Small-Town Mom (22 page)

He leaned in the car and brushed his lips against hers. “I don’t have to know right now,” he said, his breath warm against her cheek.

Almost before his action could register in her mind, he straightened and smiled down at her.

Her heart took over. “Yes, I’d like to go to the concert.”

Chapter Fifteen

T
he rap on the front door reverberated up the stairs to Jamie’s room.

He can’t be here already.
She hadn’t even done her makeup yet. Jamie checked her alarm clock. Eli was a full fifteen minutes early. She should have expected it. But it had been so nice to have the house all to herself that she’d dawdled in her bath. Anne’s mother-in-law, Mary, who was watching Rose and Opal tonight, had taken the girls early to give Jamie time to get ready, and Myles had gone over to Tanner’s this afternoon.

The rap sounded again. She glanced in the mirror at the soft ivory silk blouse she wore over the dressy jeans she’d bought last weekend because she really needed a new pair, not because of the concert. Except for a lack of jewelry, she looked fairly together. She hurried to the door before Eli could knock again.

Jamie opened the door and a look of surprise crossed Eli’s face. He’d probably expected to see Opal since she was his usual greeter. “Hi, come in. You’re a little early.”

He checked his watch.

Why had she said that?

Eli ran his gaze over her. “You look nice.”

“Thanks.” She warmed. It had been a while since anyone other than Rose or Opal had commented on her appearance.

He glanced around. “No kids?”

“No, they’re all at their designated posts for the night. I’m almost ready. Give me five.”

“I’m not going anywhere without you.”

Her heart skittered. What was with her? She and Eli had gone out before. At this rate, she was going to be total mush by the time they got to the concert. Standing in front of the mirror in the upstairs bath, she breathed deeply to steady her hand so she could apply her makeup. She finished and, after a final check in the mirror, closed her makeup case. In her room, she added the turquoise pendant and matching earrings she’d bought when she’d picked up the new jeans.

“All set.” She smiled at Eli as she descended the stairs. Even though they were now running a little late, he took what seemed to her an extraordinarily long time helping her on with her coat. And she didn’t mind one bit.

* * *

Eli pulled open the door to the church hall, his gaze on Jamie alert to any hesitation she might show. On the drive to her house, he’d gone back and forth over whether he’d made a good move inviting her to the concert. Much as he tried to tell himself that he’d invited her for the music, deep down he knew he also hoped it might be an opening for Jamie to return to God and Hazardtown Community Church. Lately, he’d sensed that she wasn’t as far from her previous relationship with God as he’d previously thought.

“Looks like a good turnout,” Jamie said as he took her coat and handed it to a teen from his youth group who was volunteering as a coat-check person.

“Yeah, it sold out fast. I would have had no problem finding someone to take your ticket if you’d decided not to come.”

“Well, don’t think you’re going to get rid of me now.”

“Not a chance.” He placed his hand on the small of her back. “There’s Neal and Anne. I thought we’d sit with them.”

“Good.”

He walked her to the seats their friends had saved for them, pleased to have the most beautiful woman in the room beside him.

“Hi,” Anne said. “I’m so glad you came. Have you heard Resurrection Light before?”

“A few times on the radio. Myles likes them.”

“I’ve become a big fan. The lead singer is from Ticonderoga, and I heard that because we’re a hometown audience, they may sing a new song that’s not going to be released until next week.”

Eli waited for Jamie to sit and then made himself comfortable in the chair next to her, resting his arm on the back of her seat. As the band worked through its set, he dropped his arm around her shoulders. The music wound down and the lead singer stepped back to the microphone. “We’re going to take a twenty minute break then come back for another set. I hear there are some refreshments to keep you entertained until then.”

The dimmed lights turned up and Eli and Jamie rose to walk over to the kitchen side of the hall. He took her hand and she slipped her fingers between his, as if it were a natural thing for her to do.

“Eli.” Patrick Russell stopped them halfway there.

“Patrick. I didn’t know you were coming.”

“Brett got us tickets. I want to thank you again for all the help you’ve given him with the Air Force Academy application.”

“No problem. So he’s here with you?” Eli looked past Patrick.

Patrick shook his head. “No,” he said in a subdued voice. “I’m here with Charlie.”

