Harvest of Hearts Read Free Page B

head.
     
    “Will my response determine your answer?”
     
    Matthew frowned. “I’ll need to give Levi the key he asked for and check with him before I go. He is my boss, after all.”
     
    Shanna closed the trunk and headed for the front seat. “Hurry back.”
     
    Matthew gave her another look she couldn’t decipher before he turned away.
     
    ***
     
    When Matthew entered the shop, Levi was putting the finishing touches on a chair. Matthew placed the key on the counter nearby, then hesitated. “I moved Shanna’s things into the apartment. She wants me to go into Seymour with her. Said something about going shopping and seeing about getting her old job back.”
     
    Levi grunted. “Never should have allowed her to take that job in the Englisch world. Gave her too many ideas.”
     
    “It happens.” Matthew shrugged. “Maybe she’ll come back to the faith.”
     
    “I pray so.” Levi picked up the key and pocketed it. “Danki for helping her. I guess you can go with her to town, if you’d like. At least I’ll know she’ll get home safely.”
     
    “She’ll be the one driving. Maybe you shouldn’t be so confident…?”
     
    “Hmm. Maybe so.” Levi looked up and grinned at Matthew. “Have fun. You can finish when you get back.”
     
    “Okay. If you’re sure.” Matthew went out, headed toward that little blue car where Shanna waited.
     
    “He said jah?” Surprise was evident in Shanna’s voice and her raised eyebrows. However, she didn’t elaborate. Instead, she waited as he climbed into the car next to her and then reached for the gray seatbelt. After eyeing it for a moment, he snapped it in place. He hated the tightness of these harnesses across his chest, but Englisch law required them.
     
    “He said go if I wanted to.” No need for her to know the part about seeing her safely home. He wanted to ask about the situation between her and Levi but decided it would be way too nosy. Some Amish fathers did cut off their children in rumschpringe if they ventured too far away from home base. And Shanna clearly had.
     
    His gaze skimmed over her lacy pink shirt and low-cut jeans. Her flip-flops looked like they must hurt her feet, the way they wedged a hard-looking plastic thing between each of her big toes and the toe next to it. But what did he know?
     
    Well, he knew that if he’d met her on the street, he never would have guessed her to be Amish.
     
    Most Amish girls didn’t stop wearing plain clothes during their rumschpringe.
     
    “Your mamm said you’re going to school in Springfield. What for?”
     
    “Nursing. I’m working on my degree. It’ll lead to a good job when I finish. At least, I’m hoping so. I still have another semester of school and then a semester of clinical rotations before I graduate.”
     
    He looked down and studied his stained fingers. “Why did you come home, then, if you’re in school?”
     
    “School lets out for the summer. All my friends were going on a medical mission trip to Mexico, but it cost a lot of money, and, well, I couldn’t exactly ask my family for donations. I earned some money toward the trip, but nowhere near enough to cover it, so I gave it to a friend who needed some.” There was a pause as she maneuvered her car around a washout in the dirt road, then picked up speed again. “I found a job for the summer in Springfield, but, you know, apartment leases require the first and last month’s rent, plus a yearlong agreement, plus a security deposit, and I couldn’t come up with all that, either. I have grants and scholarships to fund my education. Not that much extra money, you know? I had no choice.”
     
    That explained the comment she’d made earlier about wanting to be anywhere but here, even Mexico. She’d actually wanted to go. Little else in her dialogue made sense. He had only a vague idea what grants, scholarships, or security deposits might be. “What about your job in Springfield?”
     
    She shrugged, then made a