“Don’t get in her way or you’ll have me to answer to me this time,” Aridell threatened, shaking a fist at Cathy, then pinning her nephew with a hard gaze. “And don’t get in Pastor Baltimore’s way or there’ll be hell to pay.”
“Pastor Baltimore’s trying to do good here,” Tee said to everyone. “If they’d had that teen program here, like the one he’s thinking of doing in his new church, I’d probably be away in college right now. Instead of taking care of two kids, grieving about Najee, and struggling, trying to make ends meet before I’m meeting the ends.” Tee shifted her gaze to Tony and Kari, whose hands were linked as they smiled at her. “They’ve got something good going and I want to be all up in the mix.” She looked at her uncle, whose murderous expression mirrored the family members’ standing around him. “You’re not going to do anything like they’re trying to do. You’ll talk a good game and then you’ll leave like you always do. You did it before.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Terrence growled, bearing down on his niece.
Tony, Karim, and Aridell moved in unison to head him off.
“She’s talking about your first, second and third wife, plus all those kids,” a cinnamon-skinned beauty said from the middle aisle.
“Second wife?! Third wife?!” Terrence’s current wife shrieked, offloading one of the silver trays she held in the hands on Sister Olivia standing to her right.
“Oh, you thought you were the only one?” Aridell chimed in, trying not to smile—and failing. “Try three. Eight kids. Alimony up the yin yang.”
Tony gave Aridell a look to silence the older woman. She was supposed to remain that way during the entire process. Especially when they’d had a little “come to Jesus” meeting an hour before they walked through the doors to the church ...
“Sister Aridell, I’m going to need you to lay off the name-calling,” he’d said from the center of his living room. “I’m also going to need you to be a little more Christ-like when it comes to your nephew.”
“I am,” she replied and had the presence of mind to look a little chagrined. “You’d better be glad I met Jesus and left those F-words on the altar.”
Tony closed his eyes, pressed his lips together, and tried not to laugh. But failed. “Sister Aridell. I’m going to need you to try.”
“All right,” she mumbled, lowering her gaze to the floor. “Can’t help it if the man lost a little air during birth and it caused a major malfunction in his brain.”
“Sister—”
“I didn’t call him a name,” she protested, holding up her hands in surrender, but there was a twinkle of mischief in her eyes that he did not miss.
Thankfully, she’d managed to keep her mouth shut all this time, but from the look of things, she had pulled off a major upset by inviting all of Terrence’s women—known and unknown—to be in the same place at the same time. A recipe for pure disaster.
“You never told me about any ex-wives or children!” the “new” first lady said, bearing down on Terrence and giving him a shove that took him off balance and landed him on the carpet. “You lied to me?”
“It wasn’t lying,” he defended, righting himself and his clothes as he got to his feet. “The past should stay in the past. I just didn’t tell you everything.”
“That’s lying, especially when you were all up in my business,” she shot back. Her fist was at her side, but it trembled from a need to land in her husband’s face. “Wanted details about who I’d been with. Even shamed me about it. And you certainly didn’t have a problem putting Mrs. Baltimore’s past out there. Shamed her, too.” She shook her said, “Then had the nerve to tell me you don’t want children now, when you didn’t say a word about the ones you already have when I asked before we got married.”
Tee clicked a few keys on her cell, and turned the screen to show the image of a beautiful baby boy. “This one’s about a year old. Uncle Terrence’s youngest one.”
The wife’s head whipped around so fast, it nearly left the rest of her body. “While we were married?!”
“I paid her to get rid of it,” he protested, quickly looking over his shoulder then grimacing when he realized his gaffe. Terrence pivoted slowly, taking in the dubious and shocked expressions of the board members and the deacons who suddenly didn’t seem so pleased with him. “I can’t help that she refused. And I don’t even know if it’s mine.”
“That wouldn’t be an issue if you could keep that puny little thing of yours where it belongs. Either in your pants or in your wife,” she yelled.
“Whooop,” one of the choir members chirped and almost dropped the box in her hands. Another member standing next to her caught it before it landed on the carpet.
“Which wife,” a woman asked from the back of the church. She stood and sauntered up the aisle, a sly smile on her red lips and a slinky dress clinging to her body. “Seems like he’s confused the current one with the ex. I see him every Friday night. Well … ” Her grin widened. “I see more of him than I should.”
Weary groans went up from those around them.
“Sit down,” he growled, waving frantically for Lily to take a seat or shut her mouth. It was hard to tell which.
“And I see him on Mondays. Sometimes Saturday mornings,” another woman said, her streaked auburn curls shaking with the effort to effect a sexy pose that didn’t quite work.
Tony’s gaze narrowed on Sister Aridell, who had the nerve to look sheepish—but only a little. Evidently, she didn’t wait for Terrence’s skeletons to come out on their own. She’d given them a shove and booted them from the closet they’d been hiding in all this time. Now they were rattling up the aisle, bones creaking under the weight of sins Terrence certainly wished had remained unspoken.
