He still had prayer. God knew the truth, He knew Michael's heart. Now if God could just convince Maggie to give him a chance and to not give up on him.
* * *
The hotel where her dad was staying was located on the south edge of town in an area not yet built up. The parking lot was freshly paved and there were only a few cars. Michael pulled into a space near the office and turned off the engine.
At least he had driven the car today.
"Are you ready for this?"
Maggie turned to look at Michael as she reached to unlatch her seat belt. Glancing away from him, toward the hotel, she nodded.
"Ready as I'll ever be."
"Just try to think of it as a blessing, a long-awaited answer to prayer." Michael reached for her hand.
"You hold on to that optimism for me, will you?"
"Maggie, this is a good thing. This is a beginning for you and your dad."
"I know." She licked lips that were suddenly dry. "Michael, before I forget, thank you for doing this. At first I was mad at you for interfering. Now, well…I should have done this a long time ago."
He leaned over and kissed her cheek. "I should have talked it over with you. I shouldn't have gone behind your back."
She laughed at that. "Like I would have agreed?"
And then she opened the door and stepped out of the car.
"Is it too late to change my mind?" she asked Michael when he joined her.
Michael laughed but held tight to her hand, as if he feared she might bolt. She wondered if that might be his reason for locking his car. But then, he always locked it and set the alarm. And he never failed to put his keys in his pocket.
The temporary distraction for her thoughts ended. She glanced toward the hotel and the man waiting at the front door.
"What am I going to say to him?"
"Start with hello." Michael leaned to whisper, his breath soft on her ear.
They walked through the front door of the hotel and stood in the lobby. Jacob Simmons stood off to the side. It had to be him because he had her hair, her smile. He wore a wary smile on his face as he approached them.
Maggie's throat tightened and she somehow managed to hold back her tears. She couldn't hold back the sob that escaped.
"Maggie." He spoke her name in a low voice, making it sound strained. His lips tightened as he shook his head. "You're beautiful."
"I…" She bit down on her bottom lip. "I don't know what to call you."
He nodded his head, as if he understood that she couldn't call him Dad or even Father. Not yet. But where did that leave them? They were two strangers who just happened to share the same DNA, the same blood.
She looked to Michael, hoping he could help. He smiled his encouragement and patted her arm. "The two of you need time alone to get acquainted. Maybe in your father's room? I'll wait down here in the lobby."
Maggie wondered how many daughters ever had that said to them about their fathers. Getting acquainted should have happened twenty-seven years ago. It should have started with midnight feedings, first days of school and first dates. Instead they were virtual strangers.
It seemed a little too late for closeness. Maggie fought that negative emotion. In God's kingdom did too late exist? A prayer had been answered. She needed to concentrate on that and not on lost years.
Unfortunately the lost years would always be between them.
Michael's hand rested on her arm. "Go on. I'll be here when you get done."
Maggie nodded as her eyes clouded with tears. She mouthed the words "thank you" and then turned to follow Jacob Simmons onto the elevator.
When they walked through the door of his suite, Jacob pointed to the small sitting room. "Have a seat. I'll make coffee. Or do you drink coffee?"
"I drink coffee." And with that they learned something else about each other. Baby steps, just like those first years of life.
Maggie sat on the sofa and picked up one of the throw pillows. A few minutes later her father joined her. He took the seat across from her.
"The coffee's on. Now what do we do?" His question snatched her attention away from the loose threads that hemmed the pillow.
"I'm not really sure." Maggie tried to smile.
"Could I explain?"
Maggie tossed the pillow to the end of the sofa and crossed her arms over her chest. "Explain what? I just don't see how you could have an explanation."
"I don't have a good one." He admitted with a sigh. "I can only be honest and tell you that I made a serious mistake. I regretted my actions for years, but I never regretted you. I just didn't know how to undo what I had done."
"How can you say that?" Maggie uncrossed her legs and moved to the edge of the sofa. She leaned toward the man sitting opposite her and was glad when he didn't look away.
"If you didn't regret us, then how could you leave and not come back?" Maggie wiped at the few tears sliding down her cheeks. "My mother loved you. Until the day she died she loved you. And even then you broke a promise. Probably the most important one you ever made, and you just broke it, without a second thought."
"I know that I hurt you."
Maggie shook her head. "You don't know. You have no idea what I went through, or what happened to my mother." And then the truth. "For years I've blamed you for her addiction and for her overdose. If you had done something to show that you cared. If you had called. Or even answered the message she left for you."
"I know that I failed you. I'm hoping in time you'll forgive me."
"I forgive you. That doesn't mean the pain is gone. I'm working on that now. And I'm working on understanding how you could go on with your life like we didn't exist."
"And that's where you're wrong. You have no idea how I've regretted that decision. You need to know the whole story."
Maggie sat back and with a deep sigh she managed to regain a feeling of almost calm. It came from detachment, from pretending this wasn't really about her.
"Fine, tell me the whole story."
