Fraying at the Edge by Cindy Woodsmall Read Free Book Online Page A

standing. There’s more red cabbage to make into coleslaw. Some beets and Brussels sprouts are continuing to produce. Some years we’re still gardening during the first snow flurries.”
    “No way.” Why did she continue to sound like someone who cared? She glanced at Martha, imagining the sweet wedding-cake girl in a tattered winter coat and no gloves while gathering food for supper. Why did that image bother Skylar?
    “Maybe you should choose gardening,” Isaac said. “It’s coupled with the chores of canning and meal preparation, but a lot of people find working with the dirt to be healing. I do. No matter what difficult thing is going on, when I’m planting or harvesting crops, I feel better and think and sleep better.”
    “I don’t need any healing.” Did these people just say anything that was on their minds while everyone was in the room?
    And to think she’d almost felt bad for planning to go behind their backs in order to reach Cody. Not anymore. They didn’t want to connect with their new daughter. They wanted slave labor. That’s all.
    When she left here, she didn’t intend to be a part of either family—Brenneman or Nash. And certainly not a Jenkins, because Nicholas was a pain. She would head to New York or L.A., and she would never look back.

A bram slung a bundle of shingles onto his shoulder and toted the sixty-plus pounds up the ladder. This part of the neighborhood had no residents, only homes in various stages of completion.
    “Abram.” Jackson’s tattoo flattened and inflated as he slid a shingle into place and shot several nails into it. “You okay?”
    “Ya.” Abram tossed the bundle onto the roof and dug in his pocket for his lock-blade knife. He pulled out the blade, ready to rip the paper off the shingles.
    “Hold up. Don’t open those.”
    Abram closed his knife. “Why not?”
    Jackson rocked back to sit on his haunches while looking at Abram. “Because we don’t need any more bundles of black shingles, especially since that color doesn’t go on this house.”
    Abram looked to the ground below at the two stacks of roofing materials, one on this side of the driveway and one on the other. He’d spent the last thirty minutes getting bundles from the far side of the driveway. How had that not dawned on him?
    “I just realized the mistake as you were climbing up.” Jackson shifted until he was sitting on the roof. “You’ve been distracted lately. No biggie. Just take a breather for now.”
    Abram’s knees were a bit weak, and he sat. He knew exactly where his mind was—Ariana. She had been the confident one, his safety net when he needed to talk, someone who could help him get through everyday encounters. Now that she was gone, he wasn’t quite sure how to function. He was sick with worry about her, and he didn’t know what to do about that either.
    Sitting on this roof, looking at dozens of unfinished homes, watching other workers on the ground moving about, he had one clear thought: he couldn’t let the café go under while Ariana was gone.
    “I don’t think I can keep this job.”
    “Why? We’ve been a team for three months. And you’re good at roofing when your mind is where your body is. I gotta say it’s bothered me to watch you go from extremely focused to superscattered over the last month. I’m not the boss, so there’s no need to explain anything to me. I just wanted to get that off my chest.”
    Abram should string together a few more words. Ariana would want that of him. “I’m not dying. No one I know is dying. So you know…I’m fine.”
    “Ah, so that’s how it is. If you’re not gut shot and none of your buddies are gut shot, everything is just fine.” Jackson propped his forearms on his knees and interlaced his fingers. “The Amish guys you arrive with each day seem to have had your back since your focus disappeared. I’m guessing they know what’s going on, right?”
    “Ya. They know.”
    The local Amish community knew the