Fortress of Love

by Ann Nichols

  Melissa squeezed Anastasia’s hand. “Told me what?”

  Anastasia took a deep breath and continued. “Melissa, the automobile accident that killed my husband and unborn child occurred shortly before Luke returned to Greece.” She paused and spoke as gently as she would to her daughter. “Melissa, it occurred. . .on the evening of. . .” she paused again, and then whispered the date.

  Melissa blinked and tears came immediately to her eyes. It couldn’t be. But the stark realization of what had occurred swept over her like a tidal wave, and a nightmarish horror began to fill her heart. “That’s the day that Luke and I were supposed to—” she choked back a sob, unable to complete her sentence.

  Anastasia nodded and looked wistfully at Melissa, tears streaming down her face.

  “And if we had gotten married,” Melissa spoke the thought out loud, “you and your husband wouldn’t have been here in Greece. . .but. . .” She stopped. She couldn’t continue. The implications were too horrible. “Oh, Anastasia,” Melissa wailed. “I had no idea.” She looked down at the legs that would never walk again, and big tears of anguish spilled over and coursed down her cheeks in a raging torrent. She imagined the horror of what Anastasia and Luke had lived through. She had lost her precious husband and long-awaited son, and Luke had lost his bride, his brother-in-law, and nephew—and in a large measure, his sister as well.

  The sudden onset of grief drove Melissa to her knees and, without thinking, she rested her head on Anastasia’s lap.

  “Shhh. . .” Anastasia soothed Melissa and stroked her hair, just as she might do for Emilia. “How were any of us to know?”

  Melissa lifted her tear-stained face and stated the obvious fact. “I know that it wasn’t directly my fault,” she sniffled, “but Luke blames me all the same. I could see it in his eyes, and now I understand it. Deep underneath it all, he blames me for what happened to you.”

  Anastasia wiped a fresh tear from Melissa’s eye. “He doesn’t blame it all on you. He blames God, too.”

  Melissa breathed a long, sorrowful sigh and looked up at Anastasia. “What about you?” she said with a note of resignation. “Do you still blame me?”

  “Oh. . .” Anastasia waved her hand above her head. “In my ‘Why? Why? Why?’ days, I suppose I did. For awhile.” When Melissa looked stricken, she quickly continued. “But I finally realized how silly that was. How were any of us to know?” she asked again. “We could just as easily have crashed on the way to the wedding.”

  Melissa squeezed her eyes shut. “Anastasia,” she breathed out, “I am so sorry.”

  “All of our sorrow combined won’t give me back what’s been lost,” Anastasia said matter-of-factly. “But, Melissa, when I saw the life and the joy in your eyes that first day you were here, it reminded me that life is still worth living. And when you told me about your parents, I knew that you understood me as few others can. As hard as it may be, we absorb our losses and try to keep going. You didn’t say that with words, but I saw it in your eyes—and that’s what saved me.”

  Placing her hands firmly on Melissa’s shoulders, she sat up straight and tall in her chair, reminding Melissa of pictures she had seen of President Franklin Roosevelt. And like the great commander in chief from the Second World War, Anastasia issued her order. “Now you know what you’re up against in Luke. He’s a stubborn man, but even more he’s a hurting man. I want to see my brother happy, Melissa. And ever since I met you, I have known that he will only be happy if he’s with you. I want you to promise me that you will fight hard for him and not give up.”

  Melissa smiled and brushed away the last of her tears. “That’s a very easy promise to make.”

  As if on cue, fighter jets from the nearby military base flew low over the villa, rattling the windows. “There’s your air support,” Anastasia said with a grin, and the two women fell into each other’s arms, laughing. Melissa knew that she had support from an even higher source, and she resolved once again to trust God to change Luke’s heart.

  Sixteen

  Luke didn’t come home until very late that night.

  Melissa waited up for him.

