Free Murder, Handcrafted (Amish Quilt Shop Mystery) by Isabella Alan Page B

plates, putting her untouched doughnut in front of me.
    I broke off a piece of the fresh doughnut. “Tell me.”
    “I don’t know everything,” she said. “I was very young. I’m sure Jonah or Anna could tell you all the details.” She wrinkled her nose and added, “Or Sarah Leham.” Sarah was another member of our quilting circle. She was also a notorious gossip. Rachel and Sarah had settled their differences, but I knew Rachel still didn’t approve of Sarah’s gossip-mongering.
    “All I know,” Rachel said, “was that Kamon was going to leave the community. He hadn’t before hedied. He was working as an apprentice for Griffin Bright and was killed in an accident on a jobsite.”
    “If it was an accident, why does Jonah claim that Griffin killed him?” I popped another bite of doughnut in my mouth.
    She shook her head. “You’ll have to ask him that.”
    I paused before asking her my next question. “Did you know Jonah considered leaving the Amish like Kamon planned to do? He told me as much when he started to tell me about Kamon.”
    She nodded. “I may have not known about it at the time, but I heard others talking about it years later—about how Jonah had made a rapid turnaround back to the Amish way after Kamon’s death. For a while there, everyone thought he would leave the Amish way of life.”
    I wrapped my hands around my coffee mug as if I needed the warmth. “That just doesn’t make any sense to me. My whole life it never occurred to me Jonah could be anything other than Amish. Why would he leave? He loves the Amish life.”
    “You,” was her simple answer.
    “What?” I squeaked. At least this time my hands were around the mug, so I didn’t flail them about and knock something else over, like the remainder of my doughnut. It would be truly sad to lose a doughnut like that. “What are you talking about?”
    She pursed her lips as if carefully considering her words.
    “Rachel, tell me what you mean,” I pleaded.
    “Jonah was sweet on you,” she said. “He thought aboutleaving the Amish for you. He knew you would never become Amish, so he was willing, at least at that time, to become
Englisch
.”
    I shook my head, denying it. “He might have had a boyhood crush on me when we were little kids, but it was nothing more than that. A crush is not enough to walk away from your home, your family, or your entire life.”
    Rachel shook her head. “It was more than a little boy’s first crush. I was a child, and even I knew how Jonah felt about the blond
Englisch
girl who visited Eleanor Lapp during the summers. The boys in our district teased him relentlessly about it.”
    “I didn’t know Jonah was teased over our friendship.” I frowned. “But I still can’t believe he was thinking about leaving his community for
me
.”
    “Why?” she asked. “Your aunt left her life for your uncle Jacob.”
    I ran my finger along the mug’s rim. “That’s different.”
    “I don’t think it is.” She took a deep breath as if she needed the extra wind power to say what came next. “Haven’t you ever wondered why Miriam doesn’t like you?”
    “Miriam hates everyone,” I said.
    She shook her head. “
Nee
, Angie. Only you.”
    “Ummm . . . ouch.” I winced. “So she doesn’t like me. Don’t tell me it’s because Jonah was going to leave the Amish for me.”
    “It is,” she said without an ounce of doubt in her voice.
    “That’s ridiculous. Even if what you said is true—which I’m not saying that it is—that was twenty years ago.” I broke off a larger piece of doughnut.
    Rachel shook her head. “
Nee
, it is not. I’m sure Jonah told his wife about his feelings for you, which is why she dislikes you so much. That’s the kind of thing an Amish couple would share during courting. Miriam most likely never felt too concerned about it because you were so far away.” She paused. “Then you came back.”
    “He’s married,” I protested. Miriam couldn’t possibly