“I’m not Mr. Clean.”
“Well, I never liked a man with an earring anyway,” she said and then laughed and flapped her hand. “I’m just going on with you, Ethan. But you listen to this old woman and you listen good.”
White tennis shoes squared, she leaned forward and pointed out at the brown van.
“See those mirrors on your truck? God doesn’t have those. Some people do, but God don’t. He never looks back at what you’ve done, only forward to the good you’re doing now. There’s no Reverse in God’s kingdom.”
Ethan allowed a smile. Miss Patsy had a way of laying out the gospel unlike any he’d ever heard.
“Are you saying that God doesn’t hold my mistake against me? That He isn’t trying to tell me I’m not good enough for Molly?”
“That’s exactly what I’m saying. Oh, some people will criticize no matter what you do, but you have to give it to God. Move on. Put the past to rest once and for all.”
“But part of my past will always be with me.”
“The Lord has a purpose in all things, even mistakes or tragedies. Now, I’m not saying He causes them, but I do know that He takes anything that happens in our lives and works something good from it. Just look at you and Laney. Isn’t she worth the trouble? Aren’t you glad she’s in your life, no matter how she got there?”
The light inside Ethan came on as bright as if the sun rose in his chest. When he’d turned his life over to the Lord, the nightmare with Twila had culminated in a beautiful thing—his daughter. Then, from the ashes of his unrestrained lifestyle, a new and better man had risen.
“I’ve been as bad as Molly about hanging on to guilt, haven’t I?”
“Most likely. But if we trust Him, the Lord will take us from where we are to where He plans for us to be. And it’s always better than anything we can imagine.”
Patsy was right. Even the time in his life that began as a mistake had become his greatest blessing—Laney.
“I think Molly’s struggling with that, too, Miss Patsy. Because of all that’s happened she’s lost confidence that God has her best interest at heart.”
Hadn’t he almost done the same?
“Well, mark my words. The Lord has a plan. You and me have just got to be smart enough not to get in His way.”
“I can’t make her want me and Laney.”
“No, you can’t.” She pushed up out of the chair and came to him. “But I’m asking you as a friend, Ethan. Don’t give up yet. Give her some space and some time. And keep on praying.”
“What if she never comes around?”
“What if she does?”
He laughed, surprised at the simple logic. “How did you get so smart?”
She patted his arm. “Life’s a good teacher. I’ve learned a few things through my own blunders.”
“Not you,” he said, gently teasing.
She swatted his arm. “Get going, you big lug. People want their stuff delivered on time.”
He pulled her to him for a quick kiss on the cheek. “Thanks, Miss Patsy.”
Face flushed with pleasure, she flapped her hands. “Go on now. And bring that baby by sometime soon.”
Ethan executed a smart salute. “Yes, ma’am.”
As he jogged to his truck, Miss Patsy’s cleansing words circled inside his head and took root. God never looks back. And he shouldn’t either. He was doing his best to walk in God’s will, and he had to believe Molly was a part of that.
Time would tell if Molly could overcome her fears, and learn to trust.
And if there was one thing Ethan had, it was time.
Chapter Fourteen
M
olly spotted Ethan and Laney the moment she arrived at the church picnic. Her traitorous heart leaped to see how handsome Ethan looked in a plaid shirt hanging open over a white T-shirt and a pair of ordinary jeans. His wide white smile flashed at something Pastor Cliff said when he placed Laney in the outstretched arms of the pastor’s wife.
Molly’s arms ached to be the ones holding Laney. And she wanted to talk to Ethan so badly her throat hurt.
Not for the first time, she questioned the wisdom of attending this annual event. For a week after the break-up with Ethan she’d confined herself to home and work. Then Aunt Patsy had gotten hold of her. This time she hadn’t been gentle. Worse still, Aunt Patsy had cried, and Molly couldn’t stand to see her beloved aunt upset. Not if she could do something to prevent it. So she’d gone back to church again.
