Daughters of the Heart Read Online Free PDF

you didn’t have to look like a lunatic.” She turned in the seat. “Now let’s talk about your money and what I have to do to get it.”
    Once she got the horse headed home and threw one last goodbye wave, she glanced over at her sister. “First, I want to know what Elijah said to you.”
    Bonnie shook her head and looked off in the opposite direction. Was she thinking or being her obstinate self? She finally turned back. “Can’t exactly say.”
    “And why not?”
    One hand went to her hip, and she squinted and pursed her lips. Cecelia hated that expression.
    “Because he asked me if I could keep a secret. And I told him I could. So there. I’m bound by my honor not to divulge Elijah’s private conversation with me, and there isn’t anything you can do about it.”
    “Why you little –”
    “I can tell you.…” She smiled a stupid superior grin and raised her chin. “Wait. I almost forgot. My pay. Now what else can you offer if I come with you every day? And tell you what I can about what I know?”
    “Forget that for now. So there is something you’re able to tell me concerning what you and he talked about?”
    “Oh…that…” She sighed and stared dead ahead. “Well, it was about you.”
    That was good. Right? “So what did he say?”
    “CeCe, you know what store Daddy puts on keeping one’s word. Am I going to have to tell him you’re trying to get me to break a confidence?”
    Such a brat. How did she get so smart so fast? Cecelia and Gwen were what? Twelve and fourteen when they used to.…
    Oh, mercy. It hit her between the eyes. She was reaping what she and Gwen used to sow with Rebecca. And even Mary Rachel to a certain extent. She hated being on the big sister side of that coin. She needed to outsmart her some way.
    Hey, there was an idea.
    She’d figure out an excuse to ship Bonnie off to live with Wallace and Rebecca until Elijah asked her to marry him. Would she have to let her oldest sister in on the plan? Would Rebecca be of a mind to help her?
    She toyed with that idea for a quarter mile. But if she could rid herself of Bonnie, Houston might even be worse. And he probably couldn’t be bribed nearly as easily either. What about Charlie?
    No, he’d be an even bigger pain. Last time the Rusks came to dinner, her brother-in-law was all about how busy he was with the planting. Maybe that could work in her favor.
    “Fine. I’ll not badger you to break a confidence. But if there’s a way you could like…give me a hint or.…”
    “No guessing. Or hints. Now stop trying to weasel it out of me.”
    “Fine. But one day....” She let the threat trail off, then when Bonnie didn’t take the bait, turned her attention to her father. Pigheaded man had to punish her and her sisters just because of Mary Rachel running off. It wasn’t fair.
    Her father’s oft spoke words danced across her memory: ‘Life isn’t always fair.’
    How could she sugar-up this situation?
    Why’d he go and shoot his mouth off about having to be eighteen to be courted? Hmm. Maybe she knew a way around Mister Henry Buckmeyer. Mama May! As a woman, she’d surely understand. But would she agree to wield her considerable influence over the man to change his mind?
    Though in some quarters Cecelia would already be considered an old maid, that tact wouldn’t likely hold water with a lady who hadn’t married at all until she was forty-one—and so beautiful. Why had she?
    None of her sisters could believe she was that old when they found out on the trip to Europe. They’d guessed more like in her early thirties.
    No, she had to figure out another way to get Mama May to change Daddy’s mind.
    Eleven months was too long to wait. Besides, Gwen would have a whole year of eligibility to flirt with him before Cecelia came of age. No. She had to take matters into her own hands. Wasn’t it somewhere in the Bible? Strike while the iron’s hot?
     

     
    Gwendolyn set the bowl of mixed greens seasoned with ham