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TREVOR DIDN'T WAIT until the next day, but came straight from Juliette's place, banging on the door until Victor got out of bed and let him in.
"Do you want to tell me what that was all about?" There was no apology for the late hour; he simply walked in, dropped to the sofa, and started demanding answers.
"Maybe you should tell me," Victor replied, not bothering to turn on any lights. He was not in a hospitable mood. "Do you know anything about her?"
"I took her out to dinner and a ride. Yeah, I know something about her."
"How did you hook up with her? Are you seeing her now?" Victor's blood began to boil at the thought, and his scalp tingled.
"What's this all about? You're acting like I'm doing something I shouldn't." Trevor leaned forward and set his helmet on the floor between his feet. He indicated the chair on the other side of the coffee table. "You're pacing, man. Sit down and talk to me."
Victor glared at him for several seconds before sitting. For the last several hours, he'd been tormented by thoughts of what was going on at Juliette Gustafson's home. He'd returned to the station, documented that the call was just a disgruntled neighbor, and clocked out, all under the watchful and curious eye of Sarah. He knew she was dying to ask questions, but he didn't give her the opportunity; he was too full of questions himself, and in short supply of answers.
When he got home, he headed straight for the shower, hoping to wash away some of his confusion. By the time he went to bed, however, he was even more unsettled. If he closed his eyes, he saw her; sashaying down the sidewalk in her clever jeans, peeking shyly up at him with those luminous eyes, then turning them adoringly on Trevor, as she called him 'amazing.' He punched his pillow; he could feel every lump.
None of it made sense. Trevor Zander, of all people, out with a girl like that in the middle of the night? Call-girl or not, she was obviously pretty wild in those ridiculous boots of hers. Victor didn't know what bothered him more, the surprise of finding his friend there, or the familiarity between them.
He wasn't even close to being sleepy when Trevor showed up, but that didn't mean he felt like talking to the guy. Here he sat, though, in the shadows cast through the windows by the streetlights outside, waiting for explanations.
"You don't date randomly, not unless you seriously want to pursue someone. Isn't that your rule?"
"You don't have to tell me my own rules."
"Then what were you doing with her?"
"Maybe I'm pursuing her. What's the problem?"
"What do you know about her?" Victor asked again.
"Why, Vic? Is there something you think I should know?"
"How did you meet her?"
"Her name is Juliette. And why are you answering my questions with questions?"
"I know her name," Victor growled, standing up and crossing to the window.
"Dude, this is the most worked up I've seen you in a long time. You want to tell me what this is all about?" It was the third time Trevor had asked the question.
Victor spun around and ground out between clenched teeth, "You want to know why I showed up tonight?" He scrubbed his hands through his hair as he tried to get a grip on his frustration. "I got a complaint about her, that she's involved in some seedy stuff. Having to do with men." Why couldn't he just say it? "Can you imagine my surprise when I pulled up and you were the man she was with?"
"What exactly are you implying?" Trevor's voice had a new and dangerous edge to it.
"If the rumors and complaints are true—and I'm going to be doing a little research on your Ms. Gustafson—you just spent your evening with a call-girl, my friend. Or even worse, the kind of girl who gives it away for free."
Now Trevor was on his feet. "Watch yourself, man."
They stood facing each other across the room, feet firmly planted, and Victor was momentarily swept up in the out-of-time-feeling of an old western gun fight. His trigger finger even twitched.
Finally, Trevor spoke again. He didn't sit. "You're wrong about her, Vic. And you do her a serious injustice with your accusations. You're acting like a blind fool. I don't know what's gotten into you, but whatever it is, it's got you by the throat." He leaned over and picked up his gear. "I suggest you take it up with the King. Ask Him about her. Juliette's wild, but not in that way."
He crossed the room and put a hand on Victor's shoulder. "Father, Your son needs Your peace tonight. Give him discernment. Open his eyes with Your wisdom. Amen."
Victor had tried praying tonight, demanding that God let him sleep, but his prayers seemed to bounce off the ceiling. Trevor's words, on the other hand, crashed through the plaster above them, and Victor sensed the sought-after peace pouring down, washing over him. His shoulders relaxed as he realized God had just answered him; He'd heard his prayers through the plaster after-all, and sent his friend to put him in his place.
Even after Trevor's visit, however, Victor couldn't get Juliette Gustafson off his mind. He realized how ridiculous the whole call-girl thing was, but an urgent curiosity about who she was still poked and prodded, and he felt compelled to find out.
Thank goodness she lived on his beat; driving past her house at all hours bordered on stalking, but he had the law on his side, and he was going to use it until he managed to clear his head about the whole thing.
~ ~ ~
FOR THE FIRST TIME since she'd taken her university job, Juliette called off work for no reason except that she needed a day off. Whatever showed up in her inbox could either wait a day, or—novel idea—the professors could learn how to use the copy machine themselves. Preferably without breaking it.
Today, all she wanted to do was revel in her divine appointment—not date—with Trevor Zander—not Mick Jagger. If a certain cop happened to wander into her thoughts the way he'd wandered onto the scene last night, well, maybe she would see things a little clearer in the light of day. Maybe she'd figure out what had turned him so sour.
