Merry Christmas, My Love

“Don’t forget Mr. Boswick brings the newspapers tomorrow. Everyone will be looking for theirs.”

“She said it won’t take more than an hour. I’ll have plenty of time.”

Mitch nodded and picked up the bowls and placed them into the sink. What would it be like to have a woman in the house? Someone who fixed the meals, cleaned up afterwards, sat with them in the parlor at night, sewing or reading a book? Funny how he’d never felt the lack of female companionship before now. When he felt the need, he’d make a trip into Denver to visit a widow friend of his for an overnight stay. Even those visits had dwindled down to only a few times a year.

More than a woman to cook, sew, and read, the idea of having a warm, soft body wrapped in his arms when he fell asleep at night and then awoke alongside in the morning had him wishing for things he had no right to wish for. The woman who’d made him long for things he hadn’t thought he wanted was too far above him and his life.

The nightly chores he’d done alone since Polly died seemed harder somehow tonight. Was he lonely? He hadn’t questioned that for a long, long time.

His marriage to Polly had lasted less than a year, and most of that time she’d been sick with her pregnancy. Why he was thinking now about a woman in the house disturbed him, certain Miss Priscilla Cochran prompted those thoughts. Memories swamped him of her soft body pressed up against his chest when she’d dropped from the roof into his arms. The fresh scent of lemons surrounding her. The sparkle in her hazel eyes. The plump lips she’d licked that he’d wanted to cover with his own.

Feeling like the fool he was, he stomped to the shed to settle the horses for the night. Keeping busy would stop his thoughts from traveling in a direction they had no business going. Sure, he’d invited her to church and the social afterward, but that was only because it was his responsibility to see that the new teacher was settled and familiar with the town and its inhabitants. He would have done the same for the plump fifty-year-old spinster he’d expected to arrive on the mail coach.

Yeah, but would I have looked forward to it as much?

Ian rounded the corner of the schoolhouse and came to an abrupt halt. Miss Cochran stood, feet apart, both hands gripping what looked like a Colt M1911 semi-automatic pistol. She released the safety, and, taking aim at tin cans sitting on a wooden fence running along the back of her yard, she slowly squeezed the trigger. And picked off all seven cans in rapid succession.

“Wow, Miss Cochran, that was great.”

She lowered her gun, engaged the safety, and spun around. “Goodness, Ian, you startled me. You shouldn’t do that to a person holding a gun.”

He walked up to her. “I know guns. If that’s a Colt M1911, it holds seven rounds.”

“Yes, I guess you would know guns.” She placed her hand on his shoulder and walked him back toward the schoolhouse. “This will be our little secret, all right, Ian?”

“You’re a great shot. Why don’t you want anyone to know?”

“I’m not sure how proper it is for the teacher to have such a talent.”

Ian shrugged. “All right. If that’s what you want.”

“Thank you.” As they entered the schoolhouse, she placed the gun in the top drawer of her desk. She waved him toward the bench in front of her desk. He was such a pleasant boy and as handsome as his father.

Now where did that thought come from?

“I have a test here that I’m giving to the children around your age. It’s both arithmetic and reading. This will tell me what we need to work on.” She handed him a sheet of paper that he took and sat back down.

Priscilla returned to sorting books into grade levels. She looked up after about ten minutes when Ian stood next to her. “Do you have a question about one of the problems?”

“No, ma’am. I’m finished.”

She frowned and looked at him, taking the paper he held out. Every problem was finished and correct. “Did you read the passages for the reading part of the test?”

He nodded.

She quizzed him on the passages and he answered all those questions correctly as well.

“My goodness. You are certainly more advanced than I thought.” She headed to her desk and pulled out the arithmetic sheet for the high school-aged children. “Here, try this. It will probably be too hard, but let’s see how far you get.”

Ian settled on the bench with his pencil and the paper and bent his head. She returned to her work, wondering how she would place the children in the classroom. The school she had done her training in had classes divided into two grade levels each. It would be a challenge to have all grades in one room. She looked around the space and decided dividing the benches into grade levels might work. Especially if she put the oldest children next to the youngest ones so they could help.

About half an hour after Ian had started the test, he returned it to her desk. All thirty problems had been completed and were correct.

She looked at the paper with amazement. “Ian, who’s been teaching you?”

“My pa. He also taught me history, geography, and literature.”

“Indeed?”