  The night wrapped around her like a cashmere sweater, soft and warm, as she sat on the same chaise lounge in which she had fallen asleep her first afternoon at Villa Beauvoir. While she waited, she prayed for Luke; she prayed for Anastasia; she gave thanks for the wonder of the stars as they twinkled in the infinite sky and for the soft melody that played over the still sea; but mostly she prayed that the Karalis family would soon know the completeness and happiness that only comes through a personal relationship with God.

  She heard Luke’s car pull into his parking place, and the throaty growl of the powerful engine fell silent. The door opened and slammed shut, and Melissa heard his footsteps climb slowly, wearily, up the marble stairs to the veranda.

  In the darkness, he didn’t see her.

  She remained silent and watched as he leaned against the stone banister and stared out over the blackness of the nighttime sea. She heard him sigh as he lifted his head to gaze at the carpet of stars in the depths of the universe. The Milky Way cut across the sky like a ribbon of velvety light, as it had since before the dawn of mankind.

  The muscles of Luke’s back were tense and tight against the fabric of his shirt as he lifted a weary hand to rub his neck. Melissa wondered how she could be tough enough to love him the way he needed. Every fiber in her being wanted to go to him and massage the ache in his shoulders away. But she knew that the ache in his soul would remain. She had to love him enough to be firm, to be truthful.

  “Melissa. . .” He suddenly, unexpectedly, spoke her name to the endless sky, capturing in that single word all the yearning, all the love, all the pain in his heart. She gasped before she could stop herself.

  Luke spun around and peered across the dark veranda toward where she was sitting. For the longest moment, they just looked at each other.

  To Luke’s eyes, she wasn’t more than a long, dark form against the paleness of the flowered cushion. But he felt her presence and he wondered how he had not known immediately that she was there. A wave of insecurity washed over him. It was as if she had a hold—a debilitating hold—over him. And he didn’t like it one bit.

  Sharply, harshly, almost rudely, he asked, “How long have you been there?”

  Ignoring the tone of his question, she swung her feet to the floor and stood up. “I’ve been waiting for you.”

  “It’s late.” He turned as if to go into the house. “I’m going to bed.”

  Melissa decided that she wasn’t going to let him run away from her any more. Not across an ocean, not to his office at the hospital, and not into the house right now. She blocked his path.

  He stopped just before touching her and took a couple of steps back.

  “You ran away today, Luke,” Melissa softly accused. “Just like you did a year and a half ago.”

  He let out an impatient breath and turned his back. “Melissa—”

  “No, Luke,” she cut him off. “You should have talked to me earlier. You should have told me about Anastasia’s accident and you should have told me when it occurred.”

  “So,” he turned to her, “she told you.” It was a statement, not a question.

  She nodded. “Why didn’t you?”

  “You broke up with me. Remember?” Sarcasm oozed from his words.

  “No, Luke, I didn’t want to break up. I just wanted more time. That was no reason to cut me so totally out of your life.”

  He laughed shortly and shrugged his shoulders, but kept his back turned to Melissa. “Well, Melissa, you’ve had your time. So has Anastasia. A bit different in degrees of enjoyment, but time spent nonetheless.”

  She knew that he was trying to provoke her. She wouldn’t let him. Narrowing her eyes, she said softly yet firmly, “Luke, you’re hiding behind this terrible coincidence.”

  He swiveled to face her and his self-indulgent sarcasm was replaced by anger. Melissa was g
lad. Anger demanded a response, and she was prepared for the challenge.

  “And just what am I hiding, Bee?”

  She winced at his caustic interpretation of her name, but tossed her hair and took a step toward him. “You’re hiding your fear behind Anastasia’s accident. You’re using a sorry coincidence to justify your anger at me,” she paused, “and at God.”

  He heaved a weary sigh. “I used to understand the power of your stinger, Bee. I don’t anymore.” His voice was low and hard and unforgiving. She felt as though she was losing him, but she reminded herself not to trust her feelings. Rather, she would continue to trust God.

  “Maybe because the so-called stinger that I carry now stings with the truth. And the truth hurts,” she countered, but her tone was soft and caring.

