A Secret Identity (9 page)

Angie pulled the front seat into place and Todd climbed in. He sat on the right of the seat while Angie sat on the left. She took the reins and slapped them gently on the rump of our horse, who knew from frequent practice just what to do. He ambled slowly along the shoulder of 340.

We turned right off 340 and drove down a country road. It pleasured me how quickly the bustle of the major tourist thoroughfare was left behind. Angie kept up a steady patter of information that Todd ignored but I found fascinating. We passed several farms and an Amish school. I thought of the Nickel Mines school shootings that had happened not too far from here. I looked at the little white building and wondered at the despair or illness of a man who would go into such a setting and shoot little girls.

I was shocked when I heard Angie say that Amish kids only went through eighth grade.

“Education takes you from the culture,” Todd commented, his arm resting on the open window frame. “It makes you independent, and the Amish prize a cooperative, group mentality.”

With the open door and side window and the open front and back windows, there was a soft breeze through the buggy in spite of the warm temperature. I was enjoying my ride and so, I thought, was Todd, who was looking relaxed and handsome.

At least he was enjoying it until the horse did what comes naturally. He raised his tail and Todd reacted.

“Ah, yuck!” he muttered and leaned as far back into the buggy as he could.

Angie and I both laughed at him as the manure fell harmlessly onto the road.

“No one would ever take you for a farmer,” Angie said.

When we arrived at our starting place after tracing a two-mile square, we climbed out of the buggy. Todd paid Angie. We both thanked her and walked to the car. Todd went automatically to the driver’s side again. I shook my head, amused at his presumption, and climbed into the passenger side.

“So?” I said.

“So what?”

“Did you have fun?”

He snorted and gave me a look of imperious scorn.

“You are such a phony,” I said.

“And you’re bossy,” he said.

“
Quid pro quo
,” I said.

“Exactly.”

We rode in companionable silence to and past the restaurant.

“Hey, where are we going?” I said, twisting to look back over my shoulder. “Don’t you have to get your car? Or do you like mine better, and you’re planning to keep it?”

“My car’s not there,” he said. “I walked.”

We turned off 340 and drove for a bit, made another turn, and then pulled into a drive before a brick Cape Cod with white clapboard dormers, a red door, and white shutters. A split rail fence separated a yard about an acre in size from the press of cornfields on three sides.

“You live here?” I asked.

He nodded. “Yep. This is my house.”

“I thought you didn’t like farms. There’s nothing around you but farms.”

“I don’t like manure, and I’ll admit that February and March are a bit fragrant when my neighbors are putting down their homemade fertilizer. But I love the privacy and peace. For them I’ll overlook the other.”

“Compromise,” I said, smiling. “The Amish aren’t the only ones.”

We sat in the car with the windows down, enjoying the warm magic of dusk. Neither of us seemed to want to move. We listened to the crickets’ symphony and watched the lightning bugs flash in the shrubs as sunset faded from lavender and peach to pearl-gray velvet to deep night lit by a full moon.

“Smell the honeysuckle?” I think nothing means peace and summer like that scent.

“Come with me,” Todd said.

He got out of the car and walked to the edge of the lawn where a vine grew up a fence post. I followed willingly. He broke off a sprig from the vine and handed it to me. I held it to my nose and inhaled deeply. Sweet, sweet honeysuckle.

“Ever draw the nectar from the flower?” he asked, pulling a blossom free.

“Sure,” I said. “We Maryland girls love honeysuckle.”

I watched as he pinched the base of the flower and slowly pulled the long stamen free. He put it into his mouth and, closing his lips over most of it, slowly withdrew it, obviously savoring the sweetness.

“That’s one way to do it,” I said.

“You’ve got a better way, I suppose.”

“Sure.” I plucked a blossom and, putting the end in my mouth, bit it off. Then I inhaled the sweet trace of nectar. “Simple, easy, and quick.”

We pulled every flower off the sprig and several off the vine on the post, Todd carefully pulling the stamen free, me biting the tip and sucking in the nectar.

