Free Smoke River Bride by Lynna Banning Page A

Ness said it came from France.”
    “France, huh?” He gobbled down another bite while Teddy watched.
    “Pretty good! Try some, Teddy.”
    Teddy picked up his fork but just sat there while his father ate.
    “What else does Ness have that comes from France?”
    Leah began to relax. “I do not know what else Mr. Ness stocks at his store. He—hemade me feel so unwelcome that I did not look. I walked out.”
    “He did, did he?” Thad sent her a questioning glance and broke open one of Leah’s biscuits. The two halves fell into his hands like fluffy white clouds.
    “Did Teddy make these?”
    “No, I didn’t, Pa. Bet they’re awful, huh?”
    Thad shoved in a buttery bite and then closed his eyes. “What do you want to bet, son? This is the best darn biscuit I’ve tasted since—”
    He stopped abruptly, opened his eyes and stared at Leah, who was sliding back onto her chair with an odd smile on her face. He couldn’t stop gazing at her; she looked so pleased with herself her cheeks had flushed rose.
    Teddy stabbed his fork into his beans and in the next five minutes cleaned his plate faster than Thad had ever witnessed.
    “These here are Boston beans,” the boy explained to Thad. “Kin I have seconds?”
    Leah sat up straighter, an expression of disbelief in her eyes. Her chest swelled under the red plaid shirt until Thad thought she might pop off a button. He let himself look longer than he should have, then wrenched his attentionback to his plate. What a surprise his new wife was turning out to be.
    And then she plopped an oversize spoonful of something that smelled like apples and brown sugar into a bowl, and passed him the cream pitcher. At the first bite, the crispy topping on the dish melted on his tongue. Whatever it was called, it was even better than last night’s tart. Maybe even better than one of Hattie’s apple pies.
    He closed his mouth with a snap. Nothing would ever be better than Hattie’s apple pie. Nothing would ever be better than having Hattie in his kitchen, no matter what she cooked.
    He finished eating in silence.
    After the dishes were washed, Thad noticed Leah pacing from the wide-armed chair to the settle, then back to the chair, while a sullen Teddy dried the plates. She seemed kinda fidgety. She’d been fidgety last night, too, and all at once he thought he knew why.
    Going to bed with him made her nervous. He would never force himself on her, but she didn’t know that. He didn’t want to explain his reticence; it had too much to do with Hattie.
    It would take time until he could muster the courage to risk his heart again. Something insidehim knotted tight at the thought of caring about Leah too much, but he knew he couldn’t make love with her only for physical release.
    Leah’s soft, clear voice startled him out of his meanderings. “I looked over your bookshelf today. Perhaps I could read aloud?”
    Thad grabbed at the offered distraction. “Sure. Choose any book you like.”
    “I dowanna listen to a dumb old story!” Teddy announced.
    Leah sighed. What was it Lao-zu said about progress? Two steps forward, one step backward? With Teddy it seemed
all
the steps were backward.
    She ignored the boy’s outburst, sent Thad a half smile and settled his leather-bound copy of
Ivanhoe
in her lap. With a surreptitious glance at Teddy’s hunched shoulders, she began to read.
    “In that pleasant district of merry England,” she began, “there extended in ancient times a large forest—”
    “Aw, Pa, this is boring.” Teddy stomped across to the loft ladder and started to climb.
    “No, it isn’t, son,” Thad returned in a quiet voice. “Just listen.”
    Leah skipped some pages ahead. “They stood before the castle of Cedric, a low irregularbuilding containing several courtyards and turreted and castellated towers.”
    Teddy plopped down on the bottom rung of the ladder. “What’s ‘cast’llated’ mean?”
    On the back of an old calendar, Thad quickly sketched a castle