A Noble Groom (Michigan Brides #2)(82)

Annalisa started to shake her head in protest. What about her choice? Shouldn’t she have a say in the matter of her future husband?

Didn’t Carl think so too? After all he’d said about not marrying a stranger or giving up on the chance for love and happiness in marriage?

She looked to him to say something, anything. His eyes locked with hers for a long moment. Anguish pooled in their dark depths, along with his desire to be with her.

For a fraction of a second, hope fluttered inside her chest.

But then he shook his head, his eyes filled with apology, and he looked away.

The flutter vanished into utter stillness. Was he unwilling to fight to marry her?

“Carl isn’t objecting.” Vater voiced her worst fear. “He’d considered marrying her to help her. But now that Dirk is here, Carl has no need to stay. He can move on as he’d planned.”

Nausea pooled in her stomach. So he’d asked her to marry him out of obligation? And he didn’t care enough to marry her now that Dirk was here?

She’d wanted so badly to believe Carl had proposed marriage because he loved her. But the cold truth slapped her again—he’d never once made a declaration of his love.

“Even so,” Herr Pastor said, his gentle eyes coming to rest on her, “there’s no reason to rush the matter.”

Frau Pastor sidled next to her and rubbed Annalisa’s arm. She gave her husband a nod as if encouraging him to go on.

“In fact,” he continued, “I suggest we wait two weeks. Let’s give everyone a chance to get to know one another first.”

“Two weeks is too long,” Vater boomed. But when he glanced at Annalisa, and saw the desperation she knew was ingrained in every line of her face, he stopped speaking. His brow lifted, and the confident set of his shoulders wavered.



“Then one week,” Herr Pastor said. “If everyone is in agreement, I’ll perform the ceremony in one week, after next week’s Sunday morning service.”

Vater nodded, then looked at Dirk. “What do you say, cousin? Will you wait one week?”

Dirk hesitated, then looked at Carl.

Without saying a word, Carl tugged down the brim of his hat, strode through the crowd, and stalked out of the barn, disappearing into the darkness of night.

The weight in Annalisa’s stomach pressed heavier.

“We can wait a week,” Dirk said, staring after Carl. “We would be wiser to have the good-byes behind us before we attempt to start a new life.”

Annalisa wanted to cry out in protest.

But she didn’t move, not even when Frau Pastor patted her arm again and whispered, “There, there, dearie. It’ll all work out just fine. You’ll see.”



Carl rammed the edge of the shovel into the hill of potatoes. Sweat ran in rivulets down his face and back. But he didn’t care. He took satisfaction in the fact that Dirk—who was digging potatoes in the row next to him—had fallen behind. Way behind. And he took pleasure in the fact that Annalisa had chosen to follow him and gather the potatoes from the soil he’d loosened while requiring Gretchen to follow after Dirk.

He glanced over his shoulder toward Dirk. The man had stopped again. His cough had worsened with each passing hour, and now he could hardly hold his head up under the rigors of working in the unceasing heat.

Carl held back a grin, thinking back to the days when he’d first arrived. He’d been just as weak and incompetent—perhaps even more so. He shoved the blade into the hard soil, and the muscles in his arms rippled. He wasn’t a weakling any longer. The summer of hard manual labor had turned him into a strong man, and in more ways than one.

With a swipe of his sleeve he brushed the sweat out of his eyes and peered toward the cabin, where Annalisa and Gretchen had gone to empty their baskets of potatoes.

They were his. Not Dirk’s.

The man had no right arriving after all this time and expecting that Annalisa would still marry him. Anger punched Carl’s gut again—as it had every time he thought of the previous evening in the barn. And yet the anger was just as quickly followed by helplessness. Who was he to stand up and demand that Annalisa marry him?

He’d been a fool to think he could take her as his wife—not when he was living a lie. He couldn’t just forget about his true identity or that she hated his father. He’d already deceived her enough. He couldn’t spend the rest of his life letting her believe he was someone he wasn’t.

A gust of hot wind whipped at his face. The wind had been increasing in intensity over the morning, but even so, it provided little relief from the heat.

He drew in a deep breath and caught the hint of smoke.

At the barn raising, the men had talked about the fires to the west. Everyone had agreed the conditions were too dangerous for the usual burning of slashings, that anyone wishing to clear more land needed to wait until the drought was over.

Carl could only shake his head at the foolishness of whoever was ignoring the warnings.

Dirk coughed again and this time couldn’t seem to catch his breath.

Carl wedged the blade of his shovel into the dirt and trudged over the uneven ground toward the man.



Although he didn’t particularly like Dirk, he couldn’t stand back and watch him kill himself. Besides, it wasn’t Dirk’s fault they both wanted Annalisa. From what he’d seen of Dirk so far, he seemed to be a decent man.