A Sounding Brass

by Shelley Bates

  “We need to talk.” Luke’s voice was always filled with music and humor, but there in the parking lot, she detected something new. A hint of intimacy. A note that told her he maybe didn’t want to talk about fundraising strategies or music.

  Oh my.

  Ray said something under his breath and then cleared his throat. “See you around, Claire.” He turned and strode up the street, his long legs making short work of the blocks that lay between here and wherever he was staying. Maybe he had better things to do than stand around in parking lots talking to her and her friends. Cop things. Even vacation things. Things that mattered. Not whether or not she was going to have breakfast with her boss.

  “Claire? What do you think? Is seven A.M. at the diner too early?”

  She brought her mind back with an effort. “No, it’s fine. See you then.” Her fingers finally closed around her car keys, and she unlocked the door.

  “I’m looking forward to it,” he said.

  She had the distinct feeling he meant it a little more than your average boss should.

  An hour later, showered, moisturized, and blow dried, Claire lay in bed and watched the branches of the tree outside the window make patterns on the wall.

  You kissed a worldly man.

  Her brain was taking this a lot harder than her body. The latter had given in with hardly a murmur, falling into Ray’s kiss with the ease of water leaping over a waterfall. Her brain, meanwhile, kept hearing Luke and Owen’s smiling admonishments. They were right. What would the kids think? What would other people think when they found out, as they surely would? How could she have been so careless as to kiss a worldly man right out there in public—and in the mission hall parking lot, no less? She was lucky Alma Woods hadn’t been behind a tree watching. She would have had to kiss her reputation good-bye.

  But it had been wonderful, sighed her body.

  A lot of help you are. Go to sleep.

  Because if he really meant it about joining the Elect, then everything was different, wasn’t it? If Ray wanted to come to God, there would be nothing standing in the way of a relationship.

  Nothing but Luke and probably half a dozen members of the No Pride Club, who would trample her in the stampede for the attention of another eligible man.

  Not that Ray would have anything to do with them. He was too honest. He would know when a woman just wanted him for arm candy, wouldn’t he? Besides, he had his career to think about. In Seattle. Where she wasn’t allowed to go unless she wanted to disobey a Shepherd and by extension, God.

  On that disturbing thought she finally fell asleep, but in her dreams Ray and Luke were paddling kayaks on the Hamilton River, trying to get to her as she was swept along by the current. She soon saw it was more important to them that one beat the other to where she flailed along on the surface, as though it were a race and she was the finish line.

  Neither of them was actually thinking about rescuing her.

  * * *

  THE EARLY BIRD might not get the worm, but he certainly got the coffee, the menus, and a hefty dish of sliced fruit. Judging from the goofy smile on the waitress’s face, Claire figured that last item wouldn’t be showing up on the bill. She slid into a chair opposite Luke, and the waitress came back to pour her a fresh cup of java.

  “Nice outfit,” Luke said as she put her purse on the floor beside her chair.

  “Thanks.” The soft periwinkle-blue jacket and the matching flowered skirt were the farthest from black she’d been able to come. So far. Experiments with color were turning into a community event—on the female side, anyway. Some were disastrous, such as Linda Bell’s orange wraparound dress, and some were great, such as this little number. But when you’d never worn anything but black, how were you to know what looked good with your personal skin tone and hair color unless you tried?

  She ordered an omelet with everything—even at this hour, breakfast was her favorite meal. Then she realized that Luke’s gaze lay on her, as warm as a comforting hand.

  Except that she didn’t feel very comfortable.

  She sipped coffee and wondered what was on his mind. “So.” Just dive right in. “To what do I owe this honor?”

  Luke forked up a couple of banana slices and a purple grape from the fruit dish. “After last night, I think you know.”

  “If I knew, I wouldn’t be asking.”