Chloe hadn’t been happy, but Molly had kept
her distance and soldiered on. If she’d learned anything, it was that she needed her church family and she needed God. Ethan said she’d stopped trusting God, but he was wrong. She trusted God. It was herself she didn’t trust.
Strangely, glimpsing Ethan across the churchyard or in the foyer had proven harder than dealing with Chloe’s silent stares. Sometimes he said hello, his blue eyes full of hurt. Those days she’d go home and cry.
She’d known he would be here today and thought she was prepared to see him. Now she wasn’t so sure she could get through an afternoon with Ethan so close—and yet so far away. Keeping her commitment to let him go was the hardest thing she’d done in a long time. And she had done some difficult things.
The day after Easter he’d sent flowers. Yellow tulips. She’d cried that day, too. His phone calls, every day for a while, had dwindled away to none at all now. Perhaps he’d given up on her. Maybe he’d even found someone else.
Molly ran nervous palms down the side of her jeans and considered getting back into the Jeep.
“Don’t even think about it.”
Molly swiveled around to find Lindsey Slater coming across the dirt road, her pregnancy noticeable beneath a big T-shirt advertising her Christmas-tree farm.
“Come on. We need some help getting all the food organized. Church folks do love to eat.”
A horde of people surrounded the concrete tables beneath a huge pavilion complete with outdoor
grill. Pastor Cliff manned the grill, his booming laugh as pleasant as the scent of burgers. Ice chests filled with pop and water would be put to good use throughout the afternoon.
Two men were setting up a volleyball net while some of the older folks pitched horseshoes and the kids chased each other in circles, yelling at the top of their lungs.
The lake, about a hundred yards away, was still too cold for swimming, but the late-spring day was warm and sunny enough for a potluck picnic.
“I brought cake,” she said, reaching into the back seat to withdraw a rectangular pan.
“What kind?”
“Turtle cake.”
Lindsey’s tawny eyes went dreamy. “With caramel and nuts?”
“That’s the one.”
“Now I know you’re staying even if I have to tie you up.”
Molly managed a smile, some of her nerves settling.
Falling in step beside Lindsey, she walked up the grassy knoll to the pavilion.
Aunt Patsy bustled around near the food table, poking spoons into casseroles and salads. When she saw Molly, her face lit up.
“There’s my girl.” She rushed forward, wrapped Molly in a motherly hug and whispered, “Thank you, darling.”
And Molly remembered all over again why she’d come. And why she would stay.
Along with Lindsey and Aunt Patsy she plunged into work, readying the potluck spread for the Seventh Cavalry, as Aunt Patsy called the gathered crowd.
She was slicing a pecan pie and listening to Clare Thompson chatter about the upcoming bazaar when Aunt Patsy leaned toward her. “Chloe’s here.”
As she followed her aunt’s gaze, a cold knot formed in her stomach.
Her sister stepped out of a church van and began unloading toddlers.
“You said she wasn’t coming.”
“That’s what James told me yesterday.”
Molly laid the pie knife aside. “Maybe I should leave.”
“You will not.” Aunt Patsy grabbed her upper arm. “Chloe knew you would be here, and she chose to come anyway. She saw you last weekend at church and this is no different.”
Maybe Aunt Patsy was right. She and Chloe had managed to be in the same church building together without causing an explosion. Granted, they’d ignored each other and stayed on opposite sides of the building. Maybe they could do the same today.
Squaring her shoulders, she picked up the knife again and resumed cutting.
“Good girl.”
Molly watched from beneath her lashes as her sister came up the rise. Long involved in the church’s bus outreach to kids, Chloe was followed by members of her Sunday School class whose parents didn’t attend.
Molly marveled that Chloe, who grieved so violently for her son, preferred to teach the little
ones. Where Molly panicked around kids, her sister seemed to draw comfort.
Chloe, accompanied by her husband, clucked around the children like a mother hen. When her eyes found Molly, she stared long and hard, then hitched her chin in the air and herded the kids toward the sand pile.
