“You won’t. I’ll tell him I badgered till you bled.”
He focused on the table in a dead stare, his fingers buried in his hair. He made them wait, apparently contemplating his fate. A moan merged with a sigh. “He’s sleeping at the Herald.”
The room was a morgue. He looked up, as if to gauge their silence. Whatever everyone had expected, this wasn’t it.
“Every night?” Faith slid off of Collin’s lap and thumped into her chair, appearing to be in a near stupor. “For how long?”
“Almost two months, at least according to Angus.”
Faith blinked. “The night watchman? How in the world did you find out?”
Mitch rubbed the bridge of his nose. “By accident, a month ago. I took Charity to the hospital for false labor—”
Collin leaned forward. “What?”
“Go on,” Charity and Faith’s clipped voices cut him short, their gazes glued to Mitch’s face.
“Well, we didn’t get home until about three in the morning and obviously I was too keyed up to sleep, so I went in to work. Angus made a comment about Patrick and me working long hours, and then he just spilled it. Said Patrick’s been sleeping on the couch in his office every night. Leaves at six or so after work, then comes back at about midnight or so.”
Charity felt like a sleepwalker as she lumbered back to her chair. She sank into the seat, her body numb. “Dear Lord, that can’t be. Not our parents. Everyone knows—their marriage is the bedrock of all marriages.”
“Yeah, well, ‘rock’ is the appropriate word, because at the moment, Marcy and Patrick’s relationship is on the rocks.”
“It’s not funny, Mitch,” Charity lashed out, knuckles clenched white.
His eyes softened as he stared at his wife. “I’m not trying to be, Charity. I’m just as grieved about this as all of you. It’s about eaten my insides out knowing what’s going on. I love them too, you know.” He took a deep breath. “That’s why I confronted him.”
Faith jolted to her feet. “You talked to Father? What did he say?”
“Not a lot, I’m afraid. But what he did was very telling. He seemed wounded and bitter, not concerned about what this might be doing to Marcy or if it was the right thing to do. He said he needed time to heal. And that was all. Other than asking me to keep quiet.”
Charity dragged her fingers through her hair. “And you agreed?”
His eyes narrowed. “I didn’t see that I had a choice, Charity. He’s my father-in-law and my boss. He said it was his business, and it is.”
Charity lunged to her feet and slammed her fist on the table. “No! It’s not just his business, it’s all of ours! How dare Patrick O’Connor think that the people who love and depend on him have no right to know? And how dare you, when you know those two people are the foundation of this family?”
Lizzie rose to put an arm around Charity’s shoulders. “Charity, please calm down, for your sake and the baby’s. We’ll work this out. Whatever pain is in Father’s heart, it can’t win out. Not when he and Mother have raised children who pray.”
Charity sagged into the chair with tears in her eyes. “I’m sorry, everyone. I just . . . can’t bear the thought of Mother . . . and Father . . .”
Faith squeezed Charity’s hand. “None of us can. Which is why we’re going to do something.” Her eyes scanned the table. “We need a spokesman to talk to Father. A man, and preferably not one of his children.”
Mitch groaned. “Oh, that pares it down neatly. Why don’t you girls talk to Marcy?”
Faith arched a brow. “You don’t think we’ve tried? Mother’s lips are sealed tighter than the U.S. Treasury. She’s protecting Father, there’s no question about it. So we need someone to reason with him, talk to him. And from where I’m standing, that’s either you or Collin.”
Collin shifted in his chair. “And I’d do it in a heartbeat, but I don’t see him every day like Mitch does. Besides, he’s like a father to me, while Mitch is more of a . . . peer.”
Mitch broiled him with a glare. “Thanks. An endorsement and a slam.”
“He’s right, Mitch. Father respects you,” Faith insisted, her eyes pleading.
Collin folded his arms. “Thanks, Faith, I appreciate the support.” She dismissed him with a sweep of her hand, focusing only on Mitch. “Will you do it? For us? For your wife?”
Mitch studied her for a long moment, then exhaled his dissent. “He’s not going to like it.”
Faith’s jaw tightened. “We don’t care—he’s wrong. And if that bothers him, tell him he shouldn’t have raised a God-fearing family. Will you do it?”