Jamie’s hand stiffened in Eli’s.

“I want to thank you and the Community Church prayer chain for that, too. I think your prayers gave me the strength I needed to convince Charlie to get help. We’re giving things a second try.” Patrick looked over his shoulder. “She’d like to apologize to you for all of the trouble she caused, if you’ll let her.”

Eli nodded. He had no problem hearing Charlie’s apology. Eli could forgive her, even if he might not ever be able to forget all she’d done. He wasn’t so sure about Jamie. He squeezed her hand and she squeezed his back.

“She’s over by the coat room.” Patrick led them to his wife.

“Jamie, Eli. I didn’t know if you’d come, and I couldn’t blame you if you’d refused.” Charlie raised her hand, palm out. “Let me say what I need to say before I lose my nerve. I did some awful things to a lot of people, not the least of which was spreading lies about the two of you. I’m sorry. I’m particularly sorry for hurting Rose. I hurt Katy, too.” Charlie’s voice caught.

Patrick slipped his arm around his wife’s waist. “Without getting into details, there’s a medical cause for some of it.”

“But not all of it.” Charlie stopped her husband’s excuses. “I have to take responsibility for my actions.” She touched Eli’s arm. “I hope that someday you might be able to forgive me for holding my unfounded grudge against you all of these years and refusing to believe what I knew was true about Brett. I hurt him, too, and Patrick more.”

Patrick rubbed Charlotte’s back.

Eli reached deep inside himself. “I forgive you.”

“Thank you.” Tears ran down Charlie’s face. She turned to Jamie. “I know I have no right to ask anything of you, but I hope you can find it in your heart to not hold the sins of the mother against the child and let Katy and Rose remain friends.”

Jamie clutched Eli’s hand, and her throat muscles worked to swallow. To Eli, the silence surrounding the four of them seemed interminable.

“I forgive you, for Eli’s and the kids’ sakes as well as yours.” Jamie looked into his eyes, and his heart swelled. “But you’ll have to forgive me, too. For the time being, Katy can come to our house, but I can’t let Rose come to yours.”

“Fair enough. Thanks again to both of you.”

“Charlie and I are seeing Pastor Joel for counseling, too,” Patrick added.

“He’s very good,” Jamie said in a voice barely above a whisper.

Sounds of the band tuning up punctuated her statement.

“We’d better get back to our seats,” Patrick said. “We’ll see you Sunday, Eli.”

Jamie was quiet on the walk back to their seats. Eli wanted to tell her he was proud of her for accepting Charlie’s apology and acknowledging Pastor Joel’s power as a counselor. His mother had told him Jamie wouldn’t accept Joel’s help after her husband had been killed. But Eli couldn’t put the right words together and didn’t want to chance his admiration coming out wrong.

“I thought you’d gotten lost.” Neal hailed them as they approached their seats.

“Lost? Never. We took a short detour.” Eli would let his friend weigh that one.

The band ran through its second set. “Now we have something special for you,” the lead singer said.

“I was right,” Anne said. “They
are
going to play their new song.”

“Who would have thought my engineering professor wife would become a country-band groupie,” Neal said.

“I am not.” Anne slapped his arm. “I simply like them.”

“It’s okay. Tonight has made me as big a fan as you are. I’m glad I came,” Jamie said.

“I’m glad you did, too,” Eli said for her ears only.

The band’s lead singer moved front and center. “The next song is from our new album that’s releasing next week. It’s a tribute to all of our men and women in uniform and all that they and their families give up for us.”

The crowd responded with thundering applause.

As the song moved from the first verse to the refrain, “Don’t worry about me when I’m gone. My memories of you will bring me home,” Jamie’s shoulders tensed under Eli’s arm. This wasn’t the follow-up she needed to Charlie’s apology. After a moment, she relaxed and continued to tap her foot to the music as she had all evening, except with less enthusiasm. Or did he only imagine less enthusiasm?

The start of the final verse brought a quiet gasp from her.

“Do you want to leave?”

She shook her head.

As the band rolled into the final refrain, tears fell freely down her face. “Don’t worry about me. I’ll be thinking of you when I go home to Jesus… I’ll be praying for your hurt to go away when I’m on my way to Jesus… Don’t worry about me. I’ll be rooting for you to go on with your life when I’m at home with Jesus.”