Foolishly disappointed, Molly watched the thin woman move away from her. When would she stop hoping and longing that Chloe would forgive her? That they could once again share the special bond of sisterhood?
She turned aside, only to find Ethan watching her over a can of pop. Great. From one heartache to the other in zero point two seconds. Luckily, Deb Castor came up just then looking for volleyball recruits.
“Come on, Molly. We need another warm body on our team.” Earrings swinging, Deb tugged Molly toward the net set up in back of the pavilion. “Tom’s team is blitzing us, as usual.”
Though husband and wife, Deb and Tom got a kick out of competing against each other.
Glad for the tension reliever, Molly trotted to the back court. Good-natured insults volleyed across the net long before the first serve. She relaxed and tossed a few back, feeling good to be in the midst of old acquaintances.
Hands on her knees, she waited while the other players got into position.
Suddenly, her arms tingled with awareness. She instinctively knew who stood next to her.
“Hi,” Ethan said quietly when she glanced over at him.
“Hi.” His eyes were incredibly blue today, as blue as the spring sky.
Heart in her throat, she had so much to say. She wanted to know how he was. What he’d been doing. How Laney was. She wanted to apologize for the sadness she detected in those gorgeous blue eyes of his, and to tell him what a difference he’d made in her life.
But, of course, she couldn’t.
Tom’s team served and the ball came at her, falling with a thud onto the sand.
“Sorry,” she called, trotting to collect the ball and send it back to the other side.
If she was going to play this game, she didn’t dare look at Ethan again.
She concentrated, and the next time the ball came her way, she leaped into action with a decent forearm pass. Ethan darted beneath her, slammed the ball up and over the net for a side out.
Without thinking about it they turned and slapped congratulatory high fives. As soon as they touched, Molly regretted the action. Touching him, looking at him, was killer.
Deb moved up to serve and everyone rotated. Ethan stepped to the net, leaving Molly in the back.
He looked great from her view. So good she missed the next ball that came in her direction. And the next.
“Time to eat.” Pastor Cliff’s voice boomed the news. Molly almost fainted with relief. Another five minutes of drooling over Ethan and she would be tempted to do something stupid.
Back beneath the pavilion, she slid in line behind Lindsey and took a paper plate. Pastor Cliff gave a short prayer and then the crowd surged forward like sharks after blood. Shoulders jostled, voices buzzed. A teenager put ice down Molly’s back, and she yelped and danced, all to the delight of her tormentors.
She loved being here. She hated being here. Crazy, mixed-up woman that she was.
“I’ll get you for that,” she said, glaring in mock anger at the clutch of teenage boys who tried hard to appear innocent.
“You have admirers,” a rich, purring voice said in her ear.
Her pulse leaped, warning her long before she looked that the speaker was Ethan. Even his aftershave, woodsy and dark, told on him.
“Teenagers like to pester. It has nothing to do with admiration.”
His plate piled high with enough food to last Molly a week, he gestured toward an empty table under a shade tree.
“Sit with me. Tell me what you’ve been up to.”
I’d love to.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“It’s only a hamburger.”
She couldn’t stop the smile. “That sounds a lot like, ‘It’s not a date.’”
His blue eyes danced at the memory. He took her paper plate from her hand. “Get us a soda. Then come and sit. If at any point this feels like a date you can get up and run.”
She hesitated. Had she come hoping this would happen? Was she that big a fool?
“Where’s Laney?”
“With Karen.” Both hands full, he hitched his chin toward the pastor’s wife. “Want to get her?”
Molly let the suggestion slide. Yes, she desperately wanted to hold Laney, to smell her baby smell and kiss her soft skin. But that was a risk she couldn’t take.
Just as spending more time with Ethan was a risk she couldn’t take.
She reached for her plate, took it from him. “We’d better not, Ethan. I’m sorry.”
