by Brenda Novak
Actually, his eyes were the same. Maybe that was why his presence hit her so hard.
Slowly, he rose to his feet. Next to him, Arvin did the same.
Arvin’s presence came as much less of a surprise. Hope had worried that he might crop up again, somehow give them trouble. She had not considered Bonner’s involvement.
“What’s going on?” she asked, finally looking at Faith.
Faith folded her arms in a cradling, protective manner. “I’m sorry, Hope,” she said. “I…I felt I should call Mother, let her know where I was and tell her we’re okay. She said she was really grateful I did—”
“And then she sent Arvin after you.”
“I just wanted to give her some peace of mind.”
“Your mother did the right thing,” Arvin declared, his attention on Faith. “Now you need to do the right thing. I’m your husband, after all.”
“You’re her uncle,” Hope clarified. “Nothing more.”
“You’d bastardize your sister’s child?” he cried. “Listen to her, Bonner! See what she’s become? She’s trying to make a mockery of my marri—”
“Arvin,” Bonner interrupted, his tone sharp, “calm down and let me handle this.”
To Hope’s amazement, Arvin quickly backed off. “Fine. You take care of it, Bonner. I’m just…I’m angry, that’s all. She had no right to take my wife and child away. I’ve never done anything to Hope.”
Bonner spared him an irritated glance, and Hope braced herself for whatever he might say. He was the only man she’d ever loved. She’d had a few sexual encounters since they’d created Autumn, but those experiences had been, without exception, unsatisfying and mechanical.
“You look good, Hope,” Bonner said. “But then, you were always beautiful, more beautiful than any other woman.”
“You can say that to me when you’re married to my sister?” she asked, her stomach churning with leftover emotions she’d rather not name.
“You want me to lie?”
“I want you to go.”
“Only if Faith goes with us,” Arvin interjected.
Another pointed glance from Bonner shut him up. “I know you have no reason to hear me out, Hope, but I’m only asking for a few minutes of your time. That’s all. Surely what we shared warrants that much. Is there someplace we could talk?”
Hope felt tears sting her eyes, but she absolutely refused to shed them. She’d quit crying over Bonner long ago. “I have nothing to say to you.”
“Just a few minutes,” he said. “I want to make things right between us.”
There wasn’t any way to make things right. Autumn was gone. Bonner could never restore what he’d taken from her.
But he’d been only eighteen….
Finally Hope gave a brusque nod and led him out to her back porch, where she sat in one of the two wrought-iron chairs. She would’ve offered him the other chair, but she could barely bring herself to look at him.
“It’s nice out here,” he said. From the corner of her eye, she could see his gaze sweeping the flower garden, the birdbath and hummingbird feeder.
Hope’s throat felt thick, as though she couldn’t speak. She turned her attention to the huge, colorful heads of orange, purple and pink dahlias and tried to draw strength and peace from their beauty. She inhaled the smell of moist grass and freshly turned earth. This was her haven, the safe place she’d created.
But her past had caught up with her.
“Say what you came to say,” she said, hoping for a quick release from the intensity of the moment. Her fatigue wasn’t helping.
“Look at me.”
Did she have to? She forced her eyes to meet his.
“I’m sorry,” he said simply, his expression somber. “I know I hurt you. I was young and stupid, and I’m sorry.”
Hope didn’t know what to say. She’d lost Autumn, and now he was sorry? “Not half as sorry as I am.”
“Then come home with me.”
Her heart skipped several beats. “What?”
“I’ve never stopped loving you, Hope. I’ve prayed and prayed that you’d come home eventually, that you’d come home to me.”
When she spoke, her voice was barely audible. “You’ve got to be kidding.”
“Things have changed. I have more power in the church. No one will mistreat you if you’re my wife. Everyone will forgive and forget, and things will finally be as they should’ve been in the beginning.” He propped his hands on his hips as though he’d thought it all out and arrived at a decision she could only agree with. “I’ve already received your father’s blessing. He gave it to me before Arvin and I came here. I want to take you home and marry you. Come back where you belong.”
