Precious Blessings (Love Inspired)

by Jillian Hart

  “I know.” He heard what she didn’t say. He dug the ice scraper from beneath the seat. He kissed her brow, thankful she was here, unharmed, and grateful for the soul-deep feeling in his chest that told him they’d turned a corner. As tough as it had been, things were looking up.

  He braved the icy storm and got to work clearing the windows. Maybe it was his imagination, but the stubborn winter winds didn’t seem as brutal. As if everything, not just his luck, was changing for the better.

  The sense of loneliness persisted in Katherine’s condo, even with the twins asleep down the hall. As she roamed to the kitchen to reheat her cup of chamomile tea gone cold, she couldn’t remember the place feeling so empty. So filled with shadows. So alone.

  As she waited for the microwave to heat the tea, she had to be honest. She felt lonely. She felt empty. She felt shadows filling her up. Maybe that’s what happened when you failed at what mattered most. Running away from true love instead of turning toward it. Isn’t that what the Bible taught? That love was the greatest of all things, love gave worth and value and meaning to life. Maybe it was God’s purpose for everyone on earth, including her.

  How long had she been hiding behind the pain of what happened to her one November evening? She hadn’t even realized it until she’d watched Jack and Hayden together, father and daughter, protective parent and trusting child. Somehow the ghosts of her past had been laid to rest and now there were no haunting memories to hide behind and no rationale to all that she’d been evading. She’d been horribly hurt long ago, there was no changing it, and some wounds to the spirit never fully healed. She had learned to live again but not to wholly love.

  Had she chosen to date Kevin because he was a man who hadn’t demanded emotional closeness? Kevin hadn’t brought up all the feelings and shadows that being with Jack did. Kevin had felt placid and kind and comfortable. Jack was not.

  Jack seemed to be able to see her soul, brightness and shadows. And he might not have pushed her when she’d evaded his personal questions about the emotional wounds in her life, but he’d felt them. Why did it terrify her to be so close to a wonderful, good man? Why did it feel as if she were about to jump out of an airplane without a parachute? A long free fall and then a fatal impact were certain. That’s how it felt.

  That’s how it felt to think about trusting Jack wholly. No holds barred.

  The microwave beeped, and she opened the door. Steam rose from the nearly full cup. Absently she wandered back into the living room. In the corner on the end table, a small red light flashed furiously. Her answering machine. Jack’s messages. She hadn’t listened to them and hadn’t intended to. It would be safer to avoid them.

  I asked God for a sign, and I got one. Jack wants a perfect woman for his daughter. That’s what this is about. He’s right, his daughter comes first, she thought as she cozied up into a big, overstuffed chair. Just forget it.

  She set her cup on a coaster on the end table. The blinking answering machine light was like a signal beacon in the dark. Look this way.

  She turned her back, settled into the corner of her chair, curled up her legs and opened her book. Just read, Katherine. Try to unwind. It’s one in the morning and you’ve got to get to sleep. There’s church in a few hours. She focused on the words on the page and nothing happened. They were just letters clumped together and seemed to make no connection in her brain.

  She couldn’t see the light, but she could feel it flashing. Insistent. Nagging, like her conscience. Whispering, like the inner voice she kept a deaf ear to because it was safer.

  What do I do, Lord? She closed her book and bowed her head, frazzled, feeling as exposed as the jagged edges of shattered glass. I’m too afraid to let this go. I’m too afraid to try to mend it. Maybe You could send a bigger sign, so I know. One I can’t miss.

  Her biggest problem was that God could drop a twenty-foot neon sign on the carpet right in front of her, and if she didn’t have her eyes open to see it, then what good would it do?

  The emptiness within her ached like a broken bone. She couldn’t take it anymore. She twisted around and hit the play button. The machine whirred and beeped. At the first sound of Jack’s mellow baritone, the hurt inside her eased. Sweet longing filled her simply from hearing his voice.

  “I’m sorry. I don’t know what I did or what I said. Or if it’s just me you think is wrong for you, but I’m asking you to call me. Just…call.”

  She heard his raw misery. She buried her face in her hands, hearing with her ears and feeling with her soul. She’d hurt him deeply, the same way she’d hurt herself.

  And now with the echo of his voice in the shadowed corners of the room, resounding in the empty chamber in her heart, she did not hide from the truth. She’d never felt a bond so strong. That nearness, the suggestion of his pain, that love for him shone inside her like a sun at full zenith. What more of a sign did she need?

  Her words to Jack, spoken what seemed like so long ago now, came back to her. I don’t know if I just can’t let go of controlling my life, or if I can’t trust even God that much.

  What did that say about her faith? About her heart? She had constructed far too many shields to keep out the wrong things. A whole faith. A completing love. Belief that she could let go of trying to manage everything and it would still come out all right. Maybe better. Maybe much better.

