by Sara Davison
She smiled. “I’m good. Very good.”
“Great.” Daphne grinned, dimples appearing in both cheeks. “Want to stay for coffee, get to know a few people? I’ll introduce you to the pastor.”
Summer had determined before coming to church that she wouldn’t stay, that simply coming to the service would be a solid first step and she could gradually ease into the rest of it if she felt it might be for her. Now, though, she was surprised at how much she wanted to stay. At how interested she was in meeting the people she’d spent the morning with, hearing the same words, reading the same Bible, singing the same songs.
Although she couldn’t remember being in a church before, she was struck suddenly by the overwhelming and incredibly warm feeling—one she wasn’t sure she’d ever experienced—that she belonged.
Chapter Thirty-One
“Cash barbequed, so Maddie and I will do the dishes.” Jude’s mother stacked the empty dessert plates. Jude held the screen door open for her and she smiled at him before carrying them into the house. His sister gathered up the empty coffee cups from the table and crossed the porch to the door. She nudged him in the chest with her shoulder. “Not sure why you don’t have to help with the dishes, but whatever.” Her voice held a hint of laughter, the way it always had before—
Jude slammed the brakes on that thought.
“Jude just came home. We’ll give him a few days before we put him to work.” Their mother’s voice carried out onto the porch.
“Yeah. So stop mouthing off and go get those dishes done.” Jude ruffled his sister’s hair and she made a face at him before flouncing into the house. Still grinning, he closed the door behind them. The day had been oddly warm for early March, so they’d seized the opportunity to eat out on the wraparound porch.
“Cigarette?” Cash pulled a half-full pack from the pocket of his jacket and held it out.
Jude shook his head. “No thanks. I quit a while ago.”
“Seems like you quit a lot of things.”
His head jerked. Was that a dig at his lengthy absence from the family? “What do you mean?”
Cash lifted his chin in the direction of the table where the beer he’d set by Jude’s plate still sat, untouched. “Never known you to let a bottle get warm.”
“No.” Jude propped both elbows on the porch railing. “Guess I never did.” Regret over his past threatened to wash over him again but he pushed it back.
“Find a woman?” Cash tapped the packet against his palm until a cigarette tumbled out.
Jude swallowed. Here we go. “That’s part of it.” He straightened and turned to lean back against the railing. If he was going to open up to his brother after all these years, he’d do it face to face. “The bigger part is that I found Jesus.”
“Why, was he lost?” Cash struck a match. His face lit with an orange glow as he brought it close to light the cigarette. Inhaling deeply, he flicked the match out onto the lawn where it hissed against the slush. “Sorry, bad joke.”
“It’s all right, I get it. Something like that would have sounded completely crazy to me too not that long ago. Thing is, now that I understand it, it’s not crazy at all.”
Cash propped a shoulder against the gray siding and blew out a puff of smoke. “What is it then?”
Jude mulled over the question. His faith was so many things to him—how could he give his brother a simple answer? “Life-changing about sums it up.”
“Other than requiring you to give up all your former guilty pleasures,” his brother held up the pack of cigarettes before shoving it back into his pocket, “how has it changed your life?”
Jude nudged a curl of paint lifting off a floorboard on the porch with the toe of his running shoe. “I used to think I had it all figured out, you know? Big jock in high school, captain of the hockey team, everybody thought I was so cool, that I had everything together. I guess I did too, or convinced myself I did anyway, until…” A sharp pain gripped his chest and he rubbed the heel of his hand over the spot. “Until what happened with Tessa.”
In the soft wash of the porch light, a shadow passed over Cash’s features. He lifted the cigarette and took another long draw, the round end glowing red. “Yeah, that changed us all, I guess.”
