Janet Tronstad - Mail-Order Christmas Brides Boxed Set - Her Christmas Family / Christmas Stars for Dry Creek / Home for Christmas / Snowflakes for Dry Creek / Christmas Hearts / Mistletoe Kiss in Dry Creek

Maeve looked at him, speechless, and then smiled before turning to wake up her daughter.

“I can carry her in,” Noah said as he started to climb down off his wagon. “I’ll come around.”

His men had walked up to the back of the wagon and were starting to unload the supplies.

Noah hurried to the other side of the wagon and held out his arms for the girl. He had moved most of his clothes out of the bedroom yesterday and put them in the room at the end of the bunkhouse. The woman and her child would be comfortable in the house. His room shared a wall with the parlor fireplace so it was the warmest place in his house, except for the kitchen.

He could hear Violet murmuring as her mother gathered her up. The girl was likely still half-asleep. Noah’s hat was knocked off by the wind and it fell into the back of the wagon. He left it there since the woman was ready to set the girl in his arms. For a moment, he let her weight settle. He was surprised at the contentment he felt holding her. He’d never had a child on his ranch before, not one he could lay claim to as his own. His neighbors, the Hargroves, brought their girls over once in a while when they visited, but there was no one else.

Noah had hoped his wife would have his children, but, even if she had stayed, she had made it clear she didn’t intend to be a mother. She had muttered something about little ones having sticky fingers and colic.

The girl shifted suddenly in his arms, and then stiffened as she opened her eyes. A shriek of pure terror split the early night as she screamed.

“What’s wrong?” Noah looked up at Maeve in alarm. The girl was rigid in his arms.

“She’s frightened.” Maeve slid to the end of the wagon bench and opened her arms to take her daughter back. “She was startled when she saw you. I should have known. She hadn’t fully woken up yet. I wasn’t thinking.”

Noah gave the now-shivering girl back to her mother. Maeve was apologizing, but Noah didn’t think she was surprised. The child had been terrified.

Dakota had opened the door to the house and two other ranch hands were moving the trunk inside. They set down the burden and ran back to the wagon at the sound of the scream.

“What’s wrong?” Dakota asked breathlessly. The other ranch hands crowded around.

Maeve was rubbing her daughter’s back and Violet’s whimpering was slowing down.

“We’ll be fine,” Noah answered. The girl’s eyes had opened wider at the sight of the other men. She might be silent now, but she wasn’t at ease.

“Give her some room to breathe,” Noah advised the other men.

The men were used to animals that panicked and nodded.

“Anything she needs,” Dakota whispered as the men turned their backs.

They all walked away quietly and picked up the trunk again.

Noah waited a few minutes for the girl to start breathing normally.

“Let me help you down,” he finally said as he lifted his arms up to help the burdened Maeve down. He pulled her toward him and then let her slide to the ground. Carefully, he avoided touching her daughter cradled in her embrace. Something in his heart shifted as he watched Maeve protect the girl. Not all women were so fierce in defending their young. His wife never would have been.

When Maeve stood squarely on the ground, he put his arm around her and escorted her to his house. He could feel her trembling, but he didn’t say anything. He sensed she was too proud to admit to being shaken up, though he found he liked having her lean on him.

He wondered how they were going to live with each other, even for the duration of the storm. He had always said that his heart had been torn out by its roots when his wife left. Now he suspected there might have been a seed left behind. He doubted it was enough for him to love someone again, but it might be enough to remind him keenly of all that he was missing. He liked being able to protect the woman and her child. He knew that when they were gone from him he’d worry.

With those despairing thoughts, he reached down and turned the knob so he could open the door to his home. He looked down and saw red strands of hair sticking out around where the blanket was wrapped. Maeve moved farther toward him. He was relieved that it was the situation and not him that made her hesitate.

“It’s a good house,” he said, pausing with his hand on the doorknob. “Safe and warm. Live in it as your own while you’re here.”

As he swung the door wide-open so they could all enter, he wondered how long the blizzard would last.

“Your daughter will feel better once she’s been here for a while,” he said, adding the last bit of comfort he could, wondering what had happened to Maeve and Violet to make the girl so afraid.

Chapter Three

Darkness continued to fall as Maeve let Noah guide her through the main door of the house, down a short hallway and into a large square room that smelled faintly of coffee. She figured he sat here sometimes and drank his morning beverage. The windows were bare and must provide a good view of his ranch as he emptied his cup. Tonight, however, the gray sky outside didn’t let in much light. Despite the picture she’d painted in her mind about the man and his coffee, Maeve sensed the room was seldom used and had seen much sadness.

Or maybe it was her, she thought.

“Your home’s lovely,” she forced herself to say politely, clutching Violet close to her as though she needed to protect the girl. By now, she could see brocade-covered chairs in the shadows so she knew she wasn’t in the kitchen. It was the parlor, maybe. She still didn’t look up as she felt drops of melting snow fall from her tumble of hair, landing on the plank floor beneath her.

“I’ll wipe up the spots,” she said. “We’re dripping everywhere.”

Noah grunted, but didn’t say anything.

She didn’t blame him. If only Violet had been able to hide her fears, he might have come to see her daughter’s delightful side. As it was, he likely thought he’d be living in a house full of screams if he married Maeve. What made her particularly unhappy was that Noah would never know that Violet sang Sunday school songs in a sweet voice and tried to catch birds because she thought they were hungry and she wanted to feed them bread crumbs.

Maeve heard Noah’s footsteps as he walked across the room, sounding increasingly distant.

She felt as if her chance for a new life was slipping away.

“It was her father,” Maeve blurted out without thinking. She had never meant to tell anyone this part. “He was killed in a brawl at a bar.”

Noah turned around, but didn’t say anything.

“On the waterfront,” she added since he seemed to expect more details. “Violet was sitting in the corner and saw it all.”

Noah raised an eyebrow. “Did she follow him there? To the bar?”

Maeve shook her head. This was why she hadn’t wanted to tell him. “My husband was taking care of her and he took her there because he had an—ah—an appointment.”

“And the bar owners let her stay?”

“They let people do anything. It wasn’t the kind of place most people would go.”

“And I remind her of that?”

She shrugged. “I understand many of the men in the brawl had beards. In the dark, that’s probably all she saw of their faces.”

“She must have been terrified.” Noah’s voice was tense.

Maeve was silent even though he seemed to be waiting for her to say more. She couldn’t confess the rest of it. She didn’t want anyone to know the shame of her husband betraying her like he had. It still made her feel ugly.

Finally, Noah walked to the fireplace.

Maeve let the blanket slip down from her head so she could look around. Four large paned windows, two on each outside wall, faced out to the night and she could see the silhouette of trees swaying as the wind blew beside the house.