Hope Between the Pages, Pepper Basham [best ebook reader android .txt] 📗

sobering expression, parted from her conversational partner to cross the bakery to me. “Sadie? You’re here in the middle of the day.”

“I had a package to collect for Mrs. Vanderbilt.” My gaze never wavered from my sister’s face and she finally sighed, took me by the hand, and pulled me to a quiet corner of the shop.

“His name is Ralph Wolfe, a banker.” She straightened to her full height, still a few inches shorter than me, and I readied myself for the blow. “And I’m going to marry him.”

Clearly, I’d not readied myself sufficiently, because the declaration stole my breath.

“He fell in love with my cream puffs, first.” Her smile kept growing the more she spoke, her hazel eyes nearly beaming. “He’s been into the bakery every day the past three weeks and he told me last week that it’s because of me.”

“And your cream puffs?”

“Sadie, he’s not one of the factory workers.” Lark grabbed my hands. “He can provide me with a good and proper home. I can have store-bought dresses and bake because I want to, not because I have to.”

“Has he asked you to marry him?”

Her smile faded and she looked away. “Not yet, but I know he will soon. He’s already spoken to me about how delightful it would be to have a wife who knows her way around the kitchen to help entertain his business associates properly.” Her attention fastened back on mine. “Entertain them? The hostess of my own house where dinner parties happen! Sadie, you know how much I want this.”

Yes, I did. Lark had always wished for a wealthy husband, or at least one that could provide all the “necessary” things she couldn’t afford now. “Have you spent time together, other than here?”

Her cheeks darkened and she released my hands to grab her own, nodding like a guilty child. My heart squeezed. But she wasn’t a child. Nearly nineteen. A perfectly marriageable age.

“Twice.” Her gaze shot back to mine. “But nothing scandalous. We merely walked along the street and talked.”

My mind immediately went to Miss Withersby. “What did you talk about? Mutual interests?”

“Well, mostly he talked. He’s very passionate about his job. He did compliment my hair.” She looked around the corner to where he still sat staring out the window with his Apollo-like profile. No wonder he turned Lark’s head. The man had a way about him that commanded attention. “And he spoke of his townhouse and his expectations for the future.”

“And he appreciated yours as well?”

“Mine?”

“Your expectations for the future?” I searched her face, so young, so certain.

“Sadie, I just want to be married and not have to work as hard as Mama did her whole life. That’s all.”

“Marriage is much more than a townhouse and house parties, Lark.”

“If I’m lucky enough to have more than that, then it will be like the cream on top of a strawberry pie, but I don’t need that. I’ve never needed that.”

How could she even know what she needed after their childhood? An absent father. A mother who worked such bone-wearying hours she barely had time to see her daughters, let alone talk to them. At least, when her mother had been assigned to the library from housemaid, the workload had lightened a little, but she still traveled back and forth to Biltmore Village every day and they’d rarely seen her during daylight hours. Lark’s reasoning made painful sense if logic and indifference served as the only predictors of future happiness. “Don’t you want more?”

Lark’s bottom lip quivered with her deepening frown and I immediately redirected my concern with a smile.

“Perhaps you could introduce me to him? If you like him so much, I’m sure I will too.”

Her smile resurrected and she took my hand and pulled me toward Mr. Ralph Wolfe, a man whose eyes matched his name a little too much for my peace of mind.

My feet walked toward a dream, even an impossible one.

After collecting Mrs. Vanderbilt’s newest book package from the post office, I took the long route back to the Biltmore’s Gate House. If Lark married, Aunt Elaine would move to live with her daughter in Waynesville, and then what? No one to watch after except myself.

My gaze traveled over the Brick House, re-envisioning what it could be, what I could make it, if given the chance. Lark’s perspective of logic tugged against the dreamer inside of me. Couldn’t I have both the dream and the reason? The imagination and the reality?

If I worked hard enough, was it possible?

“Well, what a pleasant surprise this is.”

I spun around and came face-to-face with Oliver Camden, who looked dapper in his light brown sack suit and straw bowler atop his head.

“Mr. Oliver.”

“Vicky said you planned to be in the village this afternoon and look, in your civilian clothes, no less.” His grin etched into a playful turn and he scanned me from my simple navy hat to the bottom of my blue skirt. “I wouldn’t have recognized you from such a distance if Vicky hadn’t pointed you out from across the street.”

I scanned the sidewalks along the way but didn’t see the goldenhaired girl anywhere.

“She’s inside the toy shop with Father.” Oliver shifted a few steps closer. “I feel certain she’ll be there for quite some time.”

“And…and you didn’t want to visit some of the other shops?”

“Actually, I was in search of a fairy.”

His answer nearly drew my gaze to his face, but I quelled the impulse and remained quiet. Writing harmless notes was one thing. Having private conversations was quite another.

“What is it about this house that held you so spellbound a moment ago? It looks rather vacant?”

My throat tightened around my response. How should I answer him when we shouldn’t even be conversing at all? “Mr. Long plans to sell it soon.”

I closed my eyes and pinched my lips together. What sort of response was that?

“And you plan to buy it?”

A laugh burst from me before I could stop it. “If Mr. Long can wait another five