Her Restless Heart Read online

  Jamie sat up and glared at him. "Thought you had to work late."

  "Things got slow. You know how that is."

  She gave him a disparaging look. "You asked your boss if you could go home early."

  "Well, you know how it is, baby."

  "Yeah, I do, baby." She glanced at Mary Katherine. "This is Robert. Robert, Mary Katherine."

  "Hi."

  Jamie got up. "Admit it. You came over because you thought the guy from the pizza place was here."

  "Well, you know how it is."

  "Yeah." She turned to Mary Katherine. "Excuse us for a minute."

  She grabbed Robert by the shirt, pulled him into her bedroom, and shut the door.

  Mary Katherine blushed and started the movie up again.

  When the voices that came from the bedroom came loud and angry, she fiddled with the remote until she figured out how to increase the volume button and tried to focus on the movie. Long minutes later, the voices quieted and she glanced at the door, wondering when the two of them would come out.

  The movie ended. Mary Katherine had spent the night here several times, so she tried to remember what to do to get the television to show regular stuff. The news came on. Mary Katherine wasn't naïve—she knew that bad things happened out in the world. Sometimes they even happened in her community. But she had no idea of all the bad things that had happened today while she'd enjoyed herself: murders and rapes and robberies and bad car accidents. Oh, most of them outside of Lancaster County. But the television was like a window into a world she didn't know much about, since all she saw of the Englisch world was when she worked at the shop and walked around the town.

  After the news, a comedian came on that Mary Katherine didn't think was so funny because he kept bringing up headlines from the news and she didn't know what he was talking about. She changed the channel and found a nature show. When she realized she was drifting off watching it, she made up the sofa with the sheets and blankets Jamie had put on the coffee table for her. Tired from her day, she slept.

  Mary Katherine woke before dawn and lay there on the lumpy sofa, remembering the events of the previous night.

  Her back hurt, so she shifted and tried to find a more comfortable position. Jamie had shrugged when she first told her that she had a nice apartment and said most of the furniture had come from thrift shops and stuff that friends were getting rid of. Jamie had used her artistic talents with color and fabric and made it a charming space, Mary Katherine thought. She wondered what it was like to have a space of your own that was totally yours, not part of a relative's home . . .

  Her back hurt. Jamie had said the sofa was a bargain. Mary Katherine wondered if Jamie had ever slept on it. One night, and Mary Katherine's back was killing her.

  Jamie's door was still closed. She didn't know if Robert had stayed, but it wasn't any of her business, anyway. After dressing in her regular clothes, she brushed and did up her hair, then put on her kapp, bonnet, and coat. She headed for the door, only remembering her overnight bag at the last minute after making sure her jeans were safely inside.

  The walk to the shop wasn't short, but along the way there was a bakery where she bought cinnamon rolls and hot chocolate, and numerous stores where she could window-shop on her way to work.

  She used her key to open the shop, keeping the sign turned to "Closed" and went into the back room to enjoy her breakfast. When she looked at the clock, she decided to fill the percolator with coffee and water and get it started on the stove. Her grandmother always liked to have a cup when she arrived.

  When she heard the bell jangle a little while later, she called out to let whoever it was coming in know that she was there.

  Her grandmother walked in. "Well, this is a surprise. What are you doing here so early?"

  "It didn't take long to walk over from Jamie's apartment."

  Leah nodded. "But I told you that you could come in late if you wanted."

  Mary Katherine shrugged and pushed the plate of cinnamon rolls across the table. "Have one. I stopped at the bakery on the way here. I didn't want to wake Jamie by fixing breakfast."

  Truth was, when she went to store the leftover pizza the night before, she'd found Jamie's refrigerator contained several cups of yogurt and a paper container of food from a Chinese restaurant. There hadn't been anything to fix the kind of breakfast she was used to eating.

  "Did you have a good evening?" her grandmother asked as she poured herself a cup of coffee and took a seat.

  Mary Katherine nodded. "We had pizza and then watched a movie at Jamie's apartment."

