Jeb's Wife Read online

  A MARRIAGE OF CONVENIENCE

  “I’m not some naïve young thing,” Leah said. “I can’t explain it any other way. The minute Matthew realized I couldn’t have kinner, he . . . changed.”

  “And you think that’s because a woman who can’t give birth is somehow less appealing. Less attractive,” he said.

  “Jeb, we agreed that our relationship—” she began.

  “And you think that’s because I’m not attracted to you?” he burst out.

  She blinked at him. “Yah.”

  Jeb laughed softly. It was ridiculous, but then, she’d been through a lot.

  “That’s not true at all. Look at you. You’re gorgeous. I’ve thought so for years. You’ve got this way about you that draws a man in. I notice you—your eyes, the way your lips purse when you’re deep in thought ... this part of your neck—right here—” He ran his finger over the soft flesh just above her collarbone. “I can see your heartbeat there . . . I can’t explain Matthew. He’s an idiot. I can pretty much guarantee you he didn’t love you as much he claimed if he could just change course like that, but that wasn’t because you aren’t a beautiful woman.”

  She opened her mouth to speak, then slowly closed it.

  “I’m attracted, okay?” he said, and he lowered his voice. “Very attracted. I see you in my home, in my kitchen . . . and I feel a whole lot. So never think our arrangement is because you aren’t beautiful enough . . .”

  Books by Patricia Johns

  THE BISHOP’S DAUGHTER

  THURSDAY’S BRIDE

  JEB’S WIFE

  Published by Kensington Publishing Corp.

  Jeb’s Wife

  PATRICIA JOHNS

  ZEBRA BOOKS

  KENSINGTON PUBLISHING CORP.

  www.kensingtonbooks.com

  All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

  Table of Contents

  A MARRIAGE OF CONVENIENCE

  Also by

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Epilogue

  ZEBRA BOOKS are published by

  Kensington Publishing Corp.

  119 West 40th Street

  New York, NY 10018

  Copyright © 2020 by Patricia Johns

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales, or persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the Publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.

  To the extent that the image or images on the cover of this book depict a person or persons, such person or persons are merely models, and are not intended to portray any character or characters featured in the book.

  If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the Publisher and neither the Author nor the Publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”

  Zebra and the Z logo Reg. U.S. Pat. & TM Off.

  BOUQUET Reg. U.S. Pat. & TM Off.

  ISBN: 978-1-4201-4913-5

  ISBN-13: 978-1-4201-4916-6 (eBook)

  ISBN-10: 1-4201-4916-4 (eBook)

  To my husband.

  I couldn’t do this without you.

  I love you!

  Chapter One

  “Rebecca’s far enough along in her pregnancy that she’s showing,” Rosmanda said, nudging the plate of shortbread cookies toward Leah. “I’m sorry to be the one to tell you, but you’d notice it on Service Sunday. She’s not exactly being modest about it. It’s as if she refuses to let her dresses out until the last minute. I’d tell her that it’s not proper, but it isn’t my place. She’d got a mamm of her own. All I can say is, I’m much further along than she is, and I’m perfectly capable of letting a dress out. And as for my girls, I’ll make sure they act with more propriety than that.”

  Leah forced a weak smile, but she didn’t touch the plate of cookies. It wasn’t right to be talking behind someone’s back—but sometimes an update was necessary so she could smother her natural reaction to seeing her ex-fiancé’s new wife. Leah had been gone for eight months while she taught school in another community, and a lot had changed.

  “You have a few years yet before you have to worry about your girls,” Leah said with a short laugh. “They’re only four.”

  “I’m thinking ahead,” Rosmanda replied, but humor didn’t glimmer in her eyes. She was serious.

  “The thing is, Matthew wanted children,” Leah said. “At least he’s getting them.”

  It was the kindest thing Leah could think of to say. Matthew had broken her heart and tossed her aside, then immediately begun courting a girl just off her Rumspringa.

  “That isn’t your fault,” Rosmanda said, lowering her voice. “Leah, I don’t know why God allowed you to be born with a malformed uterus, but it isn’t fair to cast aside a woman because she can’t give birth.”

  “Maybe it is fair.” Leah shrugged. “Matthew wanted children—what Amish man doesn’t? And I can’t give that! So, if he knew what he wanted, and we weren’t married yet, he wasn’t in the wrong. Technically.”

  “So he’s married himself an eighteen-year-old wife,” Rosmanda said, and she shook her head. “I don’t mean to degrade her. She’s family, after all. Rebecca is beautiful, sweet, and from what my husband says, she’s a good cook. But she’s young, and Matthew is—how old is he now?”

  “Twenty-five,” Leah replied woodenly.

  Leah was thirty, and dating a boy five years younger than her had already been a stretch. She’d prayed for a husband since she was a young teenager. And now that she was advancing into her old maid status, she’d thought that Matthew was the answer to her prayer—her reward for patient waiting. God rewarded the good girls, didn’t he? He worked miracles. He made a way. But her wedding had never happened. He’d dumped her, and she’d accepted a teaching position that would allow her to get out of town to try to heal from the breakup.

