An Amish Stray An Anthology of Amish Romance

By Sarah Amberson

Anna has been lonely ever since her husband was taken from her in a tragic accident. She longs for a new relationship but no man in her town seems to want to court the young widow even though she is quite lovely. She prays for man to enter her life and one night she hears a pounding on her front door. Opening up, as if dropped from Gott himself, is a wounded man. He falls unconscious upon seeing her and she drags his muscled body inside. He was he? And why did he have a gun in his pocket? 
An Ordinary Amish Town 
Leah is an Amish young woman who pines for another Enos but he pays her no mind. She is being courted by the overweight Luke but she ignores him in the same way the handsome Enos is ignoring her. As time goes by, however, Leah begins to see a certain attractiveness in the attentive Luke.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trellis Publishing
• Release date: Jun 21, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201057220

Book preview

AN AMISH STRAY

SARAH AMBERSON

table of contents

AN AMISH STRAY

AN ORDINARY AMISH TOWN

ROMANCING THE BRIMSTONE

AMISH GIRL IN THE BIG APPLE

an amish stray

Anna took another look at her tidy house. She enjoyed living with everything in its place, but she did have to admit that sometimes it became a little tedious to have everything be the same every day.

This wasn’t how she had planned her life. She had thought that by now, she would have several little children, keeping her busy, keeping her mind off of the books she had read when she had gone on rumspringa.

Worldly books weren’t allowed in the Amish community, however, during rumspringa, many forbidden things were allowed for a short time.

Anna hadn’t exactly been interested in everything that the other young people were trying out, but she had found the adventure books that lined library shelves fascinating. It was there that she had met her first husband. While everyone else had been partying and trying out all the forbidden things they would never be able to try again, Anna had been busy reading books and trying to get through the time until she was able to join the church.

Of course, she probably could have skipped rumspringa, but then all the young people were going, and Anna hadn’t wanted to feel completely left out.

The memory of John made tears gather in her eyes. They had run into each other at the library and it had been something like love at first sight. She had only been sixteen and him seventeen, but they had known from the beginning the were meant to be.

They had been married two years later. Anna closed her eyes and pictured their wedding day in her mind. She had made a new dress for the occasion and he had looked so nice in his suit. There were times when she wished that they were allowed to keep pictures so she could look at her husband’s face one more time, but she knew that was against the church’s regulations.

They had taken a picture together during rumspringa, and she had it hidden away deep inside some things in the attic. She couldn’t bring herself to look at it though. She felt wrong about it, as if she were doing something terrible against her community. But she couldn’t get rid of it either. It felt like it was the last thing on earth that she had left of John.

Despite the fact she hadn’t seen the picture in years, she remembered it clearly. They had been standing in front of the library. She had had her hair down and it was blowing about her face as if it couldn’t figure out where to be. She had worn a print dress, something forbidden after joining the church. The little purple flowers made her look as if she were wearing a flower bed. That had made her laugh. John had been wearing one of his signature smiles and looking at her as if there was nothing else in the entire world worth looking at.

She sighed; the last three years had been hard for her. It hadn’t been easy to lose her husband after only four months of being married. She knew it had been an accident, but it still made her angry. They had done everything right, listened to the church, followed the rules, and yet their lives had come crashing down nearly as quickly as they had set them up.

She glanced out the window and saw that the sun was setting. Already dusk was settling over the fields. Anna shivered. She didn’t often worry about living on the edge of town. She rather liked the privacy, but tonight, she almost felt as if she wasn’t alone.

She had had other offers of marriage since her husband’s passing, but she hadn’t felt like she was ready. She had only been eighteen when they had married and at twenty-one, she knew that it was expected of her to marry and have a family. But whenever she thought about it, John came to mind with his kind face, the way he had loved her, and the hole in her heart ached. She couldn’t imagine being with anyone else right now or ever for that matter.

The minister had expressed his worry and had suggested several different unions over the past year, but in the last couple of months he seemed to have given up too, just giving her an encouraging smile when she came to meetings on Sundays, or when he saw her with the other women of the community.

She felt as if none of them would understand how she felt, or understand the sadness she still had for her deceased spouse. Anna sighed as a light rain pattered on the roof. It seemed that the gloomy weather had heard her sad thoughts and decided to help her feel even worse.

One of the windows in the back room was open. She could hear the bang, bang, bang, as the shutter slammed against the frame. She hurried towards the sound, worried about the water getting into the house. She could already feel the cold breeze flowing through the hall.

She disliked storms. They always made her think about taking up some of the other women’s offers to move in with them. She always felt as if a storm might take her and her house away. She especially felt frustrated when something like this happened and she had to fight the storm to keep it outside.

As she reached up to secure the loose window, her eyes traveled down to the back door. She stifled a little scream as she spotted a figure lying across the doorway outside in the rain.

For a moment, she thought it was someone who was trying to get in and had ducked down to hide when she had approached.

