him, she held out a napkin with fresh hot doughnuts on it. “Fern made these for you. She thought Dad and Sadie’s diet might be wearing thin on you.” They had all lost weight this summer, all but M.K. and Menno, for whom Fern relaxed kitchen rules.

He pulled off his gloves and threw them on top of the hay. He took the napkin from her, lifted it, and breathed deeply. “I could smell those doughnuts frying way out here.” He took a bite and closed his eyes. “Takes me right back to my boyhood.”

“You haven’t mentioned your family. Where did you grow up?” She found herself often wondering about Rome and wasn’t about to let this opportunity pass.

He broke off a section of his doughnut. “Here and there.” He popped the last bite of doughnut in his mouth and reached for his gloves. He broke open a dense clump of hay, releasing a sudden scent of white clover. He scattered the hay over the ground, so the ewes would leave the cart alone.

“Rome, what would you think about staying a few extra months this fall to help us get through the harvest? Menno does well when he has someone working with him. If you could stay through October—work with Menno on the hay cuttings, supervise the threshing frolics, help us get the corn into the silo.” She paused. “The truth is, having you here has brought a peace of mind to my father.”

“It’s about time for a change of scene soon.” He grinned at her. “There’s roaming in my blood.”

Julia couldn’t imagine such a thought. She looked out over the fenced fields, the cows clumped together under a shade tree, a creek that wound its way through the pastures to nourish the land. In the sky, high overhead, she could see the arrows of a flock of geese heading toward the lake. “A home like this—it seems to me that you couldn’t find a better place to be than right here. The earth here is generous and outgoing, like the people in Stoney Ridge. It’s a place that keeps you anchored to life.” She turned and found him staring at her. “But maybe you don’t want to be anchored.” She hadn’t posed it as a question, but she waited for an answer all the same. The emotions that played over his face ranged from sadness to coldness, then settled into something that looked like discomfort.

“Would you at least consider staying through October for my father’s sake?”

The rascal returned to his eyes. “What about for your sake, Julia?”

“What about me?”

He gave her a sly grin. “Do you want me to stay?”

“I wouldn’t be asking if I didn’t think you provided a benefit to my family.”

He threw the last of the hay onto the ground. Then he pulled off his gloves and turned to her. “So you want me to stay. Just admit it.”

She could feel bright red patches burning in her cheeks. “I’m only admitting that your presence provides peace of mind to my father. That’s all.”

His gaze slipped from her eyes to her lips. “So you don’t really care if I stay or leave?”

“No. I’m only asking for my father’s sake.”

He stepped closer to her and brushed her cheek with his knuckles. “So this doesn’t make you feel anything?” His voice was deep and teasing.

She drew up her chin and met his gaze. She thought about stepping back but decided she should hold her ground. Even the smallest retreat would show weakness, and she wouldn’t reveal any vulnerability. At the same time, his nearness made her head swim.

“And this?”

Slowly, Rome lifted his thumb and slid it upward along the curve of her jaw. His touch was surprisingly gentle. She knew she should pull back, she wanted to break away, but her legs wouldn’t obey.

As she gazed up into that chiseled face, she tried to remember every grievance she held against the Bee Man. But as he lowered his head and his lips found hers, her reasoning was blotted out. One of Rome’s arms slipped around her back, then another around her head. She found herself falling into the kiss. Seconds, minutes, hours later, Rome pulled away. His forehead rested on hers.

“Still nothing?” he whispered.

His kiss was gentle and persuading, sweet and tender, nothing at all like Paul’s pleasant kisses.

Paul. PAUL. She sprang back. “Not a thing,” she said coolly, trying to not appear as shaken as she felt. She pushed past him to leave.

“Julia, where are you going?”

“Back to the house,” she called out without turning around.

“Then you’re headed in the wrong direction.”

Rome chuckled softly. Julia’s small figure was strangely dignified as she walked away from him.

