Isaiah and Joel had been in the prayer room for hours. Ramona had left to go feed Erin, but the two men were determined to pray until God turned this thing around.
***
“Okay, you think that Shawn doesn’t want you because he’s still in love with me, right?” Lily was trying desperately to reason with this woman.
“I know that’s the reason he doesn’t want me. He told me so himself,” Jules said as she poked holes in the leather chair with the knife she had threatened Lily’s life with.
“Well, what if he falls in love with someone else after I’m gone? Will you kill the next woman also?”
“I’ll do what I have to do,” Jules told her. “And besides, it not about who Shawn loves. It’s about women like you and that Paris Holmes taking men who don’t belong to you. Men who were perfectly happy until you and your kind got your hooks into them.”
Yes, Lily freely admitted that from the first time she laid eyes on Shawn Morrison, she had schemed to get him to fall just as much in love with her as she was with him. But she hadn’t been trying to hurt anyone else in the process of getting her man. And this woman was a year too late on getting Lily to pay for her transgressions, because she had been redeemed, so this woman needed to take up her grievance with God. Lily blurted out, “But I’m not the same person who went after Shawn all those years ago. God has changed me. He’s made me a better person.”
With a bitter laugh, Jules asked, “So now even God loves you, huh? Is that what you’re telling me?”
Uh-oh, is God’s love a sore subject for this woman also? Lily wanted to live, she wanted to see her sons again. But she was running out of things to say in order to plead her case. God, I need your help, she silently prayed.
Just then there was a knock at the front door. “Ms. Washington, are you in there? It’s Detective Jones.”
Lily stood up, she opened her mouth to yell, when Jules raised the hand that held her knife and said, “You better not say nothing.”
But Lily felt that Detective Jones showing up at her doorstep was some kind of intervention from God. She couldn’t take the chance that he would just leave, believing that no one was home. “I’m in here.”
At those words Jules lunged for Lily.
***
“Okay boys, I need to go and check on Mommy before you can go in the house, so please do not get out of the car.”
“Daddy, why are all these police cars on our street?” Shawnee asked.
“I don’t know, Son, but I’m going to find out. Do you trust me?”
Shawnee nodded.
“Then please don’t get out of the car and don’t let your brother get out of his seat, either. I’ll be back as soon as I find out what’s going on.” Shawn had to park two doors down from Lily’s house, because four police cars blocked the street in front of her house. Detective Jones stood in front of one of the cars with a bullhorn, yelling, “You might as well come out, Jules, we have the house surrounded.”
Mrs. Davis, the woman who watched the kids for Lily when she had errands to run, was standing in the street with her housecoat on, walking from officer to officer trying to get answers. Shawn ran over to her and asked if she could get his kids out of the car and take them to her house, which was just three doors down.
Her eyes were frantic with worry as she said, “Of course I’ll take care of them babies. But you get Lily out of this mess. I don’t know what’s going on in there, but it can’t be good.”
“I’m going to get her out, if it’s the last thing I do,” Shawn assured the woman. Then he turned and headed straight for Detective Jones.
“God loves you, too,” Lily said as she and Jules lay on the floor, both clutching the knife that Jules wanted to carve her up with. After Lily had called out to Detective Jones and then Jules lunged at her, the two women engaged in a battle that left them panting and worn out, but neither woman was giving up.
“That’s not true. God doesn’t love me.”
“God loves us all, Jules. Don’t you get it? He loved me even when I was running around doing things that other people found distasteful.” Lily wanted to say, “like stealing Shawn from you”, but she was too tired to keep the fight going.
At that remark, Jules seemed to loosen her hold on the knife a bit. “How did you know that God loved you, even when He shouldn’t have?”
Lord, please open this woman’s heart to receive the truth. “Because, no matter what I did, God kept stretching out His arms to me. He was right there, just waiting for me to repent and turn back to Him. But the thing about it was, I didn’t feel His love until I was ready to receive it. Are you ready, Jules?”
“I’m going in there to get her,” Shawn told Detective Jones as he began walking towards the door.
Jones grabbed Shawn’s arm. “This isn’t the football field, Shawn. You’re not in control here. Now, I’m trying to get Lily out of there alive. Do you really want to do something that will hinder that?”
Shawn snatched away from Jones. “I’ve got to do something, Jones. Don’t you get it? Jules has already killed my daughter’s mother. But this right here?” Shawn pointed towards Lily’s door. “Jules might as well kill me, if she’s going to take Lily out. Because I’m as good as dead anyway.”
“And who’s going to take care of your sons and your daughter if you and Lily get yourselves killed today?”
Shawn had no answer for that, but he reached for the bullhorn in Jones’s hand. At least let me tell Lily that I’m here.”
Jones handed him the bullhorn.
Shawn turned toward the house. He put the bullhorn to his mouth and said, “Lily… Lily, baby, I’m here. And I’m not going anywhere until you come out. I need you to come back to me, baby. So, please stay strong.”
“See,” Jules said as Shawn’s endearing words drifted into the house. “Everybody loves you. I just don’t know why nobody wants to love me.” Jules began crying.
Hearing Shawn’s voice was as life receiving as cold water in the middle of a desert. Lily couldn’t hide from the truth anymore. She told Jules, “Yes, he loves me. And you know what? I love him right back. Isn’t that the kind of relationship you want? You don’t really want to be with someone who you love, but they don’t love you back, right?”
Tears were streaming down Jules’s face. She let go of the knife and put her hands over her face as her body shook from heartache. “All I ever wanted was for somebody to love me.”
Holding the knife in one hand, Lily rubbed Jules’s back with her other hand. “I know somebody who will love you back, Jules. I’m going to ask you again, are you ready to receive God’s love?”
