Whoopie Pie Bakers: Volume Two (Amish Romance Short Story Serial): Kneeling to Heaven Read online

  Whoopie Pie Bakers

  Volume Two: Kneeling to Heaven

  By

  Sicily Yoder

  Dutch Farms Books

  ~*~

  Copyright 2012 byDutch Farms Books. All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form either written or electronically without the express permission of the author or publisher. This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination and are therefore used fictitiously. Any similarity or resemblance to the actual persons; living or dead, places or events are purely coincidental and beyond the intent of the author or publisher.

  Photos courtesy of Photo Bucket, I Stock, vso@BigStock and , Paha_L@BigStock, and the author. Scriptures were taken from the KJV.

  “For me and my house, we shall serve the Lord.”

  ~DEDICATION~

  To my fellow Christian authors. You inspire me. To Christ for loving me enough to die for my sins. To my family, who puts up with Papa John’s pizza on nights that I am on deadline. To Hertz Rental Car, who provides my car rental needs for research for my books. To my author friends who have helped in reviewing, book cover, and interior layout feedback, and just being there to chat with me on Facebook. To my former Kentucky State Trooper friend, Gene Stratton, for being there for me after my car wreck. No book tours would take place without you.

  WHOOPIE PIE BAKERS

  9 VOLUME SERIAL

  Volume 1: Silvery Snowflakes on Lancaster

  Volume 2:Kneeling to Heaven

  Volume 3: Amish Heart

  Volume 4: Heavenly Homecoming

  Volume 5: Special Friends

  Volume 6: A Change of Heart

  Volume 7: Amish Forgiveness

  Volume 8: An Amish Wedding

  Volume 9: Amish Romance

  Other Books by Sicily Yoder

  Amish Blizzards

  Amish Winter Love

  An Amish Winter Surprise

  An Autumn Wind in Walnut Creek

  Amish Garden: 50 Slow Cooker Recipes

  Christmas in Sugarcreek

  Frontier Kisses

  Heaven Driven

  White Christmas Fudge

  Whoopie Pie Bakers

  ~DEDICATION~

  ~AMISH WORDS~

  ~CHAPTER FOUR~

  ~CHAPTER FIVE~

  ~CHAPTER SIX~

  ~CHAPTER SEVEN~

  ~CHAPTER EIGHT~

  ~AMISH WORDS~

  Danki, Thank You

  Fraa, wife

  Schwester, sister

  Bruder, brother

  Haus, house

  Milich Haus, milk house

  Schwester, Sister

  Gut, Good

  Wunderbar, wonderful

  Grossmammi, Grandmother

  Grossdaedi, Grandfather

  Jah, Yes

  Gut Mariye, Good Morning

  Gut Nacht, good Night

  Gott, God

  Boppli, baby

  Kinner, children

  Menner, men

  Vorsinger, the Man who leads the song service at church

  Uffgevva, to give up ego to trust in God’s will

  Wie bist du heit, It is nice to meet you

  Wasser, water

  Blaeckbier, blackberry

  Dach-weggeli, wagon

  Schuldiner, debtor

  Shtill hokka, member meeting

  Chite, fit in morals

  Du dosht nelt, you may not

  Ich glie de, I love you

  Mamm, Mother

  Daed, Dad

  Rumspringa, going away period for the youth to experience the world

  Familye, family

  ~CHAPTER FOUR~

  Esther Miller sat in Bishop Smucker’s haus and busied herself with counting the wooden planks along the living room’s floor. The living room had an oversized couch, three hand-carved wooden rockers, and a handcrafted, cherry coffee table that housed the latest issue of Keepers at Home and The Budget. The bishop’s wife came walking in, stray baby-fine black hair escaping from beneath her white prayer kapp, and handed Esther a cup of hot tea.

  “Danki,” Esther said as she nervously grabbed the slender teacup and matching saucer. “Hot tea always calms a soul.”

