Jo Ann - The Amish Bachelor's Baby

Standing where he could watch them, he leaned toward Annie. A whiff of some sweet fragrance, something that offered a tantalizing hint of spring, drifted from her hair. He hadn’t thought of Annie Wagler as sweet. She was the forthright one, the one who spoke her mind. But standing close to her, he realized he might have been wrong to dismiss her as all business. She had a feminine side to her.

A very intriguing one.

“Caleb?” she prompted, and he realized he hadn’t answered her.

Folding his arms over his coat, he said, “Nobody mentioned anything about Becky Sue having a kind .”

“But you’ve got to let her family know she’s here. She...”

Annie’s voice trailed off, and Caleb looked over his shoulder to see Becky Sue getting to her feet. Annie didn’t want his cousin to know they’d been talking about contacting Becky Sue’s parents. A wise decision, because making the girl more intractable wouldn’t gain them anything.

He realized Annie had guessed the same thing because she strolled into the front room and began asking how Becky Sue and Joey had liked their impromptu picnic.

The girl looked at her coat that was splattered with soup. “He liked it more than you’d guess from the spots on me. I should wash this out before the stains set.”

Making sure his tone was conversational, Caleb pointed into the kitchen area and to the right. “The bathroom is through that door.”

Becky Sue glanced at her drowsy son and hesitated.

Annie held out her hands. “I’ll watch him while you wash up.”

“Danki,” the girl said as she placed the boppli in Annie’s arms.

Becky Sue took one step, then paused. She half turned and appraised how Annie cuddled the little boy. Satisfied, she hurried into the bathroom and closed the door.

Annie began to walk the floor to soothe the uneasy boppli . He calmed in her arms when she paced from one end of the kitchen to the other. As he stretched out a small hand to touch her face, she said, “This may be the first moment she’s had alone since they left home. I can’t imagine having to take care of a boppli on my own while traveling aimlessly.”

“What makes you think she’s being aimless?”

“It seems as if she’s thought more about running away than running to a specific place.”

Caleb nodded at Annie’s insightful remark. “We’ve got to figure out what to do.”

“What’s to figure out? She has to have a place to stay while you—” She gave a glance at the closed bathroom door. “While you make a few calls.”

He was grateful she chose her words with care. If they spooked Becky Sue, she might take off again.

“That’s true, but, Annie, I live by myself. I can’t have her under my roof with nobody else there.”

Puzzlement threaded across her brow. “Why not? She’s your cousin.”

“She’s my second cousin.”

Comprehension raced through Annie’s worried eyes. Marriage between second cousins wasn’t uncommon among plain folks. He had two friends who’d made such matches.

“Won’t Miriam take them?” she asked, adjusting the boppli ’s head as it wobbled at the same time he began to snore.

“Under normal circumstances, but she has caught whatever bug has made so many of her scholars sick. When I stopped by earlier today, the whole family was barely able to get on their feet. She won’t want to pass along the germs.”

“Then there’s only one solution.”

“What’s that?”

“She can stay at our house.”

To say he was shocked would have been an understatement. “But they’re not your problem.”

She gave him a frown he guessed had daunted many others. He squared his shoulders before she realized how successful her expression nearly had been.

“Caleb, Becky Sue and Joey aren’t a problem. Becky Sue is a girl with a problem. Not that this little one should be called a problem, either.” Her face softened when she gazed at the sleeping boppli in her arms and rocked him.

He almost gasped, as he had when he recognized his cousin among the boxes in the bakery’s kitchen. The unguarded warmth on Annie’s face offered a view of her he’d never seen before. He wondered how many had, because she hid this gentle softness behind a quick wit and sharp tongue. He was discovering many aspects of her today. He couldn’t help being curious about what else she kept concealed.

“We’ve got plenty of room in our house,” she went on, her voice rising and falling with the motion of her arms as she rocked the kind . “There will always be someone there to help Becky Sue.”

He couldn’t argue. The twins’ younger sister, Juanita, was in her final year of school. In addition, Annie’s grossmammi and younger brother lived with them.

At that thought, he said, “You’ve already got your hands full.”

“True, so we won’t notice another couple of people in our house. Let us help you, Caleb. You’ve worked hard building our community, and doing this will give our family a chance to repay you.”

Guilt suffused him, but he couldn’t think of another solution. It seemed Becky Sue had already decided she could trust Annie. Now he must show he trusted her, too.

The bathroom door opened and Becky Sue emerged. When Annie asked her to stay with the Wagler family, she made the invitation sound spontaneous.

Caleb held his breath until his cousin said, “Danki.”

“Get your things,” he replied. “I turned the heater on in the buggy when I got the thermos. It’s as warm in there as it’s going to be, so bundle up. I’ll stop by later and check on you.”

“You aren’t coming with us?” Becky Sue asked suspiciously.

“No. I’ve got work to do.” Turning to Annie, he said with the best smile he could manage, “You taking them tonight will let me keep my work on schedule.”

“Gut,” Annie replied, as if the timetable for the bakery was the most important thing on their minds.

As soon as Becky Sue went into the front room, Caleb lowered his voice and said, “ Danki for taking her home with you. Now I’ll have the chance to contact her family.”

“Do they have access to a phone?”

“I’m pretty sure they do. If not, I can try calling the store that’s not far from where they live. The Englisch owner will deliver emergency messages.” He couldn’t keep from arching his brows. “I don’t know what would constitute more of an emergency than a missing kind and kins-kind .”

“You know the number?”

“The phone here at the bakery is for dealing with vendors, but I’ve let a couple of our neighbors use it, and at least one of them mentioned calling the store. The number should be stored in the phone’s list of outgoing calls.”

Becky Sue returned with a pair of torn and dirty grocery bags in one hand. The girl carried a bright blue-and-yellow blanket in the other. Stains on it suggested she and her boppli had slept rough since leaving their home.

Joey woke as Annie was wrapping the blanket around him. He took one look at Caleb and began to cry at a volume Caleb hadn’t imagined a little boy could make.

As Annie cooed to console him, she handed him to his mamm . She finished winding the blanket around him at the same time as she herded Becky Sue out of the bakery.

Caleb went to a window and watched them leave in his buggy. He went to the phone he kept on top of the rickety cabinet that must be as old as the building. He’d planned to start tearing the cupboard out after giving Annie a tour of the bakery. He wondered when he’d have time to finish.

Soon , he told himself. He’d set a date at the beginning of May to open the bakery. He’d already purchased ads in the local newspaper and the swap magazine delivered to every household in the area because his customers from the farmers market had been so insistent he inform them as soon as the bakery opened its doors.