“Do I have a choice?”
Charity rose and raised her chin. “No.”
Mitch’s lips flattened as he stared at his wife. “I didn’t think so.”
“When?” Charity asked.
“When I feel the time is right.”
“Monday.” Her gaze connected with his as she rubbed her swollen belly.
His brows dipped. “When-I-feel-the-time-is-right.”
She leaned in, took advantage of the easy tears in her eyes, and enunciated as clearly as he. “Monday-Mitch-no-later. When this baby arrives, I need there to be two loving, happy grandparents waiting in the wings.”
“Don’t push me, Charity . . .”
She clutched at her stomach. A small cry of pain wrenched from her lips.
Mitch shot to his feet. “What’s wrong?”
She pressed a frail hand to her chest and took a deep breath. Her voice was a hoarse rasp as she leaned over the table. “Monday, Mitch. I can’t wait any longer. Please.”
He blinked, his mouth settling into a mulish press. “You’re milking this pregnancy.”
She lowered herself into the chair with difficulty, finally settling in with a low groan. She sighed and folded her hands on her belly, then gave him a timid smile. “I know, Mitch, but I’m carrying your child. Humor me.”
He gave her a hooded stare. “What happened to the compromise we were supposed to have in this marriage?”
She fought the twitch of a smile. “It’ll come back when I’m not pregnant, I promise.”
Collin and Sean snickered.
Faith rose and stood behind Mitch. She grinned and kneaded his shoulders. “Don’t worry, Dennehy. After the baby’s born, she’ll be right back where you keep her—under your thumb.”
He swabbed his face with his hands and grunted. “Yeah, right.”
Charity scooted to the edge of her seat and steepled her hands on the table. She flashed a pretty smile. “Well, I don’t know about anyone else, but I certainly feel better. Shall we pray?”
Lizzie stared out the kitchen window, her eyes trained on a threesome of little girls playing in the neighbor’s backyard. Plumed hats and their mothers’ hand-me-down jewelry painted a pretty picture for an afternoon tea party. Their giggles floated in the thick, warm air. On the other side, twelve-year-old Libby O’Shea coasted on a homemade swing, toes touching a blinding-blue heaven dolloped with clouds.
Lizzie breathed in, filling her lungs with the scent of July— Mother’s rambling cottage roses and freshly laundered linens swaying stiff in the occasional breeze. Life had once seemed so simple—as free and uncomplicated as pumping high on the wooden swing Father had hung on the oak. Lizzie closed her eyes, remembering the tingle of air against her skin as she’d sailed, like Libby, into an endless sky. She sighed and opened them again to the sink of soapy water that now withered her hands. Life was no longer that simple.
Somewhere along the way, her high-flying fairy-tale dreams had taken a sharp dive into reality, shriveling her wide-eyed hopes faster than her skin in a tub of hot dishwater. First with Brady, and now with her parents. Growing up, it had been so easy to escape between the covers of a book, where heartbreak seldom thrived and happily ever after was a given. Reality was not so kind, she was discovering.
Nor as forgiving.
She was grateful that God was. She reflected on Tom’s assessme
nt of her faith, and her cheeks burned as warm as the water chafing her hands. At least God’s forgiveness allowed her to begin anew. But what about the next time a man turned her head? When his kisses warmed her skin. Could she be strong?
The screen door squeaked open, and Lizzie glanced over her shoulder. “What are you doing here? I thought Collin’s mother’s birthday party was today.”
Faith hefted a box of homegrown tomatoes and cucumbers onto the table, then brushed her hands down the smooth lines of her navy cotton skirt. “It is, but I wanted to drop these vegetables off first.” Her gaze flicked to the backyard where Marcy’s once thriving garden now toasted brown in the sun. “I know Mother hasn’t felt much like gardening, and since we’re having a banner year, I thought I’d surprise her. Where is she?”
Lizzie fished the last of the pots from the rinse water and began to dry. “Upstairs, taking a nap.”
“Again? She’s taking naps every afternoon, it seems. She’s never done that before.”
