The Baby Quilt. Christine Flynn
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she murmured, but she would give him no more than that. Her last observation had slipped out before she considered what she was saying. He didn’t need to know she could still imagine how comforting their solid, masculine weight had felt against her back when he’d wrapped her in his arms. He didn’t need to know how drawn she was by their strength. How drawn she was by him.
“I’m relieved to hear that.”
She thought he might be smiling—the way he had when he’d teased her about her chain saw. But he wasn’t smiling at all. He was watching her as if he knew very well she was thinking of his hands on her body. And she was. Though until his glance slowly wandered to her mouth, she hadn’t considered that he might have been thinking of that, too.
She wasn’t comfortable with the awareness shimmering between them. That was as obvious to Justin as the faint tremor in the breath she drew and the chips of sapphire darkening in her eyes. He wasn’t all that comfortable with it himself. But it was there, thickening the air, snaking through his body and washing wariness over Emily’s fragile features.
Pressing her hand to her stomach, she blinked twice and reached for the peroxide to continue with her task.
Clearly flustered, trying not to look it, she promptly knocked it over.
“Oh, mein!” She gasped, bumping the bottle again as she snatched for it. Solution spilled over the edge of the table. It pooled on the wood, splashed on his pants.
“I’ve got it.” Catching the bottle before it went over the edge itself, he turned it upright and saw her grab a towel.
“I’m so sorry,” she murmured, mopping at the wet spot on his thigh. “I wasn’t paying—”
“It’s okay. Really.” Catching her wrist, he stilled her frantic motions. “It’s okay,” he repeated, ducking his head so he could see her eyes. “Honest. No harm’s done.”
“I’m not usually so—”
“Emily.” Beneath his fingers, he could feel her pulse, its beat as frantic as a trapped bird’s. Incredibly with her mouth inches from his, his own didn’t feel much calmer. “You don’t need to be nervous with me.”
“I can’t seem to help it.”
His glance swept her guileless face. There wasn’t an ounce of cunning in this woman. Nothing false or deceptive about her. She didn’t seem to have any natural defenses at all.
Deliberately ignoring the urge to tug her closer, he slipped his hand from hers. “What was that you said?” he asked, thinking she needed to protect herself better if she was ever going to make it on her own. “What language?”
All she’d said was “Oh, my.” Emily told him that as she pulled back, handing him a towel for his pants, and made herself focus on wiping up the table. “It’s Pennsylvania Dutch.”
She must have been even more rattled than she’d thought to have reverted to the only language she’d heard spoken until she was six years old. She rarely spoke the old German dialect at all anymore. Except to Anna once in a while, so she’d know something of her heritage. She’d learned English in school and had spoken it most of her life, but she’d worked hard over the past two years to pronounce her words the same as her neighbors. She didn’t want to be different. She wanted to belong.
Desperately.
Something like caution entered Justin’s deep voice. “Isn’t that what the Amish speak?”
“In their homes and to each other. In the Old Order communities, anyway,” she said, returning her attention to his abraded arm. “But they speak English, too.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because I was Amish,” she said, gently wiping antiseptic over his scraped skin. “And we were Old Order.”
She turned away, picking up her needle again. When she turned back, she frowned at his biceps. “You have one here that looks awfully deep.” Apology touched her eyes even as she began picking at the stubborn splinter. “I’m sorry if it hurts.”
He didn’t get the feeling that she was avoiding the subject. She was simply concentrating on what she felt was more important—something he found oddly touching since what she was concentrating on was taking care of him. With her wielding that needle, he didn’t want to distract her, either.
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