First Love (Love Nibbles Book 2) Read online

  “Your little sister.” Joe smiled. “What kind of games do you play?”

  “Catch. She loves baseball. She uses Daniel’s old mitt and wants to practice every day. Sometimes we skip rope or play with her dolls or capture fireflies.”

  He reached to straighten Rachael’s cap, laying the ties neatly on either side of her face and down onto her breasts. His hands lingered there. “I always wanted a younger brother or sister, but there’s only me.”

  “Trust me, it’s annoying having a younger sibling. They always want you to do something with them or for them.”

  His hands drifted from her breasts down to her waist. He swayed her back and forth as he hummed a tune. “I wish I could take you dancing. You’d love it.”

  “That girl Darlene seemed anxious to go, maybe you should invite her.” Rachael lifted an eyebrow.

  He clicked his tongue and scoffed. “Darlene.” Then he slid his hands around her back and pulled her close again. “What would happen if... How bad would it be if your parents found out about us?”

  Rachael cringed at the very thought. “I’m not a baptized member of the church so I wouldn’t be shunned, but there would be lectures from my parents, the deacon, the minister, maybe even the bishop. And I might have to confess my error before the congregation. It wouldn’t be...” She shuddered.

  “I’m sorry. This is really dangerous for you.” He rested his forehead against hers. “My parents wouldn’t be thrilled, but there’s not a lot they could do. They’d have to get used to the idea.” He kissed her mouth. “I wish I could tell everyone we’re dating.”

  Dating. The term was frightening. They could never be a real couple. There was no future for them. And yet, right now, Joe was all she could see or hear or think about. He filled her mind and heart completely. He’d taken possession of her completely.

  Rachael let herself relax into his embrace, resting her head on his chest and breathing in the freshly laundered scent of his T-shirt.

  “Me too,” she whispered.

  *

  “How could you forget about the Zook’s barn raising? You’ve been so preoccupied lately. Today I want you to have fun with your friends and try not to think so hard.” Her mother held Rachael’s face between her hands and kissed her forehead. “Have some fun.”

  Rachael smiled. Funny that her mother, who’d pressed her to search her soul, now told her she was too serious. She wandered off across the yard to look for Ruth Zook.

  The frame of the barn rose dark against the blue sky. Boards were already being nailed in place on one side. Men in black pants, blue shirts and suspenders crawled over the scaffolding like ants. This was the Zook’s second barn, built on young Jacob’s portion of the property. The Zook’s farm was prosperous enough to sustain not only the parents but three sons, their wives and children.

  Rachael’s friend Ruth had married Jacob last November at age eighteen. The cheerful, gregarious girl had been one of Rachael’s best friends growing up, but since Ruth’s marriage they’d seen little of one another.

  “There you are! I was beginning to wonder if you were coming.” Ruth set a casserole on a food-laden table and came to greet Rachael. “You look different. Older somehow. Maybe it’s because I haven’t seen you in so long.”

  For a moment Rachael had to bite her tongue not to confide her secret to Ruth. Full of the excitement and mystery of her romance, she needed to talk to a friend. But even though she loved Ruth, she knew the girl couldn’t keep a confidence, especially one as huge as this. She would tell Jacob, who would tell someone else and soon the whole community would know.

  “I’ve been pretty busy,” Rachael said vaguely. “But not as busy as you. Tell me all about married life What’s it like living with the Zooks?”

  Ruth gave an exaggerated shudder. “I’d rather we’d built a new house for us than another barn. I don’t know how much longer I can live with my mother-in-law.”

  As her friend rattled on about her new family, new husband, new life, Rachael’s attention wandered. She looked around at the happy, busy workers, people she’d known her whole life and cared for deeply and wondered what was wrong with her. Why couldn’t she be happy with what she had? Why couldn’t she choose someone like Amos Bieler who was watching her from over the lumber pile? If she wanted him to eat dinner with her later, she knew he would.

  “Rachael, are you even listening to me?” Ruth demanded.

  “I’m sorry. I was thinking of something.”