He didn’t miss the subtle head nod exchange between Tee and Sister Aridell. Trouble with a capital T-R-O-U-B-L-E.
“If you haven’t told me that, what else have you lied about?” the first lady said, chest heaving with her effort to remain calm.
“We don’t have to watch the Haves and the Have Nots anymore,” Sister Vera said loud enough for everyone to hear. “Church has been straight drama for the past week.”
Several people voiced their agreement with that statement.
The three-ring circus of Terrence’s exes and currents blocked Terrence’s path and were giving him enough issues to keep him busy. A couple of them let loose with a few profanity-laced diatribes and had to be forcefully escorted from the sanctuary.
While Terrence dealt with the unraveling of his personal life, several members came up to Tony and Kari to ask about their new ministry, to which he answered, “We’re only in the planning stages right now. We’ll let you know.”
Terrence’s fist shook in the air, but he was smart enough to keep some distance as he said to Tony, “This isn’t over.”
Tony passed a ring full of keys to one of the board members. “Aside from the counseling records that some of you returned to me today, I no longer have any church records, keys, or copies. My name’s been taken off all of the accounts.” He held up a stack of papers. “Here’s a complete accounting of where things stand.”
Tony held up another stack of papers. “And we made copies for everyone. It’s on their drives.” He leaned in to make eye contact with Terrence. “Now let’s see you put in some work for a change.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Three months later
* * *
Terrence Henderson hadn’t fared well on any level—personally, or with the church he’d managed to commandeer. On his first Sunday as the new pastor, only forty people besides his deacons and board showed up to church. The following Sunday, only twelve people came.
Then the deacons and board members found out that Terrence had managed to take out a loan against the building and put the church in the type of debt it hadn’t been under since Tony took the helm. They had no choice but to step down and turn the church building along with its operations over to Tony, but
he refused to have anything to do with the building or cleaning up their mess. Meanwhile, Terrence’s divorce was underway, and his wife was making every attempt to strip him of what little he owned. The family was still giving Tee a hard time, but she was holding her own. She was enrolled in college, was working a secretarial position in the church, and would be able pay her own way without any assistance from Aridell in a few more months.
As Kari now sat behind the podium of Temple for All People—the name Tony had choosen for their new ministry, she watched members and guests move to their seats to hear her speak. The reporter who had come to her for an exclusive stood in the back, her face pure cosmetic perfection. She had chronicled the Temple’s progress in weekly television news segments that showed the hard-working members, the systems they were putting in place testimonials of the people they had helped.
The teen program had especially been controversial. “Abstinence alone isn’t working,” Kari told the mothers, guardians, and grandparents at the first meeting. “How many of you waited until you were married to have sex?”
Several hands had gone up.
“I mean for the first time.”
Those hands lowered.
“‘Abstinence only’ didn’t work for you,” she explained. “And let’s be honest, it didn’t work for a lot of your grandparents or great grandparents either. Yet we’re trying to hold today’s children to a higher standard, when we couldn’t do it ourselves.” Kari swept a gaze across the women who had varying expressions of shock, anger, and acceptance. “Your teenagers will tell us that they promise to stay virgins, but when those hormones kick in, we’re going to end up with more teens with big bellies than we can handle. Today’s children need a realistic approach because they’re being hit with sexual content from everywhere—radio, television, peer pressure.” Then she smiled to lighten the tension in the room. “And they might live under your roof, but when little ‘Quan’ starts whispering the right things at the right time, they’ll forget every rule you’ve put in place, every threat you’ve ever laid, or every promise they’ve ever made.” Kari tilted her head. “Ask me how I know.”
When a clip of that hit the Internet and social media, it went viral. Soon letters, Facebook posts, and Twitter feeds were taking Kari to task for what she’d said. The opposition and support ran half and half, but it didn’t faze her either way. The only people she cared about were the teens, who needed a dose of understanding and guidance, tempered with today’s reality.
First a trickle of people came to the Temple, then even more. Soon people poured through the doors every week. Most of them the un-churched and people who stopped going to church so long ago that they didn’t think God even remembered their names. People who had been hit by life from all sides and didn’t believe there was such a thing as redemption.
Oh, but there was. Some of the liveliest conversations Kari and Tony had at the dinner table were those discussions that had to do with Bible misinterpretations. And with every one of them, there was open and honest dialogue, with no judgments.
Kari became stronger each day. After she came out from the darkness and shared her story, Tony had been a ray of light in her world. Now, she was able to help others who were emotionally damaged, and spiritually worn.
Like Tony made mention quite often these days … it was definitely her time in the sun.
Tony, on the other hand, was getting a lot of heat for splitting the ministry into four segments—women, children, teens, and men.
