WHEN THEY GOT BACK TO DEDE’S, Abby wandered out to the porch with her Bible. She sat on the porch swing. She’d been out there for only minutes when Aunt Dede joined her.

“Ethan will be here for dinner,” she said.

Abby nodded. “That sounds good.”

Dede had a fleece throw with her and sat down next to Abby and arranged the throw over both of them. She reached over and put a hand on Abby’s. “You’ve had a rough summer. I know that. I’ve been praying for you.”

Abby felt a lump in her throat and it surprised her. People praying for her when she couldn’t seem to pray for herself touched her deeply.

Dede patted her hand. “Feel like talking?”

For some reason the thought of baring her soul to her aunt brought the threat of tears. Dede might not understand her as well as Luke, but she was always a source of comfort and guidance.

Swallowing the lump, she said, “I feel so off-balance right now. This shooting has thrown me into a tailspin. I’m not sure I can go back to work. That’s what makes me want to hide.” Her voice broke and she grabbed a Kleenex, unable to stop the tears.

“Give it time and prayer. I can’t imagine going through what you just did. Confusion and second-guessing is human. You work a job that requires you to make hard choices.” Dede leaned over and pulled Abby into a hug. “I haven’t always agreed with your choice of profession, but I do know that you are good at it.”

“But I’m just not sure of anything anymore. Not my job, not my life, not anything.” The words came out in a tumble she couldn’t stop. “I shot an innocent man. Before that I let a guilty man shoot himself in front of me. And the worst of it is, I almost shot that guilty man in anger, not because he was a threat to me. I only wanted justice, for things to be put right, and everything has gone wrong. I feel like God doesn’t listen to me anymore.” She hated the whine in her voice. Her fist clenched on the Kleenex as she ran it under her nose.

“God always listens.” Dede sat back but kept Abby’s hand in hers, gently patting it. “And I’m listening. But I don’t think that’s what’s at the root of your angst. Tell me about the man you shot.”

Abby turned to stare at Dede and saw love and understanding in her eyes. She’d been trying to forget Clayton, had been overjoyed that she slept the night before without dreaming of him. Now Dede wanted to hear about that awful day? “Why do you want to hear that story?”

“It has everything to do with why you feel off-balance, as if God has forsaken you. Which, by the way, is something he would never do.”

“I don’t want to talk about it. I’ve talked it out with the PD psychologist. We’ve spoken several times.” Abby looked down at Bandit sitting at her feet.

“Did that help you get your balance back?”

Abby couldn’t answer. The talks with the psychologist had been impersonally clinical. He was a nice man, and Abby had nothing against him, but no, he hadn’t helped her get her balance back.

“Indulge me,” her aunt insisted. “I promise, it may be painful, but it will be like tearing off an old bandage, letting fresh air into the wound to heal it.”

Abby looked away and took a deep breath. After a long moment, she mustered up the best cop voice she could and dispassionately told Dede about the death of Clayton Joiner.

Dede listened without interrupting.

When Abby finished, she turned to her aunt. “It was the worst day of my life.”

“I believe that. And even though you know you did the right thing, it still lacerates your heart.” She gripped Abby’s hand with her right and squeezed, holding tight.

“I can’t get the image out of my mind.” Abby sniffled as tears ran down her face again. “That’s why I took the leave. It was interfering with my work, with my ability to do my job. Am I finished as a cop?” The last sentence tore at Abby’s throat, and she fought to keep from sobbing. This was her biggest fear.

“Like tearing off an old bandage.” It stung to realize the real fear she had that her career was over.

“I can’t answer that question; only you and God can. But I will tell you what I believe.” Dede let go of Abby’s hand and placed an arm over her shoulder, pulling her close again as the bench swung gently. “Your parents’ case defined you, dictated your choices for most of your life.”

Abby flinched to pull away, but Dede held her tight. “I’m not condemning. You know I never wanted that case to be an obsession for you. You became an officer because of it, and a dedicated one, with a single goal always in your mind: find the killers. Now you’ve come to the end, the final chapter in that horrible case, and it only brought more questions, not the black-and-white answers you wanted. Your foundation was sand, and the sand has washed away.”

Abby sagged into her aunt. “You’re saying I’m done?”

“No, I’m saying you need to go back, set your life on the right foundation, first and foremost. Pastor Cliff told you how important a foundation is for a building . . . and for your faith. Once your faith foundation is firmly set, then I think everything else in your life will become clearer.”