  He smiled. “Okay. I’ll spell it out for you. The Elders approved the design for the worship center unanimously, with a few little tweaks that I’ll take back to Anton Amato today. After the sale goes through, thanks to Mark and Owen, we’ll come to the fun part—the actual clearing of the land and building. That’s where you come in. I’m going to need you to—what?”

  Claire set her cup down carefully enough so that it only rattled a little. “The worship center?”

  “Yes. What else?”

  Would she ever learn? Had she really dressed in her very best to hear about the worship center? Not that that wasn’t a worthy cause, and one she was probably about to devote most of her working hours to, but she’d expected . . .

  Come on, Claire, admit it.

  Okay. She’d expected him to read her a little lecture on the dangers of kissing in parking lots, and then tell her that the reason he cared so much was because he was interested in her himself.

  You are so lame.

  Who did she think she was? Did she seriously believe that every eligible man in town—and some who were the farthest thing from eligible—was going to fall at her feet just because she was feeling alone and achingly available?

  “Claire?”

  Could she just hide in the diner’s restroom for the rest of her life, please? “Nothing, Luke.” The waitress brought their plates and she dug into the steaming omelet. “Go on about the plans. I’m dying to hear.”

  “The Elders and I are meeting with the Realtor to finalize the sale. Whatever money we bring in this week is dedicated to the down payment. I’m going to change the prayer program so that for a gift of a hundred bucks, the listener can not only call, but can send in a written prayer and have it read on the air. It’ll be more than what we were doing before—every quarter hour around the clock. Toby’s going to cover his shift and we might even ask you to take a shift, too, until God gives us what we need.”

  Four hundred dollars an hour times eighteen hours a day times seven days a week equaled—well, glory to God is what it equaled.

  Wait a minute.

  “Me? Take a shift? Are you crazy? I don’t know anything about doing a show.” She put her fork down and stared at him.

  He waved off her objections with one hand. “It’s a snap. One session and you’ll have it down. All you’ll have to do is play the CDs, back-call them, then read the prayers on the quarter hour. Simple.”

  “Luke, I’ve never played a CD in my life. I’m still getting used to having the radio on in the car and my kitchen.”

  “I have every confidence in your brains.” He speared a sausage with gusto and pointed it at her. “Anyone who can crunch numbers can work the CD decks.”

  “What if something goes wrong and all I do is produce dead air?”

  Dead air, she’d learned, was the disconcerting silence on the airwaves that indicated someone in the studio had forgotten to slide up the lever on the mixing board that modulated the power to the microphone. Toby sometimes got distracted and forgot to do it, but so far Luke had not. He was too much of a pro. Which was another reason this was crazy.

  As if he’d heard her doubts, he leaned toward her. “Claire, we need to work together on this. Toby and I can’t put in twelve-hour shifts, and with the amount of money that I suspect will be coming in, we can’t hire someone temporary. We need people onsite that we can trust.”

  “What about a premade tape?” Oh, good thinking. Surely technology would get her out of this predicament.

  “We’ll be doing those, too, for when we all have to be offsite or doing other things. But tapes have time limits. Come on, Claire. Y
ou’ll be fabulous. Your voice is made for radio. In fact—” He sat back, looking as inspired as if a light had gone on in his mind. “—why don’t you guest with me this morning? After you’ve counted the gifts, of course,” he added hastily. “I don’t want to hinder you from doing your part of God’s work.”

  “Why don’t we wait and see how that goes,” she suggested. Even if only five dollars came in, she’d make sure she was so absorbed in entering it in the database that there wouldn’t be time for him to teach her how to operate the microphone.

  She glanced at her watch. “Luke, look at the time! It’s nearly eight.”

  If she’d expected him to leap to his feet and dash off to work, she was mistaken. He shrugged. “Toby will stay on duty until I show up.”

  “But people expect your show to start at eight. You said yourself you like people to start their day with praise.”

  “Relax, Claire. Don’t be so anal.” His grin flashed. “Besides, this is all work-related. Technically, your day started at seven. Charge the station for the overtime.”

