by Arlene James
“He was, wasn’t he?” Phillip muttered.
“Let him have it,” Dale said mildly.
Petra fought a surge of disappointment. It was just a silly garter, for pity’s sake, but it seemed almost like an omen. Surely, if Dale was thinking about marriage, he’d have tried to catch the thing. She told herself that she was being foolish, but she hadn’t realized just how far along the path of matrimony her feelings had taken her. In a little less than a month, she’d gone from single-minded focus on her career, despite Garth’s attempts at securing her interest, to hoping that Dale Bowen would propose.
Odelia and Kent went off to change into traveling attire. The orchestra returned to play another set, and then it was time for the bouquet toss. Odelia herself came and got Petra. Dressed in pink silk crepe and the largest cameo earrings that Petra had ever seen, she still wore the ivory silk headband and sash, a cameo the size of a saucer pinning the latter in place. Petra couldn’t help smiling when Odelia stuck her right in front of the other single women.
When the bouquet came sailing directly toward her, however, Petra stepped aside. If Dale wasn’t to have the garter, then she wouldn’t have the bouquet. The thing plopped right into Dallas’s hands. Her sister’s mouth fell open, and she dropped the bouquet as if it had bitten her. Bending, Petra swept up the thing, a smaller version of the one Odelia had actually carried at the church, and thrust it back into Dallas’s grasp.
“Congratulations,” she said pointedly and turned away.
She caught a glimpse of Garth’s horrified face as he stared at Dallas with that bouquet in her hands. Petra laughed. She just couldn’t resist.
* * *
Neither Dallas nor Garth returned to the table immediately. Instead, they were herded off to have photos taken. Then it was time for the bride and groom to leave amidst a hail of birdseed on the front lawn.
“Any idea where they’re going?” Dale asked.
Before Petra could tell him that the newlyweds would spend the night in Waco then go on to San Antonio for a few days, someone’s phone rang.
“Anderton,” she heard Garth say. Then, “I see. We’ll be right there.”
The next thing she knew, Garth had seized her by the hand. “Lousy timing, I know,” he said apologetically. “But we have to get down to the hotel. Something about an unscheduled delivery.”
Petra frowned. “I can’t imagine what it could be.”
“Well, I certainly don’t know,” Garth said. “I’ve been out of town for most of the past three weeks. You’ll have to come with me.”
Petra sighed. “Oh, all right.” At least the reception was over. She turned to Dale, who stood frowning behind her. “Sorry.”
“Not a problem,” he told her. “Are we still on for tomorrow?”
Breakfast. “Yes,” she called as Garth dragged her away, “but I’ll have to call you with the details.”
Nodding, Dale waved. Petra offered him a last smile as Garth bundled her into the passenger seat of his rental car. Five minutes later, they pulled up to the curb in front of the hotel. Garth got out, so she followed suit.
“I don’t see anyone trying to make a delivery,” she said, just as a strange man opened the front door of the building and walked out. “Well, I never!” she exclaimed. “How did he get in?”
“I’ll ask,” Garth said, going over to the man. Something changed hands, then the fellow went on his way. Garth waved her over. “We’d better take a look inside.”
He took her straight to the elevator. “What is this about?” she asked, but he just smiled and punched a button on the panel.
“You’ll see.” As the floors flowed past, she realized they were going to the penthouse.
“This isn’t about work, is it?” she asked, both saddened and wary.
“It can be if you want it to be,” he said as the elevator door slid open. “On the other hand,” he went on, ushering her quickly forward, “you don’t ever have to work another day in your life if you don’t want to.”
He threw open the door to the apartment. Soft music flowed from a room filled with roses and flickering candles. She saw by the light of a candelabra that the dining table had been set for two. It was the perfect romantic setting—and meant only cringing discomfort to her. A very different scene rose before her mind’s eye—a picture of Dale sitting on a park bench in the sweltering heat, patiently patting a crying toddler.
Garth reached into his pocket and brought out a ridiculously large diamond set in a slender platinum band. She thought of Dale standing beneath the porte cochere at Chatam House last tonight.
“You look like a million bucks.”
Her heart turned over. She didn’t need a million bucks or a big diamond or even romance. She didn’t even need a job. She just needed Dale.
Looking at Garth now, she felt so very sorry that she’d ignored all his overtures these past months. It would have been much better if she’d just walked away, but she had let ambition and insecurity dictate her actions. No longer. Never again.
Lifting a hand to Garth’s cheek, she told him softly but firmly, “No.”
He blinked at her. “But I haven’t even asked—”
“Don’t,” she interrupted, shaking her head.
“Just hear me out,” he argued.
“It won’t change anything. I’m in love with someone else.”
His lips flattened into a determined line. “That carpenter is not for you. Even your sister says so! I won’t give up. Every day I’ll—”
“Then I quit,” Petra said calmly.
“Quit?” His eyes widened almost comically.
“I can’t work with you anymore,” she explained, backing away, “and I can’t do this.” She waved a hand at the room in which she had not even set foot. “I have to go now.”
She hurried back to the elevator. As the doors slid closed on Garth’s perplexed face, she thought he looked as confused as she had been.