  “Something or someone?” Ruth grinned. “You’re still interested in Amos, aren’t you? He would court you if you wanted. All you have to do is give the word and I’ll put a bug in his ear.”

  “No!” Rachael said sharply. “I mean, no. Ruth. I like him, but not in that way. I wouldn’t want to encourage him. I’m not ready to make that kind of commitment.”

  Ruth heaved a sigh. “If you don’t mind my asking, what are you waiting for? You’re nineteen now. It’s time to grow up.”

  “You sound like my mother.”

  “Well, your mother’s right.” Ruth took Rachael’s arm and led her away from eaves-dropping ears. “Listen. I’m going to tell you something. You know when we went through rumspringa I got a little wild, staying out late, watching the boys race their buggies, drinking sometimes, making my parents upset. When Jacob and I were bundling, I cut a slit in the bag so Jacob could… Well, let’s say, I wasn’t exactly a virgin at my wedding.”

  Rachael’s eyes widened. She wasn’t shocked that Ruth and Jacob had fooled around. She was shocked that Ruth had managed to keep the secret from her all this time.

  “My point is once you join the church and then get married, all of that childish foolishness seems…well, foolish. Doubts drop away and everything falls into place. Trust me.”

  Rachael frowned. “Did my mother ask you to talk to me?”

  There was a long silence that answered her question better than words. The girls exchanged a look and both of them began to laugh.

  “Maybe she did,” Ruth said. “But she isn’t wrong. Besides, you could do worse than Amos Bielere.”

  “I know. He’s a good person. It’s nothing to do with him. It’s me. I look around at all of this,” she gestured at the work party surrounding them, “and I feel like I want something more, something different. Do you understand?”

  Ruth frowned. “But, Rachael, this is your life. As I said, your doubts will all fade away once you decide to embrace the faith and take a husband. Honestly they will.”

  She spoke with such confidence and a new-found maturity that Rachael felt more confused than ever. Maybe she was simply acting like a willful child. Maybe it was time to put away her daydreams and accept real life.

  She would keep her date with Joe tomorrow, but only to tell him they must end their dangerous flirtation.

  Chapter Seven

  Sunday morning Rachael was beside herself with nerves. When she told her mother her stomach hurt and she had a headache, she wasn’t lying.

  She waited until the black buggy disappeared from sight, not only from the driveway but down the road. She didn’t want to take any chance her family would turn back for something forgotten. Rachael looked at her reflection in the polished metal of the coffeepot. Her image was rounded so that her nose stuck out frighteningly and her eyes looked crazy. “Mein Gott,” she whispered.

  She put down the pot and went outside. This time she beat Joe to their meeting place, waiting in the shade behind the coop for almost fifteen minutes before she saw him coming.

  He walked quickly along the edge of the field and when he spotted her, he broke into a run.

  “Sorry,” he called as he drew near. “My dad almost decided to stay home too. He wanted to go fishing and Ma had to practically beat him over the head to get him to go to church with her. They’ll be back in a couple of hours, but I don’t care if they find me gone. I’m nineteen. I can skip damn church if I want to.”

  “Mine will be gone most of the day.” Rachael
took his outstretched hand. He looked very handsome in a white cotton shirt and navy dress pants. She’d never seen him in anything but every day clothes.

  “Have you eaten breakfast yet? I could cook for you,” she offered shyly, forgetting completely that she was supposed to send him away for good.

  “Yeah, I did but I can always eat again.” He grinned and her heart filled her throat.

  It felt so strange leading him across the yard and into her house. As she moved around the kitchen preparing a meal for both of them, it was like playing at being a woman with a home of her own. “Would you like bacon and eggs?”

  “Bacon, eggs, pancakes, sausage, toast. I’ll eat anything you put in front of me.”

  He sat at the kitchen table and looked around the room. She tried to imagine what the kitchen looked like through his eyes, but didn’t know how it compared to his own. She’d only been in an English house once when her mother bought an old treadle sewing machine from a woman. Rachael tried to picture electronic appliances like she’d seen in catalogs and at the store in Joe’s house.

