Let It Be Me
Page 36
Laughing, she did so.
Fifteen minutes later, Tess and Rudy appeared at the door.
Leah beckoned them forward and they bustled inside, full of concerned questions and sympathy. The older couple had made it here even before Dylan’s friends, who had phones permanently grafted to their hands.
“Buddy!” Rudy gripped Dylan’s shoulder. His glasses were askew. His chin quivered. “We were so frightened when we heard. Are you all right?”
Dylan nodded.
Rudy carefully hugged him.
Tess straightened Dylan’s blankets and hair, her lips tight. That subtle sign was a giveaway. It informed Leah that seeing Dylan, injured and lying in a hospital bed, was supremely difficult for Tess.
“What do you need?” Rudy asked. “I’ll go get it for you. Pizza? Cheez-Its? Gatorade? One of those really big cups of Coke?” He held his hands about a yard apart to indicate the Coke’s size. “You name it.”
“Rudy.” Tess heaved an exasperated sigh. “We don’t yet know how Dylan is receiving his nutrition, since he has a tube in his throat. Nor can we offer food and drinks his doctors might have forbidden him to have.”
Rudy winked at Dylan. “If you want a giant Coke, I’ll get you one.”
“Rudy!”
A nurse had left paper and a pen on Dylan’s bed tray. He pulled the tray closer and wrote, Thanks, but I’m good right now. I’m glad you’re here.
“Leah?” Tess asked. “May I have a word?”
Leah followed her into the sterile-smelling hallway.
“Thank you for contacting us,” Tess said.
“You’re welcome.”
“Rudy and I will stay here with him if you need to take a break. Or go home and get some of his things.”
“I don’t plan to go anywhere for the rest of the day. In fact, I’m wearing work-out clothes, so I’ll just sleep here on the futon.”
“When will you be making a trip home?”
“In the morning?”
“We’ll come back then to relieve you.” Tess captured a renegade strand of gray hair and forced it behind her ear. “Today must have been awful for you.”
“It was. I watched him struggle to breathe. I . . . thought he might die.”
Today, Leah had glimpsed what the world might have been like if death had stolen her brother. Now she could understand a glimmer of what Tess must have felt when death had stolen her son and what Sebastian must have felt when death had stolen his mother.
Tess took hold of Leah’s hand, and the comfort only grandmothers can provide flowed from Tess to Leah.
Because of what Leah had been through with her parents, the brand of love she valued most was the brand of love that stayed. That showed up over and over, year after year.
That was the kind of love Tess and Rudy had given to her and her brother.
It was no longer possible for Leah to view Tess with the same wholehearted trust that she had before. But even if she could not forget what Tess had done, she could forgive.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
It was Dylan’s closet that precipitated Leah’s breakdown.
The morning after his accident, Tess and Rudy arrived at the hospital just as they’d said they would. Leah returned home to shower, change, and gather the items Dylan had requested.
To her astonishment, she’d slept well last night on the hard futon. She and Dylan had shared a room when he’d been small, so sharing a room with him last night had wrapped her in a blanket of nostalgia. Even the middle-of-the-night visits from the nurses had soothed her because it had been reassuring to know she wasn’t the only one in charge of Dylan’s well-being. Trained professionals were watching over him!
It wasn’t until she opened his closet in order to pack some of his clothes and smelled the familiar scent of his soap that a wave of emotion swelled up and enveloped her.
Every article was so him. So familiar.
Her brother was going to live.
Thank God, her brother was going to live. Her gratitude was too enormous to contain.
Knowing everything she knew now . . . if she could go back to the hospital nursery on the day of her birth and change the course of events . . . would she choose life with the Brooksides over life with Dylan?
She would not.
It wasn’t even a close call. No set of circumstances could tempt her to give her brother up.
Tears slid down her cheeks.
Tess’s action had impacted Leah’s life in drastic ways. It was easy to think that Tess had entered in and mucked up what God had ordained. But could Tess’s error in judgment actually have been used by God?
Could something happen in a way that was so strange and amazing that it could only have been Him?
In recent days, she’d been disappointed by what she’d perceived as God’s inattention. Dylan’s accident revealed that God had not been inattentive. He’d simply been working in ways she hadn’t understood.
Yesterday, when Dylan raced off in his truck, her false sense of control had been stripped from her. She’d been powerless.
Yet God had not been.
He’d brought Sebastian to her months ago. When Dylan overheard her switched-at-birth secret, God had placed Sebastian there. When Dylan collided with that tree, God ensured that Sebastian possessed the skills needed to preserve her brother’s life.
Despite her quibbles over some of the twists and turns her life had taken, everything was, ultimately, exactly as it should be.