Jacob Simmons nodded, his graying blond hair catching a ray of sunlight, making him look younger. Maggie now understood her mother's attraction to him. She could almost picture them together. Him with his blond good looks and money, and her mom vivacious and full of laughter.
"I met your mom at the lake. I was a senior in college. She had just turned nineteen." His eyes took on a faraway look as he remembered that time. "She looked at me and I fell in love. Special doesn't even begin to describe her or the way she made me feel." He paused and for a second Maggie thought tears glimmered at the surface of his eyes.
She remembered her mom like that. Before the drugs destroyed her she had been full of life, finding a lot to laugh about, even in the hard times.
"I loved her and I used her. I knew how my parents would feel about our relationship, but I just had to be a part of her life. I wanted to elope, but she wouldn't let me." He stopped speaking and silence entered the room for several long seconds. "After I graduated and went back home, she called to let me know about the pregnancy. By then I was in another relationship."
"You could have taken care of us. You could have at least been there." Her mother had never even asked for child support.
"I know that now. But at the time I didn't know how."
"That's an excuse."
His eyes closed and he nodded. "Yes, I guess in your eyes it is. That's the way it was, though, and I can't change any of it."
Maggie stood and crossed to the large window that looked out over the hotel pool. When she turned she met the questioning gaze of Jacob Simmons, her father.
"It seems like there should be more to it than this. I wanted you to have a better excuse, some real reason why you walked away and why you never came back. Instead, it was just to make your life easier."
A cloud covered the sun and the room dimmed. In shock Maggie watched as tears ran down the cheeks of the man she'd spent her life resenting. She swallowed as her anger melted.
"I should have com
e for you when your mother died. I just didn't know how to tell my wife Nancy the truth."
"Nancy means nothing to me. I don't know a thing about you, about what has happened in the last twenty-seven years of your life."
Maggie crossed the room and sat in the chair next to his. He turned, wiping a hand across his face. She reached for his hand and tried to think what it would have been like to be his little girl, to hold his hand crossing the street. How would it have felt to crawl up on his lap after a bad dream?
Her own tears flowed and he reached to hold her. For the first time in her life, Maggie knew what it felt like to be held by her dad. It should have felt better. The moment shouldn't have been tangled with anger and resentment.
"Why did you suddenly decide to tell Nancy about me?" Maggie pulled away, brushing away the tears that dampened her cheeks.
"Conviction. Your friend called my office and I had to take a good long look at what I'd done. I'd tried to forget, but I've never been able to do that."
"And?" She wanted more than that.
"Some weeks back our pastor preached a sermon about the consequences of our sins. We can pretend sin doesn't exist in our lives, but it's still there and we have to recognize it and how it affects us. The consequences of our sins have to be dealt with. We have to seek forgiveness, not brush our mistakes under a rug."
"So I'm just a sin that has to be dealt with? Is that the only reason you're here?"
He reached for her and she pulled her hand away.
"You misunderstood, Maggie. That was the sermon. I didn't say that's how I felt. The sermon helped me to see that I couldn't deny you. You aren't a sin, but what I did to you and your mother was…is."
"So you told Nancy about me?"
"She said she always knew and it's always bothered her that I've left you alone. She just didn't know how to confront me."
"I see."
"Maggie, you have two brothers. David and Jonathan are in high school."
Brothers. She closed her eyes, trying to make sense of what she'd just learned. She had two brothers and she had no idea what they looked like or who they were.
"Do they know about me?"
"I told them last week. They were upset, not about you, but about what I did. They're looking forward to meeting you."
Maggie closed her eyes and, taking a deep breath, she counted to ten. She tried to relax, and finally she remembered to pray. She should have done that first, before anger got the best of her. Counting to ten never really worked, it just gave her ten more seconds to boil over.
"Maggie, I am sorry and I'd like it if you could forgive me."
"I need some time."
"I would like to get to know you." He let out a long sigh. "I know that's going to take time. And forgiveness will take time."
It didn't make past rejections obsolete, but his apology brought some healing. Maggie knew that her anger wouldn't disappear overnight just because he apologized or because he now wanted to be a part of her life. Healing the mistakes of the past would take time.
This was a start. And Michael had given this to her, this chance to have a family.
* * *
Michael drove Maggie home. Her silence cued him to give her space and so he didn't push her to talk. When she was ready, she would tell him the details of the meeting with her father.
They were pulling up in front of her grandmother's house when she finally turned to face him. Her smile hovered tremulously on her lips and tears clung to her eyelashes. Michael stopped the car and waited.
"I'm not sure how to feel about him."
"That sounds like a normal reaction to me."
She took a deep breath and exhaled shakily. "I want to give him a chance and yet a part of me is still so mad at him."
"What did he say, or do you want to talk about it?"
He listened as Maggie gave him a brief description of the conversation with her father. His heart ached for her as he listened to the story. It could have been so different for her, had her dad been the father she had needed him to be.
"It sounds like a good starting place."
"I suppose it does." She looked toward the house when the front porch light came on. "Grandma is waiting to hear how it went."