Before she could change her mind she walked away, feeling his eyes on her back. Searching the tables for someone comfortable to sit with, she saw Lindsey and her family.
“Mind if I join you?” she asked.
Lindsey scooted to one side. “We’d love to have you.”
Truth be told, her appetite had gone with Ethan, but she threw a leg over the concrete bench and sat. Lindsey’s step-daughter, Jade, beamed her good will. “My mommy’s having a baby.”
Jesse laughed. “Eat your burger, Butterbean, before I do.” He pretended to reach for the sandwich. Jade squealed and jerked it away in a full body swing.
“You two kids stop fussing,” Lindsey said, laughing with them.
Jesse slid an arm around her waist and hugged her close. “Yes, ma’am. We’ll be good.”
He winked at Jade, and Molly envied the love flowing through the little family.
She picked at her food, found it flavorless. Around the crowded table, the conversation flowed, but she felt no compunction to participate other than to smile or nod. Try as she might, she couldn’t stop thinking about Ethan.
From where she sat, she could see the side of
his face. Some girl she didn’t know sat across from him. A bit of jealousy curled in her stomach, so she doused it with root beer and potato chips.
He leaned back and laughed. Molly watched, mesmerized. On his lap, Laney waved her chubby arms, grabbing at everything within her reach. Ethan efficiently thwarted her attempts to steal his potato chips, handed her a toy instead and kissed the top of her head.
Molly remembered the strength of those hands and the warmth of his mouth on hers.
“Why don’t you go over there and sit with them?”
She jerked to awareness, embarrassed that Lindsey had caught her staring at Ethan like a sick dog.
“Not a good idea.”
“Why not?” Lindsey asked. “I thought you two were a couple.”
“Were. That’s over.”
“And that’s too bad. He’s a terrific guy.”
Molly didn’t need anyone to tell her how terrific he was. Pieces of her heart broke loose every time she thought of what might have been.
She bit into a forkful of potato salad, barely tasting the tangy mustard. The food was good but she’d lost her appetite, even for turtle cake.
Ethan liked her turtle cake. She wondered if he’d gotten a slice.
There he was again, in her head. She furtively slanted her eyes in his direction, trying not to draw attention.
As if he heard her thoughts, Ethan turned and captured her gaze with his.
She had to stop this nonsense. Now.
She stood abruptly, garnering curious glances from her table mates. “I think I’ll take a walk.”
Dumping her half-empty plate in the trash, she started toward the lake a hundred yards downhill from the pavilion. Trash littered the beachfront, an acceptable excuse for getting away from the crowd and Ethan’s tempting presence. She found an empty sack and started picking up cans and bottles and paper along the water’s edge.
The cloudy green water lapped against the shore in gentle waves. She inhaled, taking in the freshness of the air and the slightly fishy scent of the lake.
She hadn’t been out here in a long time. Once she and her dad had fished for bass in this lake, and as kids she and Chloe had learned to swim here.
Gazing out across the wide expanse of Winding Stair Lake, she remembered. Good memories that no amount of heartache could erase.
A wave swelled and white-capped, pretty as a painting.
Something orange, a buoy perhaps, caught her attention.
She frowned and strained her eyes. No. Not a buoy. Something that ballooned up over the wave top and flapped with the motion.
A chill of fear skittered down her spine.
A shirt. An orange shirt. A very small orange shirt.
Surely, it wasn’t attached to a person.
She squinted against the glare, her hand going to her mouth. “Oh, Lord. No.”
A child’s head bobbed up and down. The orange object was the bulge of his air-filled T-shirt holding him, barely, above the water.
Molly whirled toward the pavilion where Ethan walked toward a Dumpster, plate in hand.
“Ethan,” she screamed. “There’s a child in the water!”
Ethan whirled toward her voice. He dropped the plate and took off in a gallop. But he was more than a hundred yards away. The child didn’t have that much time.
She looked back toward the lake. Only the orange shirt bobbed on the surface. The child’s head had disappeared beneath the waves.