Free The Midwife's Choice by Delia Parr Page A

McMillan, just as they had with Doc Beyer, with separate quarters on the third floor. Rosalind Andrews tended house and cooked for the doctor. Burton, who had only just returned after legal charges against him had been dropped, worked at the sawmill during the week and handled the heavier household chores and the stable.
    â€œYou and Victoria need some time together. Alone. Without anyone trying to interfere,” Fern added and cast a harsh glance at her sister.
    Ivy ignored the warning. “Don’t be absurd. Mrs. Morgan has no intention of interfering. She came all this way, even in her delicate condition, just to make sure Victoria arrived safe and sound.”
    Martha wanted to ask Ivy if she wanted a halo to hang over June’s head, but thought better of it. Ivy always did see the best in people. Fortunately, Fern’s pessimism was a healthy counterbalance, at least most of the time. “I think I’ll venture over and see if Victoria’s ready to come home, unless you have something you’d like me to do first.”
    Fern and Ivy shook their heads in unison. “Nothing,” Fern insisted. “Go on. When you both come back, it’ll almost be time for dinner.”
    â€œI sent a few things over with Victoria for the doctor and the Andrews. You could bring the plates back,” Ivy suggested.
    Martha agreed, found her winter cape hanging on the peg in the kitchen as June had promised, and went out the back door. Several pie pans had been returned, by custom, and lay stacked on the steps. She put the pans into the storage room, closed the door, and tugged her cape a little tighter.
    The sun seemed unnaturally bright today, but the air was nippy. She walked around the back of the building and went directly to the covered bridge. Relieved that no one seemed to be out and about, she hurried. It took a few steps for her eyes to get adjusted to the shadowy walkway, and she was halfway through when an all-too-familiar figure came out of Dr. McMillan’s and headed straight for the bridge.
    Her heart did a flip-flop, and conflicting emotions tumbled through her spirit. Thomas Dillon was definitely not a complication she needed today.
    She slowed her steps, waiting for him to take notice of her.She had ended their first courtship twenty-five years earlier. In the ensuing years, each of them had married someone else and had families. Each of them had endured the pain of losing a beloved spouse. Each of them had followed callings—Martha as a midwife, Thomas as mayor and town leader, heir to his father’s fortune and the legends surrounding Jacob Dillon’s founding of Trinity some sixty years earlier.
    For the past few months, Thomas had seemed determined to restore the affection they had once shared, and she had let him. Faithful and ardent, he had stopped just short of asking her to marry him. As much as she cared for him, however, she was not sure exactly how she would respond if he did ask her.
    She was cautious. And uncertain. She was also forty-two years old and set in her ways. She had a life and a calling that demanded most of her energies, if not her time, as her problem with Victoria could attest. She had absolutely no intention of abandoning her calling.
    Not for Thomas.
    Not for anyone.
    Still, part of her yearned for his companionship, to ease the loneliness she felt whenever she left a household and headed home, where she knew no one she could call her own was waiting for her. Another part of her, quite to her embarrassment, longed for physical intimacy, a touch, a gentle kiss. . . .
    She shook her head to clear those shocking ideas, just as Thomas entered the bridge, apparently so lost in his own thoughts he had yet to notice her presence. He was tall and lean, and as handsome as no man had a right to be at his age, which only made her feel a little more self-conscious about her curves, which had become even rounder since she had moved into the