Love Unexpected (9 page)

“Young man,” the woman said, grasping his arm and yanking him back to his feet. “You get in the house right now.” Her thin face was a mask of calm fury, her eyes fierce.

Josiah was so startled that he gulped down his sobs and turned immediately silent and ashen-faced.

“I won't put up with any of your nonsense,” Bertie said, louder this time. “And your mother shouldn't put up with it either. If I were her, I'd have taken a switch to your backside by now.”

Bertie half dragged, half hauled the boy into the house, her
steps firm and quick, her lips pinched together. Emma followed after them, her face burning. What must Bertie think of her?

The woman plopped Josiah into his seat and then situated herself in the chair next to him, glowering as if daring him to make a sound.

Josiah looked at Bertie, his lashes glistening with the wetness of unshed tears. Emma had the urge to stare at Bertie too. She'd never met a woman quite like her, and she wasn't sure whether to be frightened alongside Josiah or laugh at the absurdity of the situation.

Instead, she rushed to the stove, to the coffee she'd left warming on the burner from earlier. She poured two mugs and searched for anything she could serve Bertie, anything at all. Other than the fish and griddle cakes that sat in the greasy pan from breakfast, she had nothing. She swallowed the dismay that kept surfacing and forced a smile as she turned.

“I wish I had something to serve you besides coffee,” she said, setting the mug before Bertie. “But your visit caught me by surprise.”

Bertie examined every inch of the kitchen before settling back in her chair and reaching for her mug. Emma was glad she'd made an effort to dress up the kitchen a little with a canning jar of cattails and wildflowers and a few colorful and uniquely shaped rocks she'd found along the shore.

“To be honest, I'm not much of a cook.” Emma sat down across from the woman. What she wouldn't give to learn how to make a meal or two for her new family, instead of having to resort to leftovers of the meals Patrick prepared.

“Not to boast,” Bertie said while taking a sip of coffee, “but I've gained quite the reputation for my baking abilities. If you need any tips or receipts, I've got plenty.”

“Oh, I could use all the tips you could give me.” Emma slid to the edge of her chair in her eagerness. “I'd be forever grateful if you could show me how to make biscuits or bread or anything really.”

Bertie peered over the rim of her mug. Her eyes lacked warmth, and her cheeks pinched as though she had swallowed vinegar instead of coffee. “Young lady, it looks to me like you took on a job here that you can't handle.”

Emma traced a dark coffee stain on the table. She couldn't deny Bertie's assessment. She dreaded that eventually Patrick would realize just how inept she was and regret he married her. “I'd be much obliged if you could teach me everything you know.”

Josiah was taking tiny bites out of a cold griddle cake. He continued to stare at Bertie as though she might reach out and bite him if he moved.

“Would you have time to give me a receipt or two today?” Emma asked.

“'Course I can,” Bertie said, her voice echoing in her mug as she took a gulp. “That's what friends are for.”

Emma was writing the last of the ingredients for biscuits and fish chowder when the front door opened.

“Daddy?” Josiah called, squirming in an effort to get out of his chair.

“Sit, young man!” Bertie ordered. “You wait for your mother to lift you down.”

Patrick's squeaky boots sounded in the hallway with his approach. Emma removed Josiah from his chair, knowing how important it was for him to see his daddy upon his return home. Once his feet touched the floor, he charged forward, arms outstretched as Patrick entered the kitchen.

Patrick's face lit up with a grin. He swept the boy up and lifted him above his head. “There you are, lad.”

Josiah giggled.

Patrick lowered him into a big hug and brushed a kiss on top of the boy's head.

Bertie had risen from her chair and was watching the display, her expression stormy.

Emma never tired of witnessing Patrick's gentleness with the child. Truth be told, she couldn't imagine anything more beautiful than a father showering love on his son.

Patrick's eyes met hers above Josiah's neatly combed red head. He seemed to be checking on her, making sure she was still there. And at the sight of her, he released a slight breath.

“Thank you for the chickens,” she said.

“I hoped you wouldn't mind,” he said, focusing on Josiah.

“You were very kind to think of it.” She wanted to tell him that no man had ever given her anything before. Even if the chickens were for all of them and not just her, it still felt like she'd been given a precious gift.

She had the urge to run over to Patrick like Josiah had and throw her arms around him in a grateful hug. But Bertie cleared her throat loudly, drawing their attention and reminding Emma that she still had company.

At the sight of their visitor, Patrick took a step back, his face hardening. He exchanged a few terse words of greeting with Bertie before excusing himself. “I'll take Josiah along with me,” he offered, as he usually did when he returned from fishing.

Bertie watched him go, her lips growing thinner until Patrick and Josiah disappeared.

“Delia told me the board doesn't pay Patrick enough for his
light keeping,” Bertie said in a hushed voice. “That's why he has to get the extra income from fishing.”