  Twin beams of light cut across the closed window blinds and disappeared. Odd, because the direction of traffic through the parking lot didn’t usually send light into her front window. Was that the rumble of an idling engine?

  Jack. It wasn’t a thought; it was knowledge. She was peering through the slats in the blind, unaware what she was doing until she spotted a broad-shouldered hulk of a man behind the wheel of a state patrol car. The light shining within her quadrupled at the sight of him. Talk about a sign.

  He looked up and his gaze fastened on hers. Across the distance, the night, the uncertainty and hurt, she felt his love. A rare, shining devotion that nothing—not even her fears—could break. As he climbed out of his car and strode down her walkway as committed as a soldier on a mission, she felt the strum of his heart within hers.

  Somehow she had the doorknob in hand, the door was open. She didn’t feel the cold sleet hammering against her or the merciless night wind. All she saw, all there was, was Jack.

  Taking her in his arms, he pulled her flush to his chest, cradling her against his tender strength and steel. Right where she belonged. She felt his kiss against her temple and one big hand cradled the back of her neck, holding her as if cherished. It was pure heaven.

  He whispered against her ear. “I already know what you can’t say to me.”

  “What?” Who told? Ava, she was horrible at minding her own business. Tears welled up from those dark, soul-deep shadows.

  Then it hit her. He knows. He knows and he’s still here. He still loved her. Sobs broke free and she finally let herself relax into his embrace, into his comfort, into his love. Pure paradise.

  “I put it together,” he confessed. “From different things you said.”

  Wait a minute. He couldn’t have put everything together. He didn’t know the whole story. Her heart stopped. Her brain screeched to a halt. She felt her dreams fall like rain to the ground at her feet. She squeezed her eyes shut, vowing to savor the wondrous experience of being held in his arms even as she gently broke away from him. It was like turning down heaven.

  “I’ve seen too much. I’ve been a lawman for sixteen years. I know what happens in this world. It wasn’t such a stretch to put it together, Katherine. You were raped, weren’t you?” He towered over her, his hand reaching for hers, to stop her from withdrawing, the precious love he had for her a certainty. It brightened the air around them and felt like hope on angel’s wings. Far too precious a love to lose.

  Katherine swiped the tears from her face and fought down the burn of defeat building in her chest. Whatever she did, she would not cry when she told him the rest of the t
ruth. For there was another piece he could not have figured out on his own from anything she could have possibly said.

  Lord, I hope I can find the words and the courage to do this. She was going to trust that she would not fall. She put her faith in Jack, the good man that he was, that he wouldn’t pull away. A big risk. The hardest she had ever faced.

  She had to prepare herself for him to turn away. After this, he would never see her the same way. It felt like dying simply to clear the emotions jammed in her throat. To look him in the eye. To face what was to come. To lose forever this moment between them. But the only thing worse than having him reject her would be to turn away from him now and live the rest of her life knowing she’d lost the best thing that ever happened to her because she was afraid.

  She took a deep breath and just said it. “I was date-raped when I was a college freshman. I was seventeen years old. Two years older than Hayden. But there’s more, Jack. Much more.”

  He waited, patiently, unwavering. She loved him the more for it, that he had no problem understanding that this had happened to her. She could see it on his face, feel it in her heart, that she didn’t need to say how hard she’d fought, but she hadn’t been strong enough to protect herself from a man almost twice her size and weight.

  “If only this were the whole story. What I would give for it to be.” She braced herself. He was going to withdraw now. This was where Kevin had lost it. She couldn’t bring herself to say the words.

  You’ve put this in God’s hands, remember? Come what may, it is the right thing. She took a shaky breath, facing this man who waited so patiently, concern lining his granite features and his heart wide open.

  “I, uh…” She paused, pressed her fingers to her forehead. There were no words to explain it. There was nothing left but the truth. “Nine months later I gave a baby girl up for adoption. Danielle came and stayed with me through the last trimester, so I didn’t have to go through that alone. I—”

  “You what?” Jack’s eyebrows drew together as if he hadn’t heard her right. As if he didn’t understand. As if he couldn’t quite believe what she’d said. “You went through with the pregnancy and gave a child away?”

  That wasn’t quite how Kevin had taken it. He’d have to get over the shock before he started ranting. So it was self-preservation that made her take a step back and turn away.

  “How could you do that?” he asked.

  Hold it together, Katherine. Whatever he says, you know the truth. How hard it was to go through. How it would always hurt. She carefully unlocked the deadbolt and pushed open the door. A silent invitation for him to leave.

  When she turned around, there were tears pooled in his eyes. They did not fall, and after he blinked them back, she could almost fool herself into thinking she’d imagined it. He stood there, six feet three inches of pure gold, looking like a bear about to roar and attack.