  He caught her watching him. “Nice house. Very homey.”

  “You mean plain.” She put the skillet on the burner and lit the gas.

  “No. Quaint.” He walked across the kitchen toward the stove. “Sweet and cute. Like you.”

  She rolled her eyes and turned away from him to melt butter in the skillet. He grabbed her from behind and buried his face in her neck, tickling her with his kisses. “Charming. Love your eyes, your nose, your lips, and your adorable accent.”

  She wiggled in his embrace and laughed.

  “And I love your hair.” He removed her cap and unpinned the thick coils. Her hair tumbled down long and he combed his fingers through it. “A beautiful shade of brown. Not plain at all.”

  He kissed her neck again until she closed her eyes and forgot about the frying pan.

  “One of us is going to get burned if you do that while I’m cooking.” She raised her spatula to drive him back.

  He laughed and leaned against the counter to watch her work.

  They talked about their families, their daily lives, their impatience with parents who loved them well but controlled too much.

  They continued to talk while they ate and cleaned the kitchen and after that, they faced each other across the room with nothing else to be said.

  Joe walked toward her. Rachael took a deep breath. He put his hands on her waist and swayed her back and forth, dancing her slowly around the kitchen as he hummed a tune. She recognized one of the songs she’d heard on the radio the other night. The lovely one that went Only you can make this world seem right. Only you can fill the lonely night.

  She moved in the circle of Joe’s arms and imagined this was their life every day, sharing a house with no one to come between them. She lifted her chin and looked up at him. “Do you want to see the rest of the house?”

  His eyes were solemn as he nodded.

  She took his hand and led him through the living room and upstairs to the bedrooms.

  Joe’s big, rangy body filled her and Mattie’s little room under the slanting eaves, like a big dog in a small kennel. Turning too fast, he rapped his elbow sharply on the bureau. “Ow! Damn.”

  Rachael smoothed her hand over the quilt covering the bed and flicked away an imaginary thread. He sat down at the foot and moved her body between his knees, then he

  looked up at her with a serious expression. “We won’t go any farther than you want to. We don’t have to do anything if you don’t want to.”

  She nodded, feeling too awkward and shy to even speak.

  “Would you lie down with me for a while?”

  She removed her apron and shoes. Joe took off his shoes too then they lay side by side on the small bed.

  She glanced at him staring up at the ceiling, at the same crack shaped like Africa that she looked at every night before going to sleep. His head was on Mattie’s pillow. His body pressed into the mattress with much more weight than Mattie’s and Rachael rolled toward him, pulled by gravity.

  He put his arm around her so she could rest her head on his chest. His other hand rested on her hip and he stroked it. “What was it like going to your school?”

  “Small. Everybody knows each other and there’s no way to keep any secrets. Once people have decided you’re a certain way, they’ll never see you differently, even if you’ve changed. Your reputation means more than the real you.”

  Joe nodded his understanding. “I used to play football. I liked it all right. Then junior year I realized that that’s all I was. Mr. Football. I didn’t like being stuck in that narrow box. So I quit right in the middle of the season. A lot of people never forgave me for that, and I don’t just mean the kids at high school. The coach and the principal tried to talk sense into me. Some members of the school board actually came to my house to talk to my parents. And my dad shouted till he was blue in the face. But I was stubborn. I wouldn’t play again. When I went out for baseball that spring, the coach wouldn’t let me on the team. He already saw me as a quitter.”

  She felt him shrug. “I don’t know. Maybe he was right. Guess he was just looking out for his team.”

  Rachael smoothed her hand over his T-shirt, feeling his heart beating into her palm. “Why do people make decisions about people without really knowing them or trying to imagine what that they’re thinking or feeling?”

  “I don’t know.” He eased his arm out from under her and turned on his side to face her. Rachael scooted up so she could look into his eyes.

  Joe touched her lightly, stroking strands of hair from her forehead and tracing the contours of her face. When his thumb brushed her lower lip, her lips parted. He leaned in and kissed her, light and easy.