  A gentle smile touched the bishop’s fraa’s lips as she rubbed her hands on her long black apron. “I have buttermilk biscuits in the oven. It’ll go gut with some of our sugar-cured ham.” Wrinkles relaxed across the bishop’s fraa’s face as she stood there, studied Esther. “You look a bit uneasy, Esther. Relax. You’re still a member of our church.”

  “Jah, but I know I will be shunned.” Esther pouted, and the bishop’s fraa, Bertha, sighed.

  “But you don’t know that for sure. Now make yourself at home and enjoy your tea. Lunch will be done in about twenty minutes.” Bertha smiled, then turned and crisscrossed the hardwood floor.

  Esther called out to her, “May I help you with anything, Bertha?” Bertha turned, shook her head before disappearing into the kitchen. Esther examined two small cracks along the handle of the teacup and smaller cracks running across the tiny saucer. Bertha had six small kinner, so cracks were to be expected. Esther took a sip of the hot tea and slowly let it slid down her sore throat. Today had been difficult to say the least, and Jacob Smith hadn’t helped to get her to The Big Apple to catch her schwester, Emma’s, abductor.

  Well, Jacob had physically been there, pretending to help her. She’d sat in his pick-up truck, believed he was sincere.

  He hadn’t been by a longshot. He’d driven her straight to the bishop’s haus to be next in line for The Bann. Jacob thought her going to New York to follow her schwester’s potential abductor was a crazy idea.

  Emotionally, he’d shown no support. How could he betray her trust? Jacob’s deception hurt her, and she wished that he would go back to Berne, Indiana where he’d came from when he was young.

  Jacob bragged about how Berne Amish were so strong and resilient compared to the local Lancaster Amish. Resilient had left Esther’s vocabulary the morning Emma was abducted.

  Esther was sure Jacob would react the same way if someone kidnapped his schwester, even if his actions could result in the Bishop banning him.

  Esther took another sip of the hot tea, thought it pleased her sore throat. It was the end of autumn in Lancaster County, and the winter chill had spread across the hills and sloped down into the sprawling Amish farms.

  However, autumn was good while it lasted. The red sugar gum leaves lit the ground like a fiery furnace. The sweet smell of spiced cider infiltrated the air around Miller Bakery. Crisp air flowed through the back screen door of the bakery, and brown patches pushed its way through the tender leaves.

  Winter was there to stay. Esther took another sip and gripped her fingers against the teacup’s handle. Winter was cold, she thought. Single menner like Jacob were chillier than the turning winter. She thought again. How could he betray her? It wasn’t fair!

  Esther switched her thoughts to Emma’s homecoming. She had to because the more she thought about Jacob, the more she shivered.

  It would be gut to see little Emma home before the first significant snowstorm. She’d been gone five long years, and everyone missed her deep orange freckles, buckteeth, and smiling face. She lit up a room like no other child. Now, Emma would be ten years-old and flying through chapter books. She’d be all bundled up and warm and snug.

  If she was alive.

  And that was the hardest part. No one knew for sure
if Emma had met a bad fate, although everyone hoped and prayed that someone would find the child alive.

  Esther closed her eyes; a feeling of sincere gratitude entered her mind. She was no longer scared of being shunned for wanting to follow the potential bad people to New York City. She had acted as any big schwester would: she’d surged to protect her.

  The bishop came into the living area, his brown eyes glistening behind thin black-framed eyeglasses, his face washed with an ear-to-ear smile. He walked closer to the couch. “I was just at the phone shanty speaking with the Pennsylvania State Police,” he gave a quick nod and added, “that was why I was a bit tardy to our meeting, but I have gut news.”

  “I’m not shunned?” asked Esther, her brow arching high as she pulled the steaming tea away from her face. Her blue eyes lightened as she held a respectful gaze with the bishop.

  “You are shunned,” he said, and Esther flinched, almost spilling the hot tea.

  “But you saved your schwester,” the bishop remarked, and Esther just sat there, her face flushed, her right hand trembling against the teacup handle. Life was so cold, she thought, and it wasn’t fair!