Finally we wandered back to my car, and Todd handed me my keys.

“I’ll see you tomorrow morning,” he said. “How about if I bring us some breakfast? Egg McMuffins?”

“With orange juice and a large coffee. We can eat out by the pool.”

I climbed in and Todd shut my door. He leaned in the open window.

“I’m glad we met this evening.” Then he grinned. “I had a good time.”

I grinned back. “And I’m supposed to believe that?”

He stood up. “Yep. It’s the truth.”

As I backed out of the driveway, I couldn’t wait for tomorrow morning.

“Cara, I’d like you to meet some friends,” Todd said after the service Sunday morning. We were standing in the parking lot. “This is Clarke and Kristie Griffin.”

I smiled at the couple. He was tall with very dark brows under sandy-colored hair; she was slim and somehow lovely despite being dressed in swirls of ruby, emerald, sapphire, with shiny gold dots all over.

“This is Cara Bentley, a client of mine,” Todd said. “I’m taking her out to the Zooks’ place to see about her renting your old rooms, Kristie.”

Kristie’s eyes lit up. “Oh, Cara, you’ll love it! I had the most wonderful year there.”

“Sure you did.” Clarke grinned at her. “You met me.”

Kristie leaned into his side and gave him a gentle elbow to the ribs. I remembered Todd saying that the woman who had rented the rooms before me had just gotten married. It showed in the way she looked at Clarke and the way he smiled back.

“You’ll love the Zook family,” Kristie assured me when she pulled her gaze reluctantly from her husband. “Mary and John are so pleasant and nice and hospitable.”

“And Mary is a great cook,” Clarke said. “Don’t overlook that very important fact.”

“And she’s an artist.” Kristie obviously thought this a great thing. “We’ve just begun selling some of her landscapes and quilt pictures. In fact, if you’re a client of Todd’s, you’ve probably seen one in his office.”

I nodded. “There are two beautiful paintings on his wall.”

“One of them is Mary’s,” Kristie said.

“And the other is Kristie’s,” her proud husband said as he gave her shoulders a squeeze.

Before I had a chance to ooh and aah, Kristie continued talking about Mary. “I still go out to the farm to take Mary on drives so she can pick scenes she wants to paint. Then I take pictures of the scenes with my camera and have them printed for her to paint from.”

I was fascinated. Apparently cameras weren’t allowed in Amish culture. I couldn’t imagine life without pictures, especially now because they served as reminders of the wonderful life Mom and Pop had given Ward and me. But if photos weren’t allowed, why were paintings?

I asked that question.

Kristie shrugged. “They’re not really. Icons. False representations.”

“Then there can’t be many Amish artists. At least not the ‘good’ Amish people, the obedient Amish people.”

“You’re right, there aren’t many. Mary and an artist named Susie Riehl are the only two I know or at least the only two in this area I know who are selling their work to the outside world. Both of them are good Amish women. Of course, there may be others who, like Mary until recently, paint in secret.”

“It puts a terrible strain on someone to be gifted in the arts and not be allowed an outlet,” Clarke said. “I think that’s one reason there are so many beautiful quilts coming out of the Amish community. It’s an accepted way to create something of color and beauty.”

“But…” Kristie raised her finger as she made another point. “If you’re gifted, even driven, in a specific area, any old outlet won’t do. If you must paint, quilts won’t fulfill that need. It’d be like telling a novelist to be happy writing articles. After all, both are words. Or telling a dancer to be satisfied with running. Both are movement.”

I understood her point. Telling stories was what I was compelled to do. Even narrower in focus, I was driven to tell stories of romance and faith. Any other kind of writing, no matter how noble, no matter how helpful, wouldn’t be as satisfying or wouldn’t satisfy at all.

“Cara’s a writer,” Todd told Kristie and Clarke. He looked at me. “So you’d be okay. If you were Amish, I mean.”

“Writing’s good,” Clarke agreed. “You can make it spiritual, talk about the Lord, discuss the tenets of the church, present ideas on family and child-rearing. But art isn’t nearly so practical, so pointed, so didactic.”

