Heartland Wedding

Half the town’s buildings had been shredded into raw timber.

Pete Benjamin had just saved her life.

But what of Edward? Her knees buckled. “How could he have survived this?” she whispered.

Pete abruptly turned to her, hesitated only a second before taking charge. He directed her to a solitary bench near the stable and sat beside her. “Once you catch your breath we’ll go in search of your brother.”

What a kind offer. She knew she should refuse. Pete had to tend to his own property. Yet she found herself nodding at his offer. “Ja. I would appreciate your help.”

They rose as a unit and walked toward the center of town. With each step Rebecca’s breathing quickened. There was so much destruction. So many people stumbling along beside them, but none of them were Edward.

Where was her brother?

She gripped Pete’s arm, afraid of what they would find as they picked their way through the debris. Afraid that Edward had not weathered the storm as well as she had thanks to Pete’s quick thinking and persistence.

When they rounded the corner onto Main Street, Rebecca stopped dead in her tracks. A large pile of shredded wood filled a newly formed gap between them, the schoolhouse and church. “Pete.” Her fingers tightened on his arm. “The town hall is gone.”

Without waiting for his response, Rebecca released his arm and rushed forward.

Oh, Lord, please. Please, let Edward have taken cover anywhere but in the town hall.

Chapter One

One month after the tornado ripped through High Plains, Rebecca made her way down Main Street. She still had plenty of time to buy her supplies at the mercantile before the lunch crowd arrived at the boardinghouse.

With that in mind, she let the sun rest on her face as she walked along the slatted sidewalk. She couldn’t help but marvel at the intense July heat. Summer in Kansas was far hotter than in Norway, which was why she chose not to wear gloves or a bonnet like the American women. It was just too hot for her thick Norwegian blood.

No one else seemed to mind the dreadful heat. The street bustled with an excess of sights and sounds. Hammers hitting nails mingled with mothers shouting after their laughing children. Two young boys chased a dog with a stick in his mouth. A horse hitched to a work wagon rolled by at a leisurely pace.

Breathing in the scent of sawdust and fresh paint, Rebecca focused her attention on the town itself. Buildings at various stages of construction lined the street, firmly declaring that the rebuilding of the town was coming along.

“Good morning, Rebecca,” a jaunty voice called out to her.

“Oh, hello.” Rebecca waved at her friend, Cassandra Garrison, as she rode by in her calash-covered buggy. The town lawyer, Percival Walker, sat beside her, reins in his elegant hands. Despite the heat, the two were impeccably dressed. They were clearly courting, if their smiles were anything to go by.

Rebecca dropped her hand and sighed, shocked at the jolt of sadness that whipped through her at the sight of all that happiness. Rebecca wanted what Cassandra seemed to have. Love. Companionship. A man of her own.

Another equally depressed sigh came from a slouching cowboy standing just outside the mercantile. Rebecca didn’t know the lanky man well, but she recognized him. Clint Fuller had eaten at the boardinghouse a few times in the past month. She opened her mouth to speak to him, but he was intently watching the happy couple ride by in Cassandra’s little buggy.

Rebecca recognized the scowl on the cowboy’s face. Unrequited love. She understood the emotion. And sympathized. Ever since she’d taken refuge from the storm with Pete in his cellar, she couldn’t get the reserved blacksmith out of her head.

She recalled the events of that day often. Pete’s concern as he pulled her to safety. His kindness as he calmed her panic. His help as she searched for her brother. For one brief afternoon, someone had put her needs above his own. And she now understood God’s design for marriage. It was unfortunate that the one man who had caught her attention was completely out of reach.

Pete’s loss of his wife and subsequent year-long grief was legendary in High Plains. Rebecca had spent too many years fighting for her own parents’ affection to set her sights on a man still in love with his dead wife.

Shaking her head at her unproductive thoughts, she smiled at Clint—who did not smile back in return—and hurried into the mercantile.

