29

 

Jake headed the truck back toward Mammoth at the end of the longest day he could remember.

Sunset painted the broken storm clouds shades of fuchsia, burnt umber, and amethyst as they turned on Main Street.

“Who’s hungry?” Lilah asked, pointing to an empty space in front of Earl’s Kitchen. The orange neon sign winked “Open,” beckoning them inside for a dish of comfort and a cup of reassurance after their long day.

Jake parked and shut off the engine.

Jeremy, Luke, and Eden jumped out the back of the king cab.

Jake hesitated, hands still gripping the curve of the smooth steering wheel.

Lilah unlatched her seatbelt, but made no other move to leave the cab.

“Quite an effort today.” He cleared his throat. “Well done.”

“You, too.” A smile touched her lips. “It meant something to those folks, you know. Your being there.”

“I didn’t do anything.”

“You. God. Whatever.” She emitted a strange-sounding laugh.

“Me, God, whatever?” He repeated her callous words, a shard of worry slicing his spirit.

Where was this flirtation going, exactly? If he followed this relationship through to fruition, what sort of comfort would she be as a pastor’s wife?

“I told you, Jake.” Her gaze went cold. She shrugged, as if in answer to his silent question. “I’m the wrong girl for you.”

His thoughts dusted to Margaret—the perfect pastor’s wife—all but raised for the part by her devout family. Charitable to a fault. Sweet. Good-natured. Understanding about the time required to help those in crisis. Or, at least, so she’d seemed on the outside. Looks were deceiving...

“I’m going in.” Lilah’s hand hesitated on the door handle.

“Wait.” Jake captured her hand, thumbed a circle caress on the back. “I just wanted to say thanks. For not giving up on me. Not yet.”

“I’m not giving up on you.” She blinked. “I’m just telling you I’ve got emotional baggage. Like enough to travel around the world without doing laundry. Twice.”

“You and me both, kiddo.” He drew her close, kissed those bow lips. Inhaled her subtle strength, her silent warmth, until at last, she stopped fighting him. She fit tight in his arms, pressed against him, as if they were two halves of the same whole. Their kiss, sweet, the need behind it grew clear. He focused on that and let the rest fall where it may. “Don’t let me fool you. I’ve got no idea what I’m doing.”

“And yet, you keep doing it.” She opened her door and slid out.

He remained in the truck cab with eyes closed, reviewing the day’s events with amazement. Seeing God so visibly at work mentally brought him to his knees. Every pastor should go through crisis, to see the strange beauty of coincidence play out, how God lifted ordinary people to angel status by helping each other, by just being there to offer a shoulder, a smile, make someone laugh, or help them stop hurting, begin to heal. A ragtag quintet of helping hands put together, seemingly for the sole purpose of finding and freeing the Steadmans from their own shelter.

His mind drifted to the plains of Thayer now lay to waste alongside the remains of Barn Hollow. They’d followed the scar of that tornado from the Steadman place through Thayer, lending help where they could, prayers where they could not.

Inside the restaurant, the dusty group edged into an empty booth, all tables and the seven stools at the counter full of customers. Four lifetime friends, high school buddies and twin sisters who had probably been at that same diner for sodas and fries after every hometown Friday night football game.

Folks shuffled into the diner, shell shocked, and lined the waiting area until a booth or table opened up.

Where do I fit in with this, Lord? Will I always be the one on the outside, looking in?

A muffled tone from the glove box brought him to blink. Cellphone. He’d thrown it in there—when? Couldn’t even think the last time he’d made a call on it. Amazing it was still charged at all. Caller ID read Hot Springs Regional Ministries, the head office.

“Dad?”

“Jake!” Margaret’s voice cannon-blasted across the miles. “Are you OK? I asked your dad if I could call—I hope that’s all right.” She clipped at the end. He could almost see her manicured fingernails rat-a-tatting on the cherry wood desk of her office.

“We’re still here. If that’s what he’s wondering.”

“Well, of course he’s concerned—”

“Then, put me through.” A breath, then silence as she transferred the call. Calming, wordless hold music chimed in his ear. Jake inhaled, no more words left to fight her, but no forgiveness in his heart, either.

“Son?”

The phone booped its battery level warning.

“Better hurry, Pop.” He eyed the red bar. “Phone’s dying.”

“We saw the news.” His father’s pastor-tone soothed. Just like it sounded over the radio. He knew the warmth could fire to brimstone just as easily. “They’re saying you got hit hard.”

“Class four. I hear it could’ve been much wo-rse.” Jake cringed through the crack in his voice. Suddenly, he was the little boy with the black eye who’d broken Timmy Ryan’s nose on the playground. The star of the baseball team who’d struck out at the state finals. The grown man telling his father—the head of the largest church in the southland—that his marriage was at an end. And the endless well of disappointment in his famous father’s pale, blue eyes.

“Hold it together, son—with the storms up and down the whole eastern seaboard, it’s making folks panic a bit. We need to be a rock, son. We need to be His rock.”

“I know. Dad, I—”

“I’m sending a news crew out to get your story. Could do wonders for the ministry, son. For the church.”

“No!” Jake curled his fist around the phone. “These folks don’t know who I am. I won’t capitalize on their pain, Dad. Not like last time.”

“We did more good than harm, Jake, and you know it.”

Across the miles, Jake knew they thought of the same thing. The San Diego fires. Parents who’d lost a daughter to the blaze, his shame of not knowing what to say…his anger at the destruction, unable to offer God’s comfort to ones who’d lost everything. And the unspoken, bitter disappointment in his father’s steady gaze.

His father bridged the gap first, in his low, pastoral tone. “It’s your chance, son. And, maybe enough now to bring you home.”

Silence dragged as Jake’s gut churned with his father’s dangling proposition. “These people don’t need the media. They’re hurting…they’re—Dad?”

Silence.

The phone was a brick in his hand, worthless as a stone skipped on the river.

Moments later, a subtle knock startled him out of his quandary. “Pastor Gibb?”

Jake blinked into the round, wind-weary face of Tom Steadman. He rolled down his window with a squeal of gears. “Tom!”

Hand to Jake’s shoulder, his contractor smiled. “We needed somewhere to go for the night. We’re headed down to the bed and breakfast and saw the lights on at the kitchen.”

“No dinner at the mayor’s B&B,” Earnestine chuckled.

“Join us?” Tom opened the door, apparently not one to take no for an answer.

Jake stepped out, and amazed by the swiftness of the Lord’s answer, followed them into the restaurant.