“No, ma’am. I’m not a liar.”

  “But you were willing to marry her.”

  “Yes, of course. For the child’s sake. I tried to stop drinking after the . . . miscarriage. Told her we needed to stop seeing each other. Hard as it was, working together, I managed to get away from her, but not stop with the morphine or whiskey. Not until God sent you.”

  She placed her free hand on top of his, the one that covered her other. “And . . . if I may ask, what would you do if your ex-wife came around and wanted you back?”

  “Nothing. No, ma’am. That ship has sailed. I thought I loved her, but what was in my heart then . . . It’s nothing to what I’m experiencing now. I’ve never felt this way about anyone before, Lydia.”

  “Never?”

  “Yes, ma’am. Since you . . . from the first time I laid my eyes on you, I’ve been drawn to you. With her, it was all wrapped up in one big ball—her beauty, her parents—and I swallowed it.”

  “But you loved her.”

  “I thought I did, but I’m convinced now it was never love. Her leaving hurt my pride, of course. But now I know what true love is. And I know beyond all doubt that you are the love of my life.”

  “But we’ve only known each other such a short time, and—”

  “True, but nothing will change with time. I am deeply in love, and I know with all certainty, this is love.” He removed his hand from the sandwich and produced a small black box from his coat pocket.

  Opening its lid, he revealed a sparkling diamond ring. “Marry me, Lydia.”

  “Jacob.”

  “We can wait as long as you want—until you’re comfortable that I’m a man of my word and have stopped drinking. Please say yes. Make me whole. You are everything I’ve ever wanted, the one I’ve been waiting for. You’re the light that brightens my gray days. I know.”

  “You know what?”

  “That God made you for me; me for you. We complete each other.”

  That last statement rolled around in her thoughts, echoing through her mind. That’s what it was! What she’d experienced, completeness.

  Although ‘run’ sounded again, it couldn’t drown out ‘complete’ or ‘made for him’ and made for her. Her hand suddenly obeyed her heart, and she took the ring from its box.

  “Yes!” She studied the beautiful stone then looked back into his eyes. “Yes, I’ll marry you! One year from the day we met, provided you stay sober.”

  “Done.” He grinned. “And done.”

  Later that evening—or the wee hours of the morning—on Miss Trudy’s porch, she extended her hand palm down then . . . at the last second, pulled his shoulders up and drew him closer by the lapels of his coat.

  She tilted her head and puckered her lips, allowing him to seal his proposal with a proper kiss.

  The best kiss of her life!

  Epilogue

  True to his word, Jacob didn’t touch a drop of alcohol for the eleven months.

  The bride, her mother, Aunt Donna and Mis’ess Banks decked out the Infirmary’s cafeteria to the nines, and over a hundred folks attended the wedding and reception, counting all the hospital’s patients who were able and many of the happy couple’s past patients who loved them.

  It was a perfect day, just as Lydia had always imagined and more!

  The doctor and his nurse wife stayed at Touro another five years with her interning under Doctor Bensadon and both spending more and more time in their joint private practice.

  Having received her medical license to practice beside Jacob, she specialized in childbirth and pediatrics while supporting him in becoming the region’s—even the nation’s—leading orthopedic surgeon, greatly advancing the ‘open reduction and internal fixation’ techniques.

  And Mis’ess Banks got her grandsugars, two of each, to spoil . . . but not too, too bad.

  Mis’ess Banks’ slipped Lydia her recipe for beignets (pronounced ben-YAY). Here it is for you to try!

  Mis’ess Banks’ Beignets

  Ingredients:

  3/4 cup lukewarm water

  1 (.25-ounce) packet active dry yeast

  1/2 cup, plus 1 teaspoon sugar

  4 cups all-purpose flour

  Pinch salt

  2 egg yolks

  1/2 cup evaporated milk

  3 tablespoons melted butter

  1 teaspoon vanilla extract

  4 to 6 cups peanut or other neutrally flavored oil, for frying

  Powdered sugar, for dusting

  Directions:

  --Combine ¾ cup water, a package of active, dry yeast, and a teaspoon of sugar in a measuring cup or small bowl. Stir then allow to sit 10 to 12 minutes. Yeast should be frothy.