“Please don’t hurt Lily, Jules,” Shawn was still talking into the bullhorn. “Let her go and take me instead. Lily shouldn’t have to pay for what I did to you. Do you hear me, Jules? I rejected you, not Lily.”
Detective Jones took the bullhorn away from Shawn. “That’s enough. We don’t want to say too much.”
Shawn let him the bullhorn, but then he took off towards Lily’s door. Jones said this wasn’t a football field, but Shawn ran the yard as if he was trying to win the Super Bowl.
Jones ran after him. “Don’t do this man.”
“I don’t have a choice,” Shawn said as he held onto Lily’s rail. He was about to take a flying leap up the steps, when the door swung open.
Lily calmly walked out of her door with her arm around Jules’s shoulder. Jones pulled Shawn out of the way as he grabbed hold of Jules and slapped the cuffs on her.
“Wait,” Lily said as she walked over to Jules and gave her a hug. “I don’t care what happens, always remember, that from this day forth, God loves you and he has redeemed you from your past.”
Shawn wanted to yell at Lily… tell her to get away from Jules and stop trying to save the world. But when he saw the look of pure joy on Jules's face that replaced the sadness she seemed always to possess, he had a moment of clarity, and wanted his own share of redemption. And now that God ha
d kept Lily alive, Shawn knew that he could no longer kick against the prick either. He, too, wanted God to forgive all of his sins, so he got on his knees—even his bad one, in front of Lily and everyone else standing outside and asked God to come into his heart and forgive him of his sins.
Lily put her hand over her mouth and started crying as she saw what Shawn was doing. “Thank you, Lord, thank you,” she said as she walked over to the man she loved.
Shawn stood up and pulled her close to him and asked, “So what do you think, Lily? Can God redeem you to me?”
Lily had made up her mind before she even walked out of her house. Shawn had made a bunch of mistakes, but so had she. Lily wanted this man, and she would not walk away from him again. “Baby, He already has.”
Shawn’s cell phone rang. He looked at the caller ID and saw that it was Isaiah. He answered the phone. “Hey, bro.”
“Hey, yourself. How’s Lily?”
“She’s safe and I know you were praying because this thing ended miraculously. And I think I might even be able to convince her to marry me.” After saying that, Shawn turned to Lily to get her response.
She nodded. “Yeah baby, I’ll marry you.”
“Did you hear that?” Shawn yelled at Isaiah. “I am now the most blessed man on earth.”
EPILOGUE
At the ripe old age of ninety-two, Joel Morrison went home to be with his Lord. His children and grandchildren stood around his bed as he made his ascent into heaven. Joel was smiling because he had finished his work on earth. His children had learned the true meaning of giving. And having so learned, they now could appreciate the gift of Jesus Christ that God has freely given to all mankind… all anyone has to do is receive Him.
No one could beat God giving. Joel knew in his heart that the five hundred million dollars that his children had given away was nothing compared to the gift that God had given each one of them… the gift of eternal life.
At the reading of the will, the Morrison children discovered that their father had about ninety seven million of his massive fortune left. The five children would each receive equal shares. As they left the executor’s office, Shawn asked Dee Dee what she was going to do with her nineteen million dollars; she said, “Well, after I give ten percent to my church, I think I’ll put another ten or twenty percent into my foundation. But I have no clue who I want to give the rest of it to.”
All five of the Morrison children burst out laughing. Because as the executor had been telling them how blessed they were to be sharing in a ninety-seven million dollar fortune, each of them had been trying to figure out how they would bless someone else. Their father had taught them well; Eric, Isaiah, Dee Dee, Shawn and Elaine all knew that they had been blessed to become a blessing to others.
And that is why for years and years to come, anyone passing by Joel Morrison’s massive tombstone had to stop and read the inscription: Here lies a giver… a man who was blessed and highly favored of God.
Blessed and Highly Favored Titles:
The Blessed One
The Beloved
The Preacher’s Choice
Second Chance at Love
Redemption of the Playboy
AUTHOR BIO: Vanessa Miller
Vanessa Miller of Dayton, Ohio, is a best-selling author, playwright, and motivational speaker. Her stage productions include: Get You Some Business, Don’t Turn Your Back on God, and Can’t You Hear Them Crying.
Vanessa has been writing since she was a young child. When she wasn’t writing poetry, short stories, stage plays and novels, reading consumed her free time. However, it wasn’t until she committed her life to the Lord in 1994 that she realized all gifts and anointing come from God. She then set out to write redemption stories that glorify God.
To date, Vanessa has written four complete series and one single title mainstream book. Her readership steadily grows with each new release as she is a consummate promoter of her works. Vanessa believes that each of her books touch the heart and soul of readers across the country in a special way. It is, after all, her God-given destiny to write novels that bring deliverance to God’s people. These books have received rave reviews, winning Best Christian Fiction Awards and topping numerous Bestsellers’ lists.
·Essence Bestsellers’ List March 2008; May 2008 (Former Rain)
·Essence Bestsellers’ List September 2008 (Rain Storm)
·Black Expressions Book Club Alternate Selection 2007, 2008, 2009 & 2010
·#1 Ebook for fiction on Amazon.com November 2010 (Long Time Coming)
·#1 on BCNN/BCBC Bestsellers’ List November 2010 (Long Time Coming)
Vanessa is a dedicated Christian and devoted mother. She graduated from Capital University with a degree in Organizational Communication. In 2010, Vanessa was ordained by her church as a minister. Vanessa believes that God has called her to minister through her writings and help readers rediscover their place with the Lord.
Most of Vanessa’s published novels depict characters that are lost and in need of redemption. The books have received countless favorable reviews.
“. . . Heartwarming, drama-packed and tender in just the right places.”—Romantic Times Book Review.
“Recommended for readers of redemption stories.” –Library Journal.
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