A Convenient Christmas Wedding

“I won’t be moving to another boardinghouse,” Nora said, swiftly folding in a nightgown, several sets of undergarments and an extra dress. “But I can no longer stay here either.” The bag bulged, and she strained to clasp it shut. “You see, I got married.”

As Nora rose, Mrs. Elliott’s fingers flew to her lips. “Oh, my child! I wish you’d spoken to me first. Some of the men here are so wild and unkempt. You shouldn’t have settled.”

Nora thought of Simon, waiting for her outside—tall, strong, handsome, willing to sacrifice for family. She did not feel as if she had settled in the least.

“Oh, I didn’t marry one of those fellows,” she assured Mrs. Elliott, lugging her bag toward the door. “I’m Mrs. Simon Wallin.”

Mrs. Elliott’s astonished look was almost as gratifying as Meredith’s gasp.

“I’m paid up through the month,” Nora told her as the woman’s mouth opened and closed wordlessly. “I would appreciate you leaving everything in the room until then. Someone will come for it shortly. Not,” she hastened to add, “my brother or his wife. You are only to provide access to someone named Wallin.”

Nora hurried out into the hallway, and Mrs. Elliott fluttered after her. She seemed to have recovered her voice. “Certainly,” she warbled. “I will be delighted to do as you ask. Give my regards to all the gentlemen in your new family. Such fine, upstanding fellows, the Wallin men, for all you’re the third of my girls they’ve snatched away. And if there is anything else I can do for you, Mrs. Wallin, please let me know.”

Mrs. Wallin. A real bride might have felt a jolt of delight at hearing herself addressed by her new name. Yet now it sent a tremor through Nora. She’d entered into this bargain thinking nothing about her life would change save that she would rid herself of Charles’s interference.

Now everything was about to change. She was heading out into the wilderness. For all that Mrs. Elliott called them fine gentlemen, Simon and his brothers were rough loggers, the sort of fellows Charles would not have allowed in his home back in Lowell. Though she knew Catherine and Rina, the rest of the group were strangers.

She had an odd feeling that she was about to learn exactly what it meant to be Mrs. Simon Wallin.

* * *

Simon drove the wagon north along the primitive road that led toward Lake Union. The rain had stopped earlier, but the firs they passed still shed a drop or two from their heavy boughs. He caught the briny scent of Puget Sound on the cool air before the trees closed around them.

He couldn’t understand the woman at his side. She’d just upended her life, and his, yet she sat calm and proper beside him, her hands folded in her lap, her cloak draped about her. More, she gazed around at the forest as if it were the most amazing thing to appear in a long while. Perhaps she hadn’t ventured much outside the town proper, but she wouldn’t have had to go far to notice the trees, the inland sea, the mountains.

And after all that she’d been through at her brother’s house, shouldn’t she be a bit more upset?

“Are you all right?” he asked.

“Fine,” she said with a smile.

“No regrets, concerns?” he pressed, feeling a frown forming.

“None,” she said happily.

Once again, the lion had changed before him, becoming a tabby, docile and complacent.

“And you’re absolutely certain you want to move out here with me?”

“Oh, yes,” she said. “Thank you for agreeing. I’m sure we’ll get on famously.”

He felt no such assurance. “We should discuss our bargain, as you seem to have changed it.”

She sighed. “I suppose so. I’m terribly sorry to inconvenience you, Simon, but I didn’t know what else to do.”

“It was the obvious choice,” he allowed. “But it will cause a few complications.” He paused, feeling suddenly guilty for not having confided the truth to his family. Right now, only John and Levi knew he had married Nora. The weather had kept him from doing more than laying out permanent stakes on the new claim, so the rest of his family was also unaware of the land. He’d been trying to find the right moment to tell them.

He knew he was not the most eloquent of men. Their father had left them a small library of adventure novels and epic poems, including Robinson Crusoe, The Last of the Mohicans and The Courtship of Miles Standish. Though he’d enjoyed reading them over the years, he couldn’t convince himself the flowery language was necessary. If a man had an opinion on a matter, why not just say so?

Yet when he stated his opinion, he as like as not started an argument. Apparently his words were too brash, his opinions too strong. And he had never figured out a way to soften them. So, if he couldn’t bring his family around to his way of thinking on something as mundane as which field to clear next, how did he expect to explain something as unorthodox as his and Nora’s bargain?

At least with her he could speak his piece. Nora didn’t seem to mind when he argued his point, and she was willing to listen and offer a counterpoint without claiming he was bullying her. Of course, now that he’d met her brother, he had to own that she was used to far worse than him.

“Let’s start with the sleeping arrangements,” he told her, drawing on the reins to guide the horses around a curve in the road.

“Sleeping arrangements,” she repeated in a strained voice.

He refused to let her worry. “My cabin is small—main room on the ground floor, loft half the depth across overhead. And there’s only one bed.”

“Oh,” she said, and he thought she hunched tighter with concern, but it might have been a reaction to the chill breeze that blew in from the water.

“You will take the bed, which is upstairs,” he said. “I have a spare pallet my brothers use when they stay. I’ll use it to bunk by the fire downstairs.”

“I couldn’t put you out that way,” she protested.

Simon shook his head. “It’s only logical. I rise early to work. If I’m already downstairs, it will be easier for me to slip out without disturbing you.”

“Thank you.” She beamed at him, and all at once the day seemed brighter, warmer.

“Then there’s the eating arrangements,” he said, determined to press forward. “I keep dried venison and fruit in the cabin, but everyone generally eats at the main house.”

She turned to him, her face puckered. “I can’t take your food without paying for it. That wouldn’t be right.”

Having another mouth to feed would put a strain on their supplies. But he could not accept Nora’s money. They had made a bargain. It wasn’t her fault her brother’s behavior had forced her to change it.

“You are welcome to anything you need, Nora,” he told her.

“So long as I contribute in some way,” she agreed.

He smiled. There. That hadn’t been so hard. Maybe he was getting better at discussing things civilly. Or maybe Nora was just easier to talk to than the rest of his family. Either way, he thought she was right—they just might make this bargain work, after all.

He reckoned without his family.

They reached Wallin Landing as the day was darkening. James was leaning against one of the supports on the back porch as if waiting for them. He strode out to meet the wagon as Simon pulled up in front of the main cabin.

“If you were going to go to the trouble of picking up my new waistcoat, Simon, you didn’t have to bring the seamstress with you,” he teased with a grin to Nora.

That was James. He was only two years younger than Simon, but decades apart when it came to outlook. James didn’t speak—he teased, he joked. No deed was so dire, no day so dark he could not make light of it.

“How nice to see you again,” Nora said as James came around to take charge of the horses, who nickered a greeting. “I haven’t quite finished your commission, but I’ll get to it as soon as possible.”

It shouldn’t surprise Simon that James knew Nora. James was the brother most likely to care about his wardrobe. Even now, his wool coat gaped to reveal a patterned waistcoat over his flannel shirt and a red silk scarf at his neck. He cut a dapper look, his short hair a shade darker than Simon’s, his blue eyes deeper.

The back door opened, and Levi stepped out onto the porch as Simon climbed down from the bench.

“Hello, Nora,” he said before reaching for the rifle that hung beside the door. In the act of removing it from its cradle, he froze, then turned to stare at the wagon. “Nora?”

“Good evening to you, Brother Levi,” Nora said.