“Okay, Lord, now what?” she asked as the elevator dropped.
Suddenly she was out of a job. Again. How was she going to support herself? Could she even manage to stay in town? The aunties probably wouldn’t object, but she couldn’t live off them, and if she couldn’t find some kind of job around here, then what about Dale?
Chapter Fifteen
Dale watched from his mom’s sedan as Dallas pulled up behind Anderton’s rental car. He was surprised he’d beat her here, but not at all amused that his instincts had been right. When he’d seen her slip her cell phone into her evening bag on the porch of Chatam House, he’d suspected that the urgent phone call Garth had received had come from her. Since she hadn’t been around when Garth had literally dragged Petra away with him, Dale could only assume that Dallas knew where they were going because she had arranged to send them there.
He wondered what plan she had concocted, and if Anderton was a part of it. When Petra burst out of the building, he thought he was about to get his answer. He rolled down the window in time to hear Dallas demand, “Well?”
“I knew you had something to do with this!” Petra accused.
“Never mind about that,” Dallas complained. “Did he ask you?”
Petra dropped her hands onto her hips, striking a pose. “You mean, did Garth propose marriage to me?”
Dale’s heart dropped into his stomach.
“Of course I mean that!” Dallas snapped.
“No,” Petra said firmly. “He did not.”
“What? But he had the whole thing arranged, a grand gesture that no woman in her right mind wouldn’t find romantic!”
“He didn’t ask,” Petra reiterated, “and it’s a good thing, because I’d have had to turn him down. In addition to quitting my job.”
Such relief
swamped Dale that he almost missed Dallas’s scoffing laugh. “As if you’d do such a thing.”
“But I did do such a thing,” Petra said. “It isn’t the first time I’ve quit a job, you know.”
Petra had quit her job? Dale’s jaw descended.
“But…this is your big chance!” Dallas pointed out. “You’ve said it over and over again.”
“I was wrong,” Petra told her, going to the passenger side of Dallas’s car and opening the door. “God willing, I have a chance at something bigger than any career, Dallas. I only hope it works out the way I want it to. Now take me home.” With that, she got into the car.
Throwing up her hands, Dallas stomped around to get behind the wheel. Moments later, they drove away.
Dale sat where he was, thinking. Was he the chance of which Petra had spoken? Would she give up her job, her vaunted career, for him?
“Not if I can help it,” he muttered. All he wanted was for her to be happy, and he was beginning to believe he could make that happen. “Please, Lord,” he whispered.
Suddenly the thought occurred to him that he needed to make a grand gesture of his own, something unique to him, something Anderton would never dream of, something truly meaningful and audacious. He’d made a fool of himself for far lesser reasons, but what would convince Petra—and everyone else—that she belonged with him?
He would think on it, he decided, and pray on it, and something would come to him, something that would make everyone see that, to him, she was the most important thing in this world.
* * *
Alone in her room an hour or so later, Petra sat down on the sofa and took her Bible in her hands. She had told her parents only that she had quit her job. If they knew why, then Dallas had told them, but none of that really mattered to Petra. She knew she ought to be worried. Not only did she have no job, she had no real reason to hope that Dale was even considering marriage to her. Still, she felt an odd peace. For once, she knew what she truly wanted.
Petra opened her Bible to the thirty-first chapter of Proverbs and, closing her eyes, laid her hands flat upon the page. Then she began to pray.
“I’ve been confused and wandering for a long time,” she told God, “but I know now that I want to be this woman. I want to be this woman for Dale, but he has to want me for that, too, and so do You. I know that if You will it, Lord, it must surely be. So I’m asking You now, please, please help me be the kind of wife…and mother…who is worth more than rubies. Help me be what I never thought I could be, what I judged my own mother of failing to be. And forgive me, Lord, for holding on to petty grievances and letting them rule my life.”
Lapsing into silence, she went on for a long while, pouring out her every fear, question, resentment, praise, speculation and hope, placing each and every one into the Father’s keeping.
By the time Petra laid down her head that night, her eyes felt gritty with fatigue and her mind had gone blank, but she had found a measure of peace. That would do for now. She would worry about tomorrow when tomorrow came, trusting her Lord to see her through whatever would be.
* * *
Petra slept well, resting deeply. Awaking before her alarm went off, she stretched and rose to quickly sweep her hair up into a ponytail and dress for the day in a sunny yellow tank top and pink denim capris, with a short matching jacket. She chose the tank top simply so she could wear her yellow sequined flip-flops with the outfit. They made her smile, and she felt like smiling today. She was determined to, in fact.
Only as Petra took a seat at the table in the sunroom with her parents and brother Phillip did she recall that she’d invited Dale to join them for breakfast then hadn’t followed through with the arrangements! Gasping, she pulled out her cell phone and began going through her contacts for Dale’s number. When the call connected, she knew at once that she’d been diverted to his voice mail.
“Hi!” Dale’s voice said brightly. “Dale Bowen here. I can’t talk now, but your call’s important to me, so I’ll get back to you as soon as I can. You know what to do next. Thanks.”
