Ruth’s heart sank slightly.
“Partly.”
Jonah looked away.
She studied him.
“What is the other part?”
He said nothing.
Ruth rose.
“Jonah.”
His shoulders shifted beneath the blanket.
The movement made the lamplight cross his bare chest and abdomen.
Ruth forced her attention back to his face.
“You keep giving me half answers.”
“I’m trying not to make this worse.”
“You are doing remarkably badly.”
That earned the smallest smile.
Then it disappeared.
Ruth approached until only a few feet separated them.
“What was the other reason you refused?”
Jonah looked at her.
“I had already decided to marry you.”
The simplicity of the answer left her defenseless.
Ruth swallowed.
“Before he came?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
There it was again.
The question he apparently did not want.
Ruth watched his face.
Jonah Clay could confront a bank president, break a wild horse, negotiate cattle prices with men twice as loud as him, and stare down drunks who enjoyed provoking him.
But this question unsettled him.
Ruth found that strangely comforting.
“I noticed you before the scandal.”
Her breath caught.
“When?”
“Last spring.”
“Where?”
“Boardinghouse dining room.”
Ruth searched her memory.
Jonah had eaten there occasionally.
She had served dozens of meals.
“You barely spoke to me.”
“I know.”
“You didn’t even look at me.”
“I did when you weren’t looking at me.”
Heat rose through her neck.
Jonah immediately looked embarrassed by his own confession.
Ruth almost smiled.
“What did you notice?”
“Ruth.”
“You brought this upon yourself.”
He exhaled.
“You were carrying four plates.”
“That is not romantic.”
“One woman complained her potatoes were cold.”
“They were not cold.”
“I know.”
Ruth blinked.
“You remember that?”
“You touched the plate with your bare finger.”
“I was checking.”
“She accused you of being careless.”
“She accused everyone of everything.”
“You apologized anyway.”
Ruth frowned.
“That made you want to marry me?”
“No.”
He almost smiled.
“Then another waitress dropped a tray.”
Ruth remembered.
Young Maggie Harper.
Sixteen.
First week working.
The entire dining room had laughed when plates shattered.
“Maggie.”
“Yes.”
Ruth looked at him.
“You helped her.”
“I was working.”
“You knelt on the floor in front of half the town and helped her pick up broken dishes while the manager was shouting.”
Ruth had forgotten.
Jonah had not.
“You cut your hand.”
She looked down automatically.
The scar remained faintly near her thumb.
“You remember that too.”
“Yes.”
Ruth’s chest tightened.
Jonah continued.
“Then later I heard the manager tell you he was docking the broken dishes from Maggie’s wages.”
Ruth smiled faintly.
“I told him he wasn’t.”
“You told him if he did, you’d quit before Saturday supper.”
“I did.”
“Three hundred customers expected that meal.”
“The manager reconsidered.”
Jonah’s mouth curved.
“Exactly.”
For a moment Ruth forgot Silas Pierce.
Forgot Edwin.
Forgot the scandal.
Forgot she was wearing a wedding dress in a bedroom while her shirtless husband intended to sleep with livestock.
She simply looked at Jonah.
“You remembered all that.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you speak to me?”
His smile faded.
“I was married.”