We watched the rebel men leave with torches on horses where darkness and distance shrunk the flames into harmless embers. We all let go of a collective sigh. Even Mr. Greeley was coaxed out from hiding and joined us on the front porch.

Jake reassured my hired hands on the homestead that the old soldiers would not bother us again. "They got what they came here for. No sense in letting any fear linger."

I wanted to say I was haunted by what happened. But I was relieved Horace was exposed for his deception. Jake took my hand and walked me away from the front porch beneath a crescent moon where the cool air heightened my senses. I took advantage of the private moment and whispered in his ear, words slipping from my tongue with no where else to go. Vulnerable. "Well, Jake McCord, did you find what you came here fer?"

As his eyes shined in the evening beneath a billion stars, I was like butter on a hot skillet. "You got me, Jane, I didn't come here to see an ear of corn or run my fingers through your soil. It's always been about you. You brought me back to life. You're given me a second chance."


Jake took me away from the others into the corn rows where we could be alone. The earthy smell took hold. I breathed in the sweet savor of the corn, I breathed in his skin. He held me around my waist. "After your husband died, I wanted to kill the man, myself. I didn't want him to hang. I wanted to take him from jail and choke him to death. But what I knew was right took hold. Instead, I dove into taking care of you and the expected child. It saved me."

I clung to his words, as if they kept me from falling into a bottomless well.

"The good Lord has given me a second chance after you were left for dead in the war." Tears pressed against my eyes until they simmered inside."

"Will..." Jake cleared his throat. I gulped at the ring he produced that shimmered in the night. "Will you marry me, Jane Taylor? Will you be my wife?"

Words failed me in the moment. I nodded. My heart pecked like a trapped bird. "I will marry you Jake McCord. I know it be God's will."

Then Jake looked at me with doubt. "But do you love me, Jane?"

As he held me around the waist, I hugged his neck. I kept his eyes on me with my words. "I know what you think. I can't love another since my husband. But I've been taught I can love again for all the right reasons. Life on the prairie and this homestead is a hard scrabble. And some marriages, they be for convenience sake. But I do love you. I love you in a way all our own, Jake McCord."

We kissed long and deep. I'd almost forgot what it was like to feel the firm warmth of another man against me. And I was lost, as if the others on the porch disappeared and the stalks of corn hid us from the whole world under a canopy of darkness.

Jake slipped the ring on my finger. And suddenly, I realized fireflies filled the sky, as if there should be a celebration of life. They were sparks of hope in the depth of darkness.

Psalm 27:13
I had fainted unless I had believed
To see the goodness of the Lord
In the land of the living