by Lisa Harris
“Well, guess what? That’s exactly what you did. And it’s about to get even worse.” The rosy flush in her cheeks was gone, replaced by a white pallor. “I’ve been getting phone calls.”
Ty shook his head. “What do you mean?”
“Someone’s been calling me, presumably to convince me you’re guilty, and then tonight—”
“Whoa, slow down, Kayla. You never told me any of this.”
“The same way you didn’t tell me? Just remember I wasn’t the one trying to hide something from you. I was hoping the phone calls were nothing but pranks or the wrong number. Tonight all the dots finally connected.” She grasped the door handle as if wanting to escape. “I thought our relationship had changed this time, Ty. You told me honesty and trust were the keys to making this relationship work … but you lied to me.”
“Wait a minute.” He wanted to reach out to grasp her hand, but he stopped himself. “I never lied to you.”
Her brow furrowed into a narrow line. “You never lied? The police interviewed you, didn’t they?”
“They interviewed all the employees who worked for Abbott during the past five years. It’s procedure.”
“And the night you told me you were working late?”
He closed his eyes and tried to remember the details of that day. There had been a family emergency with one of the employees, and his boss had asked him to oversee the end of the month accounting. In the middle of updating the computer, the police had called. He’d spent an hour being grilled on everything from his job description to Abbott’s lunch habits. It hadn’t been an experience he’d like to repeat. But he hadn’t lied to her. He just hadn’t told her.
“I was working late that night. The police called me in about seven. I might not have told you about the interview, but I never lied to you.”
“Tell me, Ty. Does the president of Farrington Cranberry Company know the last employee he hired to oversee his financial status might be indicted for fraud?”
“That’s not fair, Kayla—”
“Isn’t it?” Every ounce of trust he’d gained back from her during the past couple of months vanished into the cold night air. “I don’t know, but when I hire a person I like to make sure there’s no chance they might spend the next thirty years in prison.”
His stomach knotted at the statement. Losing his current job had been an issue he’d chosen to keep shelved in the back of his mind. No doubt the only reason he hadn’t had to hit the unemployment lines was because his new boss was an old friend from college who knew that while his personal life might have been marred with a few imperfections, his professional ethics were spotless.
Right now, though, his concern had to focus on Kayla. “Tell me what happened tonight.”
She blew out a hard breath. “A woman stopped me at the restaurant and wanted me to give you a message. She said you needed to watch your back.”
“Who was she?”
“How should I know? Some woman in a black dress, who wasn’t there to be my new best friend—I can tell you that much.”
“I don’t understand.” Ty pounded his hands against the steering wheel.
Abbott.
The noose was tightening, and this was a message. A message that they were watching and could get to him—and Kayla. Ty felt his forehead bead with sweat despite the cold weather. It had been foolish to believe all of this would go away without Kayla’s finding out. Foolish to think he could hand over convicting files without Abbott’s turning against him. Foolish not to have listened to the Spirit’s urging to tell her the truth from the beginning.
A trickle of fear seeped through him, growing each moment as he tried to digest the implications. How low would Abbott stoop to ensure he wasn’t implicated? The police had questioned Ty regarding the papers with his signature, and he thought he’d convinced them they’d been forged. The pieces were starting to come together. Was it all simply a warning to be quiet or part of a setup Abbott was putting together with the help of his lawyers? Ty had believed that cooperating with the police was all he needed to do, but now with Kayla involved …
He turned up the heater a notch as the outside temperature continued to drop. “Tell me more about the phone calls.”
“Someone apparently thinks you’re guilty, and for whatever reason they want me to know.”
He hated the edge of bitterness her voice held. God had given them both a second chance, and for him to have blown it was almost more than he could handle. “I should have told you, and now …”
“And now what?”
“I need you to believe I was never a part of anything illegal.” He looked up at her, but she avoided his gaze. “I turned in documents to the police that I hoped would lead to implicating Abbott. But Abbott’s going to do everything he can to make sure he’s not the one who takes the fall.”
Ty thought back on the past few weeks. The car that had followed him. Misplaced items at work and at home. He’d tried to chalk it up to coincidence, but now he knew that wasn’t true. Abbott was looking for something. Warning him they could get to Kayla. And they would do anything to save their own skins. Leaving the company might have been the right decision, but it had put him at the top of Abbott’s list.
She folded her arms across her chest. “I want you to take me home, Ty.”
He looked up at her wondering what to do now. What he could say to make things right? “Don’t do this, Kayla. We can work this out.”
The hard lines that had marked her face earlier had softened into a look of sadness. What hurt him most of all was that he’d let her down. Why hadn’t he trusted their relationship enough to tell her?
“I’m sorry, Ty, but it’s too late this time.”
Ten minutes later Ty watched Kayla slip into her mother’s house without a look back. He’d told her once that their relationship would make it as long as they were honest with each other. Pulling out of the driveway, he pushed on the accelerator and sped down the road, wondering how he could have neglected the very thing he’d assured her was most important.