  Esther forced words out, “Only Gott can save my schwester, Bishop Smucker, and Gott is ignoring us right now. He has been for five long years.”

  The bishop’s eyebrow arched and his head shook. “That’s not the gratitude that I’d expect from a young woman who will be reunited with her little schwester within the next three hours.”

  Esther jumped, and the bishop took the hot tea out of her hand and smiled. “They found her? They actually found her?”

  “Jah, and she is on her way down the New Jersey Turnpike right now. She’s well and alive!”

  Esther started crying as Bertha flew into the room and grabbed her, leaning her onto her shoulder. Bertha reached and tucked loose black strands of hair back under Esther’s prayer kapp, smoothly said, “The kidnapper was not among the outlaws. He was your bruder, Raymond.”

  “Raymond had Emma all along!” Esther jerked up, threw her hands over her mouth before releasing them, and wiggled against Bertha’s chest. “She was warm, well-feed, and happy the whole time!”

  “Jah, he was in New York City, and when he got wind of you trying to follow three outlaws to the city, he got scared and decided to bring her back home. He said that she came willingly; she told him that Grossdaedi was sick, so one less little one would be good. She had been calling your bruder Ben.”

  Esther drew quiet. Ben was no longer a member of the community. He had done time in prison for grand theft auto and drugs. He was a lost soul, and everyone was a little edgy when he’d come home for the holidays. “Where is he?”

  “He’s with the FBI and Emma.” The bishop smiled, the lines in his forehead relaxing.

  “At least he’s on the good side of the law this time,” Esther remarked as she gave Bertha a bear hug and smiled. “He’s not used to that at all.”

  “No, they aren’t. And the word is that he wants to meet with me and so does your bruder.” Bishop Smucker’s dark eyes glowed beneath his glasses, and his shiny silvery hair looked like a Christmas blanket of snow.

  Esther’s brow shot upward, “It would be good if Gott reunited our familye back. I miss my bruders. Although they were adopted, I still love them like my real siblings.”

  Bishop Smucker sighed. “We’ll have to see. They are going to have to prove; you know that, don’t you?”

  A slight smile washed over Esther’s face as she agreed. “They need to work hard to prove that they will serve Gott and not man again.”

  The bishop nodded. A joy of the upcoming homecoming filled the air. Emma was coming home.

  Alive.

  In addition, so were Esther’s two adopted bruders. Life was good. Gott was good!

  ~CHAPTER FIVE~

  Esther couldn’t get home fast enough as Jacob Smith drove the large pick-up truck down the country two-lane highway. Brown-tinged leaves hurled with the wind across the rain-slick highway, and the truck was quiet.

  Too quiet.

  “He knows I’m mad at him,” thought Esther as she reached up and tucked loose strands of her charcoal-hued hair under her white prayer kapp. Her nose wiggled and she leaned her head against the cold window, watching the almost-sleeping farmland brace for an early winter. Memories of Jacob’s words about the Berne Amish preoccupied her mind. “Were the Berne Amish really that resilient?” thought Esther as she slid a lingering glance toward Jacob. He held the steering wheel loosely and focused on the road in front of him. Esther wondered how he could act so calm and in control in the seat.

  Of the Englisch world. An Englisch truck. An Englisch path.

  To nowhere.

  But hell.

  Additionally Esther knew it, and she should take the time to talk with him about his chosen path, but she didn’t want to. She felt selfish and only focused on getting home to see her beloved parents’ happy faces. Emma had been found. She was coming home.

  Alive. As she rode in the truck, she thought. Praise Gott, Praise the heavenly angels that had surrounded her. Life couldn’t get any better for Esther.

  But not for Jacob. He’d crossed over. Although Esther was brimming with joy and praise for her familye, she had to consider Jacob’s path. Like an open wound left untreated, his path was broadening him away from Gott. She turned toward him and caught his baby blues. A smile washed over her, and he copied her, his handsome face serene and soothing. He looked like the ultimate future partner.

  If he was saved.