  “I can’t do that. And I’m not anal.”

  “Okay. You’re conscientious.”

  “You make it sound like a bad thing. In the bank, a person would lose her job if she wasn’t.” Maybe it was the coffee. Maybe it was coming this close to totally embarrassing herself. Or maybe she was just a tiny bit confused about his attitude. “Besides, people are depending on you.”

  “It’s radio, Claire, not life support.”

  “But you said—”

  “I hope you don’t memorize everything I say. I’d hate to think what might come back to haunt me later. Here, have some more coffee and let’s talk.”

  She didn’t want to talk. His lighthearted attitude stung. She had walked in here with anticipation, feeling fairly cheerful despite her lack of sleep. Now she just felt confused and a little annoyed and, yes, a bit let down and defensive.

  “No, thanks. I’m going by the post office and then to work.” She found her purse and pulled her wallet out.

  “Don’t even think about it.” He stood and pulled his own wallet out of his back pocket. “The station is picking it up. Here, I’ll walk out with you.”

  But by the time he’d taken care of the bill, she’d already escaped out the door.

  At the post office the clerk had to bring the station’s mail in a plastic bin instead of just handing it to her. “What are you guys selling, lottery tickets?” she asked as she pushed it across the counter.

  “Listen to KGHM sometime and find out.” Claire dredged up a public-relations smile, tossed her purse in the bin, and lugged everything across the street to the station. Luckily, Toby met her at the door and held it open.

  “Looks like the junk mail people finally found us,” he said, peering into the bin as she squeezed past him.

  “It’s not junk mail. It’s money.”

  He took the bin from her and carried it into her office. “What, all this?” Together they sorted the contents into piles. He took the FCC and radio-geek stuff, which hardly made a dent, and Claire stared at the rest, hands on hips.

  “I guess I’ll just start at the top and work my way through it. At least I won’t be guesting on Luke’s show.” She glanced at Toby as he stood in her doorway, thumbing through his little pile of envelopes. “I assume he’s talked to you about the changes to the prayer program?”

  “The every-quarter-hour thing? Yes. People have seemed pretty receptive to it so far.”

  “He wants me to do a show.” She still felt a little incredulous. “I don’t even know how to turn the mic on.”

  “If things keep up like this, you won’t have time to do a show.” He looked up from his mail. “Just take one thing at a time. We don’t have to fall in with every single thing Luke suggests, you know. This isn’t a dictatorship.”

  “But he’s the reason the station came back to life.” Then she realized how that must have sounded to Toby, who had been manning the mic for years before anyone had even heard of Luke. “I’m sorry, Toby, I didn’t mean to imply—”

  “It’s okay, I know what you mean. He has revitalized it. He’s tapped into a need I didn’t even know was there.”

  “Has he come to speak to your church?” she asked. “Attendance has gone up at our Gatherings. Of course, that might be because things have loosened up a bit.”

  Toby turned toward the door. “No, he hasn’t.”

  His voice sounded muffled, but Claire couldn’t figure out why he looked so uncomfortable. “Why not? He’s a great speaker.”

  He hesitated, then came back in and closed her door. “How close are you to Luke?”

  Close? Did he mean as in working relationship or as in . . . something more personal? “Um . . .”

  “You seem pretty loyal.”

  “Well, I am. But I’m just as loyal to you. We’re all in this together, aren’t we? The station doesn’t succeed without all of us.”

  “I wonder.”

  She reached under her desk to turn the computer on, and when it hummed into life, she turned back to him. “Toby, what’s the matter? Don’t worry about me saying anything. I used to work for the bank, remember? There, even going to the restroom is confidential.”

  His smile was a brief stretch of the lips. “My wife says I’m crazy, and maybe I am. What do you think of Luke? As a person. As a godly man.”

  Claire gazed at him while she tried to come up with an answer. What did she think? Or was she too busy being dazzled by his talent and leadership to think?

