Free In a Stranger's Arms by Deborah Hale

bucket on the floor. Unbuttoning the cuffs of her sleeves, she rolled them up past her elbows and began to wash the dishes.
    “Can I get you some coffee?” she asked Manning.
    “No, thank you. It would likely keep me awake.” That and imagining her asleep in the room next to his. Manning hoped he’d soon get used to it. He desperately needed some rest. His tired mind was entertaining too many dangerous fancies.
    He considered excusing himself from the kitchen to go keep an eye on the children. But there were matters he and Caddie needed to sort out so he could get on with his mission. Reluctantly, he rummaged around the dimly lit room and found a length of homespun cotton Caddie had been using for a dish towel. He’d rather have kept his distance from her, but he couldn’t sit idle while she worked.
    “We need to talk about my plans for Sabbath Hollow.” Picking up a plate still warm from the wash water, he began to dry it.
    She glanced at him with a queer expression on her face, as though he was the most peculiar object she’d ever beheld. Her cheeks were flushed from the heat of the dishwater, and a faint sheen of perspiration moistened her nose and hairline.
    As if in answer, beads of sweat broke out on Manning’s brow.
    “What are you doing?” she asked.
    Wisps of her fiery hair had pulled free of the tightly pinned knot on the back of her head. They framed her face like a copper halo. The creamy sweep of her forearms tapered with delicate grace to a pair of absurdly fragile wrists.
    Giant invisible hands seemed to clench around Manning’s throat.
    “Drying the dishes,” he croaked. “Is there something wrong with that? I promise I won’t break any.”
    She tapped a plate of the cheapest tinware against the side of the washtub. “You’d have to work hard to break these. I’ve just never seen a man take a hand in house chores before.”
    Manning shrugged. “Nothing like the army for teaching a fellow to look after himself. I learned how to cook and wash clothes, too, if you ever need me to pitch in there.”
    “I can manage the chores on my own.” She released him from the power of her silvery-emerald gaze, turning her attention back to the dishwater. “Were you in the army long?”
    “Since First Manassas.”
    The plate in Caddie’s hand dropped back into the water with a splash. “I thought up North folks called it Bull Run?”
    Manning felt the heat stinging in his face. What had made him refer to that battle by its rebel name? Was he just trying desperately to fit into a world where he’d always be an outsider?
    “I guess whoever wins a fight should get to name it.” Manning didn’t need to remind his rebel wife that Confederate armies had beaten Union ones both times they’d clashed over that creek in northern Virginia.
    “I reckon so.” She didn’t sound convinced by his explanation. “What kind of work did you do before joining the army, Mr. Forbes? Whereabouts up North do you come from?”
    If she’d demanded his answers over the barrel of a cocked pistol Manning could not have felt more threatened.
    “What difference does it make?” he snapped. “The past is gone and nothing this side of heaven can change it. It’s the present and the future that matter. Let’s talk about Sabbath Hollow and what we need to do to make it prosperous again.”
    “You needn’t get so riled up over a couple of innocent questions.” Caddie collected the dishes he had dried and began to put them away, making considerable noise in the process. “I just thought that since we’re... married, I ought to know a little more about you. Folks are bound to ask me, and it’ll look mighty peculiar if I can’t tell them.”
    “Of course. You’re entitled to know, I guess.” Evading her questions was apt to make her more suspicious, not less. “Nothing very interesting to tell is all. I was a woodworker before I enlisted. Lived in Pennsylvania, not too far north of here. Anything else you want to