  “He was not,” so Esther thought as she broke the loving gaze and turned her bright blue eyes to her lap. Her eyes deepened, and her hands tightened. It was not a woman’s responsibility to point out the flaws of a man, although the Englisch shoppers that sometimes frequented the bakery were known to talk down to their husbands. Esther was different. She was respectful of the menner. The Bible said that man was formed first and that the wife was to be obedient to her husband. Her mamm had been a very gut role model for this godly rule.

  Esther sighed and thought. What if Jacob lost his soul like her cousin, Frank? Within the blink of an eye, Frank was gone. Wiped out. Taken away. Blotted out.

  Out of the Book of Life.

  “Examine your own life,” Bishop Smucker had always said as Esther had sat in the backless wooden bench every-other-Sunday for church service. Surely, Jacob had been listening over the years. Esther would remind him, “You ever listen to Bishop Smucker as he asks us Christians to examine our own lives before looking at others?”

  “Of course, and if this conversation will be directed toward me, I find it rude for you to bring it up.” He reached and tapped her arm, and she jerked toward him. His face tightened, and his grip was snug on the steering wheel. “I have Christ, and that is all that matters.” His eyes traveled back to the busy road. Reds lights emerged within 500 feet. There had been a wreck. “I knew that young Miller boy would destroy that new car in no time!’ Jacob shook his head, and Esther nodded before moving her attention to the cold window.

  “He’s covered up with a blue tarp!!!” Esther’s mouth flew open, and her eyes widened. She was stunned. The Miller boy was in Rumspringa, and he had no driver’s license. She didn’t even know he knew how to drive a car. She couldn’t drive one, and she was many years older than him. “I bet he’s dead.” She leaned back, clenched her eyes shut, and exhaled a breath. Why in the world did her community have Rumspringa? “Such mindless acts, how do our own people get messed up in such a tangled mess?” Her paled eyes protruded through the frozen windshield to see the ball of metal that was off the right side of the road. A sheriff’s deputy was flagging traffic, and it was their turn to go past the wreckage.

  “I am sorry about your sister, Ms. Miller,” the deputy said in a solemn voice, hanging his head before slowly looking back up at her. “It’s a mean world out there, isn’t it?”

  “My sister was found. I forgive my brother, Deputy. He did the right thing by bringi
ng her back home. We are a forgiving community.” Esther smiled and hoped that she had calmed the deputy. A misty rain pebbled down on the windshield, and Jacob reached down and slid the heat onto max. “The rain caused the accident?” Esther asked as she stared at the deputy.

  “The accident is the least of our worries, Ms. Miller. It must be hard losing two sisters in one day. He shook his head, his lips gripping tightly. “Her boyfriend was killed in the wreck too. They just got his body out.”

  Esther froze up, unable to speak, her face losing all its color. Jacob patted her on the left shoulder and took control. “Deputy, I think that she didn’t know about the wreck until now. As far as she knows, all of her sisters are safe, and Emma has been found alive.”

  The deputy snickered. “Your brother Ben was involved in the kidnapping. You know Ben’s left town in a hurry. He’s got to know something.”

  Esther didn’t buy it. “Maybe he couldn’t handle the fact that Emma had been snatched, Deputy,” Esther said, her skin still white as snow. “My brothers love my sisters and me.”

  The deputy shook his head, his wrinkled hands firmly on the open driver-side windowsill. “Love can’t cancel drug debts. You know he owes a man–actually–three men—”

  “Three outlaws.”

  Esther’s brow arched, her mouth agape, and a cold anger rushed in her face. “I knew it!” Her tone rose, “I knew it was the three outlaws. Where are they? They have my sister, and I know it. I want to talk to them!”

  “Two of the trio are down at the police department. I’ve been in this line of work for days, and I can tell you that we’ll never get a lie detector test from any of those bad mean. And, we will never find—”

  “Out why your momma lied.”

  “Lied about what?” Esther became confused. Her mother had nothing to do with Emma’s disappearance. She’d grieved herself sick for five long years. “How dare this man to speak so badly of my mamm!” thought Esther as her nostrils flared, her heart beating in her ears.