“She’s doing a lot of things she’s never done before. Naps, sleeping late in the morning, staring out windows, spending time with Mrs. Gerson.”
Faith pulled out a chair and sat down. “Well, that’s the first good thing you’ve said. Mrs. Gerson is the best person for Mother right now. She was my spiritual mentor for so many years, that no one could see me through a crisis like her. She’s exactly what Mother needs.” Faith huffed. “Now, Father? What he needs is—”
“A swift kick in the behind?”
Faith’s lips zagged into a droll smile. “You’re too kind, Lizzie, but you certainly get my drift. I love our father more than any man on the face of this earth except Collin, you know that, but I’m not very proud of him right now. He taught us to face our fears and hurts, not to run away. I don’t know what kind of pain he’s dealing with, but I do know he’s not dealing with it in the right way, not when he’s wounding Mother like he is. I only wish Mitch were talking to him tomorrow instead of Monday.”
Lizzie joined her at the table. “Well, you and I both know he can’t say anything at Sunday dinner. Mother would be humiliated if she had any idea. And only God knows how Father would react. It’s way too risky.”
“I suppose.” Faith squinted at her sister. “You don’t seem yourself this morning. Is all this troubling you . . . or . . . is it Brady?”
Lizzie tried to smile. “Both, of course, but there is something else.”
Faith folded her arms and leaned in. “Give.”
“Want some iced tea?” Lizzie jumped up and scurried to the icebox.
“Yes. What’s on your mind, Lizzie?”
She paused, taking her time to pour the tea. “Faith, you like it when Collin kisses you, don’t you? I mean, it’s wonderful, right?”
“Yes, of course . . .”
She sliced a lemon into wedges and plopped one into each glass. She set them on the table, careful to avoid her sister’s eyes. “Well, you were engaged for almost a year. When Collin would kiss you, how . . . I mean . . . well, how did you manage to . . . to—”
“Stop?”
Lizzie blushed. “Yes.”
“Did you have trouble stopping with Tom?”
“A little . . . I always did stop, of course, so nothing ever really happened . . . but it could have. More easily than I liked.”
“Is that why you broke it off?”
She nodded and searched her sister’s face. “Is something wrong with me, Faith? Tom said that my kisses, the way I responded to his, well, he made it pretty clear that even though I told him no, my kisses said yes. I think deep down he thought I was . . . loose.”
Faith laid a hand on Lizzie’s arm. “There’s nothing wrong with you, Lizzie. We’re a passionate family—about God and about love. And romantic love feels really good. God made us to desire it, to gravitate toward it like a moth to flame. But the irony is that unless God’s in the center of it, you can get singed pretty badly.” She took a quick sip of tea and closed her eyes. “But, oh my, when he is in the center of the love between a man and a woman, you can’t imagine the rightness of it, the freedom, the joy. No guilt, no shame. Just becoming one with your husband. And in the process, one with God.”
Lizzie forced herself to breathe. “Oh, Faith, that’s what I’ve been looking for my whole life. But I’m so scared that I’ll ruin it, taint it with my weakness. Wasn’t it hard for you and Collin to stay pure until your wedding night?”
Faith grinned. “Little sister, you have no idea! That man can heat my blood with a look, much less a kiss, and although his commitment to God was as strong as mine during that year, the closer we got to the wedding, the harder he’d push, testing the limits of my self-control.”
“How did you get through it?”
A faint smile softened her lips. “Passion for God. I begged God for it, cried out for it. I wanted a passion for him that would rival my passion for Collin. And so I prayed, day and night and always before I’d see Collin. Prayed that God would strengthen us to honor him. After all, it was God’s love that brought us together. I never wanted to betray that love for a moment’s pleasure. Not when I knew I could have a lifetime of pleasure sanctioned by him.”
She idly traced a finger through the moisture beading the side of her cool glass, her eyes lost in a faraway stare. “It’s hard, Lizzie, there’s no question about it. But if you really love someone, then you want the best for them. And the ‘best’ is clearly laid out in Deuteronomy 30, a mainstay in my life: life and death, blessing and curse. God begs us to choose life—his precepts—so that he can bestow blessings on us. If you really love someone, why would you choose death—your own lust and pleasure—and cut off God’s blessing from your relationship and the one you love? It just doesn’t make sense. So between my passion for God, my passion for Collin in wanting the best for him, and prayer—well, somehow we got through.”
