Amish Brides

by Jennifer Beckstrand, Molly Jebber, Amy Lillard

Genres: Amish & Mennonite; Christian Anthologies & Collections; Romance Anthologies & Collections

Synopsis

"The Reluctant Groom" by Jennifer Beckstrand: Suvie has three marriage proposals-but none from the man she truly loves. No matter how lonely widower Aaron Beachy is, he seems determined to stay that way. Now, Suvie will do whatever it takes to change that.

"Joshua's Bride" by Molly Jebber: Madeline fears her fiance's family will never accept her because of her family, but when Maddie adopts her sister's abandoned baby, can she and Joshua find a way to unite their families?

"A Summer Wedding in Paradise" by Amy Lillard: Reba longs to be a bride, and she knows her mischievous nieces just wanted to help when they "chose" Abel Weaver for her, but he's the last man in the world she'd ever marry.

Release date: May 29, 2018

Publisher: Zebra Books

Print pages: 334

Sample

Amish fraas were supposed to butt into their children’s lives—not the other way around. But Anna Helmuth’s daughter Esther passed out advice like most Amish mammis handed out cookies. And Esther had real trouble taking no for an answer.

“Mamm,” Esther said, stuffing her yarn into her jumbo-size canvas bag. “Your hands are going to shrivel up like chicken feet if you insist on crocheting a dishrag for every unmarried boy and girl in the district. You don’t want to be a cripple, do you?”

“I’d rather not be a cripple.” Anna purposefully doubled her speed with the crochet hook. Esther meant well, but she knew nothing about crochet or cripples. Anna’s hands were sure to shrivel up with arthritis if she didn’t keep them limber with her handicrafts. And there were so many of die youngie who still needed a dishrag. How was she supposed to get two young people together without a crocheted gift to soften them up?

“You’re working too hard, Mamm,” Esther said. “A woman your age shouldn’t be flitting about town making matches for all the unmarrieds. It’s not gute for your health, and it’s not exactly respectable, either. Mary Eicher says you encourage young people to kiss. Before they’re married.”

Poor Esther. She was always so worried about what other people thought.

Felty, Anna’s husband of sixty-six years, glanced up from his newspaper. “When you’re in love, it doesn’t hurt to do a little spooning to see if you like it.”

Esther fastened her most serious frown on her face. “Cassie told me that Dr. Reynolds kissed her for the first time in your barn. And there are rumors that Titus kissed Katie Rose Gingerich right here in your kitchen in front of their parents and you.” She waved her hands in Anna and Felty’s direction.

Felty grinned, even though he seemed to be paying rapt attention to his reading.

Anna couldn’t keep a smile from her face either. “Isn’t it wunderbarr that Titus found love right here in our kitchen? It didn’t even matter that both his goats pooped on my rug.”

Esther grunted. “I’m glad Titus found Katie. I was sure no girl would ever fall in love with him. But that’s no excuse for letting him kiss her right out in the open like that.”

Anna reached out and patted Esther’s hand. “Now, Esther. I don’t make a habit of encouraging die youngie to kiss. They might think it strange that a middle-aged woman was so concerned about their lips.”

“But you do encourage matches,” Esther said.

“Of course,” Anna said. “All young men should be married before they make nuisances of themselves. Bachelors and fish stink after three days, you know.”

Esther grunted when she didn’t agree with something Anna said. She was doing a lot of grunting today. She sounded like a bear who’d missed her breakfast. “It’s not your responsibility, Mamm.”

Anna snipped her yarn and tied a knot. “I don’t know who else would make the matches if I didn’t.”

Felty always stood up for her. She loved that about him. “If it weren’t for your mater, half the population of Bonduel would still be single.”

Anna smiled at her husband. “I wouldn’t dream of quitting. Die youngie need my help.”

Esther did the grunting thing again and zipped up her canvas bag. “Well, you could at least charge people money for your matchmaking. It would help pay for all that yarn.”