  His soft nibbling kisses weren’t demanding. She was the one to bring her tongue into play first. And soon their tongues twisted together sending delightful shivers through her. She didn’t know how much time passed. Each second seemed to stretch out like pulled taffy. Luxurious to simply lie together like this with no chores to be done or demands on her time. Their bodies pressed warmly together and their legs tangled around each other until it was hard to know where she ended and he began.

  Joe reached between them to touch the front of her dress. “How does this...?”

  She opened the hidden row of snaps to reveal her slip underneath, another barrier between them. Rachael took her arms from her sleeves, twisted around and pulled her slip over her head. Underneath it she wore nothing. Her chest heaved with her quickly drawn breaths. Her skin burned as Joe gazed at her bare breasts. It was excruciating…and exhilarating.

  “Good Lord,” he murmured. His pupils were so dilated his eyes appeared almost black. His breath caught as he reached out to touch her left breast. His rough fingertips scraped her nipple and an electric bolt sizzled from there straight down to her sex. The pleasure was so intense it was nearly painful. She needed more of it.

  Rachael lay still while he fondled one breast then the other. Her eyes closed as she enjoyed every touch of his work-callused fingers, and when he lowered his head and took one of her nipples into his mouth, she gave a soft cry of surprise and delight. She’d never felt anything to even compare with the sensation. She opened her eyes to watch him suckle, and the sight of his lips encircling her nipple aroused her even more.

  Then Joe moved his hand down her body to touch her between the legs. He reached under her skirt. Through the fabric of her underwear, he stroked her most private place and sent powerful waves surging through her. The intense contact was almost more than she could bear. He rubbed a spot that made her sex go warm and pliant, wetness flowing from inside her. An insistent aching need swelled stronger as her body tensed.

  With a low moan, Rachael arched off the bed as that tension burst and bliss unfurled. “Oh, oh, oh.” Her breath came in little pants and gasps as shudders quaked through her body.

  At the end, she lay quiet, breathing heavily. Embarrassed by her strong re
action to his touch, she glanced at Joe, who smiled as he met her gaze.

  “Rachael, would you…could I ask you to...” Unable to say what he wanted, he took her hand and pressed it against the bulge in the front of his trousers. He drew a shaky breath at her touch and his eyes half closed.

  She wanted to give him the same joy he’d offered her, but she wasn’t certain what to do. Gingerly, she stroked her hand over the bulge beneath his fly. Joe unfastened his zipper and guided both of their hands inside his underwear, molding her fingers around his erection.

  Emotions tumbled through her; curiosity, embarrassment, distaste, and eagerness to experience the mystery of a man’s member. The shaft in her hand was warm and smooth, pulsing with life. She was enthralled by the satiny feel of skin and the firmness underneath. But even more interesting than his cock was the way Joe reacted to her stroking hand. His eyes closed and he swallowed hard, throat clicking. That small, desperate sound of need made her shiver. She had the power over his pleasure in the palm of her hand.

  She rubbed tentatively until Joe molded his hand around hers and showed her how firmly she could grip. He sighed with pleasure as she stopped being so gentle and massaged briskly. He groaned and thrust into her touch, hips moving, head rolling back on the pillow. It didn’t take long for him to completely surrender to sensation. A few more firm strokes and he shuddered hard.

  Rachael felt the pulsing in his member and the warm liquid shooting from it. She wasn’t sure if she should stop yet, but at last he muttered, “That’s good. Thank you.”

  She removed her hand from him and went to get a cloth to clean up with. When she returned, Joe lay with his arms behind his head, smiling contentedly as he looked at her. “Thank you,” he repeated.

  She offered him the cloth. “Thank you.” Sudden shyness made her blush and look away from his open fly and the cock which she’d only felt but not seen. He wiped himself clean and fastened his trousers, while Rachael awkwardly sat beside him on the bed.

  He put a finger under her chin and tilted her head up, forcing her eyes to meet him. “You’re not like any girl I’ve ever known. I wish...” He left his wish unspoken, gathering her into his arms and pulling her down to lie with him once more.