Home to Paradise Read online

  Home to Paradise

  Other books by Barbara Cameron

  The Quilts of Lancaster County Series

  A Time to Love

  A Time to Heal

  A Time for Peace

  Annie’s Christmas Wish

  The Stitches in Time Series

  Her Restless Heart

  The Heart’s Journey

  Heart in Hand

  The Quilts of Love Series

  Scraps of Evidence

  The Amish Road Series

  A Road Unknown

  Crossroads

  One True Path

  The Coming Home Series

  Return to Paradise

  Seasons in Paradise

  Home to Paradise

  Copyright © 2017 Barbara Cameron

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, except as may be expressly permitted by the 1976 Copyright Act or in writing from the publisher. Requests for permission can be addressed to Permissions, The United Methodist Publishing House, 2222 Rosa L. Parks Blvd., P.O. Box 280988, Nashville, TN, 37228-0988 or e-mailed to [email protected].

  The persons and events portrayed in this work of fiction are the creations of the author, and any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

  Published in association with Books & Such Literary Management.

  Macro Editor: Teri Wilhelms

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Cameron, Barbara, 1949- author. | Cameron, Barbara, 1949- Coming home series.

  Title: Home to Paradise / Barbara Cameron.

  Description: Nashville : Abingdon Press, [2017] | Series: The coming home series

  Identifiers: LCCN 2016037700 (print) | LCCN 2016044550 (ebook) | ISBN 9781426769931 (pbk.) | ISBN 9781501837630 (e-book)

  Subjects: LCSH: Amish—Fiction. | Paradise (Lancaster County, Pa.)—Fiction.

  Classification: LCC PS3603.A4473 H66 2017 (print) | LCC PS3603.A4473 (ebook) | DDC 813/.6—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016037700

  Scripture quotations from The Authorized (King James) Version. Rights in the Authorized Version in the United Kingdom are vested in the Crown. Reproduced by permission of the Crown’s patentee, Cambridge University Press.

  For Barbara Scott and Ramona Richards

  and for women who share their love

  of quilting with others

  A Note to the Reader

  Many readers who are familiar with the Amish allowing their children to join the church in their adulthood ask me how many actually decide to stay in the community.

  The number is surprisingly high—statistics say as high as 90 percent. I believe this is because Amish families form very strong bonds because of their commitment to their faith, to each other, to extended family, and to their community.

  Remaining apart from the outside influences of those they call the Englisch means the family and community can influence values important to them.

  But to make sure that their children have free will to join, the Amish allow their teenagers to explore the nearby Englisch community. It’s a period they call rumschpringe or “running around.”

  The idea came to me to write a series about three brothers who leave the Amish community and the three sisters who love them and want them to return. The sisters love the brothers—have for years—and want them to return to their family, their friends, and their church.

  The series made me think about what home, family, and the place we live mean to us. The loss of those people and places also interested me and found their way into the series.

  Lavina Zook loved David Stoltzfus and brought him back to the Amish community in Return to Paradise, Book 1, and Mary Elizabeth, Lavina’s sister, convinced Sam, David’s brother, to return as well in Book 2, Seasons in Paradise. Now, in Home to Paradise, Book 3, Rose Anna has a real challenge bringing John, the third Stoltzfus brother, back to the Amish community.

  Someone once said, “Home is where your story begins.” Abingdon Press has been my writing home since 2009, helping me bring my stories of hope and faith and love to readers. I will never be able to thank all the wonderful people for their hard work bringing my words to readers in beautiful editions. Few writers get an opportunity to work with such dedicated and caring staff. Thank you to all of you.

  I also want to thank Tom Vickers and Monica Peters for their tireless encouragement.

  And, as always, thank you to God for giving me life and the inspiration to share His faith and belief in us.

  1

  Snow fell quietly, cold and white. Inside the big old farmhouse where Rose Anna had lived all her life it was warm. A fire crackled in the hearth, the only sound in the room.

  Rose Anna glanced around the sewing room. Usually she and her three schweschders sat chatting and sewing with their mudder, sometimes singing a hymn as they worked. Today it was just her and her mudder.

  She sighed. “So here you sit with your old maedel dochder, Mamm.”

  Linda laughed. “I hardly think you’re an old maedel at twenty-three, Rose Anna.”

  She knotted a thread, clipped it with scissors, and squinted as she rethreaded her needle. “I feel like one,” she said, pouting a little. “Both of my schweschders are married, and so are lots of my friends. I have been a newehocker at so many weddings!” She made a face as she began stitching on her quilt again.

  “Guder mariye!”

  Rose Anna glanced up. “Ach, here comes my newly married schweschder.”

  The three Zook schweschders were often confused for each other because they looked so much alike with oval faces, big blue eyes, and hair a honey blonde. They’d been born just a year apart, so they’d grown up close. Rose Anna was the youngest—something her two older schweschders never let her forget.

  “Mary Elizabeth, it’s gut to see you. Kumm, sit by the fire and get warm. You look cold.”

  She leaned down and kissed her mudder’s cheek. “Lavina’s on her way up.”