Anna tried hard to keep her patience. Esther was her very own daughter. Hadn’t she taught Esther better than to think she could put a price on true love? “I wouldn’t dream of charging money. Seeing two people fall in love is payment enough.”

Esther scrunched her lips together as if she held a pickle between her teeth. “Yarn doesn’t grow on trees.”

Anna simply gave her daughter a sweet smile. Esther was sixty-eight years old and a strong, determined widow. Anna had done her best to raise her, and she’d turned out quite well, even if she did have misguided notions about yarn and kissing. “Will we see you for Sunday dinner?”

Esther slung her bag over her shoulder, and the weight of it made her stoop. “I’ll bring pies and rolls. Do you want me to roast a chicken?”

“Nae. I’m trying out a new recipe. Gouda-and-raisin-stuffed hamburgers.”

Esther’s right eye twitched. “I’ll roast three chickens.”

Someone tapped firmly on the front door, and Esther opened it since she was on her way out. Suvie Newswenger stood on the porch, nibbling the nail on her index finger and holding a small brown paper bag. She smiled—Anna had rarely seen Suvie without a smile—and threw her arms around Esther as if she were her long-lost sister. “Esther! Gute maiya.”

Esther did not take kindly to affection, but she stood patiently until Suvie released her grip. Suvie was like that. Everybody in the community had mostly gotten used to it. When the hug finally came to an end, Esther took a giant step away from Suvie and ushered her into the great room that served as both a kitchen and living room.

“Cum reu, Suvie,” Anna said, jumping to her feet—well, not exactly jumping. Anna hadn’t executed a good jump for probably twenty years. “How wunderbarr to see you.”

Suvie laughed and reached her arms out for Anna. “I’m sorry to bother you, but I need your help.”

Esther raised her eyebrows and gave Anna one of her I-told-you-so looks. “Remember what I said about the yarn.”

Felty rested his paper in his lap. “We love you, Esther. Travel home safely and give the kinner our love.”

Esther transferred her bag to the other shoulder, marched out the door, and closed it a little harder than she needed to.

“Cum and sit, Suvie,” Anna said. “And tell us what we can do for you.”

Suvie waved in Felty’s direction. “Wie geht?”

Felty folded his paper in his lap. “It’s wonderful-gute to see you, Suvie. How is your dat getting along with that new heifer?”

Suvie plopped onto the sofa, set her brown bag beside her, and took off her bonnet. “My dat got a new heifer?”

“Last week.”

Suvie giggled and leaned toward Felty as if sharing a great secret. “I hope he hasn’t named it yet. He named our last milk cow Fred. I told him not to name another animal on the farm without consulting me.”

Felty grimaced. “He named her Rocky.”

Suvie laughed harder. “I guess that’s better than Fred. We’ll just hope that Rocky doesn’t give lumpy milk.”

Suvie had a round, sensible face and especially intelligent eyes, as if she hadn’t forgotten a thing she’d been taught since first grade. The smile lines curved naturally around her mouth, and they’d probably been there since the day she was born.

A more cheerful girl had never been seen in Bonduel.

Did she need help finding a husband?

Surely that couldn’t be what she wanted from Anna and Felty. Suvie had been seeing Vernon Schmucker for several months.

“I need your help finding a husband,” Suvie said.

Well. You never knew with some people.

Suvie turned to Anna. “It’s no secret that you’ve been successful finding matches for many of your grandchildren, and I am hoping you can do the same for me.” She picked up her brown paper bag and unrolled the top. “I brought some cookies to butter you up.”

She pulled two blobs from the bag that were probably cookies, even though they looked like lumpy gray pebbles, and handed one each to Felty and Anna.

Anna plastered an excessively cheerful smile on her face, just to prove she wasn’t afraid, and took a bite. The cookie crumbled to dust in her mouth. If she accidentally breathed in, she’d die of smoke inhalation. Stifling a cough, Anna swallowed as best she could. “Would anybody like some milk?”

Felty took a hearty bite. He wasn’t shy about strange food. “Delicious,” he said. “Peanut butter?”