It appeared to be a man. She watched him for several minutes and she realized that he wasn’t moving. His head was down on her step and his arms were out beside him in an awkward position that didn’t look comfortable. Had he fallen there recently?

Hello? she called out timidly. There was no answer. Hello? she tried a little louder. This time she was certain that whoever it was would have heard her, but yet he still didn’t move in the slightest. She wasn’t even sure if he was breathing.

She hurried to the kitchen and pulled the broom from its place. In a matter of minutes she was back at the back door, the broomstick in hand, held out in front of her like a sword.

She wasn’t sure what she would do against a full grown man with just a broomstick, but she couldn’t just leave whoever it was outside in the rain. There had to be a reason that they were laying like that without moving. Maybe they were hurt, or even dead.

Her curiosity getting the better of her, Anna opened the door a crack and poked her broomstick through the small opening with uncertainty. She poked the man several times with the piece of wood but gathered no response.

Of course, she had heard all the terrible stories about opening your door to strangers, but this one wasn’t moving. She couldn’t leave him outside in the rain on her step for the remainder of the night. It just wouldn’t be right. Not to mention, Anna was sure she wouldn’t be able to sleep knowing he was out there, without knowing what was going on. She couldn’t call anyone. The Amish only allowed one telephone in their community and that was a 20-minute walk from her house. She wasn’t willing to go out into the storm to look for help.

She finally opened the door the rest of the way and bent to inspect him. His clothes looked of good quality, but he definitely wasn’t an Amish man, but an outsider. She struggled to turn him over and when she did, she stifled a yelp.

Blood covered the front of his white shirt, the dark red showing quite plainly by the dim light that filtered through from the doorway.

She didn’t have to ask herself what to do now. She tugged and pulled the man until he was fully inside, sprawled on her wood floor. She closed the door behind him and then wiped her brow. She was going to have a lot of work to do to get him to a bed. He was a heavy man.

He looked pretty pale for any men she had seen around the community, and it appeared he hadn’t shaved in a couple of weeks. His breathing was light and almost nonexistent and for several moments, Anna had to pause to hear it. Deciding that she needed help moving him, she brought back a large quilt and rolled him unto it.

She then proceeded to pull the blanket with the unconscious man on it to the guest room. Getting him up on the bed was a challenge in itself and Anna worried that she might be doing the man more harm than good as she wrestled with the bed and blanket pulling him onto the bed.

Finally, after several tries, she managed to haul him up onto the bed wrapped in the quilt. She pulled his legs around to the foot of the bed and straddled him trying to scoot him up onto a pillow.

Maybe she should get help. But she really didn’t want to involve anyone else.

Finally, she had him situated on the bed and she prepared the things she would need to examine him. This was going to be a long night. She cut the shirt off of him and began to clean the gunshot wounds, digging into the flesh until she found the bullets. She found some alcohol in the medicine cupboard and poured it liberally over the wounds and then wrapped his shoulder tightly with strips she tore from a clean sheet.

Then she removed his boots and soaked clothing averting her eyes and covering him with warm blankets. That would have to do for now. She wasn’t sure who he was or why he had come to her door, but he needed rest. Maybe he would wake soon and answer her many questions.

2

Kent woke up with a splitting headache and pain through his entire body. He blinked the fuzziness from his eyes and tried to orient himself. The last thing he remembered was the authorities chasing him and bullets flying through the air.

He tried to sit up but the pain overcame him and he fell back on the bed with a groan. Where was he?

The room looked very simple, and he didn’t have any restraints so wherever he was most likely wasn’t a jail or a hospital.

You’re awake. A soft voice brought his suspicious gaze to the doorway. A young looking woman stood looking at him with a mix of curiosity and fear on her face.

She wore a simple dark blue dress, apron, and a white cap. He recognized the clothing immediately. He was with the Amish. He wasn’t sure what to think about this recent development. The Amish might protect him, or they might turn him in, but from the stories he had heard, he had a feeling their preference would be the latter, especially as soon as they heard from the authorities who he was.

Kent knew he wasn’t a good man. He had an entire list of crimes that he had committed and just in the last month. It wasn’t necessarily something that he was proud of but he wasn’t sure how to change it. It had become a fact of life that he had learned to embrace.

Where am I? He tried to sit once more, and this time moved a little more slowly. While he didn’t completely succeed, he did manage to prop himself up on his elbows.

I wouldn’t move too much. You were shot twice and lost a lot of blood, the young woman said with concern flashing over her pretty face. She couldn’t be more than twenty-two or so, that he was certain of. But some things were odd to him. Why hadn’t he seen or heard a man yet? Why had he been taken in at all?

Amish usually kept to themselves, and weren’t exactly known for dragging in unconscious shot men who they didn’t know.

I’m Anna. You’re at my house. I pulled you in out of the rain when I found you on my doorstep, The young woman said coming closer. The glass of water she held in her hand looked delicious and Kent gulped it down as soon as it reached his lips.

"When? How long have I been