A Noble Groom (Michigan Brides #2)(67)

He gave a soft moan.

She raised her head just as he blinked. His rich dark eyes stared up at her.

She did love him. With all her heart.

“What happened?” His voice was groggy.



She swallowed the swell of emotions. “I think one of Ward’s men attacked you and knocked you out.”

He tried to sit up but fell back to the ground with a moan.

“You have a nasty gash that may need stitching.”

He lifted his hand to his wound and her makeshift bandage and winced.

“But you’re alive,” she said. “And that’s all that matters.”

Another pop from the barn sent sparks flying. One landed in the dry grass near them.

“What—?” He swiveled his head, and at the sight of the blazing barn he sucked in a sharp breath. “Why’s the barn on fire?”

The tiny spark smoldered and then burst into flame, igniting the yellowed grass.

She jumped up, untied her tattered apron, and began to beat it against the fire.

Carl climbed to his knees, gripping his head as if attempting to keep from falling back to the ground.

With a few strokes she extinguished the flames. Just as she allowed her body to sag from relief and exhaustion, another spark ignited near the garden. Then another near the clothesline. Fresh dread paralyzed her. Would the fire spread and destroy everything?

Carl struggled to his feet, and he glanced around the yard, his forehead crinkling as he took in the severity of the situation. “We need water.” He began unbuttoning his shirt, wobbling with each movement.

“Soak it in water.” He lifted it over his head and then tossed it to her. “And move Sophie somewhere safe.”

In her weakened state she stumbled to do his bidding. But even as she dipped her apron and his shirt into the bucket half filled with water next to the well, more sparks ignited in the dry grass surrounding the barn.



How would they be able to put them all out—especially since the flames were famished and eating up everything they touched with a speed that left her quaking?

Carl dragged himself from flame to flame, but he was unable to move fast enough to keep up with the spreading fire.

She was ready to drop in fatigue and give up the farm to the hungry fire when she heard shouts coming down the path.

At the sight of Uri and Vater running toward them, a sob broke from her lips. From the thinness of Uri’s face and the haggardness of Vater’s, she could tell they were still dealing with the effects of the typhoid fever and the loss of Mutter.

“We saw the smoke.” Vater’s breath came in heaving gasps. “I told Uri you were in trouble, that as surely as Moses saw the burning bush, your place was on fire.”

Uri had disappeared into the cabin and came out with the sheets from her bed. He was already in the process of tearing them into halves.

As they worked together to keep the fire from spreading, beating the wet sheets against the flames, Annalisa couldn’t stop a rampage of questions from pounding through her.

What would Ward try next?

How would she ever afford to build a new barn?

With the dryness of the summer and the slow growth of her crops, how would she have enough to pay off her loan at the end of October, much less have enough to build another barn?

Besides, if Ward could burn her barn to the ground once, what would stop him from doing it again? And if he discovered Carl had survived the attack, he could always send his man out to finish the job.

If he was determined to do whatever it took to steal the farm from her, how could she possibly stop him without endangering everyone she loved?





Carl’s boots slapped against the plank sidewalk as he marched toward the building that had E. B. Ward painted in block letters across the second story. His anger had only grown over the past week since the barn fire, and now it raged through his body and tightened his fists.

He wasn’t a fist-fighting man, but he’d decided it was never too late to change that, especially where Ward was concerned.

At midday the main street of Forestville was alive with farmers and townspeople going about their business. The docks along Lake Huron teemed with dockhands unloading several steamships full of goods that had come from Detroit.

The squawk of sea gulls circling overhead and the damp scent of seaweed and decaying fish beckoned him to the water’s edge. It would be so easy to board one of the ships and run away from all of the problems.

Even though the ache in his scalp from his wound had dulled, the ache in his heart had only grown more prominent with each passing day. He cared too much about Annalisa and her girls. And the more he cared, the more trouble he was making for himself and them.

He halted in front of the door of Ward’s office. The polished glass gleamed in the hot sunshine of mid-July. His reflection stared back at him—the haughty tilt of his head, the jauntiness of his chin, the angled lines of his nose.

It didn’t matter that he was dressed in homespun peasant garments, that he’d gained plenty of new muscles, and that his skin was tanned and weathered from the long days laboring in the sun. Nothing could hide the fact that he was a nobleman’s son—the nobleman who had all but murdered Annalisa’s beloved brother and forced her family to move far away from their homeland.



He was their enemy. How could they ever accept him? Especially if they learned he’d deceived them these past months?