Suvie’s face fell. “Coconut and lemon.” She sighed the air from her lungs. “This is one of the reasons I need your help. I can’t cook, and a man wants a wife who can cook.”

Anna was immediately sympathetic. Not everyone had the talents in the kitchen that Anna had been blessed with. Suvie was a wonderful-gute girl. Her lack of cooking skills shouldn’t doom her to spinsterhood. “But, dear, why do you need us to help you find a husband? I thought you and Vernon Schmucker were serious.”

Suvie sighed again. Long and loud. She must have very deep lungs. “Vernon and I saw each other for six months, and I tried. For sure and certain, I tried. This is nothing against Vernon, but I’d rather be an old maid.”

Anna nodded. “I don’t blame you.” Vernon could do that to a girl.

“He asked me to marry him, and I feel terrible that I might have made him believe that marriage was even a possibility. He didn’t take it well, and Clara Yutzy told me he’s gained ten pounds in the last month.”

“Vernon never had trouble drowning his sorrows in a Big Mac.”

“My sister Hannah told everyone that we were practically engaged. She’s more frantic to see me married than I am.”

“Sisters can be that way sometimes,” Felty said.

Suvie shifted in her seat as if she couldn’t get comfortable. “I think I should tell you that I have had three marriage proposals. Vernon, Adam Wengerd, and Lee Zook. Lee has assured me that he will still marry me if I can’t find anyone else. He feels sorry for me, but I don’t feel sorry for myself. I won’t marry someone I don’t love or someone who makes me cringe whenever we’re in the same room. I don’t want you to think I’m flighty.”

“Of course not, dear,” Anna said. “You can’t talk yourself into loving someone, though some folks have tried.”

“After I turned twenty-four and the marriage prospects began to fade, I decided I was perfectly content to be an old maid.”

Anna smiled. Suvie was no shrinking violet. “You bought your own house.”

“Jah. With the money I earned from working at the feed store. My brothers built that greenhouse for me so I could start my own business.” The soft line of Suvie’s lips melted into a grin. “I’m twenty-eight years old, and I don’t want to be an old maid anymore. There’s someone I really like.”

Anna leaned forward, mostly to try to clear cookie dust from her throat. “Someone?”

Suvie laughed. “There’s a man who bought a shoat this spring, and he’s been coming into the feed store almost every week for three months.” She smiled sheepishly. “I’m in love with him, and I’m determined to make him fall in love with me. He’s tall and handsome and wonderful polite, and he mopes and sulks and broods like a gathering storm. Hardly says a word.”

Anna furrowed her brow until she felt her wrinkles crash into each other. “He sounds like a dud. Are you sure you want him?”

Suvie nodded, her eyes wide with eagerness. “I’m sure. He’s your great-grandson Aaron Beachy. You don’t think your own relative is a dud, do you?”

Felty smoothed his beard with his fingers. “Some of our relatives are duds, but Aaron isn’t one of them.”

It only took a split second for Anna to realize what a perfect match Suvie and Aaron would make. Suvie was eternally cheerful, Aaron was as gloomy as a funeral on a rainy day. They’d mix like oil and vinegar, raisins and meatloaf, peanut butter and maple syrup. “Why, Suvie,” she said, “what a wunderbarr idea! Aaron needs a girl like you. He hasn’t smiled for three years.”

Felty pressed his lips together and stuffed his newspaper between the cushion and armrest of his chair. “I hate to discourage you, Annie Banannie, but it’s too soon to talk about Aaron marrying again. Mary hasn’t been gone but a few months.”

“Nae, Felty,” Anna said. “Mary passed on almost three years ago.”

Felty’s brows inched together. “Three years? Are you sure?”

“Jah. She died two months before Beth and Tyler’s wedding, and their third anniversary is in September. I never forget an anniversary.”

“It seems shorter,” Felty said.

“Jah,” Anna said. “Because Aaron still acts as if it happened yesterday.”

