“They couldn’t find her.”
Shawn wanted to throw his phone out of the window. What was going on? How could the police just let Paris’s killer roam the city free? “Thanks, Melvin. I’m on my way to Lily’s house, so I’ll see what’s up.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
“Lord, in the book of Malachi, You said that if I pay my tithes, you would open up the windows of heaven and pour out a blessing that I wouldn’t have room enough to receive,” Joel prayed to his God. “Well Lord, my family not only pays their tithes, but we are givers. We’ve done what You asked of us ten times over, now we ask that You pour out a blessing for us. We don’t need a financial blessing, because You’ve already blessed us with more money than we could spend in a lifetime. What we need right now, is your blessing of protection, in the name of Jesus. Help Lily, Lord. I don’t know what she’s going through right now. But I feel in my heart that she is in danger. We need You Lord, because our money can’t help us out of this jam… we’re depending on You.”
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 contentment and joy flash across Jules face at the knowledge of God’s redeeming power… Shawn could no longer kick against the prick. He wanted his own share of redemption. 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.
The End
Other Books by Vanessa Miller
Long Time Coming
A Promise of Forever Love
A Love for Tomorrow
Yesterday’s Promise
Forgiven
Forsaken
Through the Storm
Rain Storm
Latter Rain
Abundant Rain
Former Rain
EBOOKS
Love Isn’t Enough
A Mighty Love
The Blessed One (Blessed and Highly Favored series)
The Wild One (Blessed and Highly Favored Series)
The Preacher’s Choice (Blessed and Highly Favored Series)
The Politician’s Wife (Blessed and Highly Favored Series)
The Playboy’s Redemption (Blessed and Highly Favored Series)
Anthologies (Editor)
Keeping the Faith
Have A Little Faith
This Far by Faith
The Blessed and Highly Favored Series is available in ebook format only…
The Blessed One: (March 2011) Joel Morrison proved his love for God when he lost all of his children in the 1952 Kern County earthquake. He weathered those hard times, and God blessed him with five more children. But now that his children are grown and living their own lives, Joel worries that the devourer has once again set his sights on the family that God has blessed.
For the most part, Joel’s children are successful and rich yet very unhappy. Joel realizes that giving his children more money will not make them happy, nor will it secure a place in heaven for them, when their hearts and souls are not fully committed to Christ. So, Joel Morrison decides to change his will in an attempt to teach his children a lesson in giving. He invites his children on a family vacation in the Bahamas to tell them that he will be giving most of his money away to charity. However, Joel’s declaration is not the biggest surprise of their vacation.
Shockwaves are sent throughout the Morrison family, the likes of which they may never recover from.
The Wild One: (release date: June 2011) Dee Dee Morrison-Milner is a movie star and the wild child in the Morrison family; you name it and she’s done it, with almost no regrets. However, when her younger sister, Elaine, asks her to adopt an African orphan child (Natua), Dee Dee agrees because Hollywood is full of actresses adopting underprivileged children--no big deal. But when a psycho fixates on Dee Dee’s maternal abilities and imagines himself married to the movie star diva, she finds herself running from a stalker.
When Natua is kidnapped, Dee Dee turns back to her estranged husband, Drake Milner, to help her find the child whose kind nature stole her heart. Along the way, Drake helps Dee Dee restore her relationship with the Lord.
The Preacher’s Choice: (release date: August 2011) Isaiah Morrison is a man after God’s heart. Even though his wife divorces him, Isaiah continues to preach and declare the goodness of the Lord. He is content to live alone for the rest of his life, never imagining that God has something else in mind for him.
The first day Ramona Verse walked into Christ Tabernacle, she fell in love with everything about the church, and especially the handsome self-assured man behind the pulpit. But would a man like Pastor Morrison ever consider a woman with a dark past like hers? Ramona and Pastor Morrison are brought together through his need for someone to head his charity foundation, but Isaiah will soon discover that he needs much more from the secretive Miss Verse than he ever thought possible.
The Politician’s Wife: (release date: October 2011) Eric Morrison’s wife, Linda, hits a football superstar while driving drunk, and Eric tries to cover it up. But Linda is now ready to atone for her sins. With help from unexpected places, she finds the strength to stop drinking and gives her life to Christ. Eric is thrilled when his wife stops drinking. However, when she tells him that she wants to start an organization that helps recovering alcoholics put their lives back together and that she intends to use some of his father’s foundation money to do it, Eric rejects the idea, convinced that it will put his bid for governor at risk.
Th
en a blackmailer threatens to reveal pictures of his wife’s drunk-driving accident unless he receives ten million dollars. Eric must decide whether he will stand up for the truth that his father taught him and that his wife also believes in or sell his soul for public office.
This story has so many twists and turns, you won’t be able to put it down!
The Playboy’s Redemption: After a very public argument over child support payments, the mother of Shawn Morrison’s third child is found dead. The police believe that Shawn is involved and bring him in for questioning.
In the fight of his life, Shawn turns to the brother who disowned him and the ex-fiancé who left because of his cheating ways, and wants nothing to do with him. But Lily is now a born-again Christian and feels compelled to help her lost love.
Will stepping back into Shawn’s world prove to be too much for Lily to handle? Or will her forgiving heart and new attitude concerning morality finally help Shawn turn back to God in this, his darkest hour?
Love Isn’t enough (Short Story) ebook
Sometimes love just isn’t enough and Hannah Ellison is sick of pretending.
She promised to love, honor and cherish her husband, but Thomas kept secrets. And now as Hannah wades through all of Thomas’s unpaid bills, baby mama drama and her inability to conceive… she must decide if love is enough to keep her at home when her heart and mind is in turmoil over something that only God can fix.
The Playboy's Redemption Page 8