  --Combine 4 cups of flour, half a cup of sugar, and a pincjh of salt in a large mixing bowl.

  --Combine two egg yolks, a half cup of evaporated milk, 3 tablespoons of melted butter and a teaspoon of vanilla extract in another bowl. Beat together then add the yeast mixture. Whisk together well.

  --Add the wet mixture into the mixing bowl of dry ingredients and mix. Once well combined, knead the dough 5 minutes then cover and let rise 2 hours (Dough should double in size.)

  --In a Dutch oven or fryer, heat 4-6 cups neutrally flavored oil to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

  --Remove and knead lightly on a floured work surface then roll dough to ¼” thickness and cut into 2-inch squares with sharp knife or pizza cutter.

  --Fry squares a few at a time in the hot oil, turning to brown on both sides. Remove to cookie sheet lined with paper towels to drain then dust liberally with powdered sugar. Best served hot.

  *To save some for later, freeze dough. Place uncooked squares on a cookie sheet to freeze then transfer frozen squares to freezer bags. To fry later, thaw first.

  The Next “Nursing the Heart” installment:

  A NURSE FOR CONNOR

  Book five in the Nursing the Heart Collection

  by Patricia PacJac Carroll

  Going through the test scores, Miss Harrow sighed. “Well, Josey passed.”

  With an exasperated look, the administrator groaned. “Oh dear, I’m afraid her patients will too?”

  Miss Harrow sighed. “There’s no way around it, we have to assign her to a patient she can’t kill.”

  Joseph Stark looked at his son. More was broken than his leg ever since Connor’s fiancé left. It hadn’t helped when his horse fell on him. Staring at the ad about nurses, Joseph knew what to do--order a nurse for his boy. Maybe she would help him heal his leg and surly attitude.

  And now, please enjoy a sneak peek at Caryl’s next release

  Coming in September 2020

  Texas Troubles

  A Thanksgiving Books & Blessings Collection Three, Book Book One & Book Five in the Cross Timbers Romance Family Saga series

  Chapter One

  O’Neal, Van Zandt, Worley Settlement,

  Delaware Creek Barn

  Saturday evening July 28th,1860

  Cass strolled toward the big red oak on the barn’s north side. Momma carried the box of food inside while Poppa saw to the mules. She hoped JoJo would be there and waiting under their meeting tree.

  Since her parents had moved to Texas, she’d spent so much time there with her best friend.

  Once under the shade, she worked her fan double time, but stirring hot air didn’t do much good other than cool the new beads of perspiration popping out on her forehead.

  Never ever in her eighteen years could she remember a hotter or drier summer. Land that usually produced two or two and a half bales of cotton per acre barely made a quarter or less.

  A body couldn’t draw enough water to keep a garden making. Other than okra—and who liked the slimy stuff?—there’d not be much of anything worth heating up the kitchen to fill the new batch of Mason jars that Poppa ordered in the mail last fall.

  Worst though, no one talked about the heat or what it was doing to the crops.

  All she’d been hearing the whole week centered around the slaves’ revolt.

  How they’d set the fires that burned down almost all of downtown Dallas, plus a lot of Denton on the same day, and reports of other cities burning around the area kept coming in.

  Her kin tended to lean toward those phosphorus matches spontaneously igniting, but they were certainly in the minority.

  To hear folks tell it, that new man who’d thrown his stovetop hat into the ring, bidding for the office of President was the devil incarnate.

  Everyone said Abe Lincoln would set all the darkies free, but what could be so bad about that? It’d be fine with her, but first he had to win the election, and she didn’t see how he could.

  So many in the south seemed to hate the man, and he wasn’t even President yet—why borrow trouble?