"I bet she's been praying all evening." Michael smiled at the thought. He could almost see Grandma Betty on her knees, intervening on behalf of her granddaughter.
"She's been praying longer than that." Maggie smiled at him and he felt as if his whole life had been leading up to this moment.
He touched her hair, letting a silken strand slip through his fingers. Slowly he leaned forward, touching his lips against hers. She returned the kiss, her lips moving lightly from his lips to his cheek. Her hands moved up his arms, her fingers soft on his shoulders.
One kiss, one moment. He knew that he shouldn't take this from her. He had nothing to give and no future to speak of. She had nothing but distrust.
Slowly he came back to his senses and pulled free from her embrace.
"Goodbye, Maggie."
Chapter Seventeen"Goodbye, Maggie." The words played through her mind the next day as she sat waiting for him to show up. She hadn't though about it last night, about the note of finality in his tone or the sweetness of a kiss that seemed to signal a parting.
One of the kids asked her a question. She looked up, managed a smile and even an answer. They were all watching, waiting for her to do something. They had planned to go over recipes and plan meals for shut-ins today. With school out, she had a list of activities to keep them busy and out of trouble. She couldn't focus, though. Her thoughts kept slipping back to Michael.
Why hadn't he said something like, "see you soon"? Goodbye had meant something, and now her imagination was carrying her away on a wild game of speculation that included him slipping back into a past that he couldn't escape from. That didn't fit, not with the Michael that she knew, the Michael who had made her feel protected. But what else did fit?
The creak of the door brought her around, a lecture already forming on her lips. Pastor Banks took a step back, raising his hands for mercy.
"Sorry, I thought you might be Michael," Maggie explained.
"Nope, I'm not him. From the look in your eyes, I'm glad I'm not."
"He didn't show up."
"Well maybe…"
"And he didn't call," she continued, ignoring his attempt at excuse making.
Pastor Banks's gaze slid past her and she got the hint. This wasn't a good time for this conversation. She turned to face the group, pasting on a smile that wouldn't fool them.
"So, let's get started." She didn't know where to start, not when her mind was racing, trying to come up with a reason for Michael's absence. Anger mingled with fear, making her stomach turn. She wanted to call his parents or the hospital…or the police. She had already tried calling him and he hadn't answered his phone.
"Let's just shoot some hoops today." Pastor Banks shot her an understanding look. "Hey, school's out for the summer, it's time for some fun."
The kids jumped up from their chairs and raced from the room, Pastor Banks in the center, being adored because he had saved them from her. She didn't mind, not today. Glancing at her watch, she walked to the window, hoping to see Michael pull up.
He didn't.
* * *
Michael didn't show up until the next day. He swaggered into Maggie's office without warning. She looked up from her Bible and met his wary gaze. He rubbed a hand across the stubble on his cheeks and grinned.
"Sorry, I just woke up." He fell into the chair across from her desk.
"Sorry?" she repeated, looking at her watch. It was almost noon. "You just woke up?"
He laughed. "You're repeating me."
Sarcasm suited Michael like the dirty clothes he was wearing. Neither of them was his style. Maggie almost told him that, but she kept her lips clamped shut.
"Michael, what's going on with you?" She chose the easier route, the route of counselor, not friend.
As a counselor she could be detached from the situation. She could almost convince her heart that it wasn't involved.
She reminded herself that this was why she never got involved. When she tried to fix broken people…well, fixing people wasn't possible. She couldn't save the world.
She couldn't save Michael Carson. An ache, lonely and empty, accompanied that thought. She wanted to save him, to pull him back from whatever he was going to, to keep him in her life, smiling and making her feel as though something special could happen.
He put his feet up on her desk and leaned back in the chair, giving her anger a target. She pushed his feet down.
"Nothing's going on with me," he insisted. Maggie met his gaze, those clear eyes that she had always thought could see into her heart. Something in his look pleaded with her for understanding.
She wanted to give him that. She wanted to believe he was okay.
"Michael— " She broke off in a sob and he leaned toward her. For a moment the old Michael returned.
"I'm sorry, Maggie." He rubbed a hand across his face, across the stubble on his chin, and sighed. "I have to go. I just wanted to tell you that I never meant to hurt you. Pray for me, will you?"
He stood and without a smile, without a backward glance, he walked out of her office. Maggie watched him go and then decided not to let him get away with that. He wasn't going to be her mom, giving up and not fighting. She wouldn't let him be her dad and walk out on her. She jumped out of her chair and followed him.
As she hurried into the hall, she saw him. He picked up his pace as he headed for the back door.
Maggie ran, knowing she had to catch him. She had to pull him off the destructive path he seemed to be taking. He was better than this, she knew he was.
He was getting on his bike when she reached him. She stopped a few feet away, breathing deeply to calm her heaving chest. Michael waited, sitting on the seat. While she tried to calm down, he pulled on his helmet, looking for all the world like he honestly didn't care.
Trusting Him Page 17