He slammed his fists against the steering wheel. Trust was something one earned, a fact he knew all too well. Yet in the process of proving himself to her he’d managed to destroy everything he’d worked so hard to gain. And possibly lost Kayla in the process.
Something ran across the road, and he jammed his foot against the brake to miss it. The car skidded sideways, striking the edge of the sidewalk with a jolt. The seatbelt jerked against his chest as the car came to a stop.
For a full thirty seconds Ty didn’t move. The quiet roar of the engine competed with the accusations filling his head.
“Lean on Me.”
He barely heard the words through the muddle. The wind whipped across the windshield. A car honked in the distance. Even the pounding of his heart seemed to echo in his ears.
“Lean on Me.”
He stared at the dashboard. This time the words filtered through the noise of the chaotic world around him. He’d worked so hard in the past year to make things right: with God, with Kayla. And he thought he’d succeeded until tonight. The words lean on Me echoed through the recesses of his mind. Maybe that was the problem. Everything had been about his getting things right. Had he forgotten to put God in the equation?
Pastor Jenkins had preached Sunday on how salvation was a gift of God’s grace. Never something a man could earn on his own merits. The thought was sobering. He’d spent his whole life working to get ahead, and his efforts had gained him huge financial success and status. But success came with a cost, and the price tag had been too high. He’d lost Kayla in the process. Yet even after realizing he needed a Savior he’d continued to go at things his own way.
Choosing to follow Christ wasn’t the end. For too many years he’d only listened to his own voice. He was going to have to make it a habit to stop and listen to the Spirit’s prompting. Learning to be quiet and hear God’s voice might have kept him from losing Kayla.
Ty held up his hands in
defeat. I need Your help, Lord. Help me to listen for Your voice.
He pulled back onto the road again, fighting the strong urge to drive back to Kayla’s. There were too many things left unsaid between them; too many things needing to be resolved.
“Lean on Me.”
Slipping into the turn lane, he swung a right toward his apartment. He still had no clue what the future held, but for the first time in weeks he knew he didn’t have to go through it alone.
Kayla thanked Hillary for staying late, then walked the older woman to the door. Locking it behind her, she slumped against the wall. The last couple of hours had played out like a bad movie. She’d been certain Ty’s visit to her mother would end with a proposal tonight … then everything changed in an instant.
Turning off the lights, she walked down the hall to check on her mother who’d gone to bed early and was snoring softly in her room. Kayla stood in the doorway of the bedroom and smiled at the look of peace on her mother’s face. Her left eye still drooped, and the road ahead wasn’t going to be easy, but her mother would make it.
Kayla sat down on her bed, wishing a good night’s sleep would erase the weeks of fatigue that were piling up. Picking up her Bible from the bedside table, she flipped open the pages. Between running the business and taking care of her mom she couldn’t remember the last time she’d had a quiet time with God. Or how long she’d been trying to handle everything on her own. Somehow she’d let her spirit become a dried-up well in the middle of the desert.
I just can’t do this anymore, Lord.
She opened to the first chapter of second Corinthians, a recent passage in one of Pastor Jenkins’s sermons, and started reading. The apostle Paul had always been a superhero in her eyes. The list of things he endured for the sake of the gospel read like a New York Times bestselling thriller.
Pulling her legs up under her, she stopped at verse six. Paul wrote how suffering produced patient endurance. How could suffering produce patience? Kayla rubbed her temples with the tips of her fingers. She’d never been shipwrecked or left in prison or even gone without a meal. Her struggles were real, but in the scope of what many had to endure she wasn’t sure they even counted as trials. On top of that, patient endurance read more like an oxymoron than a word of encouragement.
She reread verses three and four. “‘Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles.’”
All our troubles. Her mom’s stroke. Ty’s betrayal. The load of running the business while caring for her mother.
She continued reading the chapter, stopping again at verse nine. “‘This happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God.’”
The truth seared through to her heart like a hot iron. That was what was missing in her life. How long had she spent her time relying on her own efforts to take care of everything? She claimed to follow Christ but was all too quick to grab the steering wheel and head off in her own direction. Controlling the business. Controlling her mother’s recovery. Controlling Ty.
Tears she’d held back for weeks poured down her cheeks like healing rain, and the love of her heavenly Father enveloped her. The future was still uncertain, but one thing wasn’t anymore. This time she was going to put her trust in the One who created her.
Ty parked his car in his spot, then locked the doors before heading up the sidewalk toward his apartment.
“Ty Lawrence?”
Ty stopped short of the small patio and turned around. “Yes?”
“My name’s Samuel Lance. I’m a law enforcement officer for the State of Massachusetts.” The man flashed a badge beneath the bright street lamp as he took a step toward him. “You’re under arrest for accounting fraud and other illegal activities in connection with our recent investigation into Abbott Financial Services.”
twelve
Kayla combed out a section of her mom’s hair, then clamped it into the curling iron, wishing she could spend the rest of the morning in bed. She’d finally fallen asleep around one, but her dreams had been filled with Ty. Already she missed him, torn between her heart’s longings and the common sense that constantly reminded her she needed to stay away from him. Even putting her trust back into God’s hands had become a minute-by-minute effort.
