Cliques had been cast, relationships formed, and Ginger was an oddball whom no one really knew.
After high school, she had to fight tooth and nail to get her parents to agree to pay for her LPN and RN degrees. Her mother wanted her to go Asbury University in nearby Lexington, where she could have studied youth ministry or French, but Ginger had stayed firm in her desire to nurse, and her parents had finally acquiesced, under the condition that Ginger continue to live at McHuid Farm under their watchful eye. She, in turn, had moved out to her Gran’s empty cottage, which had made her mother fuming angry, though technically, Ginger reminded her, she was still living on the farm.
These would have been small victories in someone else’s life, but in Ginger’s, which had been under the oppressive eyes of her parents since her early childhood, they felt huge. They felt like proof that she was growing up and looking for a life of her own.
But now? Stopping work and getting married to her parents’ chosen mate at twenty-one? Suddenly she felt like the six-year-old girl with a broken heart all over again. Small and helpless, at the mercy of her parents’ decisions and control. Something about her life right now felt like giving up, felt aimless, and it scared her that when she got married, she’d just disappear a little more.
Of course, Woodman had an answer for that. He didn’t want her to disappear. Aside from being his wife, he had another job all laid out for her, and just last night they’d had another little tiff about it.
Rolling away from her, he’d sighed, pulling off the condom and tying a knot in the end before throwing it in the trash. With his back still to her, he said, “Any idea when we might stop usin’ these, darlin’?”
It wasn’t the first time he’d asked, but she had noticed that as their wedding approached, he asked with increasing frequency.
“What? Condoms?”
He turned to her, putting his hands on his naked hips and raising his eyebrows.
She averted her eyes from his naked body. Turning onto her back, she reached under the covers for her pajama bottoms and pulled them back up to her waist. “I’m not ready to start a family.”
“Gin, you’re twenty-one. I’m twenty-four. We’re gettin’ married in two months, and between my pension and paycheck, we’re more’n comfortable.” He reached down for his boxers and pulled them on, sitting on the edge of the bed and twisting to face her. His voice was gentle. “We’ve got this sweet little house. You’re not workin’ anymore. You want kids, don’t you?”
Sure she did. In a roundabout, someday sort of way she wanted kids, but not yet. She wanted to go back to work, maybe even travel a little—have a little fun together before they were tied down forever.
“Not yet.”
Woodman sighed, lying down on the bed and pillowing his hands under his head. “Everyone expects us to start a family right away.”
She clenched her eyes shut. Everyone expected them to date. Everyone expected them to get engaged. Everyone expected her to quit her job. Everyone expected her to marry Woodman. Now kids?
Who gives a sh—snit what they want? It’s your life, not theirs.
Her heart clutched from the sound of Cain’s voice in her head, but she ignored it as she always did and opened her eyes. “And we will. Someday.”
“You happy, baby?” Woodman asked, turning his head to look at her. His eyes dropped to her pajama top, which had remained on while they’d had sex, and he frowned before looking back up at her. “Tell me the truth, you happy to be marryin’ me?”
“Course,” she said.
“’Cause sometimes you don’t seem . . .”
She took a deep breath and held it, knowing what was coming.
He shrugged. “You don’t seem . . . into it.”
“The weddin’?” she asked.
His cheeks flushed. For all that he’d spent his childhood watching horses breed, when it came to talking about sex with her, he was clumsy. “No, baby. Us.”
She hated this conversation. She hated it because the wall of cloudy glass that she’d erected was very thin, and tapping on it too much could break it, bring it down, force them to face the truth that Gran was right and they were wrong—there was a place in human life for a marriage based on friendship, but it wasn’t when you were twenty-one years old.
Her stomach turned over. “Wouldn’t have said yes if I didn’t want to marry you.”