“It didn’t change me as much as it opened up my eyes to see myself for who I really was. I realized I had nothing figured out. That I wasn’t cool, I didn’t have my life together, and I certainly wasn’t a big man. I was, in fact, the smallest of men, not in control of anything, least of all myself. And I couldn’t take that. Couldn’t take seeing that truth in the eyes of everyone who looked at me. So I took off. It was easier to run from everything than to face it. Which was the biggest truth of all—I was a coward through and through.” Jude studied the cigarette his brother clutched between two fingers. Man what he wouldn’t give for a smooth, calming drag on that little baby right about now.
Tearing his eyes away, he drove his fingers through his hair. “You’re right. I did meet a woman. I walked into a coffee shop on my way to work one morning, same one I walked into every morning, so often the barista always had my drink waiting for me when I arrived. Same drink. Same people. Same everything every day.”
“Until one day.” Cash dropped the cigarette butt onto the porch and ground it under the toe of his boot.
“Exactly. One day—it was a Friday morning in September, two and a half years ago—I walked in and started for the counter where the guy was already holding out my drink for me. Then I saw her sitting in the corner and I froze. I mean, it was like something out of a romance novel. Like being struck by lightning. She was beautiful, with long, dark curls that hung halfway down her back and these incredible, almost-black eyes. It was more than that, though. Something I couldn’t have explained in that moment, but it paralyzed me.”
“And you’d never seen her there before?”
“No, definitely not, or I would have remembered. So there I was, standing in the middle of the coffee shop like some kind of marionette with no one working the strings, until the barista, a high school kid named Josh, called out my name. I blinked as if I’d been in some kind of trance and stared at him until he lifted the drink and I came out of it enough to walk the rest of the way and grab it from him.”
“Let me guess. You left without talking to her.”
Jude offered him a wry grin. “You know me too well. Like I said, coward. So yeah, I took the drink, sent her one last, fleeting glance, and strolled out of the place as if I wasn’t walking away from the best thing that might ever happen to me in my life.”
“Was she there the next day?”
“She wouldn’t have been, no. She lived on the other side of the city and only happened to be in the neighborhood to meet a friend. She’d never been in that coffee shop before and likely would never have set foot in it again.”
Cash’s forehead wrinkled. “So how do you know all that?”
“Because I went back. I got halfway down the block, still thinking about her and lamenting the lost opportunity to meet her, and suddenly this hot, burning rage, aimed at myself, billowed up inside me. I spun around, stalked back to the shop, and walked straight over to her table.”
“And the rest is history.”
“Not quite.” Jude let out a short laugh. “She wasn’t at all interested. Too busy with her career and figuring out her own life to get involved with anyone. Or so she claimed.”
Cash blew out a breath and sank down onto the bench below the front window. “This is going to take awhile, isn’t it?”
“I can give you the condensed version. She was pretty firm in her rejection, and normally I would have walked away, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. So I made a classic, chick flick move. I grabbed a napkin and a pen from the counter and scribbled my name and number on it. I went back to her table, told her I usually didn’t do this sort of thing but that I had felt a real connection with her as soon as I saw her. When she merely lifted a shoulder, not giving me the slightest bit
of encouragement, I dropped the napkin on her table, slid it over to her, and asked her to think about it.”
Cash snorted. “Begged her, more likely.”
His brother really did know him. “All right, begged her.” He didn’t care then and he didn’t care now if that made him sound weak. He’d have gotten down on his knees that day, in the middle of that crowded coffee shop, if he’d thought it would help. Given the cool wariness in those dark eyes staring at him over the rim of her paper cup, he’d assumed it wouldn’t. “And then I left. Which, considering it was my signature move, was the hardest thing I’d ever done.”
“I take it she called.”
“Not for nine of the longest days of my life, but yes, she did.” Warmth spread through Jude’s chest as he thought back on that time. What if she hadn’t? His throat tightened and he swallowed hard.
“I’d like to meet her. Are the two of you still together?”
“That is a long, complicated story. One better saved for another day.”
Cash nodded. “So how does Jesus fit into this narrative? Was this mystery woman some kind of missionary or something? She drag you to church? Force you to convert before you could date her or what?”