Eli stared at her helplessly. What had he done? Tonight was supposed to have been a fun night out for Jamie. And it was turning out to be anything but.

At the end of the song, Jamie stood with the others in clapping an ovation, tears streaking her cheeks. Eli mechanically brought his hands together while his mind rolled over ways to try to make things up to Jamie.

Eli was surprised at the way Jamie held herself together saying goodbye to Anne and Neal and other people they saw walking out of the hall. Her determination to be strong made his heart ache. He so wanted to take some of the pain for her but didn’t know how to.

“I’m sorry,” he said as he unlocked the passenger side door of his truck.

Her head jerked up, almost as if she had just noticed him there with her. “John would have liked you. A lot.”

Somehow, her random statement seemed totally appropriate. “I’m sure I would have liked him, too.” He pulled the door open for her. How could he not like someone Jamie had loved?

Jamie lapsed back into her contemplative silence for the short drive to her house.

“I’m happy you asked me to come tonight,” she said as he pulled into her driveway.

“Despite Charlie and the last song?”

“No, more because of Charlie and the last song. They made me see some things more clearly that I didn’t want to see before.”

“And that’s good?”

“That’s good.”

At the front door, she tilted her face to him and he reached for her. A light went on in her neighbor’s house and he stopped.

“It’s okay,” she said. “I don’t care who sees us.”

He drew her into his arms and kissed her with a tenderness fueled by the uncertainty that had plagued him all evening, and she returned the kiss with a fierceness that reignited his desire to protect her from all the harms and hurts of the world.

Chapter Sixteen

J
amie kept an ear tuned to the radio for a weather update as she cleaned up after lunch. The weather report she’d seen on the morning news had forecast a possible nor’easter that could drop as much as three feet of snow this evening and overnight or, if the storm stalled, late tonight and tomorrow morning. The meteorologist on the radio wasn’t any more specific.

“Mom, do you know where my green long-sleeved T-shirt is?”

“I would guess in your dirty clothes hamper or clean clothes basket, depending on whether or not you did your laundry.”

“You’re not any help.” Myles rushed back out of the room.

Jamie wouldn’t have let him get away with that, except she suspected her baby boy was in puppy love. The church youth group was going to a Bible trivia competition in Glens Falls this afternoon. Normally, Myles wouldn’t give a thought to what he was wearing. That is, before the new girl at school joined the youth group. She smiled, letting the cute factor block out her concern about the weather.

“I found it,” Myles shouted from the other room.

“Good,” she shouted back, glancing out the window at Rose and Opal building a snow fort in the back yard. A snowball arced from the corner of the house and fell in the center of the square the girls were walling in. They both threw snowballs back at the tall figure that came around the corner. Jamie’s heart thrummed.

“Mr. Payton is here,” Opal said as she burst inside.

“So, I see.”

Eli grinned at her.

She wiped her hands and walked to the door. “But how did he get all covered in snow?”

“We threw snowballs at him.”

“He started it,” Rose said, laughing.

“Guilty as charged.” He leaned forward as if to kiss her hello, then straightened when Opal reminded him to wipe his feet.

“We’re going to go back out and finish our fort,” Rose said, and she and Opal trooped out.

The door firmly closed, Eli gave her a quick peck. “Hi.”

“Hi. Myles is almost ready.”

Eli looked at the kitchen clock. “Yes, I’m early.”

“I’ve been keeping track of the weather.”

Eli pulled off his gloves. “Yeah, so have Pastor Joel and I, and he’s talked with some of the parents. They all seemed to think it was just weather as usual. Besides, the report I saw on the Weather Channel right before I left said the storm is slowing and may not even reach this far north.”

“That would be fine with me.”

“Me, too.” He placed his gloves on the counter and took her hands. “I’ll take care of him. I might not have grown up in the Buffalo Snowbelt, but I’ve done my share of winter driving here in the mountains.”

“I know.” She shrugged. “But I worry anyway.”

“You’re a mother. Pastor and I talked it over. We don’t expect any problems.” Or at least he’d convinced Pastor the weather wasn’t problematic. The kids were really up for the competition, and the weather reporters were yet to be right about a single big storm they’d forecast this winter. “You know we wouldn’t put the kids in danger.”