LITMIR.BIZ

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would have thought she’d learned a thing or two from that humiliating sequence of events. Like, for instance, that making rash judgments could result in undue embarrassment for all those involved. Andrew had told her there was a perfectly good explanation for his overnight presence at Serena’s house, if she would only wait for it. But Charity hadn’t waited; she’d gone right to the deacons with her charge. And then it had come to light how Andrew and Serena had been counseling Reverend Bob’s pregnant teenage daughter.

      Shame over that situation still made Charity hang her head low. If you learned so much, what were you doing, attacking that poor builder? That Rick McKinley was wrong suddenly didn’t seem a good enough defense for her actions.

      “Charity, dear, stop daydreaming and eat some toast. You’re going to waste away to nothing. And just look at your eyes. You look exhausted.”

      Maybe that’s because I worked all night. That unkind response startled Charity so much she straightened in her chair. Guilt appeared immediately, but she covered it with a smile and a nod. It wasn’t like her to talk back to her mother, even in her thoughts. Mother always had her best interest at heart. She needed to remember that. “You’re right. I am tired.”

      “You go straight to bed then. I’ll clean up the kitchen. I did most of the cleaning while I was waiting for you, anyway.”

      “Thanks, Mother,” she said, choosing not to respond to that last comment or the mild censure that came with it.

      Charity let herself be shooed up the stairs to her room, but the tiny daisies that covered the bed, walls, filmy curtains, even her picture frames, immediately crowded her. It was a little girl’s room. Nothing had changed in that room in twenty years, except the grade level of shelved textbooks and the arrival and upgrades in her desktop computer.

      She couldn’t sleep here, or anywhere else. Not as confused as she felt after the events at the hospital. And not with Rick McKinley’s smug face reappearing in her thoughts. Before this morning, she’d only seen him that one time at the groundbreaking, and now his image wouldn’t go away. More frustrating than that, just one confrontation with this guy had dissatisfaction with her whole life twisting inside her like a tightening noose.

      That made no sense. Her life was fine. Settled, even. So it had to be something else. Something about the man himself. Crawling under her blankets, she tried to push away the images as well as the agitation that kept her breathing from steadying toward sleep. She could still see him measuring and sawing wood, outside in the September morning. Outside the church.

      “Wait. That’s it.” She looked about the room, as surprised at having spoken aloud as having sat straight up in bed.

      She’d never seen Rick inside her church. Maybe he didn’t attend anywhere. Come to think of it, she didn’t recognize any of the crew from Sunday services, and since she never missed one, she should know. Oh, Rusty attended regularly, of course, but the rest were definite prospects. Maybe her preoccupation with Rick was a sign of her mission to bring that motley construction crew into the church.

      Letting her head float back to the pillow, she imagined all the men, tool belts still slung on their hips, lining the church’s front pew. But her plan stalled, only halfway formed. Before she could act as a candle leading those men to light, she needed to make amends with their difficult leader.

      A case of nerves. Nothing else could explain the way her pulse tripped at the thought of facing Rick again. She flipped onto her stomach, burying her face in the pillow and pressing her heart into the mattress to slow the beat.

      Maybe it was anticipation for the mission ahead. It had nothing to do with being under the scrutiny of those huge, unreadable eyes or absorbing the tension he radiated in waves. No, she had been and would continue to be unaffected by the rugged Rick McKinley. But an uneasiness settling deep inside made her wonder.

      Rick took the last bite of his sandwich during his lunch break, wishing he could bite back the resentment that had soured his mood all morning. That he couldn’t shake the irritation only made him angrier. He stood up from the picnic table, stowed his cooler under a tree and stalked toward the building site. Rusty caught up with him halfway across the parking lot and fell into step beside him.

      “Hey, Boss, sorry about the run-in with Sister Charity. You’ve just got to understand that—”

      “That what?” Rick jerked to a stop and faced the other man. “That she’s a shrew? That she had nothing better to do than to come here and bother me?” He glanced at his shoulders that had lifted to about ear level and carefully lowered them to a relaxed pose. “No big deal.”

      Rusty nodded. “I can see that.”

      “Can see what?”

      Rusty countered Rick’s sharp look with a sheepish grin. “I know Sister Charity can get under the fingernails of the best of them, but she’s not so bad really. She’s got a real good heart when she lets it shine through. If I had my guess, I’d say it was her mother who taught her to hide it so well.”

      Rick didn’t need to hear this, didn’t care what made the spitfire spit. It was like hearing a serial killer explain how he didn’t get enough hugs as a child. So he had no idea what made him ask, “What do you mean?”

      “After Mr. Sims died, Sister Laura moved to Milford with Charity, who was about three from what I’ve heard tell. Her mother was a founding member of Hickory Ridge, around since the church still met in an empty storefront at Main and Commerce.”

      When Rick prompted him to move along in the story with a twirl of an index finger, Rusty held up his hand. “I’m getting there. It’s said that the late Joseph Sims was a real good Christian man, a deacon who had just been called into the ministry when he passed. Sister Laura has spent almost three decades preparing her daughter to marry someone just like him.”

      Rick started walking again but turned to speak over his shoulder. “What does that have to do with attacking strangers on construction sites?”

      Rusty raised both hands in a gesture of simplicity. “Charity is trying to act the part of a perfect minister’s wife, hoping that will help her catch a minister. But she’s got it all wrong.”

      “That’s pretty obvious, but I don’t see how any of this matters.”

      “Hear me out, okay?” Glancing first at the parsonage, Rusty turned back to his boss. “Almost two years ago, when Andrew started his fellowship at Hickory Ridge, Charity chased after him like toilet paper stuck to a shoe, and she was appreciated about as much. It was a real blow to her when he married Serena instead.”

      Andrew and Serena who had just had a child together? With Charity as their nurse? A seed of pity for the woman he’d immediately disliked threatened to sprout inside Rick, but he pushed it safely underground. “I bet that made it uncomfortable today at the hospital.”

      “It might have been, but I just know Sister Charity did everything she could to make the delivery comfortable for Serena. Charity’s a great nurse. You can just tell how much she cares about those babies—and their moms. That’s how I know she has a good heart.”

      Rick took a few more steps away. “She wasn’t displaying any good heart when she marched in and attacked me over my choice of music.”

      Rusty walked up behind him again. “Our Charity. What a gal.” He laid a hand on his boss’s shoulder until Rick faced him, and then Rusty leaned in for a close examination. “Well, it doesn’t look like she left any marks—visible ones, anyway. Why don’t you give her a break this time?”

      “Yeah, you’re probably right.”

      “Besides, it’s not like you have to work with her every day or anything. You probably won’t have to see her again until the dedication.”

      From your mouth to God’s ears. But to Rick, he only said, “Okay. You’re right.” It was awfully hard for him to see gray in his black-and-white world, and his friend expected him to see the full range of hues from soft silver to dark

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