Jude laughed. “No, nothing like that. Faith wasn’t really part of either of our lives when we met. In fact, we dated for weeks without it ever coming up in conversation. But she is really into music, and one night we were strolling down a side street in Toronto and passing by one of those old stone churches with the stained glass windows. Someone was playing a massive organ inside and you could hear it out on the sidewalk. She pulled me up the steps and we slipped into the back row and sat there listening—it was incredibly beautiful.”
A light breeze ruffled his hair and Jude closed his eyes, almost able, even now, to hear that music playing in the dark.
“What happened then?”
“When the music stopped, a guy in robes walked to the pulpit carrying a huge Bible. Normally that would have been it for me, so I don’t know whether the music had gotten to both of us or what, but neither of us moved. We stayed and listened to everything the pastor had to say and for the first time in my life it made perfect sense to me. He talked about how broken we all are, and lost. He was talking in general terms, but it felt as though he was speaking directly to me. Then he said that Jesus had come and given his life for us so that everyone who was lost could be found. It struck me hard. I couldn’t argue with the fact that I was lost—I had been for a long time and was deeply aware of it. And I knew I couldn’t find my way out of the darkness I was wallowing in on my own because I’d been trying to for years. Someone else had to show me the way.
“It hit her just as hard. We went back the next Sunday and the next, and it continued to feel as though the words were spoken right to me. When the minister asked at the end of one of the services if anyone wanted to come forward and give their life to Christ, we didn’t even discuss it, just looked at each other then got up and went. And nothing has been the same since.”
“Huh.” Cash fumbled with the pack of cigarettes until it came loose from his pocket and dumped another one into his hand. Neither of them spoke as he stuck it into his mouth, cupped his hands around it and the matchbook, and lit it up. He took a long draw on it and leaned against the back of the bench. “So it helps you, believing in God?”
He gestured toward the bottle of beer on the table. “A lot more than that ever did.”
Cash glanced over but didn’t respond.
Jude tipped his head back, gazing up at the half moon surrounded by stars. God, help him to see. Help him to understand. I can’t do it. Only you can.
“Is that why you came back?”
Jude sighed. “It’s not why I came to Elora—that’s part of the long story I mentioned earlier. But it is why I came back home. I needed to see all of you, tell you how sorry I am, and ask for your forgiveness. I don’t really expect it, and I wouldn’t blame any of you if you couldn’t give it to me, but I needed to stop running away and finally face up to what happened. To what I had done.”
“It wasn’t your fault.”
His brother’s quiet words drifted across the space between them, enveloping him as softly as the tendrils of smoke wafting around Cash. They loosened something inside of Jude, part of the wall he’d built to maintain a safe distance from anyone who tried to get close. Fear clutched at him. Was he ready for that wall to come tumbling down? What would happen to him—to his heart—when it did?
Cash propped an elbow on the arm of the bench. “I mean it. Tessa knew she wasn’t supposed to be out on the ice and she chose to go anyway. If you had kept trying to get to her, you both would have gone through and likely drowned. None of us blame you for not saving her. We never did.”
Jude’s heart thudded so loudly in his ears he could barely hear what his brother was saying. He pushed away from the railing. “It’s getting late. Better say goodnight.”
Cash stabbed the butt into the ashtray on the windowsill and pushed to his feet. “Running again, little brother?”
Jude stopped on the top step. “No. Just need a little time to think things over. I’ll be back.”
“Good.” Cash reached for the handle of the screen door.
“Cash.”
His brother turned around. “Yeah?”
“Thanks.”
Cash nodded. “See you tomorrow?”
“I’ll be here.”
His brother grabbed the still-full bottle of beer from the table and pulled open the screen door. “Don’t want you falling prey to temptation now.”
Jude watched him disappear into the house and close the wooden door. He pursed his lips. He had been tempted to take a drink, almost as tempted as he was to walk off this porch, disappear into the night, and never return.
But either move would drag him back down into the pit he’d been rescued from, and he had no desire to spend time in that black hole ever again.