“But maybe you’re stronger than me.”
Faith wrinkled her nose. “I don’t think so. But God is. Pray for fervor, Lizzie. Pray that God is the most important thing in your life, so much so that hurting him would hurt you. When that happens, and your choices line up with his, it produces an amazing ripple effect of blessings—in your life, that of your family, and for the man you eventually marry.”
“Oh, Faith, I—”
A knock sounded at the door. Both sisters looked up.
“Beth, hello! I hope I’m not interrupting . . .”
Lizzie blinked and touched a hand to her cheek. “Brady?”
A crooked grin lit his face. “No, it’s Michael, John’s brother. I came to apologize.”
Faith bounded to her feet and opened the door. “Sweet saints, Collin was right—you are the spitting image of your brother. Come in, please.”
She held the screen as he sauntered past, hat in hand. He was dressed impeccably in a tan linen waistcoat and matching trousers, sporting a trace of a swagger that clearly set him apart from Brady. His smile bordered on mischievous. He said he’d come to apologize, but there was a sparkle in his brown eyes akin to that of a little boy who’d misbehaved and wasn’t the least bit sorry.
Faith extended a hand. “I’m Faith, Collin’s wife and Lizzie’s sister. You were certainly a shock to all of us. Brady’s pretty tight-lipped about his past, you know.”
He grinned and shook her hand, revealing a flash of perfectly white teeth. “Yeah, well, I guess nobody was more shocked than him. I haven’t seen him since we were seventeen.” He gave her a narrow look. “Who’s Lizzie?”
Lizzie retrieved a glass from the cupboard, grateful for something to do with her hands. Michael’s similarity to Brady was unnerving. “That would be me. I used to go by Beth, but Lizzie is what everybody calls me now. Everybody except Brady, of course. He’s a bit slow when it comes to change. Would you like some iced tea?”
“That would be great, that is, if I’m not intruding.” He took off his jacket and draped it over a chair. He rolled his sleeves and settled in, as if intrusion wer
e not even a remote possibility. He plopped his straw boater down and folded thick arms on the table, displaying tan muscles beneath his white linen shirt. “Slow? My brother? That’s a bit like calling the Pope Catholic, isn’t it?” He laughed, and the low, rich sound seemed to vibrate in the air. His eyelids closed to a squint as he studied her. “Lizzie. I like it. It suits you better than Beth.”
“Are you in town long?” Faith asked, sliding back into her chair.
“I’m not sure.” His eyes flicked to Lizzie as she set his glass of tea on the table. “Depends. Thank you, Lizzie.” He took a large swollow, draining half the glass.
“Collin says you’re staying with Brady?” Faith asked.
“Well, I was until earlier this week. But I’m afraid we had a bit of a falling out. Which is why I’m here. To apologize to your sister.”
Faith set her glass down and started to rise. “Oh, well, I should be going—”
“No! You just g-got here and all,” Lizzie said. “I mean, you know Mother will want to see you . . .”
Faith stared, obviously reading the worry in her sister’s eyes. She glanced at the clock over the sink. “Well, I don’t have to be home for a while yet, so maybe I’ll finish my tea.”
Lizzie’s muscles relaxed, and she released the breath she’d been holding. Her relief, however, was short-lived.
“So, Michael, what is it exactly that you need to apologize for?” Faith asked.
His manner became serious, betrayed by a hint of a twinkle in his eyes. “Well, Lizzie came to see Brady last week, and I failed to tell her he wasn’t home.” His gaze wandered back to Lizzie, causing her cheeks to grow warm. “She thought I was him.”
Lizzie bounced up to fetch the pitcher of tea. “Well, I needed a shoulder to cry on after my breakup with Tom, Michael, and you supplied that. Thank you for praying with me and providing comfort. I believe you did as good a job as Brady would have.”
He watched as she poured him more tea, thumbs latched on the clasps of his suspenders. “I believe I could do better . . . if given the chance.”
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