  Still, it wasn’t right what they’d done, hanging those three men: and one a preacher! From what she’d heard, none of them were anywhere near that first store that caught fire.

  It wasn’t fair for them to die just because of the color of their skin.

  When last in the store, Monroe had gotten pretty passionate saying the matches had started it all.

  How they would have set his storeroom on fire if he hadn’t been taking inventory and seen them go up with his own eyes. Just like the ones in Dallas had—and Denton and Pilot Point and Waxahachie.

  All the fires started in general stores like Monroe and Izzy’s.

  There he was! Rich, with his sister and mother in the wagon, drove the mules across the creek. When they got nearer, she waved, and they waved back. He reined in the team at the barn’s entrance.

  Josie Jo hopped off the still-moving wagon and veered away from her mother toward Cass.

  Miss Esther went inside, and Rich clucked the mules into motion again. She waited, heart racing, for him to get the animals settled on the barn’s far side.

  “Did you talk with your brother?”

  “Yes, I did, but he says it won’t do any good.”

  Looking around, Cass made certain no one lingered within earshot.

  “So, it’s true then? Aaron’s part of that Vigilante Committee? Someone has got to talk some sense into him! I’ve been thinking Rich might be the only one who could get through.”

  “Guess not. He says it isn’t him. Truth be told, he’s mad at Aaron his own self.”

  “But . . . Oh, if Rich won’t talk to him, what am I going to do, JoJo?” Cass slipped her hand into her friend’s and squeezed. “Who else might have a chance at changing his mind?” She looked skyward, but no answer came. “I imagine if it’s up to me, I’ll just have to say something then.”

  “I don’t know if it would help. It may be too late.”

  “It can’t be. It just cannot. Do you think Aaron had anything to do with those hangings?” Cass wrung her hands. “Surely he didn’t.”

  Her friend remained silent then eased closer and whispered. “He was there.”

  “Oh, no! Are you sure?”

  How had everything gotten so messed up and complicated?

  JoJo doubted her big brother could change Aaron’s mind about anything—even if he was willing to talk to him.

  Why, the man was so hardheaded, a stone mason would have trouble chiseling any sense into him. No one could tell him anything, not even Uncle Seve, and if his father can’t get through to him, how could Rich?

  If only someone could before it was too late.

  Someone had to.

  If Aaron truly had helped string those slaves up, would it change Cass’s mind about him? By all rights, JoJo and the younger girl shouldn’t even be friends, loving the same man. But how could her friend know?

  She’d never revealed her heart to anyone, not even Katie Kay. From her first memories, she and her big sister had run after Aaron and Rich.

  Growing up then Katie getting married and moving away left a hole in her heart that Cass filled. She was her very closest friend who wasn’t family.

  Through the years, one girl after another set her bonnet for him and caught Aaron’s eye. No matter what she tried though, JoJo had never been the object of his desire.

  And neither had Cass, who unlike her, stood at the ready to tell any and all how much she cared for Aaron Van Zandt every time any opportunity arose.

  Even though he swore her to secrecy, she ought to let her friend know that Rich was so smitten with her he could barely see straight.

  Maybe if Cass only knew how he mooned over her, it might clear the way for JoJo to finally win Aaron’s heart.

  Her friend released her hand, then touched her arm. “What should we do? I can’t stand the thought of something happening to him.”

  Neither could she.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Poppa said he heard Governor Houston is recruiting more Rangers every day, doubling their numbers, and that he’s threatening to send them to Dallas if there’s any more lynching.”

  Texas Rangers coming to Dallas? She mulled that bit of information over a bit. What would she do if Aaron got himself arrested?

  The scene played out in her mind. The Rangers hauling him off, hogtied, and her following them, sneaking into camp in the middle of the night to untie the knots and set him free.

  A two-tone whistle she’d know anywhere sounded. She looked toward the barn.

  Da gave her a little nod, and the same come-inside look he’d been using for all of her almost twenty years. She smiled and waved then spoke under her breath.