  Luke heard only the words, and that was enough to ignite his anger once again. “And what are you calling the truth?” he demanded.

  Bulls-eye! It was exactly the question she had hoped he would ask. “The truth is. . .that all those years ago. . .you really wanted to be my. . .my savior.”

  “Your savior! Then ise kalla,” he mumbled in Greek, then translated the uncomplimentary phrase. “You’re not well,” he declared and turned his back again.

  Melissa continued to speak as though he hadn’t said a word. “You wanted to be the one to heal me and make me whole, to give me a life free from doubt and despair. And when I was alone with you, Luke,” she whispered, reaching out to touch the back of his shoulder, “I think you were my savior. You did free me.”

  He pulled away from her and took another step toward the far end of the veranda. He didn’t want her to touch him, didn’t want to feel, period. And he remembered wryly that Gabriel had accused him of just the opposite. Gabriel had said that Luke wanted to love Melissa with all her faults but was unable to. Wouldn’t someone in the role of savior be able to do that?

  “I loved you and you rejected my love. That’s all I know,” he said.

  “No, Luke. You rejected me. I never rejected you.” She tossed the truth back to his unrelenting silhouette outlined in the faint moonlight. “When you saw that you couldn’t be everything that I needed, and that the One who hung on that Roman cross nearly two thousand years ago could fill a part of me that you couldn’t, you ran. And even more, you grabbed for every excuse to blame both God and me, so you could remain angry at us both.”

  “That’s ridiculous.”

  “Is it?” she asked softly into the still night air. She shook her head sadly from side to side. “I don’t think so.” Sensing the need to draw his anger into the open where it could be confronted, she quoted one of her favorite verses from Psalm 62.

  “ ‘My salvation and my honor depend on God; he is my mighty rock, my refuge.’ ”

  It took Luke a moment to realize that she was reciting a Bible verse, but when he did, he lashed out with more angry words. “You’re forgetting one thing Bee,” he rasped. “This God who is supposedly a refuge, a savior. . .” He spat out the words. “Where was He the night my sister lost so much?”

  Melissa took a deep breath and spoke softly into the incalculable wonder of the starry night. “I don’t have all the answers, Luke, and I won’t insult your intelligence by pretending that I do. But I do know that God loves you, and He loves Anastasia, and He loves me. He cares for all of us. But it is our responsibility to respond to Him. He has spoken to us through His written word, the Bible; through His Son, Jesus Christ; and through His Holy Spirit, His Comforter.” She paused for a moment to let her words sink in. “Maybe He wants to tell you Himself where He was that night. But you refuse to listen. But He’s not going to force Himself on you. He’s patient and He waits for us to turn to Him.”

  Luke shook his head in wonder. It amazed him how closely her words echoed what his good friend Gabriel had told him several times before. “So, is this why you left me? Is this what you needed to learn?” He couldn’t hide the bitterness. He had worn it for so long that it had become an old, itchy sweater.

  Melissa had finally had enough. She turned to him and the amber of her eyes flashed like topaz in the moonlight. “Let’s get something straight, Luke, once and for all. I didn’t leave you. You left me. And yes, I needed to learn about the love of God—the same love that my parents had shown me when I was a girl.”

  “I see,” he spoke slowly, carefully, patiently, as if he were questioning a patient and trying to gather all the details he could about her medical history. “Then tell me, Melissa. Where was the love of God and your parents’ protection the day they died?”

  He knew it was a harsh question, and he instinctively looked at her eyes to gauge her response. By the light of the moon he saw the fire in her eyes settle into a soft and comforting glow. With a gentleness that suggested she was speaking to a child, Melissa said, “We don’t know why certain things happen, Luke. But one thing I know for sure: I will see my parents again someday. One day, we will be reunited—and, until then, they are safe with God.”