  “Rebecca’s only eighteen . . .” Rosmanda grimaced. “When you’re eighteen you think you’re ready to take on marriage and children, but you’re not quite so grown-up as you think. She married a man who’d been dating another woman for three years. And no one warned her that there would be complicated feelings left between you and Matthew.”

  “I don’t want to hold him back,” Leah said. “She has nothing to worry from me.”

  “I might have wanted to hold her back!” Rosmanda retorted. “I’ve told you about Mary Beiler, haven’t I? Many a girl plows ahead with a marriage and lives to regret it. I didn’t want that for Rebecca. But she’s related to my husband, and I’m just an in-law there.”

  “Matthew made his choice,” Leah replied.

  “Did you know that Matthew’s been asking about you?” Rosmanda replied. “And spending a whole lot of time with your brother.”

  “They’re good friends,” she replied. “They have been
for years. And if he still cares what becomes of me, maybe I should be glad that some of his feelings might have been genuine.”

  Rosmanda sighed. “And I also know you, Leah. I’m not saying Rebecca has anything to worry from you. . . . You’re a good woman, and he’s officially off-limits. But that doesn’t mean this will be easy on Rebecca.”

  And maybe it wouldn’t be, but Rebecca had won. She had Matthew as her husband, and she was pregnant with his child. Uncomfortable or not, Rebecca would survive just fine.

  The side door opened, and four-year-old Hannah came into the kitchen, followed by her twin sister, Susanna. They weren’t quite identical twins, but it was close. Hannah had always been just a little bit blonder than her sister, and right now, their dresses were covered in dirt from the garden and their bare feet were brown with soil. Rosmanda heaved a sigh.

  “Little girls need to stay clean,” Rosmanda said, rising to her feet, her own pregnant belly doming out in front of her as she rose. “We’ll have to wash your dresses now, and that’s even more work for your mamm!”

  “Sorry, Mamm . . .” Hannah wiped her dirty hands down the sides of her dress, and Leah couldn’t help but smile. The girls started toward their mother.

  “No, no!” Rosmanda said. “Stay right there. I don’t need dirty footprints all over the house.”

  Those girls were a handful, and in a matter of months, Rosmanda would have a new baby to add to the mix.

  “I should get back home,” Leah said, standing, too. “Thank you for the chat.”

  Rosmanda grabbed a cloth from the sink and shot Leah an apologetic smile. “So soon? You’ve hardly eaten a thing.”

  Leah didn’t have much appetite anyway.

  “I’ve got to start dinner for my brother, and I can’t be holding you up either,” Leah said. “I’ll see you again soon, I’m sure.”

  Leah smoothed her hand over Hannah’s hair as she passed the girl on her way to the door. Kinner . . . she’d never have any babies of her own, and there was a part of her heart that ached when she saw her friend’s little girls. This was the goal for an Amish woman—to marry and have a family of her own. Leah hadn’t managed to do either of those things, and at the age of thirty, her chance at any domestic joys were past. It was best to admit it and face the truth.

  Outside in the warm June sunlight, Rosmanda’s husband, Levi, helped Leah hitch up the buggy. Rosmanda and Levi Lapp lived on two acres of land near the town of Abundance and a short buggy ride from the Amish schoolhouse. That would be convenient for them when the girls were old enough to start school. They had family concerns . . . and they were fortunate. Other women were married, having babies, raising kids. And Rebecca was already round with her pregnancy. That mental image was an uncomfortable one, and Rosmanda’s warning had been well-meant.

  No one had written to tell Leah. That was how pity worked, though. People smiled sadly and kept their mouths shut. Was that the point she was at now—being pitied?

  Maybe she was grateful not to have had that thought of Matthew’s impending fatherhood the last few months. And maybe she wasn’t, because it meant that she was beyond hope in the community’s eyes.

  When the buggy was hitched and Leah had hoisted herself up onto the seat, Levi gave Leah a friendly wave.

  “Thank you, Levi,” she said. “It’s much appreciated.”

  “Take care now,” he said, giving her a nod, and she flicked the reins and the horse set out for home.

  The sun was high and bees droned around the wildflowers that grew up out of the ditch beside the road. Coming back to Abundance for the summer was more work than teaching in Rimstone. She’d have canning to do to refill their pantry, herbs to dry, a thorough cleaning of their little house to accomplish, too. Her brother, Simon, had been working at an RV manufacturer in town, but he’d been laid off, so his money had dried up. Besides, he was a man, and he only did as much women’s work as would keep him fed and clothed in her absence. Finding a wife might be prudent for her brother, except he’d made a bad name for himself already with his worldly ways and the daughters in Abundance stayed clear of him.

  Leah felt more responsible for Simon than most. Their parents died in a buggy accident when Leah was sixteen, so she’d skipped her Rumspringa and raised her eight-year-old brother the best she knew how.