  "She doesn't live with her parents?"

  "No. She's had her own place for about a year—since she moved out of her mom's house. She's putting herself through the community college."

  Her grandmother broke off a piece of a cinnamon roll and tasted it. "Not bad."

  "Not as good as Naomi's."

  Leah smiled. "No."

  Mary Katherine stirred her hot chocolate. "I'm spoiled. You won't let me cook at your house."

  "I thought you got enough of that at your house. I wanted you to have a break from it so you could work on your weaving. Besides, I enjoy it." She frowned. "Maybe I'm not doing you a service. If you forget everything you know, you'll have to learn how to cook all over again when you get married."

  "Hah! Like that's going to happen!"

  Leah tilted her head and studied her. "You don't think God has a mann set aside for you?"

  "If He has, He's taking a long time to show him to me."

  "Liebschen, you're just twenty-two. Don't talk like you're an old maedel."

  Mary Katherine thought about seeing Jacob last night. He'd certainly grown to be a handsome man since they'd left school.

  And he'd obviously found something attractive about her last night. Well, she could tell he'd been surprised at seeing how she was dressed . . . and wore her hair. Amish women wore their hair in a bun and covered by a kapp. Maybe he'd just been intrigued by seeing her hair. Most Amish men didn't see a woman's unbound hair unless she was his wife or girlfriend.

  She brought herself back to the present. Her grandmother was regarding her, a puzzled frown creasing her forehead.

  "What?" she asked.

  "You seem a little troubled. Didn't you have fun last night? Did something happen?"

  Mary Katherine shrugged. "Jamie's boyfriend was upset with her. He thought she was out on a double date."

  "Why would he think that? Were the two of you out with men?" Then she shook her head and held up a hand. "Never mind. It's your business."

  Mary Katherine appreciated her grandmother respecting her right to privacy during this time of getting to go out into the world and explore for herself before committing to baptism. She'd just had dinner with a friend, and Jacob and Ben had shown up and joined them. So she told her grandmother that.

  "Jacob, eh? I remember him hanging around your house a lot," Leah said. "He even came over to see you at my house a couple of times."

  "He was just a friend."

  "I haven't seen him much lately."

  "He's been busy taking care of the farm. He bought it from his parents."

  Leah nodded. "I heard. I've also heard he hasn't married."

  "No."

  "He's a nice-looking man."

  Mary Katherine nodded and tried to think of some way to change the direction her grandmother was headed in.

  "Want some more coffee?"

  "Nee, danki. So, if you two had supper together, does that mean you're interested in him?"

  "You had dinner with a man? I thought you were going out with Jamie?"

  Mary Katherine turned to see Anna standing in the doorway.

  "I didn't hear you come in."

  "You had dinner with a man? Who?" Anna asked. She put her purse in a cupboard and started taking off her coat and bonnet.

  "Anna," her grandmother warned.

  "It's okay," Mary Katherine said. "Jacob happened upon Jamie and me eating pizza, and
she asked him if he wanted to join us and that was it." She finished her hot chocolate and got up to wash her mug.

  "What was it?" Naomi asked as she walked in.

  "Jacob and Mary Katherine had dinner last night," Anna told her as she helped herself to a cinnamon roll.

  "I thought you were having supper with Jamie." Naomi put her purse away and hung her coat next to Anna's.

  Mary Katherine rolled her eyes. "Did. Jacob came in the same restaurant. She asked him to join us. That was it." She paused. "Now if we're finished with the inquisition, I'm going out to work."

  Leah chuckled. "Me, too."

  Jacob walked his fields, his shoulders hunched against the chill wind.

  Being outside, walking the land that had been tended by generations before him, always helped him think. The land didn't change.

  But people surely did.

  He'd never expected to come upon Mary Katherine dressed in Englisch clothes, sitting with a woman he'd never met, an Englisch woman whose clothes bordered on the strange.