Where she belonged? Hope wasn’t sure there was such a place. She’d thought she belonged here, in her little house and pretty garden, but now she wasn’t even sure of that.
“Hope?” he pressed when she didn’t respond.
“I can’t.”
“Of course you can.”
“It’s been eleven years, Bonner. What we had is gone.”
“I don’t think so.”
Hope clenched her hands in her lap. “I’m afraid it is.”
“Is there someone else, then?” he asked.
How ironic that he’d pose that particular question. “You’re the one who’s married,” she said.
“I have more than enough room in my heart for you.”
“I’m afraid I’m not willing to join the parade going through your bedroom.”
He grimaced. “It’s not like that. I treat my wives well. And I’d treat you especially well. I’d give you every minute I can—”
“Meaning you’d deprive my sister of the attention she’s currently getting? Or her children? Or maybe you were talking about one of your other wives, like the Widow Fields. You never asked for her, anyway, right?”
He fell silent for a few moments. “You’ve changed.”
“In more ways than you realize.”
“You’re as wicked as they say.”
Hope blanched but didn’t respond.
“I offer you true love and salvation, and you jeer in my face.”
“I don’t need you to save me.”
“You’re making a mistake, Hope. You’re going against everything you’ve ever been taught. There must be an echo left that tells you what you’re doing is wrong.”
“The only echo I hear is when you told my father you’d abide by his decision to give me to Arvin,” she said.
His jaw tightened and his eyes narrowed. “Are you trying to rub my nose in it? I told you, I was young—”
“And I was younger.”
“So you can’t forgive me. That’s what this is all about.”
“No, this is about wanting more out of life than what you have to offer.”
He rocked back as though she’d slapped him. “But I told you. I have power in the church now. I can do—”
“Pretty much whatever you want,” she finished for him. “That’s what frightens me.”
Color flooded his face, and she thought Bonner would reveal just how full of himself he’d become. But he only looked down his nose at her as though she was the biggest disappointment of his life. Then he went inside.
Hope followed, wondering what he was going to tell Arvin.
“Let’s go,” he said as soon as he reached the living room.
It was obvious that Faith had been crying. Hope felt a flash of guilt for leaving her alone with their uncle.
“What do you mean?” Arvin said, his jaw going slack. “Isn’t Hope coming back?”
Hope saw anger and accusation in Bonner’s glance, as if she had somehow wronged him. “No, she’d rather go to hell, just like her father said.”
Her father had always had such confidence in her.
“Well, Faith’s coming,” Arvin nearly shouted. “Faith, get your things.”
Faith didn’t look as though she trusted her own voice. She shook her head, in
stead of speaking, and Arvin’s face contorted. “You do as I say. I’m your husband, you hear? When I tell you to do something, you mind. Now, get out to that car.”
The clap of his hands sounded like a gunshot. Faith jumped and started toward the door, but Hope caught her by the elbow. “She’s only leaving if she wants to. Not because you think you can treat her like some kind of slave.” Turning to Faith, she purposely softened her voice. “You don’t have to go with him, Faith. I’m here. And I’m not afraid of him. I won’t let him do anything you don’t want him to do. You don’t have to worry about that. But if you want to go back, now’s your chance.”
Dashing a hand across her cheeks, Faith wiped fresh tears on the skirt of her dress and moved closer to Hope. “I don’t want to go back,” she said. “I don’t ever want to go back.”
The vehemence in her sister’s voice told Hope she meant what she said. Surprise and relief flooded her in equal measure. But there was still the issue of Arvin and Bonner in her living room. And the fact that she’d been lying when she said she wasn’t afraid of them. It might have been a long time since she’d lived under the Brethren’s authority, but her parents had struck a double blow—they’d sent Bonner, whose presence completely unnerved her, and Arvin, who made her skin crawl.
