No Greater Love - Eris Field Page 0,6

“Like everything, you have to use it to keep it.”

“And your Turkish?” Pieter posed the question gently.

“I had a friend, Emine, a wonderful Turkish-American friend. We went through nursing school together, and whenever we were together, we spoke Turkish.” With a dry laugh, she added, “I tried to teach her Dutch but she said that it was too hard and she would never need it.”

“You say, you had a friend?” Pieter risked asking.

“She married and moved to Amsterdam.” She held out her hand for his empty glass.

“Perhaps she would have benefited from those Dutch lessons you offered.” He handed her his glass with a murmured, “thank you,” and then asked as an afterthought, “Is her husband Dutch?”

“Yes. A psychiatrist. His name is Marc van Etten. She invited me to visit them but . . .” Her voice trailed off and then she turned to Carl. “You have to tell the rest of the story.”

“I’m afraid that I wandered off the topic.” He shifted in his chair. “My Uncle Henrick taught his son, Roel, the craft of copper designing that his father had taught him, but, for me, he followed my father’s wishes. He sent me to a school that prepared boys for college and then he sent me to college, a Jesuit one.” He shrugged philosophically. “My father would have understood.” He smiled at Janan. “And now we come to you. When Roel was in his mid-fifties, he spent several months in Turkey, in Erzincan, learning new techniques for creating hammered copper designs from the masters there. He worked with Janan’s father and got to know the family. Two years later, when he learned of the terrible earthquake that destroyed so much of Erzincan, he went back and found Janan in an orphanage, the only member of the family to have survived. He and his wife had no children and so they adopted Janan and raised her as their daughter.”

“And that is how you became my honorary Uncle Carl.” Janan’s voice was husky as she gazed at Carl, lost in memories, and then she stood up and said briskly, “Pieter has heard enough stories.” She motioned toward the back of the house. “We’ll eat in the kitchen.” She glanced at Pieter and stated matter-of-factly, “The dining room area is drafty in the winter.”

“Something smells delicious.” Carl sniffed. “Bay leaves, rosemary, and thyme. Dare I hope for lamb shanks?”

Pieter followed Carl down the hall and paused at the door of the kitchen. A round maple table circled by four maple captain chairs was placed in a window alcove that overlooked a tiny back garden dominated by a tall popular tree and a well-rounded mulberry tree.

Janan noticed his appraisal of the trees. “Carl planted them soon after I came,” she said simply as though that explained their presence and urged him into the kitchen.

The kitchen was small and had the well-scrubbed look of a Dutch kitchen but it was the lavender Aga stove that stopped Pieter just inside the door.

Carl smiled, noticing Pieter’s gaze. “You are wondering why I have an Aga here in this small American village, aren’t you?” He chuckled. “I must warn you it requires another story, but a short one.” He motioned Pieter to the table where brown quail-patterned plates were carefully arranged on pistachio-green linen placemats, and thin tulip-shaped wineglasses stood beside each plate hinting at the promise of a robust Bordeaux.

Janan paused in her efforts to push an old corkscrew opener into the cork of a wine bottle clamped under her arm. “Please sit down.”

“Allow me?” Pieter said as he eased the wine bottle from her grasp with one hand, the back of his hand inadvertently grazing the side of her breast, and, with the other, took the corkscrew opener from her hand.

Janan felt a tingle run up her spine. The brush of Pieter’s cool fingers had provoked a feeling that she’d never known, a yearning to be held in a man’s arms, to feel a strong, hard body pressed against hers. She felt again that moment in the snow—his cheek pressed against hers and his arms holding her firmly against him. She turned away quickly, bending over the oven to hide the blush that she could feel staining her cheeks. She removed the casserole of lamb shanks surrounded by carrots, onions, potatoes and mushrooms and, after sprinkling the fragrant gremolata mixture of lemon zest, chopped parsley, and crushed garlic that Carl loved over the top, placed it on the table. With a quick turn, she