Praise you, God. Thank you.
She cried and praised Him, praised Him and cried.
The woman who delighted in tidy math quotients enjoyed feeling as though she understood God’s plan. She liked clear guidance and guarantees. It made her comfortable to believe she had a degree of power over her brother and her relationship with Sebastian.
But God was bigger than her wishes. His methods didn’t always suit her. Often, He didn’t make her privy to His ways. Sometimes, she couldn’t fathom His plan. And in the end, she had no power to wield.
He was the only guarantee she was going to receive.
Fortunately, He was the only guarantee she needed.
Her task: to surrender.
If God could accomplish His will for Dylan so beautifully, then He could accomplish His will for her and Sebastian, too.
Still sniffling, she texted Sebastian.
Meet me at the garden next to the hospital in an hour?
Years ago, the industrial building adjacent to the hospital had been demolished. A husband had purchased the lot in order to show his appreciation to the doctors and nurses who’d saved his wife’s life. He’d turned the rubble into a lavish garden for hospital staff, patients, and community members.
Sebastian responded immediately.
See you then.
Sebastian had been trying not to sink into depression over Leah.
Her brother was recovering, and so, of course, Dylan was her priority. The fact that she hadn’t asked to speak with him until now didn’t necessarily mean that she was fine with their breakup. He’d been telling himself that she might still be willing to take him back.
He hadn’t convinced himself.
Fighting down stress, he sat on a wooden bench in the garden, elbows planted on his knees.
It scared him to want something as much as he wanted Leah. Especially because he wasn’t sure what to do to convince her to give him another chance.
If you want to express how you feel about me, I recommend that you tell me, she’d said to him once.
So he’d decided to do just that. To tell her. That’s what he’d shown up at her house the other morning to do. But then Dylan had injured himself, and the time hadn’t been right since for an honest conversation between them.
Was the time right now?
Had he chosen the right approach? Not only did simply telling her that he loved her—putting himself out there like that—terrify him, it also seemed too simple.
He’d reached one of the
most important moments in his life, a moment that would affect everything that came after. . . . And the man who’d always set clear goals, then taken steps toward those goals, had no confidence in the step he planned to take with Leah.
He’d have felt better if he’d booked them a trip or bought her a diamond bracelet or . . . anything else. Instead, he was here alone. Just him. And the words he needed to say to her.
He was trying to put her first. She’d communicated that she didn’t want gifts or grand gestures.
Even so, this setting and strategy didn’t feel like enough.
He didn’t feel like enough.
A sinking sensation moved through his torso. This was going to fail.
Leafless trees sent strips of shade across the dirt path at his feet. The plants across from him bloomed with white flowers. He picked a piece of fluff off his navy sweater and wondered if he should have chosen something nicer than jeans—
“Sebastian.”
He turned toward the sound of Leah’s voice. Sunlight highlighted the slopes of her face and the shiny lemon-colored strands in her hair. She wore the outfit with the polka dot shirt she’d worn in Atlanta.
The day they’d met, he’d thought she had the face of a world-weary angel, but he hadn’t known the half of it. He’d had no idea then of her quickness, feistiness, fairness. He hadn’t known what it felt like to kiss her. Or how one look from her blue eyes could set his world on fire.
Sick with worry that she’d reject him, he straightened to his full height.
She stilled. “You saved Dylan’s life, and I’ll never forget it for as long as I live. How can I thank you?”
He didn’t want her gratitude if he couldn’t have her. “A better man would say that you don’t have to thank me. But I’m going to press my advantage.”
“I expected nothing less.”
“As you know, I never let indebtedness go to waste.”
“I’m very aware of this truth.”
“You can thank me by taking me back.”
She angled her head a few degrees. Not shooting him down, but not saying anything, either.
Dread constricted his ribs. “Since the day we met,” he told her, “all I’ve wanted is to be with you.”
“At Claire’s house, you told me you couldn’t get any more involved with me.”
“That was stupid,” he said bluntly. “When I watched Claire’s dad hit you and realized that you’d broken your promise, it rattled me.” He struggled to find the right words. “You know when you fall, and you see the ground rushing up at you?”
“Yes.”
“The things that happened at Claire’s made my fears rush up at me. I’m sorry about how I reacted.”
“Okay,” she said simply.
“I definitely do want to get more involved with you.” It felt as though a splinter had lodged in his throat. He looked right at her, bulldozed past all his doubts, and forced himself to speak the words he hadn’t said out loud in twenty-four years. “I love you.”
She blinked. “Sebastian, I—”
“Almost all my life, I’ve felt like an outsider.” He couldn’t let her tell him they were over until he’d said what he had to say. “But I don’t feel that way with you. With you, I belong. That might not sound like much. But to me, it’s everything.”
