Forget Me Not (The Heart's Spring) Read Free

designs, the empty tin plate in her hands—just not at the man across from her. She bit her lip, afraid of the silence, but afraid to break it with her story. Would he think she was silly? Would he understand how important all of this was to her?
    Before she could brave a word, she felt the plate gently tugged out of her hands. She stared at the hard-packed dirt floor and listened to the water being pumped and then sloshed around as David washed the dishes.
    “I fell in.”
    “I guessed that much.” His tone teased a reluctant smile from her.
    “I found out I have a brother.”
    Peeking up, she saw his eyebrows scrunch, but he didn’t say anything.
    “My parents died from the scarlet fever when I was little, and our neighbor took me in. My older brother had apparently gone west before I was born. My ma—the woman who raised me—she told me about him a few days ago after talking with a friend whose husband was heading out to Nevada. I just don’t understand why she had never told me before. And she never even told my brother about me.”
    Her words gushed forth like the rapids in Clear Creek Canyon, and she found herself twisting the quilt in her hands, once again too worried to meet David’s gaze. So she just kept talking.
    “I was angry. I mean, he’s my brother by blood! I should have known about him, should have had the chance to write to him, to go meet him. He’s all I have, and he doesn’t even know I exist.” Tears misted her eyes, and she shook her head in frustration. “I couldn’t stay in the house. We live outside of Golden, and I just…ran. I’ve been out here for a couple of days, I guess.”
    She heard a clatter and jumped. He must have dropped a dish in the basin.
    “You’ve been wandering around in the canyon for a couple of days?”
    She couldn’t decipher the emotion in his voice beyond the surprise, so she rushed on before he could clarify it. “I’ve been trying to figure out how to proceed. But I…” Oh, this was embarrassing. A blush burned her cheeks. “I was getting frustrated. I went down to the creek for a drink, and as I got up I kicked a rock and slipped. Then you found me.” Thankfully.
    He was silent. She could only imagine what he was thinking. Foolish girl, to get so upset over something so trivial. You could have died, all because you let your emotions carry you away! Why don’t you think before you act? Somehow, the voice in her head had transformed into Sarah Anne’s. Her ma must be so disappointed in her. Isn’t my love enough for you? She could hear the breaking in Sarah Anne’s voice, and tears burned hotter than her blush. She loved Sarah Anne. She just wished her ma understood how much this meant to her—how the years without an older brother now ate at her, and how she didn’t want another year to go by without meeting him. Jacob. It was just right. A sturdy, kind name.
    “ Here.”
    She broke out of her thoughts and saw that David was holding out some sort of jerky to her. “Venison,” he explained. How did he know she was still so very hungry? She took his offering and gave him a grateful smile.
    He sat down next to her on the bed, a respectable distance away. “Did you ever figure out what you were going to do next?”
    She yanked off a bit of the jerky and chewed a moment before responding. “I have to go meet him. I haven’t figured out yet how I’m going to do that, as I don’t have any money, but I’ll find a way.”
    “It’s that important to you?”
    His voice was strong, serious. She turned to him, clutching the jerky in her hands, surprised to find him regarding her with determined compassion. Like the look Mr. Vance, the owner of the general store, always offered her when he asked about her and Sarah Anne as he gave her a little extra of everything she ordered. Mr. Vance was such a nice older man that she had secretly taken to thinking of him as her grandfather.
    Redirecting her thoughts to David, she raised her head and gave one