Squaring her shoulders, she projected as much confidence as she could muster. “Then that’s it. I’m afraid it’s time for the two of you to go.”
“Like hell!” Arvin cried. “Faith’s not staying here.”
“I’ll call the police if you don’t leave this minute,” Hope replied.
Arvin took a step toward her, looking as though he’d gladly wring her neck, but Bonner intercepted him. “Let’s go. She’s a child of the devil. I guess the Lord was looking out for me all those years ago.”
Arvin shook off his hand. “I’ll make you pay for this, bitch,” he snarled. “I’ll make you so sorry, you’ll—”
“Arvin, that’s enough,” Bonner cut in. “Let’s go.”
“This isn’t over,” Arvin replied. “This isn’t over by a long shot.”
“Hope didn’t do anything. I did,” Faith said, but no one seemed to hear her above Bonner’s more strident voice.
“She’ll pay a heavier price than you could ever exact,” he announced. “The Lord will take vengeance upon her soul.”
“I know He will, because I’m going to help Him,” Arvin said, and swaggered out.
Bonner glanced at Hope, and the emotion in his face frightened her almost as much as Arvin did. Not because he looked crazy. But because he looked so sane and could still curse her as though he could command even God. The power he held in the church had obviously gone to his head. And to think that for an instant she’d been halfway tempted to give up the fight and go back to her roots! How could she have wavered?
Because she still remembered the way he made her feel, she realized. She’d been dead inside since she’d left him. She wanted to feel something again, to forget…
But not with Bonner. Lifting her chin, she glared at him in return until finally, thankfully, he left.
* * *
IN THE WAKE of Bonner and Arvin’s departure, the silence felt palpable. The temperature was already rising—would hit the mid-eighties later in the day. The early warmth of spring promised another blistering summer like the last one, when St. George had known week-long stretches of 110 degrees or more. But it was the quality of the silence that felt strange to Hope, not the heat; the stilted silence and the realization that after eleven years, she’d just confronted the one man she still dreamed about.
“I’m sorry he came,” Faith said finally.
Her words seemed to ripple through the air, forever moving outward, just like the consequences of what had happened when she was only sixteen….
“It’s not your fault. Bonner should have known better,” Hope said, trying to throw off a nagging sense of loss. Regardless of how hard she wished things had ended differently a decade earlier, she couldn’t do anything to change the situation now. She’d lost the innocence that had allowed her to experience such all-consuming love.
“Are you really over him?” Faith asked.
The answer was complex, Hope knew. Because of what Bonner had meant to her, she wasn’t sure she’d ever be completely over him. What had happened had cut her too deeply. But she wasn’t about to admit that to Faith.
“I am,” she said, thinking she might as well make it simple, even in her own mind. The nuances of lost love and regret didn’t change anything.
Moving to the couch, Faith squatted close to the floor and held out one hand. “Here, kitty, kitty,” she crooned. “Come here. It’s okay. They’re gone. You don’t have to be afraid.”
For the first time, Hope realized that Oscar was inside the house. He hovered, partially concealed, between the couch and chair, obviously on edge and ready to bolt at the slightest provocation. “What’s Oscar doing in here?” she asked. “I’ve never been able to entice him across the threshold.”
“I encouraged him with a piece of meat this morning. I wanted the company. He actually sat in my lap and let me pet him. But Bonner and Arvin rang the doorbell while I was trying to get a burr out of his coat, and he panicked.” Faith indicated a couple of deep scratches on her wrist.
“Huh,” Hope snorted. “Poor thing.”
Faith arched a brow at her sarcasm. “He only scratches when he’s frightened, Hope.”
“Then he must be downright terrified most of the time.”
“He’ll learn to trust me. I like him.”
“If you want a cat, we can get you a decent cat,” she said. “One that won’t shred you to ribbons. There are definitely easier animals to love than old Oscar.”