  “He’s very good at what he does,” she said at last.

  “I won’t argue with you there. And it looks as though changes are afoot in your church, though I don’t know if that has anything to do with Luke.”

  “It has a lot to do with him. We’re allowed to wear color now. And listen to music. And Luke is always talking about widening our horizons to include other believers.”

  “Like me?” He smiled at her.

  “I hope so.” What would it be like if Toby were invited to speak at Mission? The Elect were capable of change, but that would probably stretch them so far they’d snap.

  “But what about him, personally?” Toby pressed. “What’s your opinion there?”

  If she answered him, maybe she’d get to the bottom of whatever was bothering him. Of course, that meant she actually had to have an answer. “I don’t really know. I like him. He’s entertaining and never boring. He’s good-looking, of course. But other than that he was raised Elect, I don’t actually know all that much about him.”

  “Exactly.” Toby brought a gentle fist down on the corner of her desk for emphasis. “We don’t know a thing about him. Not his religious history, not his radio shows, not his hometown, family, nothing. All we know is what we’ve seen, starting on the day he arrived.”

  “He must have given you a résumé when you hired him,” she pointed out.

  “Yes, and when I called his references, they checked out. But he says he’s been on national radio shows. When I researched them, I couldn’t find anything.”

  “But if you were looking on the Internet, stuff goes out of date and gets archived all the time.”

  He twinkled at her. “I thought using the Internet was discouraged among the Elect.”

  She lifted her chin. “The bank is online. It was part of my job.”

  Laughter lurked in his eyes, but as always with Toby, it was never directed at you, but with you. Unlike Luke, she thought suddenly. That was what had been wrong this morning. He hadn’t said anything mean or unkind, but it was the way he said it. As though he couldn’t be bothered to think about whether it would hurt her feelings or not.

  “What’s on your mind?” Toby must have seen her thoughts turn inward.

  “I’m just being oversensitive.” Which was another word for self-centered, which was a sin.

  “I doubt that. Tell me.”

  She shrugged. “It’s nothing.” It was almost as if he had been off duty, and di
dn’t have to be . . . as Toby had said . . . a “man of God.” But it didn’t work that way. Either you were godly, or you weren’t. It wasn’t a part-time job.

  “I’d better get back to work.” Claire glanced at her computer screen and with the mouse brought up her receipts database.

  Toby opened her door, and Claire gathered their meeting was over. “Me, too,” he said. “But I’m going to take the advice of Jesus, and watch and pray.”

  Praying she could understand. Claire reached over and scooped up the first batch of envelopes. But watching? What for? And whom?

  Chapter 10

  AT ONE TIME, Ray had liked his truck. It was sleek, unobtrusive, and had the horsepower to get him where he was going in a hurry. But now that he was spending inordinate amounts of time sitting in it, staring at the radio station’s windows from various vantage points up and down Main Street, he was discovering its faults.

  Its legroom was shrinking by the day, for one. He shifted around and hung his left arm out the open window. Part of the problem this morning was probably due to the four point five hours of sleep he’d managed to get when he wasn’t staring into the dark, thinking about Claire Montoya.

  He was thirty-two years old and that kiss in the parking lot two nights ago had transported him back to the age of seventeen, when a kiss had been a mind-bending event. And what made it worse was that he had no business kissing her if he was going to make an arrest and ride off into the sunset, the way he’d meant to when he arrived in Hamilton Falls. What was it about this place that sucked a man in and glued him here? What was it about these women—Julia, Dinah, and Claire—who got to a guy and made him want to love, honor, and protect when common sense urged him to save himself and run?

  Ray sighed and resumed his glassy stare at the station’s largest window while on the radio the late, great Johnny Cash asked whether the circle would be unbroken. One of the few good things about this town—besides the pie at the diner and Claire Montoya’s green eyes—was that Luke Fisher had better taste in music than he’d expected. Even the Christian stuff was starting to grow on him.