  “I can’t believe you.” He finally said, fisting his hands tight and then relaxing them. “I thought you were perfect before, but I was wrong.”

  See, he hadn’t understood. But at least she’d done the right thing. This heartbreak had been worth the risk, she thought. Maybe it would be easier next time, if she ever dated to the point-of-no-return stage again.

  Losing Jack this time meant that a part of her was never going to be the same. It was as if all the light in her faded into ultimate shadow.

  He stalked forward, toward the door. No, toward her. He laid both big hands on either side of her face, cradling her tenderly. “You’re even more perfect now.”

  He kissed her, ardent and tender so there was no doubt. A perfect hope lifted within her that outshone every fear. In the protective light of his love, she felt so radiant there was no dark place for a single shadow. Only joy.

  When Jack broke the kiss, he didn’t move away, didn’t let her go. He would never let her go. Did she have any idea how amazing he thought she was? She was a woman who could love and live despite a terrible tragedy. “I didn’t think it was possible to love anyone so much. And now you’ve gone and made me love you even more.”

  “That’s exactly how I love you.”

  He could measure the truth of her words by the blazing brightness in his soul. By how she looked at him as if he were ten feet tall. Jack wiped the tears from her eyes with the pads of his thumbs. The love he had for this woman was endless. Infinite. She took everything and made it better. Tragedy. Mishaps. Happiness. She’d even won over Hayden. She made him believe again in true love and heaven on earth.

  This, he knew, was the beginning of real happiness. He saw his future roll out in front of them. Hayden doing well, graduating from high school, going on to college. Maybe more children to come. A happy marriage that was stronger every day. And all because of this woman who loved him. “How do you feel about a proposal on the third date? It’s not too early?”

  “I think it would be perfect timing.” Her smile beamed joy.

  “Then I can expect a yes to my upcoming proposal?”

  “I predict a one-hundred-percent chance of it.” Katherine couldn’t believe it. But she felt the truth as he cupped her face in both of his big, tender hands. Oh, how she loved this man. With all her being. He was the right man for her. Heaven had been sending signs all along. She’d finally learned to listen.

  Her soul stirred as he slanted his mouth over hers. His kiss was pure tenderness. Honest devotion. Respectful and sweet and full of promise. His love made her whole and hopeful, and that outshone every fear.

  Thunder crashed overhead and wind gusted against the side of the house. The Chinook wind turning the snow and sleet into rain. The warm sound hammered on the roof above them and drummed on the frozen ground outside, a sign that spring had come late, but that it had arrived.

  The slightest pad of footsteps rustled in the hallway. There was no mistaking Ava’s low whisper. “Uh-oh. I guess this means she’s in her happily-ever-after stage.”

  “Finally,” Aubrey whispered back.

  Katherine broke the kiss and looked into her future husband’s eyes. He was silently laughing, beaming with the same pure joy that she felt.

  “Happily ever after,” he whispered, folding her against his chest. “I like the sound of it.”

  “Me, too.” She closed her eyes and listened to the steady, reliable beat of his heart.

  Dear Reader,

  Thank you so much for choosing Precious Blessings. I hope you enjoyed Katherine’s story as much as I did writing it. Katherine has weathered a lot of difficulty in her life and hasn’t let it embitter her or close her heart. I wrote this story because I wanted to remind others that no matter what storm you are weathering in your life, don’t give up hope. Treasure all the precious blessings in your life and keep hope for all the wonderful blessings yet to come.

  Wishing you peace, goodness and all of God’s precious blessings,

  QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

  What does Katherine first see in Jack that impresses her? What inaccurate first impression does she take away from meeting him? How does her second impression of Jack change her feelings toward him?

  As Katherine gets to know Jack more, what aspects of his character does she come to admire?

  A terrible wrong was committed against Katherine earlier in her life. How important was compassion from others in helping her through that hard time? Why?

  Along the same lines, how does compassion from others help her in her life today? How is that demonstrated? How have you helped friends with painful past experiences?

  How does Katherine take what she learns from a terrible hardship and make good from the bad? What impact does that have on the lives of the characters in the story? On Jack? On his daughter?

  How does Jack’s experience in life prepare him to be compassionate to Katherine’s hardships? How does he show her that the real kind of love that the Bible teaches us is compassionate and selfless and larger than one person?

  How is the importance of compassion and forgiveness demo
nstrated in this story?

  ISBN: 978-1-4268-8396-5

  PRECIOUS BLESSINGS

  Copyright © 2007 by Jill Strickler

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the editorial office, Steeple Hill Books, 233 Broadway, New York, NY 10279 U.S.A.

  All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.

  This edition published by arrangement with Steeple Hill Books.

  ® and TM are trademarks of Steeple Hill Books, used under license. Trademarks indicated with ® are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Canadian Trade Marks Office and in other countries.

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  *The McKaslin Clan