Emma nodded and tried to pretend that the news didn't surprise her. Patrick hadn't shared much about himself or his personal life with her yet, and she didn't suppose a wife ought to concern herself with her husband's financial situation the first week of marriage.

Bertie leaned forward, peeked down the hallway, and then bent closer to Emma. “Delia also suspected that Patrick needs the extra money because he's secretly giving it to someone. A woman.”

Emma recoiled at the words. “Who? And why would he?”

Bertie held up her hand as if to stop Emma's questions. “I don't like to gossip, so I won't say any more except that I've never liked Patrick.”

“I don't understand.” Although she wanted to shut the door on Bertie's words, to block out everything negative the woman said, so that she could continue to live in blissful oblivion, something inside her demanded to know the truth.

“My dear cousin wasn't one to speak much. She was quiet. And it's no wonder she was melancholy having to live with Patrick,” Bertie said, brushing at invisible crumbs on the table. “But she did say to me on several occasions, ‘Things aren't what they seem, Bertie. Things aren't what they seem.'”

Emma's stomach flipped. “What did she mean by that?”

“Like I said, I don't want to gossip.” Bertie started for the back door. “But I will say, you best watch your back. And if I were you, I'd go through his things and see what I could find.”

“I don't know what I'd be looking for. I feel completely safe here.”

Bertie halted abruptly and spun so that her thin face was only
inches from Emma's. “I personally don't believe Delia's fall was the accident Patrick claims it was.”

A stunned quiet fell over Emma.

Bertie's eyes gleamed with anger again. “Maybe she was pushed . . . or maybe she got in the middle of a lovers' quarrel.”

Emma shook her head, unwilling, unable to listen to another word. “Please, Bertie. I don't think we should say any more—”

“My thoughts exactly.” Bertie opened the door. “I did want to warn you, though. You should know exactly what you've gotten yourself into by marrying Patrick Garraty.”

Emma followed Bertie outside to her wagon. Josiah was chattering and following Patrick around as he stowed his fishing supplies in the shed. She didn't dare look Patrick's way lest he read the confusion battling inside her.

She stood by the side of the wagon as Bertie climbed aboard and situated herself on the bench. “Watch for those pirates,” she called to Patrick.

Half in the shed, his back stiffened.

“Heard just this morning that one pirate boat in particular is harassing steamers passing through the area. Captained by a man named Mitch Schwartz. Quite dangerous from what people are saying.”

Patrick turned slowly. His face was shadowed by the brim of his flat cap. “Thank you, Bertie. I'll be on the watch for any problems.”

Emma's mind flashed with the vision of flames that had engulfed the steamer and nearly killed her and Ryan. “Do you think they're the same pirates that set fire to the steamer Ryan and I were on?”

Bertie held up a hand again and cut off Emma's inquiry. “Don't
want to speculate. Just wanted you all to be aware that there could be more attacks headed our way.”

The woman flicked a sharp riding whip across the team of horses. The wheels rolled forward in the tall grass as she veered the wagon toward the woodland path. She called to Emma over her shoulder, “Pepper. Put pepper on that boy's thumb. That'll make him stop sucking it in no time.”

Emma nodded and gave a last wave to her new friend. A part of her wondered if she should chase after Bertie and demand that she take her with her back to Presque Isle Harbor, back to Ryan. Maybe she wasn't safe at the lighthouse with Patrick after all.

But she could only watch Bertie's wagon lumber away and pray that none of the woman's words of caution were true.

P
atrick ran a jack plane over the crumbling caulking above the windowpane. The crack was in need of sealing to prevent a leak during the next storm. After the long winter, the whole tower was in sorry shape, with stones loose in the lower two-thirds and the bricks wasting away in the upper part. The structure was bordering on unsafe, and he didn't know how it would survive another Michigan winter without collapsing completely.

Of course, the board hadn't sent out the Lighthouse Service tender crew yet, even though he'd mailed his request to Mr. Yates, the district superintendent, when the lake had thawed, once again allowing communication with the outside world. Since Patrick hadn't heard anything back, he'd been forced to attempt his own repairs.

From his spot in the gallery, he could hear the steady tap of a hammer. He glanced down into the backyard to where Emma kneeled next to the hen house. She held several nails between her lips and hammered at the holes in the roof with a precision that had him looking in her direction more than he should.

She'd come outside to work after putting Josiah to bed. In fact, he'd noticed that she worked most evenings scrubbing clothes, cleaning, or tending the garden until darkness forced her to stop. A niggling of guilt told him she had no choice. During the day, Josiah was still giving her a hard time and preventing her from getting much done.

Patrick looked to the west, over the towering white pines, spruce, tamarack, and hardwoods that spread over the Presque Isle isthmus. The sun was sinking, the sky streaked with an array of oranges and pinks. A warm breeze stroked his cheeks, signaling the coming of summer.

