As deep red roses bloomed in Lily’s cheeks, Roen said, “It was my choice to sleep down here. I saw logs. You know what that means.”
“You snore.”
“I didn’t want to disturb your mother.”
“You couldn’t. My pa snored so loud I could hear him when I got up to go to the privy. Ma slept right through it.”
Roen gave Lily an arch look but spoke to Clay. “Oh, well, she didn’t mention that.”
“He’s going to sleep upstairs tonight,” said Lily.
Roen knew what that meant. He would get the bed, but his wife of about twenty-four hours was going to be sleeping on the sofa. Was that irony or just a cruel joke? Sometimes he couldn’t tell the difference.
“Is that right, Da? You’ll be upstairs?”
Hearing Clay call him Da, Roen decided then that he’d sleep on a bed of nails if that was what Lily set out for him.
Chapter Nineteen
Roen sat at the kitchen table with his maps and notebook and drawings spread out in front of him. Lily was standing at the stove with her back to him as he’d first seen her in this kitchen. His maps, which usually fascinated him, were less interesting than the exposed nape of her neck as she bent her head forward to peer into the stockpot. Her rust-colored hair was fixed in a loose coil at the top of her head, and sometimes the untethered strands gleamed dark orange in the lamplight or curled damply from the heat of the simmering soup.
“You need a better place to work,” she said without turning around. “Dinner will be ready soon, and you’ll have to move so Hannah can set the table.”
“That’s not a problem. I don’t mind moving.”
“You will when you have to do it for three meals a day.”
“You have a point.” He pushed away from the table and stretched his back and arms. He extended his legs and rolled his neck. He’d been working as long on his project as she had been preparing the soup, and while he sat the entire time, she never sat once. He worked quietly. She hummed. He did calculations on paper. She chopped winter vegetables on a hardwood board. He checked measurements with a protractor and a compass. She checked portions with a scale.
Lily put the lid back on the pot before she opened the oven door to look at her bread. Satisfied that the bread’s crust was browning nicely, she quickly closed the door and pressed a hand against her midriff when her stomach growled. Leaning back against the sink, she gave Roen a surreptitious glance to see if he noticed. He had. There was the remnant of a smile still on his lips.
Vaguely embarrassed, Lily murmured an apology.
“You were chopping vegetables,” he said, “when my stomach started growling. That was an hour ago. I would have had a cup of your beef stock if I hadn’t thought you’d take a cleaver to my hand.”
“You should have told me you were that hungry. You saw the children come in and take jelly bread to tide them over.”
“Hmm.” He pointed to the corner of one of the maps. “Fort Grape Jelly.”
“Oh! Are those Lizzie’s fingerprints? Of course they are. You can’t let her near anything.”
Roen put out a hand to stop her before she came at the map with a damp dishcloth. “Give it to me. I’ll do it.” He wrung out a few more drops of water before he touched it to the paper and gently wiped the purple stain. “There. Not so bad.”
Lily took the cloth back and tossed it in the sink before she sighed heavily and sagged into a chair. “This is never going to work, Roen. You’re going to hate it here. Lizzie’s fingers are always sticky. Ham will get under your feet and bowl you over. I saw him on the stairs. He almost did. Hannah has the most ridiculous romantic notions. You said so your—”
“I never said they were ridiculous.”
“Well, they are, and you’ll tire of them. And Clay... he needs you too much, I think. This arrangement isn’t fair to either of you.”
“Lily.” Roen reached for her hand. When she didn’t pull away, he wrapped his fingers around hers and squeezed only enough to let her know he had her. “You were making soup. Now you’re making a mountain out of Fort Grape Jelly. It’s hard to keep up.”
“This is who I am,” she said mournfully.
“I like who you are.”
“You’ve said that before.”
“Do you think I’m lying?”
