A Match For Addy (The Amish Matchmaker Book 1) by Emma Miller

out the—”
    “Leave the bucket,” Sara told her. “Walk with me to the garden. I need to thin the green beans I planted two weeks ago. You can help.”
    Addy set down the bucket and dried her hands on the work apron. Why did she feel like a schoolgirl about to be chastised by the teacher? She followed Sara across the yard, not speaking until they reached the garden. “Maybe I was too sharp with Gideon,” she offered hesitantly.
    “Perhaps you were.” Sara paused with her hand on the garden gate and looked into her face. “I’ve noticed that you sometimes have a sharp tongue, and it troubles me, because I’m sure you have a good heart and don’t wish to hurt others.”
    Addy pressed her lips tightly together. Sara wasn’t the first person to say such a thing about her—both the tartness of her nature and the belief that she meant no harm. Her own mother was quick to find fault, and Addy had often been the object of that criticism. The thought that she was following in her mother’s footsteps stunned her. “I suppose I am too direct.”
    “It isn’t my wish to bring you pain,” Sara continued, fixing her with those penetrating black eyes that made Addy’s stomach go queasy. “I only mention it because I share the same fault. It is my way to speak as I find, and sometimes people are less than pleased with me.”
    Addy stared at the grass in front of her left shoe. Had Sara heard what she’d said to Ellie? She wanted to tell her employer that Gideon had hurt her feelings, as well, but it was best just to keep still and wait for Sara’s displeasure with her to pass.
    “Your mother and father asked me to find a good match for you.” Sara smiled at her. “I take that duty seriously, and I think that you would like a good husband. Is that true?”
    Addy nodded. What Amish girl didn’t hope for a marriage and her own home? She wanted children, and without a husband there could be no babies and no grandchildren for her mother to bounce on her knee. Did she dare tell the matchmaker that she dreamed of a good man who would show affection for her? One that she could learn to love? Or should she say that she hoped for a man not too old or too sour in disposition?
    A dozen things came to her head to say to Sara, but most seemed ungrateful or selfish. Hadn’t her own mother said that she must have a man of material means, someone who could help to care for her parents in their old age? Wasn’t it her duty to keep
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’s needs above her own? Maybe she had been hasty in turning down scarred Preacher Caleb. He’d been a widower, but not old, and if she’d married Caleb, she’d not have to leave her family and go to some far-off community where she would be a stranger.
    “Do you want me to tell Gideon that I’m sorry?” Addy murmured. The words might choke in her throat, but if Sara insisted... She didn’t want to lose her job. What would her mother say to that? If Sara wouldn’t have her as a helper in her house, she’d certainly never risk her reputation as a matchmaker by trying but failing to find her a husband. What a mess. And all because Gideon had been listening in corners, when he should have been in the field working.
    “You’re not a child,” Sara said, pushing the gate wide and beckoning to her to follow her into the garden. “It’s not for me to put words in your mouth. Only you know whether what you said to Gideon was deserved.”
    “Men are often careless about how a house looks,” Addy said. “So says my mother. Even my father doesn’t always think to scrape off his shoes before he comes into the house. And when his mind is on the sermon he will give on Sunday, he leaves doors open and forgets to come in on time for meals.”
    Sara laughed. “Husbands. Who should know husbands better than me, who had three? All dead and gone to a better place. All faithful to the church and to our community, but all men, just the same. You think I haven’t had cause to find fault now and