Love Inspired May 2015 #1

by Brenda Minton

  “Loafers, why?”

  She frowned. “Those won’t do.” She peered closer at his legs and feet.

  “Spring?”

  “I think Dad’s waders will fit you.”

  “Waders? Where are we going?”

  She straightened and started the car. “To check a hunch.”

  * * *

  More than two hours later, that hunch paid off. She’d parked her car at the farmhouse and swapped it for a battered but excellently running pickup truck that she backed out of the garage. Her father’s old hip waders did fit David, who was still asking exactly what they were doing.

  “A land survey,” Spring said. “Right up your alley.”

  From the house she retrieved a rolled-up map that she tossed on the dash of the pickup.

  “We’re going to do something that we—my sisters and I—should have been doing for some time. Inspecting the outbuildings on Darling land. We have someone who comes to tend to the house and the land immediately around it, but, as you know, most of this is undeveloped and there are plenty of seemingly abandoned buildings.”

  “How much land are we talking about?”

  She glanced at him. “About five hundred acres.”

  They found what they were looking for not in the outermost buildings, but tucked in the easily overlooked middle section of the property.

  “You know,” David said, “I kept looking at this area on the Google Earth image. The elevation seemed unnaturally high for this topography.”

  Spring sighed as they looked at the old building. “This area isn’t a true switchback. But as you saw, the road isn’t a road and has curves, just close enough that everyone knows what we mean.”

  “When were you last here?”

  “Never,” Spring said. “That’s why I brought the map that has all of the outbuildings marked. We need to call the police. Something tells me they’re going to be really interested in this.”

  The building, which had the look of an old bunkhouse for field laborers, was chockablock full of large boxes that very clearly had not been sitting empty for the past thirty or so years. The electronic equipment they discovered in one was further proof that the space was being used as some sort of illicit, and very modern, storage facility.

  While they waited for the police to arrive, Spring called her mother, her sisters, the family’s lawyer and a Durham-based security firm.

  The responding officers alerted the police chief, who personally came out to the scene. Several hours later, after answering questions from both Chief Llewelyn and his investigating officer, and then with those officers inspecting all the other outbuildings on the family’s land, the five Darling women, Cameron Jackson and David Camden gathered at the farmhouse. In the country kitchen, Summer sliced apples for pies, Autumn Darling paced the room and Lovie Darling sat at the table asking the same question they’d been asking each other and the police for several hours.

  “How could this have happened? A burglary ring using my property as a warehouse.”

  “Easily enough,” Cameron said, filching an apple slice from his fiancée’s bowl of sliced apples. She slapped his hand away, but he grinned and planted a kiss on her cheek. “No one is out here on any sort of regular basis.”

  “Well, that’s clearly changing as of immediately,” Autumn said. “I’ll move my stuff out here in the morning.”

  “Out of the question,” Lovie said. “Those criminals are sure to be back looking for their stuff.”

  “By this time, I’m sure they know it’s been confiscated,” Spring said. “And I’ve already contracted with a firm for twenty-four-hour patrols until we can decide what to do on a more permanent basis.”

  Lovie glanced at Summer, who was adding cinnamon, sugar and lemon juice to the bowl. “Sweetheart, I think you’ve baked enough pies for one evening.”

  Summer looked at the counter, where five apple pies were cooling. “Nervous energy,” she said. “I’ll take them to Manna tomorrow.”

  Cameron stuck his arm out and pushed two of them away from the others. “These are mine.”

  “I have to give it to you, Spring,” David said. “Your hunch played out, and you sure do offer a guy interesting dates.”

  “Dates?” several voices said in unison as inquiring and incredulous gazes moved between Spring and the architect.

  Blabbermouth, Spring thought.

  * * *

  The discovery of the stolen goods warehouse and the second downtown burglary, while not directly related, according to police, dominated the front-page reports in the next issue of the Cedar Springs Gazette. The fireworks from the planning commission meeting over the development plans was relegated to the third page.

  The police chief’s community meeting was moved from the multipurpose room at city hall to the auditorium at the high school to accommodate the crowd. And David returned to Charlotte to see to some business with his firm.

  He and Spring talked almost every night and twice Spring read bedtime stories to Jeremy, her voice coming through speakerphone on David’s mobile lulling the boy to sleep.

  One evening David brought up the proverbial elephant in the room—in their deepening relationship.

  “My team has drafted some plans, Spring. We’ll be returning to Cedar Springs to present the options to city staff and the council. I wanted you to know ahead of time.”

  “I see,” she said. “That was awfully fast.”

  “Spring, I’m telling you because I think you’ll be pleased with what we’ve come up with. Driving around your land, hearing the stories about the city’s history, those things helped me a lot.”

  “Gee, thanks,” Spring said.

  “Sarcasm doesn’t suit you,” he said.

  That did it. “And how would you know what suits me, David?”

  “Spring, you’re upset...”

  “Ya think?”

  “This is why I wanted to have this conversation in person. I knew the phone was a mistake.”

  “Everything about this so-called relationship has been a mistake,” she snapped back at him.