Since the Temple was a ministry whose focus was being a support system for women and children who’d survived traumatic circumstances, Tony’s first concern was to always make the Temple a safe haven for them. All were welcome, even men with a past. But Tony understood that not everyone who walked through the Temple doors was there to get closer to God. He had frank, private discussions with each man who had a history of sexual abuse or violence toward women and children. No longer would the responsibility be on the children to keep themselves safe by “staying away from Mr. X” or “not being alone in the same room with Uncle So and So.” The adults were going to provide the safest place possible, giving the children more of the benefit of the doubt, than hoping against chance that nothing would happen to them.
Two-thirds of the men made a hasty exit. Some felt that having the women and children separate from the men was not to their liking. Others refused counseling because they felt God would accept them as they were, so Tony should too. One-third of the women also followed the men out of the door.
“If they were truly here to find God, they wouldn’t be disturbed by not having women and children anywhere in their reach,” Tony told everyone. “And women who’re focused on getting their lives right won’t be all that upset that there are no men here to try and impress. We’ll have events and social settings where the adults come together, but this place will be a safe place first and foremost.”
Tony stood his ground even in the face of opposition and threats of being taken to court for discrimination. And for that, Kari was grateful.
Now Kari rose from her seat and stood at the podium in the gathering center of the Temple for All People.
“This man right here, my husband,” she said, glancing at Tony. “The man I love with my whole heart, was forced to have enough salvation for both of us.”
She opened up about her non-belief and the things he’d shared to show her how that one-on-one relationship with God is what was most important. Not religion. Not denomination. Not doctrine. Not a set way dictated by anyone else.
“I struggle with my faith every day,” she said, ending her speech. “Who would have thought there would be a first lady who did not believe in God? I was that first lady. So much has happened in my life, so many horrible things that brought such pain that I couldn’t even remember my own name. Experiences that made me question God’s existence.” She shifted her gaze to Tony. “But it was my husband’s walk with God that was the surest example of what it is to love and embrace The Creator. And that example has been what has kept me on the path of trying to understand who God is and what loving God is all about. From the person that I was at sixteen to the woman I am today, that is no small thing to admit—to embrace God is a daily thing, a personal thing, a spiritual journey that has to be experienced with all of the highs and lows, and the trials and triumphs life has to offer.”
Kari looked away from the audience to lock gazes with her husband, who held up two fingers. Lately, he had been secretive about some “special project” he’d been working on. Every time Kari asked him, he’d simply kiss her and say she’d know when it was time. She only hoped that time was soon. Though she never thought she’d be suspicious when it came to him, it was getting close. For now, she pushed all concerns aside, smiled at him, held up seven fingers then took a breath and said in the microphone, “I was fourteen, a freshman in high school … ”
An hour later, Kari looked out at the group applauding after she had shared her story.
From out of nowhere, a young woman ran forward and snatched Kari from her thoughts as she latched onto Kari so hard, she nearly knocked the breath out of her.
“I thought I’d never see you again,” the woman said in a wavering voice.
Kari looked over at Tony, whose eyebrow shot up before he quickly headed in her direction. She gave a gentle push to allow some space between her and this stranger. The reporter and the cameras moved closer, sensing another story unfolding. Kari held up her hand to halt Tony’s movements and the media as well.
“Honey, I don’t know who you—”
Those eyes. She knew those eyes.
The features surrounding them had filled out to become a beautiful young woman with a heart-shaped face and buttercream skin. But Kari would never forget those eyes. They once belonged to a little girl who looked to Kari to explain the unexplainable. To help quell the soul-piercing fear that was the constant companion of any female who walked through the doors of Daddy’s house.
“I never knew your name,” Kari said, microphones from the news cameras picking up every word.
A woman who had stood at a respectable distance came closer, placed a hand on the woman holding on to Kari. “Her name’s Jaycee, and I’m her mother.”
Kari nodded, noticing that the two women’s facial structure was so similar; the older one had no need to identify herself as the mother.
“I left her with a family member who let that man take my baby as payment for a debt her boyfriend owed. They said she’d been kidnapped when they went to the store.” She took her tear-filled dark-brown eyes off her daughter and locked them on Kari. “You saved her life.”
“No, I—”
“You. Saved. Her. Life,” she repeated in a more forceful tone.
Kari sighed, held on to the woman, allowing herself to feel the joy of knowing the little girl she’d once protected in that house of horrors was now safe and healthy. If only the others had been so lucky.
“I’m chasing my master’s degree now,” Jaycee said, her pink lips lifted into a smile. “Going to be a social worker.”
“That sounds awesome,” Kari said, cupping the younger woman’s face in her hands and resisting the urge to embrace her all over again.
“Would you like to go for a coffee sometime?” she asked. “Maybe lunch? Dinner?”
“I’d love that,” Kari replied, heart filling with a joy that warmed her from the inside out.
Jaycee glanced at the cameras and said to Kari, “I would never have found you if I hadn’t seen you on the news with your husband when they locked him out of the church. Loved it when he basically told them to shove it.” She leaned in to whisper. “But in a Christian kind of way.”
My Time in the Sun Page 14