A Sounding Brass

by Shelley Bates

  “Does a person have to be Elect to have a direct line to God?” he asked.

  Claire opened her mouth to reply, then seemed to change her mind about what she’d been about to say. “I don’t think so. And I don’t even think it’s a sin to say that. If I say I can see God in Toby, it’s obvious he’s a praying person, too. How can the Elect say other people’s prayers don’t even reach the ceiling?”

  “They say that? Even mine, if I were to give it a try?”

  “Don’t let what the Elect say stop you, Ray. Don’t wind up like me.”

  Which, when it came down to it, was about as honest an answer as he could hope to get.

  Chapter 11

  SHE SHOULD NEVER have said that. All the way home, sitting in Ray’s truck and listening to Toby read the six o’clock news, Claire kicked herself. No matter what she did, she only managed to give an unfavorable view of the Elect’s way of life, thus pushing Ray farther and farther away.

  Which, of course, was what she was supposed to do from a personal standpoint. Despite all the changes, the fact remained that he was an Outsider who was going to leave town one of these mornings, while she was stuck here until she was as shriveled as an unwanted apple. She’d never see him again except maybe twenty years from now at the weddings of Ross and Julia’s kids. They’d look at each other and remember a kiss in a dark parking lot and think, Look what I was saved from.

  “Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?” Saul’s prayer on the road to Damascus came into her mind as she gazed out the window. The promise of the clouds and wind had turned into the reality of rain, and the wipers slapped back and forth.

  She should just cut bait and stop torturing herself. Ray, funny and appealing and completely wrong about everything that was important to her, had to go. Now, if she could just find the guts to tell him so and get on with her life.

  Such as it was.

  If Luke’s ministry took off the way it promised, she would get great exposure. People in radio would know her name. Maybe she could convince Owen that her place was in Seattle or Spokane, enlarging the boundaries of the kingdom, and then maybe the narrow little puddle that was her life would turn into a bigger lake of possibility.

  They passed the enormous construction site where the apple processing plant had been and where now the steel and concrete structure of the discount store was going up. Maybe in a few weeks the worship center’s site would look like that.

  A few minutes later, Ray slowed the truck to take the turn into Gates Place. “Well, I can’t say this has been the best day ever.” He spun the wheel and came to a gentle stop in Rebecca’s driveway. Claire deflated even further. Two of Dinah’s chickens, wet but determined to get the last of the bugs under the rose bushes, ran from the truck and took shelter under a shrub near the door.

  “Between the mosquitoes and the swamp and the rain, I really know how to show a girl a good time.” He leaned on the steering wheel and faced her. “Sorry about that.”

  She had to stop taking things so personally. “Don’t be sorry. This was a business meeting, remember? A girl expects a little adversity.”

  He laughed and something in his eyes made her scramble for the words to the “I-can’t-see-you-anymore” speech. She opened her mouth to say the words—Ray, this was fun, but I can’t go out with you—and instead heard herself say, “Do you want to come in for a hot drink?”

  “Sure.”

  And by the time he’d jumped out and come around to open her door her opportunity had passed.

  She’d find a way to work up to it again. She had to. Because she couldn’t go on like this, feeling the blood jump in her veins every time she saw him on the street, feeling her face heat when he looked at her. Next thing you knew, she’d be dreaming about him and doodling his name on yellow sticky notes. And that just wouldn’t do.

  She herded the two stray chickens around the side of the house and into Rebecca’s enclosed backyard, where they had a cozy coop, then led Ray up the outside stairs and into her suite. He toed off his boots just inside the door.

  “It might not be holy ground, but I don’t think you need any of the worship center’s mud in here.”

  She smiled and pulled off her own shoes. Did he have to be so considerate? And did he have to look quite so tousled and damp and appealing?

  Argh.

  She put the kettle on and found a box of Dutch Almond hot chocolate mix in the back of the cupboard. It had been there since she’d received it for a white-elephant present at the bank the previous December. Company holiday parties always made her feel awkward, not just because she looked so plain in her black suit when everyone else was glittering in their festive dresses and earrings that lit up like Rudolph’s nose, but it had literally not occurred to her that she needed to go out and buy a present. Consequently she’d been grateful to get somebody’s standby present of hot chocolate mixes instead of something expensive, like the silver salt-and-pepper set Margot had oohed and ahhed over.

  When the kettle boiled, she stirred up the mugs of hot chocolate and carried them over to the couch. “You’re probably used to something stronger after a cold day in the swamp,” she said a little diffidently. An Elect boy wouldn’t think twice about hot chocolate, but it occurred to her moments too late that Ray might want something like a brandy. Isn’t that what people drank when they came in from skiing?

  “This is great.” Ray took the mug and sipped from it cautiously, steam rising past his nose. “I’m not much of a drinker. Cops tend to polarize—either they drink every chance they get or they abstain. But alcoholism killed my dad about thirty years too soon, so it doesn’t appeal that much to me.”

  To Claire’s knowledge, her dad had never touched a drop. Could any two people have less in common?

  “I’m sorry,” she said awkwardly. There wasn’t much comfort a person could offer. Even if Ray believed in God, she couldn’t very well say she was sorry his dad had gone to a lost eternity, now, could she?