Abby couldn’t argue with that. It made a lot of sense. But she’d always thought her faith was strong. Had she really let it get so weak?

Abby felt somewhat better when Ethan arrived for dinner; at least she felt normal enough to converse with and listen to Ethan. He was excited about the church build and equally excited about his next mission trip. In a couple weeks he was headed to Malawi.

“There’s so much to do there. I’m teaming up with an organization that is working to build chicken farms.”

“Chicken farms?” Dede asked. “Not churches?”

Ethan shook his head and swallowed his bite before answering. “No, the need there is for food. There’s been a severe blight to many crops and people are in danger of starving. They need food sources, and right now they love the idea of chickens and chicken farms.”

Abby wondered if Malawi was a place of unrest, of war and persecution. She didn’t remember if she’d read about it in the news. She knew that the threat of danger wouldn’t stop Ethan, and she realized she was clearly seeing his heart. He loved to travel and build and help those who really needed the help. He never feared, even when the papers were filled with stories about bad things happening where he planned to go. He trusted God and he went.

She thought of what Dede had said about the mission field, about being called.

Ethan was definitely called.

Until now I’ve always believed I was called to police work, Abby thought. She felt a little uncomfortable. She did love Ethan, but in her heart of hearts she wondered if she could ever have a passion, a calling, for foreign mission work.

“What did you think of Pastor Cliff?”

“What?” Abby realized Ethan was speaking to her. “Oh, sorry; I was daydreaming.”

He repeated his question.

“Inspiring. I really liked the guy.”

“Do you want to help with the build?”

“I don’t know anything about construction.”

Ethan put a hand on hers. “There will be a lot of professionals there. It might be mostly grunt work for you. It’s up to you, but it might be a good change of pace.”

Abby thought for a minute.

“I agree,” Dede said. “I think that you need a change of pace.”

Finishing her Diet Coke, Abby looked from Ethan to Dede. “Yeah, I guess you’re right. I’ll help.”

As they went back and forth about plans for Monday, Abby toyed with her dessert and pondered the day in a different way. I do need a change of pace, a real test, she thought. Maybe while helping with the building project, something will click and I’ll find my calling. It’s possible that I just haven’t opened the right door.

But even as she said yes, a tiny bit of unease rose. The unanswered questions about the Triple Seven murders, her father’s fate, and Luke Murphy all crossed her mind at the same time.

Finally a clear, strong prayer came to her mind. Lord, I need to know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, where you want me. At Ethan’s side or back in Long Beach fighting for those who no longer have a voice, and finally uncovering the truth in my parents’ murders.

She was certain she’d get an answer soon, one way or another.

By Sunday night, the conversation she’d had with her aunt had played over and over in her mind seemingly a hundred times. For Dede the answer to every life issue was in the Bible. Talking with her, Abby realized that she had stepped away from that belief. Through most of her career she trusted in herself, her education and training, and her own abilities.

I’ve prayed, she thought, and if you’d asked me, I would have told you that I believed in prayer. But in all honesty, I never thought God worked fast enough or that he was even listening all the time.

But it was Dede’s comment about the foundation of her life that caused Abby the most angst. She remembered the biblical parable that the idea of a firm foundation came from. It referenced building a house on different foundations. Any foundation other than obedience to God would wash away at the first sign of trouble.

Abby picked up the Bible and found the passage in the book of Luke. Jesus was telling the parable. She read the verses before going to bed.

Everyone who comes to me and hears my words and does them, I will show you what he is like: he is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock. And when a flood arose, the stream broke against that house and could not shake it, because it had been well built. But the one who hears and does not do them is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. When the stream broke against it, immediately it fell, and the ruin of that house was great.

Tears threatened. I’ve always considered my foundation firm, my belief in God strong. Why am I so shaken? Why do I feel as if everything has been washed away by the storm of the shooting?

Abby knew that in investigative work when a case looked as if it was going nowhere, you went back to the beginning, started over with the basics to be certain nothing was missed.

My life looks like it’s going nowhere, she thought. Maybe I need to go back to the beginning, review the basics of my faith.

Where to start? I’ve always taken faith for granted. I believe, God should hear, and that’s the end of it.

What am I missing?

The question stayed on her mind as she closed the Bible and lay down to go to sleep.