Felty got that unsettled look in his eye he always had when something troubled him. “It hit us all wonderful hard. They were only married half a year. It’s best to stay an old maid, Suvie. Aaron will never get over Mary.”

Suvie fingered one of her kapp strings. “I don’t expect him to get over her. I’m just hoping he can find room in his heart for me too.”

Felty shook his head. “Mary’s memory casts a long shadow.”

Suvie didn’t seem especially distressed by this bad news. “I’m sensible enough to know that I could never replace Mary. But I want to try to win a small piece of Aaron’s heart even though it might be hopeless to try. That’s why I came to you for help.”

Anna didn’t think it was as hopeless as all that. In her eighty-five years of experience, she hadn’t seen much heartache that romance couldn’t cure. And Aaron was going to be her next victim . . . er . . . match.

She went to the junk drawer in the kitchen and pulled out a pencil and her trusty notebook. “You’ve come to the right place,” she said, sitting next to Suvie on the sofa and holding her pencil at the ready. “We are happy to match you up with our great-grandson at no charge. Aren’t we, Felty?”

“Of course, Banannie. I don’t mind paying for extra yarn, especially when your dishrags help so many people fall in love.”

Suvie’s smile narrowed. “Ach, vell. I don’t mind paying.”

Anna threw out her hands and very nearly lost her pencil. “Absolutely not. Gotte has given us our unique talents to help forlorn and desperate people like you. We wouldn’t dream of charging money for it, no matter what Esther says.”

Felty nodded. “Our daughter means well, but she thinks yarn doesn’t grow on trees.”

Anna tapped the eraser side of the pencil against her cheek. “So, Suvie, if we’re going to couple you up with Aaron, we need to know what we have to work with. Tell us a little about yourself.”

“The most important thing you need to know . . . well, maybe not the most important, but it might be an obstacle. I am three years older than Aaron. Is that bad?”

“My brother was six years younger than his wife,” Felty said. “They were very happy.”

Anna nibbled on her eraser. “It is a concern, but it’s not exactly robbing the cradle.”

Suvie settled her back against the sofa and smiled as if all Anna’s grandchildren were coming for a visit.

Anna wrote “nice teeth” in her notebook. It was gute to keep a record of everything, just in case Aaron needed convincing.

“I’m a hard worker,” Suvie said, “and a gute cleaner. I can make a linoleum floor shine like it was made of marble.” She hesitated and scrunched her lips to one side of her face. “I hope I don’t sound like I’m bragging.”

Anna shook her head. “There’s no pride in telling the whole truth. I need all the facts if I’m going to help you catch Aaron.” She wrote “humble” in her notebook.

Suvie giggled. “Okay. I love to work in the garden and to grow plants at my greenhouse. My mamm says I have two green thumbs.” With her smile in place, she sighed as if one of her plants had just died. “But I don’t cook and my sewing skills are lacking, though I know how to make a dress if it’s an emergency. My sister says I’m too cheerful and that I laugh too much, but I’d rather laugh than cry since crying makes my eyes puffy. I tend to be bossy, and I chew my fingernails, and I don’t like grapes. Dogs make me sneeze and cats make me itch.” She pulled her sleeve above her elbow and pointed to a patch of bumpy skin. “I have this scar on my arm where I burned myself on the water heater, and I have another scar on my scalp from when I fell backwards off the wagon.”

“Hold on,” Anna said, furiously scribbling notes in her notepad. “What did you say after making an emergency dress?”

Suvie caught her breath. “Ach, I almost left out that I can’t knit or crochet.”

Anna wrote “NO KNITTING” in capital letters and underlined it for good measure. She glanced up at Felty. What would he think about the fact that Suvie couldn’t knit? It was a disability, to be sure.

Suvie’s smile drooped. “Do you think you can help me?”

Felty nodded with that wise glint in his eye that always made Anna glad she’d married him. “I think we’d be selfish not to try, for Aaron’s sake, but when all is said and done, we will have to leave it in Gotte’s hands. Aaron thinks his grieving proves how much he loved his wife. A boulder might be easier to move than our great-grandson.”

