My Own People Betrayed Me at My Engagement Barbecue, So I Took the Hill Back novel · Chapter 10 of 24
Chapter 10: The Harvest Dance
The Verein hall holds four hundred people.
On the night of the harvest dance it held every family who had ever tipped a hat to my father.
I wore my mother's green dress, taken in at the waist, and I walked through the double doors on Cade's arm.
He had put on a white shirt and a black string tie, and he had gotten a haircut.
The floor was full of couples going round to a polka.
The whole hall saw us at once and did not stop dancing.
They only turned their heads.
"Breathe," Cade said.
"I am," I said.
"You're squeezing my arm."
"Good."
I had barely let go when Kurt came across the floor.
He wore his navy suit and his good boots, and he held his shoulders square.
"Tilly," he said, and held out both hands.
I did not take them.
"I owe you the truth," Kurt said, loudly enough for the nearest tables.
"I was a coward. I should have come to you in August."
It was a fine speech.
The women near us softened their faces.
"Britta is carrying my child, and that child is a Wiedenfeld cousin on the hill," Kurt went on. "Come home. Be her sister."
"We'll raise this baby on the ranch as one family."
Cade stood up straight beside me and said nothing.
His hand came to rest at the small of my back, warm and heavy and perfectly still.
I looked at the man I had agreed to marry.
His eyes were brown and kind and had never once been tested.
"You told three hundred people before you told me," I said.
"That's all I need to know about the family you want me to join."
His mouth opened.
At the next table, an old man put down his beer.
"Tilly..." Kurt said.
"Enjoy the dance, Kurt."
I turned my back on him.
Cade looked down at me, and for the first time all night he smiled.
The rest of this chapter is part of the paid portion of the series. Chapters 1–6 of My Own People Betrayed Me at My Engagement Barbecue, So I Took the Hill Back are free to read — start from the beginning, then unlock the rest with coins in the app.
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