  “We best go help the ladies get everything ready. We can talk about this later.”

  Though Cass fell in beside her, she didn’t walk close enough to touch. It had to be well over a hundred degrees in the shade.

  “What’s up with Rich and Aaron anyway? Why’s your brother so mad at him?”

  A little shoulder hike answered. She hated knowing a thing but being sworn to secrecy.

  If she said anything, she’d have to go all the way around the stump, trying not to hurt Cass’s heart. Besides, her own couldn’t stand losing the closest neighbor as a friend.

  What point could that make?

  Especially if neither won Aaron’s heart. She still remembered how Charity and Arlene didn’t speak for so long over that Eberhart guy.

  “Oh, I get it. He’s made you swear, hasn’t he? Smile if I’m guessing it right.”

  From one side to the other, JoJo shook her head in extra wide arcs, but her lips betrayed her brother’s secret and turned up their corners—much as she tried to keep them straight.

  “I knew it. But you don’t have to tell me outright. I understand. So, I’ll guess, and you can smile when I’m right and frown if I’m not.”

  Two guesses that weren’t even close got JoJo and Cass inside. Before her friend could think of another, Mama caught sight of her and her confidant and barked instructions for help.

  It tickled JoJo how Mama ordered Cass around like a daughter, too. But through the years since they’d met, she’d spent so much time at the Worleys’ she might as well have been the little sister JoJo never had.

  If only Katie Kay hadn’t let Collin take her back to Kansas, she could confide in her. It would certainly be nice if she could talk things over with her big sis.

  At the stroke of six, everyone circled up and joined hands. One of the men prayed over the meal and everyone’s lives in general.

  Since she could remember, JoJo loved Saturday evenings the best of all the days, except maybe Thanksgiving, but that only came once a year.

  She loved the big barn that her family and friends had built first thing after getting to Texas.

  All the neighbors did, too.

  All the stories of the families’ early days in Texas never got old. She enjoyed them and knew most by heart—about the months the whole clan lived there together under the barn’s roof before the first cabins and the Humbles’ Trading Post were built.

  They’d recently renamed it the General Store, but it proved hard to remember.

  It seemed to her those times back then were better than the present days with those terrible lynchings and all the talk of slave revolts.

  Some even said there might be a war coming over the darkies who were slaves. But Monroe and Isabel, Mali, Ruthie, and the rest were family. Uncle Corbin used to own Isabel but set her free shortly after they got to Texas.

  So surely, they wouldn’t get in any trouble.

  If only things could be the way they were back then.

  But since the new church building got finished up on the north property, Saturday nights had become the only time everyone came together at the barn anymore.

  “Amen.”

  “Come on, JoJo. Let’s get in line.” Cass handed her a plate.

  Like always, the spread proved better than Sunday dinner! All the ladies brought their special dishes. But most all of that summer, the dishes remained meat and bread heavy. Understandable, with the toll the heat had taken on everyone’s gardens.

  Bless God for smoke houses, root cellars, and a good crop of winter wheat.

  No one was going to starve, but it sure looked to her there wasn’t going to be many peas, beans, or squash that year. No never mind the corn didn’t make much either.

  The blazing sun burned up about everything.

  The spot Cass steered her to in the far corner sat back out of the way which was fine with her. It’d be a good place to watch out for late arrivals—probably why the girl picked it.

  Where was Aaron anyway?

  Halfway to finishing her meal, Cass put her fork down then leaned in close. “Go tell Rich to ask me to dance. Would you, please, ma’am?”

  Had the girl finally come to her senses? “Why?”

  “On account of I’ve been thinking.”

  “Now there’s a dangerous proposition!” Josie Jo giggled. “And exactly what have you been pondering?”

  “Well, first—if he ever gets here, and don’t say anything until he does—it might make him jealous.”

  “How?”

  “You know, seeing me in Rich’s arms. And second, it’d be the best way for me to have the chance to talk with him. When you do, tell him to wait for a waltz.”

 

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