She stepped to him, set her palms on his chest, and kissed him. The contact was feather-light, brief, tender. Even so, it had the power to flatten forests.
Did this mean she’d forgiven him?
Pulling back a few inches, she smiled in a way that gave him hope.
His hands cradled her jaw. “You are galaxies of stars to me, Leah. The most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen. I can see my whole future in your face. And I desperately want the chance to love you.”
“Sebastian.”
“Yes?”
“Are you ready for me to complete the sentence I began earlier?”
“The one that started with ‘Sebastian, I’?”
“That’s the one.”
“Feel free, so long as your sentence isn’t ‘Sebastian, I never want to see you again.’”
“It isn’t.”
“I also hope it isn’t ‘Sebastian, I just want to be friends.’”
“It isn’t.”
“Then go ahead, Professor.”
Her body was warm against his. Her fingers interlocked behind his neck. “I was about to say . . .” She cleared her throat. “Sebastian, I love you.”
His heart stopped for a split second, then thundered. He scoured her face, hunting for proof that she meant what she’d just said.
“When I say that I love you,” she continued, “you can take that to the bank. I’m a mathematician and certainty is my currency.”
Joy overwhelmed him. He wasn’t experienced with this kind of joy, and now so much of it filled him that he couldn’t speak.
“You’re a hero,” she said.
“No.”
“You’re not going to be able to convince me otherwise,” she insisted. “You’re a hero—to me, and to a lot of other people, too.”
“I’m messed up in a lot of ways.”
“You’re not perfect,” she acknowledged. “But—”
“You are. You’re perfect.”
She laughed under her breath. “No I’m not!”
Yes. She was. He kissed her and his worries disintegrated at the feel of her lips and the scent of her lavender soap. His devotion to her was a storm within. Life-changing. Steadfast. Stronger than hardships or time.
She set her forehead against his. They were both short of breath. “Do you know what you are, Sebastian?”
“Difficult?” he asked wryly.
“You’re perfect for me. And that’s enough.”
“The Lord has established his throne in the heavens, and his kingdom rules over all.”
—Psalm 103:19
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
The plot of Let It Be Me revolves around Leah’s discovery that she was switched at birth. Were you surprised when the culprit behind the switch was revealed?
Were you satisfied with Leah’s decision not to contact her biological parents? Why or why not?
Becky was fascinated by her research into the field of pediatric cardiac surgery! Did you learn anything new about that profession while reading Let It Be Me?
Becky has a teenage son and so she had a wonderful time writing about a sister serving as the caregiver for her teen brother. What qualities of Leah’s did Becky reveal via Leah’s relationship with Dylan?
Raise your hand if you’ve ever thought or said, “I’m bad at math,” like Dylan does in the novel. Becky spent most of her life believing herself to be bad at math. However, while researching this book, she watched numerous lectures given by women with PhDs in math. The following thought of Leah’s was inspired by those lectures: “No one was bad at math. Many people didn’t respond well to the way math was taught in school. But that did not mean they were bad at it.” Do you agree? Disagree?
What characteristics of Sebastian’s and Leah’s made them a great match for one another? Can you name a celebrity who resembles the Sebastian or the Leah of your imagination?
For Becky, one of the joys of writing this novel was the opportunity to explore the friendship between Sebastian and Ben. Was there a specific aspect of their behavior toward each other that you appreciated?
Which characters or scenes in Let It Be Me made you smile or laugh?
At one point in the novel, Leah thinks that Sebastian is “a heart surgeon who did not understand the inner workings of his own heart.” Becky used baby Isabella’s journey to a new heart as a metaphor for Sebastian’s emotional/spiritual journey over the course of the novel. What scene in Sebastian’s evolution was the most meaningful for you?
The hero of the next MISTY RIVER ROMANCE novel, Luke, was introduced within the pages of Let It Be Me. What do you expect to happen characterization-wise or romance-wise in his book?
Bec
ky Wade is the 2018 Christy Award Book of the Year winner for True to You. She is a native of California who attended Baylor University, met and married a Texan, and moved to Dallas. She published historical romances for the general market, then put her career on hold for several years to care for her three children. When God called her back to writing, Becky knew He meant for her to turn her attention to Christian fiction. Her humorous, heart-pounding contemporary romance novels have won three Christy Awards, the Carol Award, the INSPY Award, and the Inspirational Reader’s Choice Award for Romance. To find out more about Becky and her books, visit www.beckywade.com.
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Table of Contents
Cover
Half Title Page
Books by Becky Wade
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Contents
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Discussion Questions
About the Author
Back Ads
Back Cover
List of Pages
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