  “Don’t say that. You don’t mean it. I know you don’t.”

  Spring shook her head even though she knew he couldn’t see her. “Goodbye, David.”

  “Spring, wait!”

  She sighed. “What?”

  “I really think you’ll like what I’ve come up with.”

  She held the phone away from her ear as if he were talking in an ancient tongue. And then she did what she’d thought about doing from time to time with various people through the years. She hung up on him.

  * * *

  “So,” Autumn Darling said as she worked out on the elliptical next to Spring’s the next day. “I miss one cheesecake confab at Summer’s only to discover that Winter’s been dating a criminal and you’ve hooked up with the man trying to turn the farmhouse into a condo and fast-food development.”

  Spring groaned. This morning workout with her baby sister at F.I.T., the gym Autumn co-owned with two other fitness freaks, was supposed to be cathartic, not a source of more stress. She wiped her brow with the small towel draped over her shoulder, then moved from the elliptical next to Autumn and onto a rowing machine.

  “First, Winter is not seeing a criminal. It was two dates and she dumped him as soon as she figured it out. And for the record, I have not ‘hooked up’ with anyone.”

  “Well, whatever you old people call dating,” Autumn said.

  A dozen years separated the oldest Darling sibling from the youngest. And the dig about “old people” was a good-humored one that had been oft repeated through the years. Today, however, the barb hit home with uncharacteristic alacrity.

  Spring stopped rowing and burst into tears.

  Autumn was so startled s
he nearly fell off the elliptical.

  “Oh, honey. I’m sorry,” she said, rushing to her sister’s side. “I didn’t mean anything by that.”

  F.I.T. had not yet opened to the public for the day, so they were alone. Spring buried her head in the towel and wept as if her world had come undone at the first stroke of her oars.

  Spring realized Autumn had never seen her big sister lose her cool. Autumn murmured comforting words and rubbed Spring’s back until the sobs subsided into hiccups and then sniffles.

  “Feel better?”

  Spring nodded. “Sorry.”

  “Don’t apologize for being human,” Autumn said, squeezing her sister’s shoulders.

  “Help me out of this torture machine of yours.”

  Autumn did. Instead of heading to the showers, they walked to the marked lanes along the gym’s interior perimeter that were used for walkers and indoor runners to do laps.

  “I take it that jag wasn’t about being old.”

  Spring sniffled and smiled. “What a perceptive child you are.” After a minute or so of them walking in silence, Spring said, “Do you want kids, Autumn?”

  “Crumb snatchers? Sure. But not now.”

  Spring gave a decidedly unladylike snort. “Take some advice from your big sister. Don’t let ‘not now’ turn into ‘it’s too late.’”

  “What’s going on, Spring?”

  The doctor squared her shoulders and increased her pace, which Autumn easily and quickly matched. “Just a little overdue introspection,” she said. Then, “Let’s turn this little stroll into some real exercise.”

  With that, she took off at a run, leaving a bemused Autumn to catch up or give up.

  * * *

  Spring didn’t have a shift at Cedar Springs General Hospital that day. She was, however, scheduled at Common Ground. That’s where the flowers were delivered.

  The bouquet of mixed exotics was beautiful.

  “Wow,” Shelby, the clinic’s front desk receptionist, said. “Aren’t you the lucky one?”

  Spring plucked the card from the floral pick in the blooms, read it and grimaced. “When the Common Ground messenger comes around today, please have him take these to Manna. Summer can use them for the dining room,” she said to Shelby.

  “Doc?” Shelby asked, concern lacing in her voice.

  Spring shook her head and walked away from David’s apology.

  The next delivery hit her hard.

  A large same-day FedEx envelope arrived. It had no return address, and she wondered how the sender had managed that. When she opened it, with Shelby looking on, she discovered a sheaf of papers. The one on top was a piece of cream-colored construction paper with multicolor crayon drawings completed in the style of a four-year-old child. The picture included three stick figures, two tall ones and a little one, all holding hands along with what looked like a brown snowman with a bow tie next to the little stick figure. A crookedly drawn red heart was in the corner of the page, presumably as a signature.

  “Oh, Jeremy, sweetie. You’re not playing fair, David,” she whispered.

  “What is it?” Shelby asked.

  Spring glanced at the other papers in the envelope. She saw an embossed logo with “Carolina Land Associates” at the bottom of the page and jammed them back inside without further consultation. She held on to the construction paper drawing, though.

  She passed Shelby the envelope. “Would you please see that these are shredded?”

  “Shredded? But—”

  Spring took the envelope back. “That’s all right,” she said. “I’ll do it. When is my next appointment?”

  Shelby glanced at the schedule and then gave Spring a quizzical look before answering.

  “Not until two.”

  “Send any walk-ins my way,” Spring requested as she headed to the volunteers’ lounge with her drawing and FedEx envelope of unread documents.

