All About Seduction(43)

After a couple of minutes back and forth, Jack realized he could turn the visitors away. But of course he didn’t.

He scooted up and leaned against the extra pillows. He appreciated the well-wishers, he really did, but his leg ached and he wanted Mrs. Broadhurst’s quiet presence.

“You’re a lucky fellow . . . but I guess you ain’t out of the woods yet,” muttered Abel while rolling his cap in his hand. “George stopped the doctor, and he told us to give you a couple of days of rest afore visiting.”

Jack didn’t feel so lucky, but he nodded.

“I’d say he landed on a mighty soft pillow,” said another, whistling as he craned his head toward the tinwork on the ceiling.

“Thinks he deserves to live here and was bound to get here any way he could,” said George, who’d been his closest friend before he married and his wife popped out three babies. Now, George had little time for him. Or they no longer had much in common. George concentrated on feeding his family, while Jack worked hard to avoid one.

“I didn’t want to be brought here,” he objected.

George patted his shoulder and gave a small mocking smile that took the sting out of his words. “I know, but you enjoy it while it lasts.”

“Take care in what you wish for,” muttered another man, evoking a chorus of murmured agreements.

Jack pushed his lips together. He had wished to earn a better life, not be pampered because he was injured. “I’d rather be working.”

“We took a collection to help you out.” George thrust a bundled handkerchief in Jack’s direction.

“You shouldn’t have.” Jack eyed the clinking bundle with trepidation. He didn’t want their charity, but he’d been the one to start such collections before. Just last year he’d gone around for Mattie’s mother to help pay for her husband’s burial. Taking the money was like admitting he would never be able to support himself again.

“You could pay the doctor.”

To not take the collection would undoubtedly make the others think he thought so much of himself that he didn’t need their money. In truth, he had a good-sized stash at home. He’d been saving for years.

George pulled back the handkerchief. “ ’Course, I could always give it to Martha. Wants a new stove, does she?”

It was too much to hope that the argument he’d had with his stepmother hadn’t been repeated all around the village. He’d said things he shouldn’t have, but so had Martha. The more he’d tried to stay calm, the more she shouted, while his father drank more gin.

Jack reached for the handkerchief. The bundle was slim, probably no more than a few shillings in total. Would his misfortune have been worth more if Martha hadn’t been shouting that he thought he was too good to live like the rest of them? “Thank you.”

Jack tucked the handkerchief under his pillows. A few of his family members hung back near the wall. He hadn’t expected his father to manage the walk with his back, nor did he expect Martha with all the little ones, but an emptiness yawned inside him. Were the rest siding with Martha? His shoulders sagged with weariness.

The deep ache in his anklebone made him grit his teeth. He didn’t think he was better than anyone. He just hated a life lived with nothing to show for it. He wanted to put a mark on the world, make something of himself, earn enough to live easily.

After a spell, Lucy shouldered her way through the throng. Her blue eyes were big and her heavy blond hair looked as if she’d pinned it up without a mirror. “Jack!”

He sighed. Once upon a time he’d liked that Lucy often looked like she’d just tumbled out of bed. Now he wondered whose bed besides his she’d tumbled out of. Not that Lucy would be stupid enough to get caught playing two men against each other. And lately she’d been laying claim to him in more and more obvious ways. As he always did when a girl started to think she owned him, he’d made excuses and stopped spending time alone with her. Or at least avoided intimacies that could lead to getting trapped.

She made a show of plumping his pillows and adjusting his covers.

“Leave it,” he said.

Her eyes narrowed for just a second before she patted his hand as if he were just a grouchy boy. They both knew she was hanging onto him because she thought he might be the one to make a better life. He was already a lead mechanic, even though he was younger than the other mechanics by a decade. But the time had long since past when he would have proposed if he was going to. He should have made a clean break months ago.