Petra waited for the beep then began apologizing. “I’m so sorry! I forgot to tell you what time to come for breakfast. If you get this message within the next half hour, please come by Chatam House. I mean, i-if you want to and you can. Mom and Dad are leaving in a little while, and…okay, if you can’t come by, maybe you could just…call me?”
Her phone beeped before she got the last word all the way out, letting her know that another call was coming in. Sure that it must be Dale, she didn’t even bother checking the caller ID, just punched the green icon and put the phone back to her ear.
“Hello?”
“You need to get down here, Petra!” exclaimed Garth’s agitated voice.
Disappointed, Petra fell back in her chair and folded an arm across her chest as she said, “I don’t work for you anymore, remember?”
“I haven’t seen a letter of resignation yet!” Anderton barked.
“I’ll email one today,” she promised.
“Fine. Whatever. But that’s beside the point. Your crazy boyfriend is sabotaging everything!”
Petra sat up straight again. “What do you mean?” He couldn’t mean Dale. Dale was the last person to sabotage anything.
“I mean, that loony carpenter is going to get himself arrested if you don’t get down here and put a stop to this insanity!”
He did mean Dale! But why… How…? Those questions obviously would have to wait. Though it boggled the mind, if Dale was in danger of being arrested, then she had to get down there.
She hopped to her feet, crying, “I’m on my way!”
“What on earth?” her mother demanded, also rising.
“Where are you going?” her father asked, pushing back his chair.
“To the hotel!” she told them, weaving her way through the jungle of bamboo furniture.
She met Hypatia in the hallway, and her urgency must have communicated itself clearly, for her dear auntie threw up a hand.
“Petra! What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know,” she answered, sliding past her aunt and breaking into a run, “but Dale’s in trouble! Garth says he could be arrested!”
Dashing up the stairs, she grabbed her handbag and jacket and flew back down to the ground floor again. As she raced across the foyer, she heard Hypatia say, presumably to Chester, “Bring the car around while I phone Asher.”
Then Petra threw open the front door and ran for her car, all the while scrabbling for her keys. She managed to get her hand on the remote and unlock the driver’s door before she got there. Yanking it open, she tossed the handbag onto the passenger seat and dove inside. Thirty seconds later, the low-slung coupe turned onto the street and laid down some rubber.
She had no idea what was going on, but she prayed fervently that Dale would come to no harm. Garth’s words still made no sense to her, and she couldn’t imagine what to expect. But it certainly was not what she found.
There seemed to be a traffic jam of some sort at the north corner of the downtown square. Some vehicles, in fact, executed tricky U-turns or turned suddenly onto side streets. People milled around among the cars and pickup trucks, looking to the south. Desperate to get through, Petra grabbed the first available parking space and struck out on foot.
Dodging pedestrians right and left, she made her way down the east side of the square all the way to the corner and Monroe’s Modern Pharmacy and Old-Fashioned Soda Fountain, Kent’s drugstore, which was run mostly by his young partner now. There she encountered a policeman setting up a barrier of painted sawhorses.
“Stand back!” he ordered. “Everyone back!”
Petra rushed forward instead, her heart pounding, and began to plead with him. “I’ve got to get through! I’m Petra Cha—”
/> “Well!” he interrupted, grabbing her by the arm and practically dragging her around the end of the barrier. “You’d better see what you can do then.” He pointed her in the direction of a police cruiser parked diagonally in the southeast intersection of the square, calling out, “Captain, this is Petra!”
Another policeman, this one with a bullhorn in hand, turned to wave her over, frowning. “Can you put a stop to this?” he asked sternly.
“I don’t even know what’s going on!”
He pointed a finger toward the hotel on the southeast corner. At first, Petra saw only Garth standing on the sidewalk in his shirtsleeves, his phone to his ear, then someone on the corner opposite diagonally waved, and she looked in that direction. The entire Bowen family stood behind another police barricade erected there. Walt and Hallie waved madly, grinning. Behind them stood Jackie Hernandez and what looked like the whole Bowen and Bowen crew. Hallie, Petra noticed, carried a camera on a strap around her neck, and she aimed it at Petra now, snapping photos. To Hallie’s left, Don hoisted Nell up onto his shoulder, as if they’d come to watch a parade! Completely confused, Petra shook her head at Sudie, who stood next to her husband and held little Callie on one hip. Dale’s sister pointed upward insistently, jabbing a finger in the air.
Petra executed a slow turn, lifting her gaze as she did so. There hung a man in a harness from the edge of the roof of the hotel, five stories up. Her eyes widened as she recognized that man. Dale.
He faced away from her and held something in his hand. As she watched, his arm moved, and bright yellow paint sprayed in arcs over the dark red brick of the building. Petra gasped, unable to believe that Dale Bowen would deface any building, but especially a historic one, in such a fashion. Then her brain began to register what her eyes were seeing. He’d painted a message all along one side of the building, even across the upper windows.
“Petra,” it read, “I love you!”
She nearly fell down, the rest of the words blurring as those first few sank in. Suddenly, Hypatia and Magnolia were at her elbow. Maryanne and Murdock arrived right behind them, her father exclaiming, “Good grief!”