  Oh, he knew that Mary Katherine wasn't like most other Amish girls. She had daydreamed a lot when they were in schul, and often scribbled on a pad of paper when the teacher wasn't looking. But he'd seen that pad and it didn't have the kind of girlish ramblings on it like "I love Jacob" or spell out their name with one of the boy's last names attached.

  No, she drew patterns for quilts and weaving projects and sketched woven caps and scarves and shawls and lengths that she pictured being worn over a woman's shoulders. Her scribbles were of names for these things—a stole?—and colors like emerald morning and cobalt sky and misty purple.

  He frowned. Daniel had been the one to mention her work when they had eaten that day at the restaurant. That was something he had forgotten. Several months ago he'd noticed that she seemed happier, but he hadn't connected that to her working at her grandmother's shop. Well, of course she would, given her girlish interest in such things years ago.

  Why hadn't he been the one who had mentioned it to her? he asked himself. Why had he let some other man look like he was sensitive and interested in her? Women loved that in a man. Even he, who hadn't had much to do with women—he certainly hadn't courted one yet.

  While he didn't think anyone should pretend to be something other than he was—a sure way to disaster—he was interested in Mary Katherine and could have found a way to know more about her, to approach her, before this. Now Daniel was in town and he was clearly interested in Mary Katherine.

  And she had seemed interested in him and where he lived.

  He kicked at a clod of dirt. He'd probably blown it. At this moment, Daniel and Mary Katherine could be sitting together somewhere talking about Florida.

  "Jacob!"

  He jerked his head up and saw his sister Rebecca waving from the edge of the field. She held up a casserole in her hands, and he nodded his understanding. Supper was here! He started walking toward her.

  Leaning down to give her cheek a quick kiss, he took the heavy casserole dish from her hands.

  "Gut-n-owed."

  "Gut-n-owed."

  He sniffed at the contents. "Stuffed peppers?"

  "Ya."

  "It's the best dish you make."

  "You think so? You don't think my meatloaf is better?"

  "Your meatloaf is wonderful. But to me, this is the best thing you make."

  They climbed the stairs to the house, and she held the door open for him since his hands were occupied.

  "So, what's your favorite dish that Linda makes?" she asked.

  She tried to look casual, but Jacob knew better. The two of them had always been a little competitive in spirit. But as twins, they were the first to defend each other whenever necessary.

  Jacob put the casserole in the oven, set the temperature on low, and turned around. He stroked his chin and thought about it. "Well, I think Linda's best dish is chicken and noodles."

  Rebecca smirked. "I taught her how to make that."

  "Mamm taught you how to make that."

  "But I improved on it and taught it to Linda."

  "Better not let her hear you say that."

  "Linda?"

  "No. Mamm."

  "But it's true. I make it better than her."

  Jacob noticed that she looked over her shoulder as she said it. Laughing, he shook his head. "Yeah, better not let her hear you saying that."

  Mamm was sweet but firm and more than once had quietly walked up on them saying or doing something they shouldn't have.

  He pulled a mug from the cupboard. "Do you have time for a cup of coffee?"

  She glanced at the clock. "A quick one."

  He poured it for her and gestured at a chair but she stood instead.

  "So, have you been to town lately?" he asked, hoping he sounded casual.

  "Haven't had time. Why?"

  He shrugged and poured himself a cup of coffee. "I thought I'd make a run there next day or two. Pick up Mamm's birthday present."

  Rebecca's eyes narrowed. "It's not for two weeks."

  "Don't want to wait until the last minute."

  She laughed and set her coffee down. "You always wait until the last minute for that sort of thing. A couple of times you'd have even forgotten if one of us hadn't reminded you."

  Remembering how his timing with Mary Katherine hadn't gone so well, he set down his coffee. Suddenly it tasted bitter.

  "Yes, well, maybe it's time to admit that my timing's been a little off in some things." He knew just where he was going to go for that present.

  Maybe he'd get a second chance with Mary Katherine.

  She put the back of her hand to his forehead. "Are you feeling allrecht?"