“No.” Faith gazed thoughtfully at her scratches. “I want this cat. I think he needs me.”
Faith had been in the house less than two full days, and she’d already adopted poor Oscar. What was wrong with Hope that she refused to get attached, even to a cat?
“I’m proud of you,” Hope said.
“Because I want Oscar?”
“Because you can still risk loving. And because you’re made of sterner stuff than I thought.”
Her sister flipped one braid over her shoulder. “You expected me to go back, didn’t you.”
“I did.”
“I was tempted, but only because it’s not fair to bring all this negative stuff back into your life. I saw the way you were looking at Bonner. I feel terrible that—”
“Don’t,” Hope said. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
Faith turned to Oscar, who crept warily closer. “Were you telling the truth when you said you weren’t afraid of Arvin?”
“Not really,” Hope said. “Were you telling the truth when you said you called Mother just to let her know you were okay?”
A faint smile lit her sister’s face. “I guess, deep down, I knew she’d send someone for me. Leaving Superior behind suddenly seemed too frightening.” Her smile disappeared. “But when I saw Arvin, I felt like there was a giant steel ball sitting on my chest. I knew he’d want to establish his claim on me as soon as we got home. He’d probably spend the next several nights with me to show me how powerless I am. And the thought of being that powerless scared me more than the fear of a future without the rest of my family. When I realized that, and then thought about my baby having no better father than Arvin, I knew I was wrong, that I had to go through with this.”
“What’d Arvin say while Bonner and I were out back?”
“He was sort of nice at first. He told me the place wasn’t the same without me.”
“And when you didn’t rush to the door to leave with him?”
Finding a more comfortable position on the floor, Faith made soft clicking noises, still trying to coax Oscar closer. “He said Ila Jane needed my help with the garden.”
Oscar, seemingly less threatened now, sniffed in the direction of her outstretched hand.
“He used Ila Jane bec
ause he knows you love and respect her,” Hope said. “He knows you care about the garden, too.”
Faith didn’t respond. She crooned to Oscar, who hesitated, inches away from her hand, then swished his tail and brushed up against her.
Hope shook her head as she watched the two of them. Maybe Faith would make a more successful adjustment to regular life than she had. At least Faith still had her ideals.
CHAPTER SIX
HOPE CALLED IN sick that night. She’d slept almost the entire day, but she still had a headache, and she couldn’t leave Faith by herself. Not again. Not after Arvin’s visit. His vile threats still echoed in her mind. Now that he knew where they were, she was afraid he might act on those threats. He might have earlier if Bonner hadn’t been around.
Bonner. His face and voice immediately appeared in her mind. I’m sorry, Hope…
“Hey, I’m talking to you.” Faith put a hand on her shoulder.
“Hmm?” Hope blinked as the familiar surroundings of her kitchen materialized. She’d just drifted off, she realized.
“I’m going to have a cup of herbal tea. I asked if you wanted me to make you one.”
“No, thanks.” Hope gazed down at the list she’d been making at the table—a list of all the things they’d need to purchase before Faith’s baby was born. They’d already talked about getting her a good doctor. The polygamist community was a tight-knit one that survived mostly on welfare. When a member fell ill or was seriously injured, he or she typically came to St. George for treatment and relied on the state to pay the bill. But prenatal care was something else entirely. The Brethren believed it immodest and immoral to allow an outsider, especially a man, such intimate access to their wives. So a few of the older women acted as midwives and gained knowledge as they gained experience. Faith had been examined by Sister Belinda and Sister Rosie, she said, both of whom claimed that her baby was coming along just fine. But she’d never been to a licensed doctor.
Hope was anxious to make sure she saw one soon. It was probably too late to worry about such things as iron deficiency or testing for gestational diabetes. But there were still a million things that could go wrong if Faith didn’t receive the proper care. Besides, Hope wanted an accurate due date; they didn’t need any surprises.