For all the hardships that came with his being a lightkeeper, the beauty of evenings like this made everything worthwhile. He took a deep breath, and his soul offered a prayer of gratitude. God had been good to him, had blessed him much more than he deserved. And he couldn't forget it.

He forced his attention back to the repairs he'd been neglecting. He dug through the toolbox issued by the Lighthouse Service and found a caulking iron. He stared at the crack. How could he fill the enormous gap?

With a sigh, he dropped the caulking iron and picked up a hammer and a piece of crumbled caulk from the gallery. He pushed the jagged part back into the hole it had vacated at some point that spring and then swung the hammer against it. But instead of hitting the narrow strip, the hammer slammed against his thumb.

A mutter escaped his lips before he could prevent it. He let the hammer fall with a clatter to the catwalk that surrounded the tower windows. He stuck his thumb in his mouth and at the same time glanced at Emma, hoping she hadn't seen his stupidity.

But of course she'd paused in her own hammering to peer up
at him. She spit the remainder of nails into her palm. “Looks like you could use a hand,” she said, rising to her feet and sending a smile his way.

He knew he should protest, but she'd already started across the yard toward the door in the base of the tower. Maybe he should let her come up, for then he could use the opportunity to apologize for anything Bertie had told her about him.

Ever since the Burnham woman had driven away in her wagon earlier that day, Emma had regarded him with a hesitancy that hadn't been there before. And he couldn't help but wonder what Bertie had shared with her.

He knew Delia had never revealed much to her cousin. Delia had been embarrassed about his past and his family and wanted to keep matters private. In fact, Delia had been the one to warn him not to say anything to Bertie about his history. He'd been all too happy to comply.

Even so, he wasn't sure what information Bertie had weaseled out of Delia during the past year. Most likely the busybody had come to her own conclusions. Even if she didn't know anything, Bertha Burnham made a full-time job out of gossiping, and most of it was just plain hogwash. Most of it . . .

His muscles stiffened again, as they had every time the name Mitch Schwartz replayed in his mind. His blood had turned cold and he'd been paralyzed the moment Bertie had spoken the name. He prayed this was another of those times when the woman was simply spouting nonsense. He hated to think what could happen if Schwartz really was in the area, if he discovered that Patrick was keeper of the Presque Isle Light.

“Please no, God,” he whispered.

At a movement inside the lantern room, he squeezed through the narrow door that led back inside. Emma was already poking
her head through the hatch in the floor and scrambling through. She focused on the Fresnel lens that took up the major part of the small lantern room.

Patrick let his eyes linger on the dozens of heavy glass prisms mounted in bronze that made up the lens, which stood two and a half feet high on a cast-iron pedestal. The platform made the lens level with the large panes of glass that formed the lantern room. “She's a beauty, isn't she?”

Emma walked slowly around the impressive object. “It's larger than I imagined.”

“It's only a fourth-order lens, not as big as some. But for a small tower like this, it's a decent size.”

She studied it with the same awe he remembered feeling when he'd first set foot in the lighthouse at Fort Gratiot, where he'd been the assistant keeper under Delia's father. The tower there had a smaller fifth-order lens, a fact Delia often forgot when she'd complained about the inferiority of the Presque Isle lens compared to the one where she'd grown up.

“The prisms are shaped to concentrate the light from the lantern. The bigger bull's-eye lens in the middle helps focus the light into a solid beam that can be seen more than ten miles away.”

“I saw it from the steamer before Ryan and I jumped,” she said. “We were following it while trying to swim toward shore.”

He nodded, wishing he were a smoother talker and that he didn't get so tongue-tied around her, a very pretty woman.

She circled the lantern again. He stood back, giving her room and noticing that her hair had come loose as it usually did from the knot she wore at the back of her neck. The blond wisps floated around her neck and gave her a wind-tossed, carefree appeal.

When she completed a half circle, she turned her attention to the windows that surrounded the room. She gazed out at the lake. “What a magnificent view.”

He leaned back against the door and smiled, content to watch her dart from window to window, taking in the spectacular sight with the excitement of a child on Christmas morning.

“No wonder you're up here so much,” she said, lingering on the west side and looking at the fingers of color streaking the sky. “It's like having a bit of heaven on earth, isn't it?”

She finally looked at him, and seeing that he was staring at her, she quickly turned toward the lake again, to the ebb and flow of never-ending waves.

He did the same. “On nights like this, it's heaven. But it's not quite as nice during a storm.”

The first time he'd gazed upon one of the Great Lakes, he thought somehow he'd gotten mixed up and was back at the ocean he'd crossed from Ireland. The lake seemed to go on forever with no end in sight, and it had waves just as high as the ocean.