  Linda brightened and turned to look in the direction of the door. When Lavina walked in a moment later, her face fell. “Where’s Mark?”

  Lavina laughed and shook her head. “You mean you’re not glad to see me?”

  “Well, schur,” Linda said quickly. “But I thought you were bringing my grosssohn.”

  “He was fussy and stayed up most of the night, so now he’s sleeping.” Lavina sank into a chair. “Waneta said she’d mind him so I could get out for a bit. She told me she wouldn’t let him sleep all day so he’d keep us up again.”

  “You look like you need a nap,” Rose Anna told her.

  “It’s tempting, but I need to stay to my goal of finishing this quilt,” she said as she threaded a needle.

  “Could he be teething already?”

  Lavina shuddered. “I hope not. He’s not three months old yet. I’ve heard about teething from my friends.”

  Soon it was like it had been for so long, everyone chattering and sewing, the mood as bright and cheerful as the fire.

  But Rose Anna felt a growing restlessness. She put her quilt aside, went downstairs to make tea for their break, and found herself staring out the kitchen window. The trees were bare and black against the gray sky. Snow had stopped falling, coating everything with a white blanket that lay undisturbed. She found herself pacing the kitchen as she waited for the kettle to boil.

  Finally, she knew she had to get out and burn off her restless energy.

  “I’m going for a walk,” she announced when her mudder and schweschders came downstairs. She pu
lled on rubber boots and her bonnet, then shrugged on her coat. “I won’t be long.”

  “But, kind, it’s cold out there,” her mudder protested.

  “I need to walk. ’Bye.”

  “She’ll be fine, Mamm,” she heard Lavina say behind her before she closed the back door.

  Funny, her older schweschder reassuring their mudder.

  She started off down the road, watching for cars and staying well to the right. Smoke billowed from chimneys as she passed farms. Fields lay sleeping under the snow. The only sound was her boots crunching snow.

  Usually she loved this time of year when life was slower, easier. All the planting, harvesting, canning was over. Farmers spent time in their barns repairing harnesses and equipment and planned their spring planting. Women occupied themselves with sewing and knitting and mending clothes. Kinner grew restive being cooped up and begged to go outside and build snowmen.

  The Stoltzfus farm came into view. Lavina had married David, the oldest sohn, and lived there now. Mary Elizabeth had married Sam, the middle sohn. And she, the youngest Zook schweschder, had hoped to marry John, the youngest bruder.

  John’s truck, a bright red pickup, was parked out front of David and Lavina’s farm. She wondered what he was doing home during a workday. Her feet slowed as she frowned and worried. Was his dat ill again? Surely Lavina would have said something. Amos had been cured of his cancer for quite some time now.

  John came out of the farmhouse carrying a box of clothes and walked toward the truck, then he saw her. “Need a ride?”

  “Nee, danki,” she said, lifting her chin and walking past him. She might have to be pleasant to him in front of family, but she’d never forgive him for not wanting her anymore.

  If she was honest with herself, though, she didn’t need to see John to be reminded of him most days. The three Stoltzfus bruders looked so much alike they could have been triplets—tall, square-jawed, with dark blue eyes so often serious. John wore his brown, almost black hair in an Englisch cut because he still lived in that world.

  Rose Anna heard the truck engine start, and the next thing she knew John was pulling up beside her. He stopped and the window on the passenger side slid down. “You’re sure you don’t want a ride?”

  “I said nee, danki,” she repeated, and her words sounded as cold as the air she was breathing. She’d rather freeze to death than get into his truck.

  His driving the Englisch vehicle was one of the many sources of friction between him and his dat. John was the last of the Stoltzfus bruders who had moved to town after not getting along with their dat and the last to reconcile with him and rejoin the Amish community. The only reason he was living here now was because Sam and Mary Elizabeth had married, and John could no longer afford the apartment he’d shared with Sam.

  Mary Elizabeth had confided to her that she and Sam had asked John to move in with them. She wondered if that was the reason for John carrying the box out to the truck just now.

  It was nice that they had offered when they’d only been married a few months and moved into their own farm down the road.

  But whether he lived at his old home, or with Sam and Mary Elizabeth instead of in town, it meant that she was going to have to see him more often and that rankled.

  Rose Anna glared at the truck. Later, she’d chide herself for childishness. She found herself reaching down to a drift of snow at the side of the road, packing it into a hard ball in her hands, and throwing it at the truck as he accelerated away.

  It hit the glass window of the truck cab, dead-on—no surprise since she was great at softball. He slammed on the brakes, then he got out and stood staring at her, his hands on his hips.

  “Why’d you do that?” he demanded.

  She turned on her heel and began stomping back toward home.

  And that was when she felt something thump her on the back. She turned and saw him forming another snowball with his hands.

  Frowning, she bent, quickly scooped up snow in her hands, formed another ball, and hit him in the center of the chest before he could lob another at her. She took off running toward the Stoltzfus farm and made it to the front door just as he got her with another ball of snow. Doors here weren’t locked in the middle of the day. She slipped inside before he could hit her again and found herself staring at Amos sitting in his recliner reading the newspaper.