  “Thanks, but it happened a long time ago, when I was in high school. He was a cop, too.”

  “Is that what made you go into law enforcement?”

  Ray shrugged. “Maybe. One of the things he instilled in me was a strong sense of fairness. Maybe I wanted to be a cop to even things out a bit. Make sure ordinary folks got a fair shake.”

  “You could have been a lawyer.”

  “Nah.” He grinned at her. “They don’t get to sit in dark alleys late at night or kick drug dealers’ doors in. Or walk through swamps, for that matter.”

  “A real thrill seeker, you are.” She smiled behind her mug.

  “Yeah, surveillance is a thrill a minute.” He snorted and took another sip of chocolate.

  “This sure doesn’t seem like much of a vacation for you.”

  Slowly, he lowered the mug and gave her a long look, as though he were making up his mind about something. “To be honest, it’s not. I’ve been working. Doing surveillance,” he said.

  She sat up in surprise. “Surveillance on what?” Her chocolate lurched in her mug before she settled back down. “Or on whom?”

  “A guy named Richard Brandon Myers. I’ve been chasing him for awhile now, and I finally tracked him down.”

  “Why are you chasing him?”

  He shrugged. “He’s a ripoff artist. Preys on vulnerable people, and I hate that. So, I’ve just been doing the usual—surveillance, license-plate checks, and background work. All I’m waiting for now is for him to make a move.”

  “Like, commit a crime? Rip somebody off?”

  He nodded. “But I’m running out of time. If something doesn’t break by Saturday, I’m going to have to pull out. My lieutenant wants me back in Seattle Monday morning.”

  “Monday?”

  She didn’t even have to make the speech. All she had to do was wait until the weekend and he’d be gone. Easy.

  Then why this sense of panic rising under her ribcage like a flock of frightened starlings?

  “Do you have
a problem with that?” His voice was soft. He put his mug on the brass-bound trunk she used as a coffee table and took hers out of her hand.

  “A—a problem? You have to do what you have to do.”

  “So, I can hitch up my pony and ride off into the sunset and it won’t bother you?”

  “I—”

  “Because it’s really going to bother me.”

  Oh dear. Here was the moment for the speech. Here was her opportunity to say, Ray, it’s good you’re going home because there is no way we could ever have anything together. Have a safe trip.

  Say it.

  “Ray, it’s—” It’s good you’re going home. Come on.

  “It’s not really this case keeping me here,” he went on when she choked on the rest of her sentence. “I could have handed the details over to the Hamilton Falls PD and skated on home a couple of days ago. But I didn’t. Ask me why.”

  “Why?” she whispered. There is no way we could have anything togeth—

  Somehow, instead of sitting in opposite corners of the couch, they were now practically sharing a single cushion. He touched her chin with one finger.

  “I think you know.” His voice was a caress of sound.

  Say it, quick—

  Her lips parted, but she would never know whether or not she would have actually said the words, because Ray’s mouth met hers. His arms went around her, and instead of feeling engulfed or intimidated, as she might have before, she felt cradled in safety. Her hands slid around his neck and up into his hair. He changed the angle of the kiss, and she began to lose track of where she was. Her whole being fell into his as he wooed her mouth, and the faint scent of his cologne—something that combined wood chips with ocean spray—intensified as their temperatures rose.

  When at last the kiss ended, Claire was breathing as if she’d just run up the stairs and Ray’s gaze was a little unfocused.

  “See what I mean?” he breathed. “How is a guy supposed to just get in the truck and drive away from you?”

  Others have. Elect guys, who got together with her, had a few dates, and then moved on simply because they could. The grass was always greener in somebody else’s Gathering. But here was Ray, who didn’t want to leave. The question was, what was she going to do with him?

  “This is crazy,” she murmured at last, and turned slightly to lean into the crook of his arm.

  “What? Us?”

  “That’s just it.” Say it. “There can’t be any us.”

  “Why not?” Just like that, he responded calmly, as if she’d said she couldn’t go swamp stomping again tomorrow. But then, he was a cop. They were probably used to keeping their emotions and reactions under wraps. Coward that she was, she felt a little relieved. Maybe this wouldn’t be as hard as she thought.

  “I told you before. Well, maybe your being an Outsider isn’t so much the point now, but you still don’t believe in God.”

  “Are you so sure of that?”

  “I know you don’t think the Elect is the right path for you. And I—”

  “I get the feeling you don’t, either.”

  “I still believe.”

  “So, we’re doomed from the outset because of religion?” he asked. “Our sense of humor, the way we talk about things, those don’t count?”

  “They can’t.” How could she explain this? “Belief in God has to be the foundation for a relationship. If that’s missing, if two people don’t have the same views on what’s important, the relationship will never work.”

  His hazel eyes were disconcertingly direct. “What’s important to you, Claire?”

  “God, of course. But I have my salvation in the Elect. I can’t give that up.”

  “No one’s asking you to. I just think we have something worth fighting for, that’s all.”

  “It’ll be something to fight about, trust me. My sister married Outside, and she’s miserable. Andrew doesn’t understand her in so many fundamental ways and it’s just not . . . right. I don’t want that for myself.”