Suvie didn’t lose her smile. “I lift feed sacks and piles of dirt around all day. I’m pretty strong.”

Felty stroked his salt-and-pepper beard. “You’ll have to be. A memory is a hard thing to budge.”

Aaron Beachy ate his cold cereal and toast in silence, just like he had every morning for three straight years. He hadn’t had the enthusiasm or the skill to make himself a hot breakfast since the funeral. Cooking for one wasted time and dirtied too many dishes. Soggy bran flakes were good enough, because he didn’t really feel like eating anything anyway. When he was feeling especially glum, he mixed the bran flakes with All-Bran, which usually made him feel worse.

As he stared out the window, he washed down his bran flakes with a few gulps of kaffee. Only eight a.m. and the sky was as dark as if it were already dusk. A storm was brewing, and it looked like it might make down hard before the morning was over.

The overcast skies suited Aaron’s mood perfectly. His life had been one cloudy, dismal day after another since Mary had died three years ago. His family had done their best to try to cheer him up, but they would never understand how deep his pain went—so deep that he would never see the bottom of it, so deep that it was impossible to “move on,” as his dat had admonished him to do months ago. “Moving on” meant forgetting Mary and the love they had shared. He had promised his love and loyalty when they were married. Her death didn’t undo what he owed to her.

Everyone else might forget, but he would never forget. Mary deserved that much.

He nearly jumped out of his skin when someone knocked on the door. He wasn’t expecting anybody this morning, and he certainly didn’t want to have to try to be polite to a salesman. He turned to stone and sat quietly, hoping whoever it was would give up and move on to the next house.

The second knock was louder and more insistent than the first. Aaron swiped the moisture from his eyes and hunkered down in his chair, as if that would make a difference to the person at the door. He hardly dared breathe. No one must suspect he was here or they might not leave.

He jumped a second time when a head popped into view outside the kitchen window and a woman in a black bonnet knocked even more enthusiastically on the glass. “Aaron, Aaron,” she said. Her voice was muffled, but he heard her well enough because she was practically yelling. Yelling and laughing and smiling like a cat who’d eaten three fat mice for breakfast.

“Aaron Beachy,” she said, still knocking on the window. “I brought something for you.”

Was that . . . Suvie Newswenger, the pretty girl who worked at the feed store? Why was she here? Did they make some sort of appointment he’d forgotten about? He jumped to his feet, opened the back door, and stuck his head out. “Hello? Do you need me for something?”

Suvie just grinned and grinned as she tromped over his sorry, unkempt grass and through a modest pile of dead leaves that had been sitting there since autumn two years ago.

“Wie geht, Aaron Beachy?” she said as she continued her tromping clear up the back porch steps. “I’m glad I caught you home.” She pointed to the tall pile of rocks sitting in the center of his backyard. “Are you planning to build something?”

“That is what I’m building.”

Puzzlement traveled swiftly across her face, but she didn’t dwell on it. “I brought you some petunias and a casserole.”

Aaron didn’t know what to say to that, especially since she had neither a casserole nor any kind of flower in her hands. He tried for a polite nod, as if it were perfectly normal for a woman to be sneaking around to the back of his house with no casserole and no petunias.

“Ach.” She laughed, and her eyes danced with amusement. He’d seen that look several times at the feed store. Suvie seemed to always be laughing. “You’re probably wondering. I left the petunias and the casserole on the front porch so I wouldn’t have to haul them all the way around the house. Your great-grandparents are watching them.”

“My great-grandparents?”

Suvie’s lips twitched, whether in amusement or uncertainty, Aaron couldn’t tell. “Jah. They’re waiting at the front door.”

Aaron was getting more and more confused. “You left my grandparents on the porch?”

“They’re not in any danger.”

“I’m sure they’re not in any danger, but why are my grandparents on the front porch?”

“They didn’t want to walk all the way around the house to find you. They volunteered to guard the petunias and the casserole from raccoons and stray dogs.”

