An Unexpected Sin by Sarah Ballance

option that did not result in lengthy queries on my behalf.”
    Shock thundered through her. “He wanted to send you away?”
    Josiah did not answer, but stared in the distance. When he did speak, it was not in response to her query. “How long did you remain in Salem Village after you lost Samuel?”
    She was curious over his change of topic, but did not press him. “A few months.” She draped the last of the linens over the drying line and settled onto the grass a short distance from him. “Mother could not seem to heal. Neighbors had lost children and had managed to move on from their grief, but Mother grew more despondent with each day. Father was quite worried and believed a fresh start would benefit her, so we moved here from the home where we lived with Samuel. Doing so offered a new start, but it also brought Mother closer to my brother.”
    Josiah’s hands stilled at his task. After a moment, he said, “It surprises me she would want to be here, so near where he was lost.”
    She lifted her shoulders, as unsure of the answer as Josiah. “Closer. Away. It seemed to be everything at once. His body was never found. Perhaps she feels closer to him this way, nearer to the water. But she never goes there.”
    Josiah said nothing, just methodically wove thin reeds into a braid. He had already secured one of the shutters, though he had a great many to go. He glanced up and caught her watching. “And what about you? How do you fare?”
    It was the second time since his return he had asked how she felt about her brother. The question seemed out of place, but she somehow knew what he meant. “I miss him. I always will, but many years have passed and I have come to accept things as they are.”
    “I am grateful to know that,” Josiah said. But he did not seem settled. His work on the reeds had paused, and he simply stared at his hands as if they were unfamiliar to him.
    “What about you? When your father died, I expected you might return to Salem.”
    His countenance, already somber, turned dark. “His wife wanted nothing of my presence.”
    “But did you not want to say good-bye? Or to see to the burial?”
    Josiah froze, the reeds falling from his hands. His arms tensed. “That particular farewell had long been said, and I was not needed for the task.”
    “He was your father,” she said softly. “He loved you.”
    Josiah’s deep amber eyes filled with sorrow. “He blamed me. There was no forgiveness. No love left.”
    “Surely he would not cast aside his own son over an accident. Samuel—”
    “Not for Samuel’s death,” Josiah said quietly. “For my mother’s.”
    Anne’s mouth fell open. Josiah was responsible for his mother’s death?
    Before she could find her voice, her mother’s call broke through the lingering silence. Anne looked toward her mother, then back to Josiah. Walking away from his confession was gut-wrenching, but she dared not draw her mother’s scrutiny.
    Josiah’s expression offered no explanation, and her mother sought her.
    Answers would have to wait.

Chapter Seven
    Try as she might, for the remainder of the day Anne could not find time alone with Josiah. Still, he remained foremost on her mind. How could he possibly shoulder the blame for the loss of his mother? As she understood it, he had been just a babe when she died—too young for guilt. She wanted desperately to know what he meant by his admission, but she thought twice about asking him. The subject seemed to have left him in a state of latent sorrow. It had quickly become apparent that all matters of Josiah’s past had the same dreary effect on him, leaving him subdued, dark, and unhappy.
    Despite the force of her curiosity, it was not a state to which she wanted to send him.
    Anne sighed. If only she could confide in her mother. She was of Salem Village—maybe she had known Josiah’s mother and the circumstances of her death. But Anne could not confide Josiah’s identity to her mother—not until her mother