  Luke felt her comforting hand on his shoulder, but this time he didn’t move away. He needed her touch, needed her strength. He looked down at her and noticed that she was gazing out at the sea, which stretched before them like a carpet of pure satin. She began to speak again, and the words that came from her lips were like a soothing balm to his soul.

  “ ‘If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.’ ” She licked her lips before continuing, “ ‘In you, O Lord, I have taken refuge; let me never be put to shame. Be my rock of refuge,’ ” she looked up toward the little fortress on the hill and smiled, “ ‘to which I can always go; give the command to save me, for you are my rock and my fortress.’ ”

  She looked up at Luke and he saw the glistening of tears in her eyes. But they weren’t tears of sadness or of pain; they were tears of joy that attested to her belief in every word she had spoken. “That’s the truth, Luke,” she whispered. “That’s the truth.”

  Luke didn’t know what to say, so he didn’t say anything, but the angry wall of resistance inside his chest seemed to melt away. Gently, he placed his arms around Melissa’s shoulders and drew her close to him. He didn’t understand everything she had said, but he was more certain of one thing than he had ever been before.

  He loved her.

  And for the first time, he was willing to admit that he loved her exactly the way she was. Her firm belief in God was now part of the Melissa he loved. He ran his hand up and down her back, and when his fingers brushed against the chain around her neck, he paused for a second before resuming his caress. He knew that she felt his hesitation, because her breath seemed to catch in her throat. And he knew what she wanted. She wanted him to ask what the cross meant. But he couldn’t. Not yet. Maybe not ever.

  “Where do we go from here?” he finally asked, relieved that the nervous silence had been breached.

  She tilted her head back to look up at him. “Well, I think we still need,” she paused, and shrugged her shoulders to soften the word, “time.”

  He looked deep into her eyes and then, slowly, their lips met in a kiss that united the past and the present in a commitment to make a new start. It was the kiss they should have shared in the cabin at Lake Breeze a year and a half before. It was a kiss that promised a love that could wait.

  After a moment, with his chin resting on top of her head, Luke repeated his question, “Where do we go from here, Meli?” He honestly didn’t know. He only knew that he didn’t want to lose her again.

  Stepping back, she shrugged her shoulders and looked up at the moonlit walls of the Byzantine tower. Gray and silvery, the ruins were romantically silhouetted against the depths of the night. “Well, I do have fortresses to research. I think I’ll travel over to Acrocorinth tomorrow and then work my way across the peninsula.”

  “Not tomorrow,” Luke spo
ke firmly, and she was sure that she heard fear in his voice.

  Arching her brows, she assured him, “I’ll be back.”

  He shook his head. “It’s not that. It’s the traffic. The roads are horrible on Fridays and the weekends. Visit Chlemoutsi tomorrow. It’s only about fifteen minutes away.”

  And then she understood. He had been angry when she drove straight from the airport in Athens without resting. Anastasia’s accident had put that fear in him. She could understand it. It was something like her fear of bees.

  “Okay, Chlemoutsi it is.”

  “Besides,” he said, “I’m going to close my office for a couple of weeks and I’ll be happy to accompany you to all the fortresses you want to see.”

  “Luke!” Melissa exclaimed. “You can’t do that. What about your patients?”

  “I’ve already made arrangements. I planned this time away as soon as I knew you were coming—just in case.”

  Melissa threw her arms around his shoulders. “I had no idea!”

  He chuckled. “Until this moment, I had no idea whether it was the right thing to do or not. But now I’m sure.” He drew her closer to him. “I want us to try, Meli. I don’t want to lose you again.”

  “Oh, Luke.” She leaned up and kissed his chin. They had so much to work on. She knew that unless he became a man of faith she couldn’t marry him, and his decision had to be genuine and uncoerced. He couldn’t profess a faith in God just to make her happy. After all that they’d been through, she knew that Luke would never do that, and she resolved once again to trust God with the outcome.

  “Meli,” he started softly, a wistful quality in his voice and gentleness in his touch. “Perhaps I did want to be everything to you,” he admitted. In truth, he still did. “But, is that so bad?”