The smell of spices and burlap filled her nose, followed by the raw scent of buffalo hides and licorice. Her mind was too full of Pete Benjamin, unrequited love and poor Clint Fuller for her to take note of the vast range of improvements that had been made to the store since the storm.

Rebecca swept her gaze across barrels of dry goods, past sacks of flour and shelves filled with kitchen utensils and canned goods. Mrs. Johnson was standing alone at the back counter with bolts of material in various styles and colors lining the shelves behind her.

Rebecca shuddered as she locked gazes with the woman.

Why was the proprietress staring at her with such censure? It was true, Mrs. Johnson didn’t like her much, nor did the woman’s daughter, Abigail, but they usually kept their dislike hidden behind false smiles.

Not today. Today, Mrs. Johnson had a positively mean look in her eyes. And her lips were pressed into a hard, flat line.

Confused, Rebecca took slow, careful steps toward the back of the store. She would simply conduct her business and be on her way.

“Good morning, Mrs. Johnson, I’d like to purchase a—”

“Miss Gundersen.” The woman’s narrowed gaze swept over Rebecca with lightning speed. “I have just one question for you.”

Unsure what to make of the woman’s mood, Rebecca cocked her head. “You…you do?”

“I would like to know where you took cover during the storm.” The haughty demand took Rebecca by surprise.

What did it matter where she took cover? And why would Mrs. Johnson care about that? “I don’t think I understand what you’re asking.”

“Come now, girl. Don’t play coy.” The woman sniffed indelicately. “Just this morning, I heard Mrs. Morrow telling the pastor that she saw you and Pete Benjamin walking through town together after the storm.”

Rebecca blinked. “Yes, we were together. Pete was helping me locate my brother.” Praise God, Edward had survived the storm unscathed, but Rebecca didn’t think that was what the woman was asking.

Setting her hands on her hips, Mrs. Johnson lifted her chin at a proud angle. “How in the world did you end up in Pete Benjamin’s company that afternoon?”

Rebecca bit her bottom lip, concerned that her answer would only increase the woman’s condemnation. She had nothing to hide, but that truth didn’t give her much relief. Matilda Johnson wasn’t always one to focus on the truth if she thought she could twist it into gossip instead. Nevertheless, Rebecca would not lie. “We took cover in his storm cellar.”

“Just the two of you? Alone?”

Rebecca didn’t understand why the woman was looking at her with that odd mix of suspicion and glee. “Well, yes,” she explained. “When the storm blew in, I went in search of my brother at the livery, but he wasn’t there.”

She could still feel the fear. Losing Edward would have been beyond what she could endure, especially so close to the death of her parents. In her panicked state, she’d been far too upset to think beyond Edward’s safety and had nearly died because of it. Thanks to Pete, Rebecca had survived the storm. Perhaps that explained why he’d filled her thoughts so often since. He’d saved her life.

“Pete pulled me to safety,” she said aloud. “I wouldn’t listen to him at first, but, eventually, I went with him below ground to ride out the storm.”

“How…unseemly.”

Unseemly? Rebecca puzzled over the English word, unsure if she had the definition right in her mind. Surely Mrs. Johnson didn’t think that Rebecca and Pete had…that they would…that they…

Rebecca gasped and quickly covered her mouth with her hand.

Much to her chagrin, Mrs. Johnson read the gesture with a nasty mind rather than a grace-filled heart and seemed to take it as an admission of guilt. “I’m shocked at you, Miss Gundersen, luring that poor man in his storm cellar like that.”

Stunned by the woman’s mean accusation, Rebecca looked around her, thankful there were no other customers in the store to witness her humiliation. “But, Mrs. Johnson, I assure you. We did nothing wrong. Pete saved my—”

“Nothing, indeed.” The woman smirked at her. She actually smirked, as though she was enjoying Rebecca’s discomfort.

“Why are you intentionally misunderstanding me?” Confusion and shock sounded in her voice.