  “Guder mariye,” she said politely. “Is Waneta home?”

  He closed his mouth that had fallen open at her abrupt entrance and nodded. “In the kitchen.”

  Rose Anna brushed the snow from her coat and wiped her feet before walking there. Waneta stood at the big kitchen table kneading bread.

  “I was just out and thought I’d stop by,” she said brightly. She spun around when she heard footsteps behind her.

  John strolled in just then. “I think you forgot something,” he said, pushing a handful of loose snow in her face.

  “John! Whatever are you doing?” his mudder cried, looking appalled.

  “She started it,” he told her and he strolled out, chuckling.

  Rose Anna wiped the snow from her face and grinned at Waneta as the older woman hurried over with a dish towel to dry her off. “He’s right. I did. I don’t know what got into me.”

  She did know, but she wasn’t going to tell the woman she’d hoped would be her mother-in-law one day. It just hurt too much to share with her how badly her sohn had hurt her when he turned his back on their relationship and left the Amish community.

  ***

  John knew he was going to hear from his mother about what he’d done when he returned for the rest of his things. And undoubtedly, if she told his father, he’d have a word or two or three with him for sure.

  But it had been worth it to see the look of utter shock on Rose Anna’s face and to rub the snow on that cold face of hers.

  Boy, the woman sure could hold a grudge.

  Icy water dripped down his neck as the snowball she’d hit him with melted. He found himself grinning as he turned up the heater, slipped his favorite CD into the player, and turned the volume to full blast.

  He jumped when he heard the siren behind him and caught a glimpse of flashing lights in his rearview mirror. A quick glance at the speedometer sent a chill down his spine that had nothing to do with Rose Anna’s snowballs. Great, he thought, hitting the brakes and signaling that he was moving over onto the shoulder of the road.

  The police cruiser pulled up behind him, and an officer appeared at the side of the truck. John lowered the window, and a blast of cold air rushed in.

  “Do you know how fast you were going?” the officer asked him, sounding testy.

  “Uh, no sir. Not exactly.”

  “Twenty miles over the speed limit.”

  He winced. “Sorry.”

  “Let me see your license and registration, please.”

  John handed him the license and leaned over to get the registration out of the glove compartment.

  “Truck’s not in your name.” The officer peered at him with suspicion.

  “I’m buying it from my brother.”

  All he got was a grunt. “Sit tight. I’ll be right back.”

  John shivered and rolled the window back up. Minutes ticked by. Long, long minutes. Was he going to jail? He tapped his fingers on the steering wheel and shivered. No way was he starting the engine to turn on the heater and having the cop think he was going to make a run for it.

  Make a run for it. Now he sounded like one of the shows he’d watched on the tiny television he and Sam used to have in the apartment they’d shared in town.

  Another police cruiser pulled up. Oh man, he thought. Two officers? I must be in big trouble.

  The officer who appeared at his driver’s side window wore a bulky jacket over the police uniform, but he saw it was a female—a familiar one.

  “Hey, John,” she said, pushing up the brim of her hat so that he saw it was Kate Kraft. “How’s it going?”

  “Not so well. I
didn’t realize how fast I was going.”

  “There’s a lot of horsepower under that hood,” she told him easily. She turned as the male officer strode up and joined them. “I know John,” she said. “He is buying the truck from his brother Sam.”

  “Thanks,” the man said, handing John his identification. “I’ll let you off with a warning this time,” he told him. “Get that paperwork straightened out as fast as you can.”

  “I will. Thank you, Officer.”

  The man nodded and returned to his car.

  “Everything okay?” she asked, studying him.

  “Yeah. I thought I was in big trouble when a second officer showed up.”

  “Officer Smith called me when he saw your name on your license. I’m often called in if an officer thinks he needs someone who knows Pennsylvania Dietsch.” She tilted her head. “So, speeding?”

  “Yeah, I just wasn’t paying attention. The truck really moves.”

  She grinned. “Faster than one of the buggy horses you used to drive, huh?”

  “Yeah. Lots.”

  A gust of wind tossed a flurry of snow at Kate’s jacket. “Well, I better go. Keep an eye on that speedometer. Officer Smith gives just one warning.”

  “It won’t happen again.”

  “Good. Okay, I’m headed home. Drive careful.”

  “You, too,” he said, then wondered if he should have said it. Police officers always drove carefully, didn’t they? Since she didn’t make any comment and was walking away he decided he hadn’t offended. After rolling up the window, he started the engine, checked for traffic, and drove out onto the road.

  John pulled into the drive of his family home and was careful to park to one side. No way was he giving his father an excuse to fuss if he needed to pull the buggy out the next day before John went to work. Not that his father went anywhere early, but he’d fuss anyway if he was blocked in.

  He parked, locked the truck, and hurried toward the house. The wind was picking up, slapping snow into his face. He grimaced, remembering how Rose Anna had thrown snowballs at him earlier.

  When he opened the door to the kitchen, he let in a blast of cold air. His mother looked up from a pot she was stirring on the stove.