I had to smile. “I write inspirational romances, about as nondidactic as it gets, so I don’t know how they’d look on that.”

“A lot of the women read for pleasure,” Kristie said. “You might be surprised to find them reading your books.”

I tried to picture an Amish woman, a
kapp
over her slicked-back hair, dress and apron pinned neatly together, sitting on the porch reading
As the Deer
. It was a hard image to conjure.

“One thing we need to warn you about, Cara,” Clarke said. “When you meet Jake, don’t let him throw you.”

Kristie nodded. “He can a bit touchy at times. In fact, he scared me to death at first. But his social skills are improving daily. Just don’t mention Rose Martin to him.”

“Who’s she?”

“The woman who called 911 the night of his accident and then sat with him until the emergency techs and the ambulance came. She may have saved his life by holding shock at bay.”

“So why can’t I mention her?”

“She wants to meet Jake—for a long time she thought he had died. He doesn’t want to meet her.” Kristie shrugged. “Don’t try to understand. It’s a control thing of some kind. She saw him when he was completely helpless, and it bothers him quite a bit.”

I must have looked like I didn’t see much sense in Jake’s position because she laughed. “I don’t understand either. That’s just the way it is.”

“Jake’s really a nice guy,” Clarke said. “He and I’ve been friends for a long time. And getting approval to take those classes at Millersville has been great for him.”

“First class tomorrow,” Todd said.

“That’s all your doing, Todd,” Clarke said. “If it weren’t for your pushing, I don’t think he’d have gotten that high school equivalency degree.”

Todd shook his head dismissively. “I’m just concerned he do well in these summer classes. He has to if he wants to gain full admission.”

When Clarke and Kristie said goodbye, I watched them walk to their car hand-in-hand. I turned to Todd to make an undoubtedly snide remark about their obvious affection and was surprised by the expression of deep longing on his face.

An unexpected and intense shaft of pain shot through me. I swallowed hard to tamp down the hurt.

“She’s very pretty,” I said, my eyes again following her. I tried to keep my voice neutral, though I wasn’t completely successful. A faint misting of melancholy hung over the words.

He looked at me with one eyebrow raised and said carefully, “Yes, she is.”

“Colorful,” I said.

He nodded. “Very.”

I felt the beginnings of a headache, the special one reserved for sufferers of vain imaginings. It didn’t matter that I knew I was foolish; the pain still attacked behind my left eye.

“But then beige is nice too,” he added politely, looking me up and down. “Restful.”

It was the third day I’d known him and the third beige outfit. Who cared that it was a pricey, raw silk pantsuit? It was beige! Suddenly I felt as boring as Wonder Bread.

“You used to go with her, didn’t you?” I asked, my eyes still on the lovely, multi-hued Kristie. I already knew the answer.

“For a couple of years.”

“What happened?”

“We broke up.”

“Your idea or hers?” I wanted it to be his, but I knew it was hers.

“Hers. She told me I wanted to remake her, and she didn’t want to be remade.”

I thought about that for a few seconds. “Did you?”

“Want to remake her? Probably. All her quirks that Clarke thinks are enchanting I thought were idiotic.”

“Not a good sign for a relationship.”

He nodded agreeably.

“Do you miss her?”

He looked at me with a funny half smile. “Do you pick at scabs often?” he asked.

I sighed. I was so obvious, poking where I had no business poking. “Only when the—”

“I know. Only when the outcome matters.” He continued to stare at me. “And it matters in this case?”

I blushed and looked at my shoes. They were bone-colored. Boring. “I think I’d like a piece of shoofly pie, wouldn’t you?” I managed to raise my gaze to his shirt button, but I couldn’t bring myself to meet his gaze. “Where do you think we should eat?”

He put a finger under my chin and lifted, forcing my eyes to his. “I’m over her, Cara,” he said softly. “I’ve been over her for some time. She was right in her analysis of how I felt about her. I liked who I wanted her to be, not who she was.”