  And this was the result. She’d done her best, but Leah had obviously failed him. So, while she never would have kinner of her own, she’d already raised her brother, and she’d had her chance to make a good man of him. But Simon’s grief over their parents’ death had taken him in a different direction, and she hadn’t been able to drag him back.

  Her mind was moving ahead to dinner, though. Simon liked her fried chicken, and this being her second day back in the community, she wanted to make something special they could enjoy together. They’d stopped by the grocery store when her brother picked her up from the bus station, so the cupboards were stocked once more, and she was looking forward to cooking in her own kitchen again.

  Leah enjoyed her teaching position in Rimstone, but she was a guest, and in Rimstone, it was Cherish Wittmer’s kitchen. Cherish was warm, understanding, and the closest to a mother she’d had since her own mother’s death ... but a woman of thirty needed some counter space to call her own.

  The horse knew the way home and plodded steadily down the road toward the little house she’d rented on an Amish farm. The rental agreement was under her name, and she and Simon kept the bill paid between them. The horse turned into the drive without any need for her guidance, plodding past the main farmhouse. She looked over at the house, silent and empty at this time of day. But then, the most they ever saw from that house was a kerosene light in the kitchen after dark. Two widowers used to run this farm together—Peter and Jebadiah King. Uncle and nephew. They acted as landlords for the cottage, too, but the older of them had passed away, and now it was just Jebadiah, a scarred and mysterious man, running the farm alone.

  Leah had never seen much of him. Peter had been the friendlier of the two. Jeb kept to himself, but there were rumors enough that passed through the community in waves every time they were reminded of his existence. Jeb made her uneasy—he always had. He was tall, muscular, and badly scarred from a barn fire. His halting gait was recognizable from a distance, and it always gave her a shudder.

  As Leah approached their rented, one-story cottage, she saw a buggy pulled up next to the house. And there was Jeb, reaching up and steadying her brother as he climbed down from the seat.

  Simon moved slowly, and he wasn’t wearing his hat. Simon looked toward her, and she saw smears of blood under his nose and mashed, bruised skin around one eye. Her heart skipped a beat and then hammered hard to catch up.

  “Simon?” she called, and she pulled her buggy up short, tied off the reins, then jumped down. She lifted her skirt to keep it from tangling with her legs as she ran toward him.

  “Hey, sis . . .” Simon grimaced as he took a step toward the house. “It’s not as bad as it looks—”

  “I find that hard to believe,” she said, but her voice didn’t sound as firm as she would have liked. “Simon, what happened to you?”

  Simon leaned on the larger man, and she turned her attention to her brother’s rescuer. Jeb was about forty, and he stood head and shoulders taller than Simon. The burn scars went down one side of his face, then disappeared under his beard. His neck and left arm were burned, too, and his limp suggested the burns hadn’t stopped there. Jeb adjusted his grip on Simon’s shoulder.

  “Nothing, nothing . . .” Simon murmured. “Don’t worry about it. Just a misunderstanding.”

  “Yah?” Leah looked toward Jeb. “What happened to him? I want the truth.”

  “I found him like this, walking by the side of the road on my way home from town,” Jeb replied, but when he looked down at Simon, his gaze lacked proper sympathy.

  “Simon!” Her voice was rising, and she couldn’t help it. “Who did this?”

  “What are
you going to do, drag them off by their ears?” her brother muttered. It was a jab at her job as a schoolmistress, but she wasn’t amused. She was about to retort when Jeb cut in.

  “Who do you owe money to?” Jeb interjected, pinning Simon with a hard stare.

  “Some men . . . it’s nothing—”

  “It’s enough to have yourself beaten like a tough steak,” Jeb retorted. “So I’m thinking this isn’t legal. That leaves gambling and booze, and you don’t smell like alcohol.”

  Leah’s gaze whipped between them. Jeb was only voicing what she was already thinking.

  Simon grimaced. “It was a sure thing. I thought I’d beat him. I had the perfect hand, and I was so sure he was bluffing . . .”

  Leah took her brother under the other arm and she and Jeb both helped him into the cottage. She could feel Jeb’s wrist brushing against her waist. When they got him inside, he hobbled to a kitchen chair and Leah stepped back. Jeb seemed to fill up more of the small kitchen than both she and Simon combined. Simon winced as he lifted his shirt to inspect his bruised ribs, and Leah went straight for the sink.

  “How much do you owe this time?” Leah asked, turning on the water and putting a fresh cloth under the flow.

  “How much did you make for teaching?” Simon asked instead.

  “Enough to pay my room and board in Rimstone, and keep our rent paid. Not a penny more than that,” she retorted. “How much have you got saved?”

  Simon didn’t answer, and maybe she should have expected that much. Simon didn’t save, he spent. Besides, they weren’t alone.

  “How much do you owe?” she repeated. This was a more important question, and she wrung out the cloth and came over to where her brother sat. She dabbed at the blood beneath his battered nose. Whoever had done this to him was a monster, and she had to hold back tears as she dabbed at his swollen flesh.