  “We’re different people, different personalities. I don’t care if you take off and go to Gathering three times a week.”

  “It’s not only that. Once they come back, the Shepherds won’t stay in a divided home, so you lose that privilege. And what about Summer Gathering and supper invites? I’d have to go to everything alone. It’s just not worth it, Ray.”

  “So, you’re saying you’d rather have a social life than the possibility of something with me.”

  The hurt ambushed her with a punch to the stomach. “You don’t understand.”

  “I have to say I don’t. I ask you what’s important and you give me a social calendar.”

  “It’s not the social calendar, it’s what’s under it. Fellowship.”

  “That’s the price, huh?” He pasted on a smile. “It’s pretty high. And no guarantees.”

  “No,” she said miserably. She had hurt him deeply and it was too late to take it back.

  He pulled his arm from under her shoulders and stood up. She felt very small and alone on the couch by herself. “If it makes you feel any better, I do think about God once in a while. But all the rules and regulations you believe in—it’s worse than boot camp, Claire. I can’t believe that’s what God wants me to spend my life on. God gets me the way I am or not at all.”

  He pulled on his boots. “Thanks for the cocoa. I’ll go down to the PD in the morning and hand off this job to them. Maybe I can get back to Seattle and take a weekend off for once.”

  “Ray—”

  “Good-bye, Claire. I hope that someday you find the guy you deserve.”

  He meant it kindly, she thought as the door closed behind him. But at that moment it sounded like a curse.

  * * *

  AT LEAST LUKE still thought she was wonderful. To Claire’s bruised feelings, his welcoming grin through the studio window was like a healing salve. It didn’t do much for the circles under her eyes, and it didn’t fill the empty hollow under her ribs that was one part defensiveness, one part loneliness, and two parts regret, but it helped.

  When she finished entering the day’s receipts, she took a moment when the next song began to knock on the window and wait for Luke to beckon her in. The surfer beat of Jars of Clay singing “It Is Well with My Soul” surrounded her until Luke turned the studio feed down.

  “Sorry,” he said. “I like this one.”

  “I do, too.” She gave him a big smile. “Thirty thousand so far this week. Thirty-one thousand, to be specific, not counting last weekend.”

  He held up a hand for a high five and she slapped his palm.

  “The prayer times are working. I knew they would. Who can resist hearing themselves on the air?”

  “And those are only the brave ones who call in. You get far more prayer letters to read out loud. And I don’t think it’s that people want to hear themselves. They want to give. It’s all the work of God.”

  “Of course, it is.” His warm gaze melted over her. “So, today I have an assignment for you.”

  “Sure.”

  “The general contractor dropped off an invoice this morning, and we need to get it paid.” He scooped an envelope off the top of the CD player and handed it to her.

  She scanned it. “Okay. Twenty-seven thousand for heavy equipment for drainage and foundation trenches. Five thousand for subcontractors to clear the land and level it. They want all this up front?”

  With a shrug, he turned to the console and cued up another CD. “They’ve already started. They have to pay the little guys. You know, their subcontractors.”

  “That will clean out the receipts we were saving for the down payment.”

  “There’ll be more,” Luke replied with the supreme confidence of faith.

  “I hope they get something going. We were out there yesterday taking pictures for the before-and-after display and it doesn’t look as though any kind of work has started.”

  “Didn’t you see surveyors’ stakes and tape and trenches?�
�

  “No.”

  “I did when I was there the other day. Did you go to the right place?”

  “Ray said it was.” But had it been? Clearly not, if heavy equipment was already working. No wonder it had looked as if no one had been there since Crazy Jack had staked his claim. Mentally, she rolled her eyes at herself. All those mosquito bites for nothing.

  “Ray?” One of Luke’s eyebrows rose in inquiry. “What’s Ray Harper doing poking his nose into Elect business?”

  “Oh, he wasn’t. It was just something to do. He must have got his directions mixed up.”

  “Something to do? As in, on a date?”

  This was what the media referred to as damage control. Since there was no hope for Ray—in more ways than one—she needed to clear up Luke’s mistaken ideas.

  “No, not a date. We’re not going out. He doesn’t know many people around here so I was showing him the sights.”

  “Be careful, Claire. Elect women can be very attractive to a lone-wolf type like him.”

  “You don’t need to worry about me, Luke. I’d never get involved with an Outsider.”

  “I haven’t seen you involved with anyone, have I?”

  Jars of Clay faded out and the Nashville Bluegrass Band came on. Indicator lights changed from red to green on the second CD player.

  “No. There isn’t anyone in Hamilton Falls to get involved with, except Derrick Wilkinson, and I’ve known him since we were in diapers.”

  “There’s someone,” Luke said softly. “Someone who thinks you’re the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen.”

  A draft blew in through the open studio door and ran soft fingers up the back of her neck. Claire shivered. “Who?”

  Luke turned back to the microphone and cued up the tape player for the 10:15 prayer request. “If you don’t know, you’ll have to wait until he’s ready to tell you. Let me know when that check’s ready, okay? I want to give the contractor a heads-up when it goes in the mail.”