  * * *

  “You’re scaring your sister, and you’re starting to scare me,” Cecelia Jeffries told her best friend that night. She and Spring were at the Corner Café downtown, where Spring was pretending to eat half of a Cobb salad and Cecelia was acting in the role of older, wiser best friend and sister-confidant. Her multicolored reading glasses had polka dots on them and made Spring smile.

  “I’m fine, CeCe.”

  “Uh-huh. You’ve dropped five pounds in a week and you’re working like the end of the world is tomorrow.”

  “Maybe it is.”

  “Spring.”

  She pushed the salad aside. “He’s showing the designs to the city council, and with that burglary warehouse being out at the farm, Bernadette has even more ammunition to take the property via eminent domain. We’ve put a lot of work into the grant application for the history center, but it was all a waste of time.”

  “How can you say that?”

  “Because, CeCe, even if we get the grant, which we won’t find out for another six weeks, by then it will be too late. This is yet another of the mayor’s fast-track projects.”

  “Maybe we should go public with our plans for the land.”

  “You can if you’d like. I’m just tired of fighting.”

  Cecelia leaned back in her chair and regarded her friend. “You fell in love with him and you think he’s betrayed you by continuing with his plans.”

  “Good deductive reasoning, Dr. Many Degrees. I see you’ve added psychology to your repertoire.”

  “That’s Professor Many Degrees.”

  The little joke earned a small smile from Spring.

  Cecelia cocked her head and raised her brow. “Wow, girl, you’ve got it bad.”

  Spring shook her head. “Not possible, CeCe. I just met the man. I know nothing about him. Well, nothing besides his job, his son and his mother.”

  Cecelia grinned. “People have married each other knowing far less. Face it, Spring, you’ve been struck by Cupid’s arrow. Fallen in love at first sight. Found your soul mate and all that.”

  “Please. I’m not eighteen and starry-eyed.”

  “Nope,” Cecelia said. “You’re thirty-five and jaded.”

  “Speaking of being young and starry-eyed. I completely fell apart on Autumn today.”

  “I know,” Cecelia said. “She called me. She’s never, ever seen you cry. Did you know that? You were always the one wiping away tears, not shedding them. She said she thought about calling Lovie, but decided that would be like calling in the National Guard for something a meter maid could handle.”

  Spring closed her eyes. “Well, thank the Lord for small blessings. That’s all I need is more questioning from my mother. I got an earful and then some out at the farmhouse after David and I found that storage facility and he mentioned dating. You’d think I was the youngest the way they’ve all been acting.”

  “That’s because you’ve been acting like a woman in love and they’ve never seen that before.”

  “Can we please talk about something else?”

  “No,” Cecelia said. “You have to face this thing.”

  “There is no thing.”

  “Then why did you give away a perfectly lovely arrangement of flowers from him and say you were going to shred everything he’s sent you?”

  Spring threw up her hands. “Spies are everywhere! Who are you, MI6?”

  Cecelia reached across the table, grabbed one of Spring’s hands and clutched it in her larger brown ones. “I’m your friend, Spring. Your best friend. I know the secrets your sisters and mother don’t. I know why you’re afraid, and, let me assure you, sister, it’s time to let it go.”

  Spring felt water well up in her eyes and she swallowed back the tears. She would not cry. Not again.

  “It’s not supposed to be like this,” she said. “It’s not sup
posed to hurt or be so complicated.”

  “Says who? Girlfriend, if men weren’t worth the heartache, the human species would cease to exist. Marriages would crumble. Life as we know it—”

  Spring snatched her hand away. “I get your point.”

  “That honey boy and his little man are worth fighting for.”

  “But he’s fighting to take away something I love.”

  “He’s forcing you to shift your paradigms, to consider new and alternative scripts for the same tired screenplay you’ve been reading since Keith.”

  Spring stared at her friend. She realized with a start and with sudden clarity that that was the first time she’d heard his name spoken aloud in a long time. While the ache of how he’d used, abused and lied to her remained, it was a vague sort of ache, like the distant memory of a fall or a bad tuna sandwich from a month ago. She didn’t have to believe or accept that David might—or might not—be The One. But she could allow herself to be free of the past.

  She may have been keeping her emotional self cloistered away and shielded from potential hurt, and Cecelia was right. It was time to let the ghost of Keith Henson float away.

  “And the light shines through,” Cecelia said.

  “What?”

  Cecelia smiled. “Your expression. Something just happened to you. I watched it cross your face.”

  Spring reached for her salad and picked up her fork.

  “You, Professor Many Degrees, are way too perceptive. And I love you for it, my friend.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  The conversation with Cecelia clarified Spring’s thinking. Rather than resigning or conceding the battle, she discovered within her a new enthusiasm and will to make the history-center project a go.

  She was a doctor, a pediatrician, but she could string coherent sentences together. She wasn’t an editorial writer or journalist. Yet the idea of putting her thoughts and concerns on paper carried a certain appeal. It was easy to let her emotions get in the way when talking to David or to fail to find the words to express what she wanted to say when talking to her sisters. She knew she and David were not going to see eye to eye on this in a conversation. They were both too passionately invested in what each thought was the right course of action.