Surely his brows were touching at the middle of his forehead. Suvie had brought Mammi and Dawdi along to hold her petunias?

“Do you want to see them?” Suvie said.

Aaron wasn’t sure if she meant his grandparents, the petunias, or the casserole, so he simply nodded and plastered what he hoped passed for a smile on his face.

Suvie practically skipped down the porch steps, and Aaron had no other choice but to follow her. He couldn’t very well leave his grandparents to languish on the front porch, even if he had no idea why they were here or why Suvie had brought them.

Or maybe they had brought Suvie.

Dare he ask? “So, what are you doing here?”

Suvie turned and grinned at him. “Well, somebody had to bring the casserole.”

And why was the casserole here?

It would probably be easiest if he didn’t ask.

His house wasn’t big. They made it around to the front in ten seconds flat. His great-grandparents stood on his front porch as promised, Mammi holding a white pan in her hands, Dawdi with a flat of petunias.

“Oh, Aaron, how wunderbarr,” Mammi said, lighting up like a double propane lantern when she saw him. “I just knew you’d be home and looking very handsome. Didn’t I tell you, Felty?”

“You’re smart as a whip, Banannie.”

Mammi wore a bright pink dress under her black apron, which made a very stark contrast with her snow-white hair and twinkly blue eyes. Nobody had the heart to tell her that elderly Amish women were supposed to wear black, or if they were feeling especially daring, charcoal gray.

Aaron cracked a smile. Even though it wasn’t a proper color for an old lady, he sort of liked the pink. So many fraas dressed as if they were expecting to die soon and wanted to save their families the trouble of dressing them for their funerals.

His smile drooped. Life was so short and so sad. It was a wonder everyone didn’t wear black. His mammi wore pink because she didn’t understand how hard life really was.

Mammi handed the casserole to Suvie and wrapped her arms around Aaron’s waist. She was short and sweet and couldn’t reach her arms around his neck, even when she stood on her tiptoes. All of the Helmuth grandsons and great-grandsons had inherited their height from Dawdi Felty. “Now, Aaron. We’re not going to stay, but we wanted to come with Suvie and make sure you got settled in okay.”

Aaron raised an eyebrow. “Settled in?”

Mammi patted Aaron on the arm. “I mean that we always like to keep an eye out for our grandchildren and help wherever we’re needed.” She took the flat of petunias from Dawdi and handed it to Aaron. “Our work here is done. We’ll see you next week at Titus’s barn raising.”

Aaron stared down at the petunias in his arms, not quite sure what to do with them. “You’re leaving already?”

Mammi’s eyes glistened like stars. “Don’t be sad. Suvie will be here, and we’ve already overstayed our welcome.” She took Felty’s arm, and they ambled toward their buggy.

Suvie will be here?

Aaron slowly turned his gaze to Suvie, who clutched the casserole in her hands and smiled at him as if she expected him to tell her a joke or something. She didn’t look like she was planning on going anywhere anytime soon, which only increased his confusion and made him a little wary.

A lot wary.

What did she want? Was he supposed to know?

Suvie transferred the casserole to one hand and waved to Mammi and Dawdi as they drove away. Then she eyed Aaron like a cow at auction, and her smile got wider. “Let’s get started then,” she said.

“Get . . . get started with what?”

“I guess I don’t mean us. I mean me. I brought this Spam asparagus casserole for you to eat, and I’m going to plant these petunias in your garden.”

He studied the casserole in her hands. Bits of asparagus and Spam swimming in a runny, orange cheese sauce. The petunias looked little better. The few flowers on the stems drooped forlornly, and the plants themselves were about three days from drying up completely and blowing away. He was at a complete loss for words, except for the question on the tip of his tongue. “Why?”

Suvie reached out and plucked a dead flower from one of the petunia stems. “Why what?”

“Why did you bring me this?”

“A widower like you doesn’t get a hot meal very often. Bake at 375 for thirty minutes.”

“Did you . . . did you grow the petunias yourself?” Suvie had a greenhouse where she rai. . .