Read Online The Amish Christmas Sleigh by Kelly Long - Free Book Online Page B

being alive . . .” And in love!
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    On Monday morning, Kate squared her shoulders when she entered Sebastian’s cabin and decided to tackle the gloomy and piled-up living area. She first surveyed the vague shapes of furniture buried under clothes and papers. There appeared to be a comfortable cushioned couch and an old chair and a massive desk. She decided to start with the desk and possibly try to organize some of the papers that protruded from drawers and cubbyholes in the beautiful old piece of furniture.
    She was an hour into organizing things into piles when she realized she kept bumping her arm on the stuffed middle drawer. She gave it a hesitant pull and realized it was stuck. She sighed and gave one more tug and the wood gave, leaving her on her backside with the drawer full of papers. She had to laugh at herself. She had gotten to her knees to replace things when a crumpled sheet of light blue paper caught her eye in the back of the drawer space. For some strange reason, she felt her heart begin to pound as she reached for the paper, but she felt drawn to it nonetheless.
    So far, she’d organized things by brief glances but when she touched the blue paper, she felt the urge to read it and pulled it hesitantly toward her. She reached up and adjusted the lamp, then felt a hesitation in her spirit, a sense that she should leave the crumpled page alone, but she rationalized that one look could not hurt. She unfolded the page and realized that a newspaper clipping was crumpled inside the official-looking print of the paper.
    To her great surprise, she realized that it was a parole letter for one Sebastian C. Christner. . . . Her eyes skimmed the document, and she felt a sickening in her stomach when she saw the words “speeding” and “involuntary manslaughter.” Then she turned her attention to the newspaper piece. The faded headline seemed to glare menacingly up at her—“Amish Man Kills Amish Woman.”
    â€œWhat are you doing?”
    Sebastian’s voice was low and confused, and she looked up hastily to see him standing near the desk in his hat and coat, his long dark pants covered with a dusting of snow.
    â€œI—I was cleaning and found this. I’m sorry . . .” She held the papers up to him and swallowed.
    He stared down at her outstretched hand, then took the papers from her. “I was just coming in to tell you the truth about this, Kate.”
    She rose to her feet and hugged her arms about herself. “I guess I find that hard to believe.”
    â€œWhy? Because now you think I’m a murderer?”
    She shivered in spite of herself. “Are you?”
    He glared at her, his normally light eyes darkened with pent-up emotion. “I need to explain.”
    â€œAll right,” she said slowly.
    He sighed and took off his hat, running his hand through his hair. “I was nineteen and it was my rumspringa. I had been drinking a bit at an Englisch party . . . wearing Englisch clothes . . . Someone offered to let me take their sports car for a ride. I remember that the roads were icy—but I didn’t care. I thought I could handle the vehicle. I came around a sharp turn too fast and hit an Amisch buggy head-on. . . . I remember hearing a child scream, and then I got out and went to the buggy. The horse was dead, but the buggy . . . the buggy. Well, the mother had been killed instantly by the collision, and the children with her—there were two of them—they’d been bumped around but were all right. I—I knew them. They were from my own community. My family and the church forgave me, but I had to get away and start over. I haven’t seen them since.” He drew a harsh breath. “I spent six years in prison and then was on parole. It was in prison that I learned how to carve toys. . . .”
    Kate’s mind telescoped back to the buggy accident that she’d been in when her parents died.... “It was the