“Are you almost done?”
Kayla’s focus switched back to the task at hand. “One section left.”
Her mom worked to fasten the top button of her blouse that had come undone. “You know you don’t have to do my hair every morning, Kayla.”
“I know I don’t have to, but I want to.” For once she was thankful for the distraction. Between her mom and the business, staying busy would make the pain of letting Ty go easier. Or at least she hoped it would.
Her mother’s hand shook as she fought with the shirt.
Kayla reached down to help. “Let me do that—”
“No!”
Kayla drew back her hand and bit her lip as her mom continued to struggle. Her fingers fumbled with the buttonhole. It was all Kayla could do not to finish the chore herself. Finding the balance between helping her mother and letting her struggle to relearn simple tasks had proved to be difficult. The stroke had added depression to the list of symptoms her mom had been forced to accept. All of which added up to a new dimension of tension between them.
Her mother jerked the button off and threw it onto the floor. For a few seconds neither of them moved.
“I’m sorry.” Her mom let her good arm drop into her lap defeated.
“It’s okay.” Kayla moved the curling iron to the last section, deciding to leave the button on the floor for now.
“No, it’s not.” Her mom’s leg shook. “Since when do I have to rely on—on my daughter and nurses to button my shirt?”
Tears pooled in her mother’s eyes. Kayla set the curling iron down and wrapped her arms around her. Frustrations over her relationship with Ty seemed minimal compared to the life-changing challenges her mom faced.
Kayla bit back her own tears of empathy. “I remember when I was in third grade, and I wanted curls like Abigail Mentor’s. You must have spent an hour fixing my hair every morning before school.”
“And your curls were much prettier than Abigail’s … weren’t they?” Her mother’s smile emphasized the droop on the left side of her face, but at least she seemed to have forgotten the button for now. “I wanted to see you last night. How was your dinner with Ty?”
With Ty on the top ten list of topics to avoid, Kayla hadn’t expected the subject to come up and wasn’t sure how to approach it. Another argument was the last thing she wanted. “I understand he came to visit you yesterday.”
“He did … and we had a nice time. What happened at dinner?”
Kayla quirked an eyebrow at her friendly tone. “There’s nothing to tell.”
Her mom strained to look up at her. “Don’t tell me the two of you … got in a fight?”
Kayla shook her head, confused. Even after her mom had agreed to keep her opinions of Ty to herself, nothing had really changed. The stroke had just postponed the inevitable explosion she was convinced was coming. Genuine interest in their lives wasn’t what she’d expected.
Kayla began to comb the short curls into place. “Why the change of heart, Mom? You’re acting as if you like him. But he’s the bad guy, remember. The one who’s stealing your daughter away, bound to break her heart.”
“Not according to everything … I’ve ever heard from you.” Her mom pointed to a gold-foil box on the bedside table. “You’d be amazed how far a box of chocolates goes when you’ve been living on hospital food.”
“He said something about that.” She still didn’t get it. Since when did peace break out? “He was going to ask me to marry him, wasn’t he?”
Her mom reached up to push a curl into place on the side of her head. “I’d say that’s between you and Ty.”
“Mom. I need to know.”
“He came
to ask my permission to marry you.”
“And you agreed?”
Her mom nodded slowly. “Lying in a hospital bed for almost three weeks makes … you look at things differently. He’s good to you. And as much as I haven’t wanted to admit it, he’s been … good to me as well.”
Kayla sprayed some hairspray to set her mom’s hair in place, making a mental note to schedule an appointment with the hairdresser for a perm. Her mom did have a point. Making sure the outside of her mother’s house was ready for winter was only one of the things he’d done to help ease Kayla’s load. He’d fixed the garbage disposal, insulated the windows, changed the smoke detector batteries, and the list went on and on.
Her mom slid on her glasses. “He also mentioned how easy it is to blame God for our mistakes. I can’t say … I’ve ever really thought about it that way.”
Kayla squeezed her eyes shut for a moment and sent up a prayer for wisdom. If she was going to rely on God for His wisdom and help in her life, now was as good a time as any to start. If her mother was opening her heart to God, what she needed to tell her about Ty was going to make things worse. How many people had been turned off from God and consequently church because of the behavior of the very people sitting inside?
“There are some things you need to know about Ty, Mom.”
Kayla sat down on the edge of the bed beside her mom and told her everything. From Ty’s involvement in the government’s investigation into Abbott Financial Services, to the strange phone calls, to the woman at the restaurant. The emotional weight she’d carried home the night before had shifted from anger to sadness. Maybe reality would hit her at some point. Right now she still felt numb.
“I’m so sorry you’ve had to go through this.” Her mom reached out and grasped Kayla’s fingers. “And I know this is going to sound … crazy coming from me, but I think you need to consider the fact that Ty’s innocent.”
