He didn’t speak. His gaze didn’t falter. “I’ll check back with you later about the books,” he said quietly.
“Okay.”
He started to turn, thought better of it and leaned down again with his weight balanced on the chair arms. “Do you remember what happened when I started to suckle you?”
She went scarlet. “Please…”
“It will be like that,” he said evenly. “Just like that. You won’t think about pain. You may not even notice any. You go in headfirst when I touch you. And I wasn’t even taking my time with you today. Think about that. It might help.”
He pushed away from her again and went to the desk to pick up his hat. He placed it on his head and smiled at her without mockery.
“Don’t let my brothers walk over you,” he said. “If one of them gives you any trouble, lay into him with the first hard object you can get your hands on.”
“They seem very nice,” she said.
“They like you,” he replied. “But they have plans.”
“Plans?”
“Not to hurt you,” he assured her. “You should never have told them you could cook.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Mrs. Culbertson wants to quit. They can’t make biscuits. It’s what they live for, a plateful of homemade buttered biscuits with half a dozen jars of jam and jelly.”
“How does that concern me?”
“Don’t you know?” He perched himself against the desk. “They’ve decided that we should marry you.”
“We?”
“We’re a family. Mostly we share things. Not women, but we do share cooks.” He cocked his head and grinned at her shocked face. “If I marry you, they don’t have to worry about where their next fresh biscuit is coming from.”
“You don’t want to marry me.”
“Well, they’ll probably find some way around that,” he said pointedly.
“They can’t force you to marry me.”
“I wouldn’t make any bets on that,” he said. “You don’t know them yet.”
“You’re their brother. They’d want you to be happy.”
“They think you’ll make me happy.”
She lowered her eyes. “You should talk to them.”
“And say what? That I don’t want you? I don’t think they’d believe me.”
“I meant, you should tell them that you don’t want to get married.”
“They’ve already had a meeting and decided that I do. They’ve picked out a minister and a dress that they think you’ll look lovely in. They’ve done a rough draft of a wedding invitation…”
“You’re out of your mind!”
“No, I’m not.” He went to the middle desk drawer, fumbled through it, pulled it farther out and reached for something pushed to the very back of the desk. He produced it, scanned it, nodded and handed it to her. “Read that.”
It was a wedding invitation. Her middle name was misspelled. “It’s Ellen, not Ellis.”
He reached behind him for a pen, took the invitation back, made the change and handed it back to her.
“Why did you do that?” she asked curiously.
“Oh, they like everything neat and correct.”
“Don’t correct it! Tear it up!”
“They’ll just do another one. The papers will print what’s on there, too. You don’t want your middle name misspelled several thousand times, do you?”
She was all but gasping for breath. “I don’t understand.”
“I know. Don’t worry about it right now. There’s plenty of time. They haven’t decided on a definite date yet, anyway.”
She stood up, wild-eyed. “You can’t let your brothers decide when and who you’re going to marry!”
“Well, you go stop them, then,” he said easily. “But don’t say I didn’t tell you so.”
He pulled his hat over his eyes and walked out the door, whistling softly to himself.
First she did the accounts. Her mind was still reeling from Corrigan’s ardor, and she had to be collected when she spoke to his brothers. She deciphered his scribbled numbers, balanced the books, checked her figures and put down a total.
They certainly weren’t broke, and there was enough money in the account to feed Patton’s Third Army. She left them a note saying so, amused at the pathetic picture they’d painted of their finances. Probably, the reason for that was part of their master plan.
She went outside to look for them after she’d done the books. They were all four in the barn, standing close together. They stopped talking the minute she came into view, and she knew for certain that they’d been talking about her.
“I’m not marrying him,” she told them clearly, and pointed at Corrigan.
“Okay,” Leo said easily.
“The thought never crossed my mind,” Rey remarked.
Cag just shrugged.
Corrigan grinned.
“I’m through with the books,” she said uneasily. “I want to go home now.”
“You haven’t eaten lunch,” Rey said.
“It’s only eleven o’clock,” she said pointedly.
“We have an early lunch, because we work until dark,” Cag volunteered.
“Mrs. Culbertson just left,” Rey said. He sighed. “She put some beef and gravy in the oven to warm. But she didn’t make us any biscuits.”
“We don’t have anything to put gravy on,” Leo agreed.
“Can’t work all afternoon without a biscuit,” Cag said, nodding.
Corrigan grinned.
Dorie had thought that Corrigan was making up that story about the brothers’ mania for biscuits. Apparently it was the gospel truth.
“Just one pan full,” Leo coaxed. “It wouldn’t take five minutes.” He eyed her warily. “If you can really make them. Maybe you can’t. Maybe you were just saying you could, to impress us.”
“That’s right,” Rey added.
“I can make biscuits,” she said, needled. “You just point me to the kitchen and I’ll show you.”
Leo grinned. “Right this way!”
Half an hour later, the pan of biscuits were gone so fast that they might have disintegrated. Leo and Corrigan were actually fighting over the last one, pulled it apart in their rush, and ended up splitting it while the other two sat there gloating. They’d had more than their share because they had faster hands.
“Next time, you’ve got to make two pans,” Corrigan told her. “One doesn’t fill Leo’s hollow tooth.”
“I noticed,” she said, surprisingly touched by the way they’d eaten her biscuits with such enjoyment. “I’ll make you a pan of rolls to go with them next time.”