Even though the waves looked the same, he'd learned over the years since first sailing the lakes that freshwater waves have a different motion to them. They're sharper; they jump and tumble rather than roll smoothly like the denser saltwater waves of an ocean.

She nodded toward the lantern. “Have you ever missed lighting it?”

“Not yet.” His body had ached to skip a night during those long days and nights after Delia's fall, but he'd forced himself up the tower steps every night regardless of how exhausted he felt.

“Maybe sometime you can show me how to light it,” she
offered. “Just in case . . . you know, you're not here, or you're sick or something.”

“I've been meaning to, but I didn't want to make too many demands of you right away.”

She smiled and nodded, and he was relieved that the hesitancy of before seemed to have faded.

“It's not hard to learn,” he added. “You have to make sure it has enough fuel, unlock the weights that drive the gears, and then use the hand crank to start a new descent.”

“Sounds complicated.”

“It's not.” Even though it wasn't quite time to light the lantern, he could get it going a little early. “Would you like me to show you now? Tonight?”

She started to nod eagerly, but then stopped and glanced down at the house. “What about Josiah?”

“He'll be fine. He's a sound sleeper.”

For all the boy's antics, at least Patrick rarely had any trouble with the boy waking up at night. As he went through the process of lighting the lantern, Emma studied his every move and listened intently. He explained the steps for setting the gears that would rotate the lens into motion. Then he showed her how to trim the wick and where to pour in the oil.

When the beam was finally revolving out over the lake, he stood back. “There you are.”

She watched the light reflected through the prisms with a look of wonder. It filled the lantern room with a brilliance that was almost blinding. “Thank you for showing me. I hope I can get it started if I ever need to.”

“Maybe you can come up again sometime,” he said hesitantly. “To practice.” He didn't want to force her, but it would put his mind at ease to know she could handle the light if anything
should happen to him. He'd never had to worry about that with Delia. She'd known more than him and would have been a fine keeper were she a man.

He was relieved to see Emma smile. “Of course. I can come up again to help you with the repairs too.”

“I admit I'm lousy with a hammer.”

“Aye.” Her smile broadened. “I was worried you'd take off your thumb.”

Dusk had begun to settle outside, and he knew it was too late for her to return to her own repairs. “I'm sorry you couldn't finish your work today.”

She shrugged. “It'll wait.”

He liked the way her cheeks flushed and her eyes sparkled.

“How old are you, lass?” The question came out before he could stop it.

She shifted and looked down at the floor that he kept immaculately swept and scrubbed.

“I'm sorry,” he rushed to say. “I shouldn't have asked. It's just that you seem so young—”

“I'm twenty-two. Practically an old woman.”

“Old woman?” He gave a soft laugh. “I would have guessed eighteen and not a day older.”

“That's probably because I don't know how to do anything.”

He couldn't keep from laughing again, appreciating the way the light from the lantern highlighted the reddish tint to her hair. And he liked her smile, the gentleness of it.

For a long moment she didn't say anything. He wanted to find the words to express his appreciation for all she'd done over the past week, yet he felt as if he'd swallowed a bucket of sand.

Though he knew he should stop staring at her, he couldn't
make himself look away. In the cramped quarters of the room, her smile turned shy. She lowered her head and took a half step toward the hatch and the ladder that led down to the landing of the stone stairway. “I guess I should get going.”

“I suppose Bertie had some things to say about me,” he blurted.

She stopped, her expression turning serious. “Aye. She doesn't seem to like you much.”

“And do you feel the same?” He knew it shouldn't matter; he knew Emma would be better off guarding her heart from a man like him.

Emma studied his face and then offered him a little smile. “I'm not one to form my opinions based on what others say. I like to make my decisions based on what I see for myself.”

The muscles in his back relaxed.

She nodded, looked as if she wanted to say more, but instead she descended the first rung of the ladder. “Good night, Patrick.”

“Good night, lass.” He knew he should say more too, and yet something held him back.

As she disappeared down the ladder, he resisted the urge to follow her, an urge he'd never had with Delia. He hated to admit that he'd always been relieved when Delia would leave him to himself. It wasn't that she was always arguing with him. But she'd had a silent way about her, one that left him feeling inadequate, as if he could never please her. He didn't think any man could please her, except perhaps her father.

In hindsight, he realized he probably shouldn't have moved away from Fort Gratiot, that he shouldn't have forced her to leave the one person in the world she loved—her father. She hadn't wanted to go when Mr. Yates had offered him the position at Presque Isle, even knowing she'd have her cousin nearby. But
he'd been excited about the prospect of advancing from assistant to a full-fledged keeper.

And more than that, he'd been anxious to put more distance between himself and his past. He was willing to face many things, including any number of hardships, but his past was something he never wanted to meet up with again.