Her first order of business was to uncover that Bible. She found it in the second box she unpacked, brought it inside, wiped the cover down with a damp paper towel, and quickly gave up trying to locate Trevor's verses just by flipping through the pages. Even with the table of contents, finding Hosea was a challenge. It was a short book, stuck in the middle of a lot of other oddly-named short books, and she wasn't accustomed to the thin, crinkly pages that kept the Bible from being a tome.
"Come, let us return to the Lord," she read aloud the first three verses of chapter six, listening to the cadence of the words. Holy poetry, she thought to herself. "For He has torn us, but He will heal us; He has wounded us, but He will bandage us."
"That's me, God," she closed her eyes and whispered, "Will You heal me? Will You bandage me? I'm so tired of being torn and wounded."
She continued reading. "He will revive us after two days; He will raise us up on the third day, that we may live before Him. So let us know, let us press on to know the Lord. His going forth is as certain as the dawn; And He will come to us like the rain, like the spring rain watering the earth."
The words fell on her like rain, watering the parched soil of her heart. She read the verses again, then tried to read on, but the passage got confusing really quickly, so she returned to those three, short, but over-flowing verses. Everything her heart needed was in those words. Again and again she read them until she knew the words by heart.
When the phone rang a few minutes after eight, Juliette laughed to see Sharon's name pop up on her screen. "What's wrong, Juju?" No greeting, no polite phone etiquette. No games. She loved being Sharon's friend.
"You know Trevor Zander, the musician from Sunday night?"
"I took you, remember?"
It all sounded a little fantastic, even to her own ears, and she was the one who'd experienced it, but by the time she finished relaying her Monday ManDate adventure, Sharon was in tears.
"I'm crying like a blithering idiot, and I'm at work, Juliette Gustafson! How could you do this to me?" But she was ecstatic and wanted to know every detail of the night. "Imagine! Trevor Zander! Are you going to see him again?"
"That's the weirdest part. We didn't click. I mean, he's an amazing guy. Perfect in every way. Seriously. Like, the ultimate perfect guy. But that zing just wasn't there." Juliette forced herself not to think of Victor Jarrett's hand around hers.
"Makes sense to me. That's probably why you were finally able to really hear God's voice; because there were no emotional entanglements between you and Trevor, you know?" Sharon continued, her voice filled with excitement. "Isn't it crazy? God used something as ridiculous as the Monday ManDates to reach you. Think about it, Juju. All this stuff with Mike, and the bad dates with the other guys, it was all leading to last night. Trevor showed up with his shameless passion for Christ, and you were already primed from his concert the night before. Wow. Just wow."
"Oh, Sharon," Juliette sighed. "It was just like you said; like a skylight bursting open. Suddenly, I could see things from a whole new perspective."
"So how do you feel today?"
"I feel incredible. I feel light-headed. I feel scared. I know I have a lot of work to do. I have a few people to deal with, and Mike is one of them. I've got a lot of anger and bitterness in me over what he's done right now, and thinking about letting that jerk off the hook makes me a little sick. I kinda liked holding on to the anger, so it's going to be tough to give it all up."
"Good girl. How can I help?" Sharon was still sniffling, but Juliette could hear the excitement in her voice.
"You can pray for me."
"Of course."
She got up to pour herself another cup of coffee and headed out to sit on the front porch steps in an effort to recapture some of the euphoria of the night before. "I need to learn to forgive people, Sharon. Now that the walls are being torn down, it seems there's a whole roomful of folks who've been trapped inside the dungeon of my little, shriveled heart, just waiting to be forgiven and set free."
They talked for a while longer before Sharon had to get back to work. "Oh! What about the Monday ManDates?" Sharon asked.
"I'm done. And now I have a good reason, thanks to Trevor."
"What are you going to tell your sisters?"
"I don't know. Maybe that I've found true love, and no one on their silly little list could ever compare to Him."
"That'll go over well." Sharon's sarcasm did not go unnoticed.
"I know. But I also know I can't do it any longer. Just pray they understand."
Sharon giggled.
"What are you laughing about?"
"You just asked me to pray for you, not once, but twice, in the same conversation."
"Don't gloat, Mrs. Scoville. It's not what Jesus would do."
When the phone rang later that morning, and she saw it was Renata, she let it go to voice mail. Around noon, when Phoebe called, she let it go to voice mail, too. When Gia called right as Juliette was sitting down to a light supper and a glass of orange juice, she didn't answer the phone either. But she did text them all at that point, letting them know that Monday night had been the greatest night of her life, and if they wanted details, they'd have to join her for a G-FOURce on Thursday evening, 6 o'clock, her place.
Dinner will be served, she added.
Needless to say, she got three texts right back. Two of them were short, congratulatory, and anticipatory. The third one, in all caps, just said, "WHAT HAPPENED? CALL ME RIGHT NOW!"
She didn't. Nor did she answer the phone when Renata called an hour later, and twice more before bed.