Until that moment, Rome had never seen a woman blush on top of a blush, but Julia managed it when he pointed out she was starting out to the house in the wrong direction. He had to bite on his bottom lip to keep from laughing out loud.

It was mean, he supposed, what he had done to her. Kissing her like that, in broad daylight. It’s just that she looked so adorable, standing there with confectioner’s sugar on her cheek. She was warm in his arms, and she smelled like a doughnut.

What he couldn’t get out of his mind was that she kissed him back! Never in his wildest imagination would he have thought that prim and proper Julia Lapp would have kissed him back, with that much passion. And when she couldn’t meet his gaze, he knew she was embarrassed.

Just look at me,
he thought,
like some moonstruck teenager.
Roman Troyer, the Bee Man, Roamin’ Roman, acting like an adolescent. He felt as if he were eighteen again, young and hopeful and naive, believing that anything was possible.

Julia had done him a favor, asking him to stay, making it seem like it was her idea. He’d already decided he was going to stick around a few more months. He felt a burden to help Amos get through this heart business. To help the whole family get through it. But how long would he stay? Would he still be here through Thanksgiving? Through Christmas? He hoped he might, and it was a strange feeling.

He shook his head and let out a long sigh. Where were those thoughts coming from? He hadn’t felt this way last year, had he? Or the year before that?

Before Julia interrupted him, his thoughts had been traveling to another Thanksgiving, years ago, when his mother burned the turkey. And then he remembered the year when his youngest sister had tripped over a dog bone as she was bringing the turkey to the table and sent it flying into his father’s lap. Oh, the surprised look on his father’s face! The memory made him laugh out loud. But, as always, a sharp tug of pain swept in right behind it. He swallowed hard, banishing the images of the past as he tried to concentrate on feeding the sheep.

When memories of those days popped up in his mind, the images were still as crisp as a new dollar bill. Why were those thoughts hitting him so squarely in the jaw this year? Was it part of turning twenty-five? Feeling older?

He drew in a long breath, inhaling the woodsy scent laced with a clover hay fragrance. He leaned against the wagon and pulled out of his pocket an envelope. He reread the letter that he had picked up this morning at the post office.

Dear Roman,

Suffice it to say, I am someone who has made mistakes, and in buying the property, I am trying to remedy them. You may think I intend to raze the farm and build homes, or condominiums, or a strip center of shops, or an industrial park. Although that would be most lucrative, that’s not what I will do. You have my promise. I want to keep the farm as it is.

Don’t be a fool, Rome. Take the money.

R.W.

16

J
ulia awoke in the morning thinking of that kiss with Rome. The question she’d been trying to avoid asking felt like a fist in her stomach. How could she have let him kiss her like that? Then she remembered the way it felt—natural and wonderful. Yet what had she been thinking? Maybe there was something wrong with her.

Julia had no illusions about why Rome had kissed her. By acting immune to his charms, she’d turned herself into a challenge—a challenge he’d forget about the instant one of the local beauties caught his eye.

Yes, the kiss was quite . . . memorable. The only other man she had kissed was Paul, and his kisses were rather staid and formal. Avuncular, almost.

Rome’s kiss wasn’t like a relative’s kiss, not at all. That kiss with Rome . . . she couldn’t bear to think of it, of what he made her feel.

She could never deny that Rome was an attractive man, because he was. She also could not deny that he could be a caring, giving man—if he ever truly learned to love someone other than his bees.

Besides, her heart belonged to Paul. Was it wrong to let Rome kiss her? A twinge of guilt washed over her, but she decided to dismiss it. And she didn’t kiss Rome—he kissed her! She was only indulging him. Just a whim. Flushing it out of her system. She had to forget what had happened and keep her wits about her. It would never happen again. Never. It was a terrific mistake. Never again!

Determined not to spend any more time analyzing that kiss, she jumped out of bed. Today was a new day. No ruthless man with dark eyes, no kiss she couldn’t explain.