  He pulled her hand away. "I'm not one of your kinner. I'm fine." He kissed her hand to take away any possible sting from his words.

  "I worry about you, baby brother. You're living alone here with no one to take care of you."

  "I'm a man. I can take care of myself."

  "Schur. That's why I just brought you supper. If I didn't, you wouldn't eat."

  Stung, he stared at her. "I appreciate the meals but I'm not totally helpless in the kitchen, you know. I can cook."

  "You've never cooked."

  "Well, how hard can it be?"

  Rebecca drew herself up. Her eyes flashed. "Maybe you should find out."

  With that, she stomped toward the front door.

  "Rebecca! Come back! I'm sorry! I just put my foot in my mouth!"

  "Try some salt and pepper with it!" She shut the front door with a snap.

  Jacob ran a hand through his hair. "What a dumbkoff," he muttered.

  First his mother. Now his sister.

  What was he doing wrong with the women in his family lately?

  Maybe if he was this inept, he should stay away from Mary Katherine so he didn't offend her when he approached her again. A guy had only so many chances with a woman. A single man, that is. At least, that's what he'd heard.

  6

  That makes five," Mary Katherine said as the door to the shop closed.

  "Hmm?" Leah looked up from her study of the day's receipts. "Five? Five what?"

  "Every one of the Miller girls has stopped in to the shop this week."

  "Really?"

  "I don't think they've all visited in one month, let alone one week before, do you? Not even in the weeks before Christmas when we get a lot of women who like to make gifts for friends and family."

  Setting her reading glasses aside, Leah tilted her head and regarded Mary Katherine. "So what are you saying?"

  "I don't know. I just—well, it seems strange, that's all." She straightened the display table where Anna's adorable cupcake hats for babies were displayed. They were one of the most popular items in the shop.

  "Jacob's mother came in, too."

  Mary Katherine's hands stilled on the hats. "Really? When? I didn't see her."

  "Yesterday, when you went to lunch with Anna. I didn't think anything of it at the time, but n
ow that you mention it, she asked about you."

  "Me? Why? What did she say?"

  Leah gathered up her receipts. "She asked how you were doing." She paused and looked thoughtful.

  "What?"

  "Well, I didn't think anything of it at the time."

  "What?" Mary Katherine put her hands on her hips and waited impatiently.

  Smiling, Leah walked around the counter. "Well, she didn't ask about Naomi or Anna."

  Mary Katherine stared at her grandmother as she walked to the back room. What was she supposed to think about that?

  A customer walked in, an Englisch one, and smiled at her. Mary Katherine returned her smile.

  "Can I help you with anything?"

  "I'd like to browse a little if you don't mind."

  "Of course. Let me know if I can be of any help," Mary Katherine told her.

  A glance through the shop window showed few shoppers out. No wonder. It had been drizzling since early morning. Her grandmother and her cousins were doing inventory, leaving Mary Katherine in charge.

  The woman walked around the shop, studying the quilts displayed on the walls, especially the collage quilt Mary Katherine had made.

  Mary Katherine walked over to her loom and studied her pattern.

  "Are you Mary Katherine?"

  She looked up at the customer. "Yes."

  "Jamie told me about you. Jamie Patterson. She said I should stop by your shop. I'm Allie Prentice, one of Jamie's college instructors."

  She studied Mary Katherine's work on the loom. "This is lovely. Quite a creative use of pattern and color. Where did you learn to do this?"

  "An aunt of mine taught me years ago."

  "Could I get you to come in and talk to my class about your weaving?"

  Shocked, Mary Katherine stared at her. "I—I wouldn't know what to say. I just . . . weave."

  "And quilt," the woman said, gesturing at the collage quilt. "I love the images, the unusual quality to it. I haven't seen many examples of collage quilts. I'd like you to talk about both to my Fabric Arts class."

  "Jamie let me see her textbook for that class," Mary Katherine said, excitement welling up in her. "It looks so interesting."

  The woman smiled. "Why don't you come in and speak, and then you can observe the class a few times if you like?"