Chapter Thirty-Two
This is a really bad idea. Somehow, Díaz didn’t care. For three weeks now he’d walked past the Taste of Heaven Café, the aromas emitting from the building proving the place was aptly named. He was sick of smelling and not tasting. Tired of being so close to something that good and not able to close his fingers around it, take a bite of it, enjoy the rich sweetness of it.
That frustration pretty much summed up his entire life. Ever since he was a kid standing with his nose pressed up against a restaurant window or a teenager crouched on a street corner, sniffing the tantalizing aromas as eager customers handed over money to vendors and received a taco or tamale wrapped in paper in exchange, he’d felt this frustration. And never more so than now, when the promise of a new life for him and his family hung in front of his face like a carrot dangling before a racehorse, driving him forward but never allowing him to reach his goal.
So, if he wanted a cup of coffee and one of those muffins he’d smelled while hanging out in the parking lot behind the building or walking past it on the other side of the street, he was going to have them. And he didn’t care anymore who saw him do it. Summer Velásquez wouldn’t know him from Adam, and neither would anyone else in town. Only Jude McCall might recognize him from the car parked outside Summer’s place, and he was still asleep in his motel room, last Díaz checked.
In ten days, the clock would run out for his boss. Díaz had no idea what would happen then, but he had a pretty good idea it wasn’t going to be a lot of fun. Might as well take advantage of these last few days, indulge himself a little, before he really had to earn his pay.
Striding to the front door of the café, he yanked it open and headed for the counter. Summer flashed him a smile as he approached. “Good morning.”
“Buenos días.” No sense pretending he spoke only English, as he couldn’t lose the accent if he tried. Which he had no desire to do.
Her eyes lit. “¿Hablas español?”
He got that a lot. After winning or losing the gene pool—depending on how
you looked at it—when he’d inherited his Canadian mother’s pale skin, blue eyes, and light-brown hair, few people who saw him suspected him of having a Hispanic heritage until he opened his mouth. Then they were mostly confused. Sometimes even hostile. He’d grown up in Mexico, where his father was from, but he hadn’t been accepted there either. A foot in each world, he’d straddled the border between the two countries for as long as he could remember, never quite sure where he belonged.
“Sí.”
“¿De dónde eres?”
He hesitated. Here’s where it got tricky. If he told her exactly where he was from, she’d realize he’d grown up outside the small town where she and her family had lived when she was younger. That would likely result in an extended conversation he might not be able to extricate himself from. Not without drawing more attention to himself than he wanted. If he made something up, she might ask questions he wouldn’t be able to credibly answer. Venir aquí fué un error. Díaz mentally kicked himself. It had been a mistake to come in here. What was he thinking, risking everything for a muffin? “México.” He stepped back and pretended to study the baked offerings covering every inch of the counter. Maybe she’d take the hint and not press the issue any further.
“Yo también. ¿De qué parte eres?”
“Del sur,” he said, curtly, still surveying the selection of items. He wasn’t from the south, but if he told her the north, where she was from, she would certainly ask for more details.
From the corner of his eye, he saw her smile dim. Good. She’d obviously gotten the message.
“¿Qué se te ofrece?”
Ah. That was more like it. What could she get for him? He’d been sure he wanted a muffin, but now that he was here, the doughnuts, croissants, loaves of lemon and banana bread, and assorted scones all looked so good he couldn’t decide. His gaze landed on a cinnamon bun covered in white icing and he smiled. Juanita’s favorite. He pointed to the platter. “Un rol de canela y un café, por favor.”
Summer nodded and grabbed a plate and a set of tongs. She lifted a bun onto the plate with the tongs and set it on the counter before going for the coffee. The cinnamon bun was still warm. Spice-laden steam curled from it as a splotch of icing dripped onto the plate. Díaz’s mouth watered. He was wrong. It hadn’t been a mistake coming in here. In fact, it might be the first truly right thing he’d done since he’d asked Juanita to marry him.