Taking a Leap of Love: An Inspirational Historical Western Romance Book

by Lilah Rivers

  Jodi wanted to agree, even if she found it a little difficult. “I… I suppose,” Jodi conceded, “I mean… I want to feel better about it —”

  “Then do, silly!” But reason for melancholy was ample, despite the good turns of fortune facing both young women. They’d been the best of friends for ten years, since they were twelve years old. At twenty-two, their fates would take them in different directions and put almost the entire continent between them. They’d relied on each other, supported each other, and finally, they would have to part ways.

  “Don’t you worry about a thing, Jodi! With the mail service the way it is, wires by cable, we can speak to one another almost as if we were in the same room.”

  Jodi hung her head. “It won’t be the same.”

  Amy took Jodi’s hands in hers. “No, it… it won’t be exactly the same, Jodi, it won’t. But nothing truly stays the same forever, does it? And even if it could, would we really want it to?”

  Jodi had to agree, there was no good sense in not doing it. “Behold,” she said, quoting the bible, “I am creating something new.”

  Amy nodded, her smile telling Jodi that not only did she know the verse, but that she agreed. “Do you not perceive it?”

  Chapter 2

  Jodi could hardly believe her ears. She sat there, stunned, in the parlor of her family home, her own fiancé pacing nervously in front of the sofa.

  “Please understand,” Giles Devlin said. “Jodi, I… I feel strongly for you. I always have and I always will.”

  Somehow, Jodi knew there was nothing she could say or do to prevent the inevitable.

  “And, of course, you’re the last person I would ever want to hurt.” He cleared his throat, twitching his shoulder to pull his neck from his collar, which suddenly seemed too tight. “When I proposed… it was almost a year ago.” He didn’t seem to be able to go on.

  So, Jodi decided to help him along—and herself, as well. “And I happily accepted.”

  “And I happily asked, Jodi.”

  She took a glance at herself in the mirror. Her straight figure was slumped forward with new misery, further disguising her small bust. She’d never been the picture of female pulchritude, she knew that. But a lot of boys had found her wavy blonde hair attractive, heart-shaped face, perky nose, and blue-gray eyes were never repulsive to anyone; except herself, perhaps.

  At some times more than others.

  She said, “You said it was a matter of your finances, Giles. All this time… you were lying to me?”

  “No,” Giles was quick to retort, “I most certainly was never… less than honest about my feelings for you, Jodi. That’s… that's why we’re talking about now. My finances were… restrictive, you know that. And it’s taken time to get to where I… to where I needed to be in order to be the kind of husband I wanted… that I needed to be for you.”

  Jodi turned away, saying as much with a turn as she could say with any words. But she still decided to add, “Or for my cousin, Alice.”

  Giles nodded with a self-deprecating smile, running his hands though his black hair and over the matching sideburns reaching down his cheeks. “It… it just happened, Jodi. I hope you’ll understand… and forgive us.”

  Jodi snubbed him with a turn of her chin. “Of course I’ll forgive you, Giles… I’m honor-bound and duty-bound to do so, as a good, God-fearing Christian. Our Lord Jesus died for your sins as much as those of any other, or those of my cousin.”

  “Jodi, please don’t be that way.”

  “How else shall I be? I’ve waited a year since your proposal and now you tell me, at the end of that year, not only am I not to be married—not only that you choose not to marry me—but that you choose instead to marry my cousin?”

  “It… it isn’t really as bad as all that,” Giles struggled to say. “Not as bad as it sounds, in any case.”

  “No? And how bad is it, truly?”

  He stammered, trying to piece together his position in a way that wouldn’t be absolutely repulsive to either one of them, or to God. “First of all, you must admit that Alice has suffered greatly, that she deserves happiness as much as anyone.”

  “It’s true,” Jodi admitted, “Alice has suffered. But I was not the cause of her suffering.”

  “No, and it's not fair that you should pay the price for her happiness, either.”

  Jodie gave it some thought. “This isn't... pity, is it? Sympathy mistaken for love?”

  “No, Jodi, it's love. I’m sorry, but it’s… it’s just a fact of life. It happened. I think, in a lot of ways,” and he really seemed to struggle to come up with what he’d say next, “it’s what God intends.”

  This made Jodi stand up, though she knew that since it was her family home, there was only so far she could go. But turning away from him made her point.

  “Think about it, Jodi: God is in control of all things, isn’t He?” Without waiting for an answer, he persisted. “And therefore, if this happens, it must be what God intended. I know He works in mysterious ways, but… could this not be one of His mysteries?”

  Jodi shrugged her shoulders to further separate them and to feebly protect herself.

  “Does that mean that every evil act in the world, every crime and every killing, must be God’s will, simply because it happened?” In the lingering silence, Jodi pushed, “What about our own personal responsibility… or yours?”

  Giles seemed flummoxed, shaking his head as if he hadn’t been expected to account for himself ever, much less in front of a woman whom he no longer wished to marry. “I… I grant you, I’m not… pleased to be telling you these things.”

  “I can imagine,” Jodi agreed. “But how pleased will you be to tell Alice that you've already told me?” She waited, knowing somehow that no direct answer was coming.

  Giles rubbed his mouth and jaw as if to rid his tongue of a bad taste. “Alice feels terribly about it too, Jodi. She… she was afraid to tell you, and you can hardly blame her.”

  “I suppose one could pick and choose what they wanted to blame her for.”

  Giles nodded. “In any case, she… I’m here to apologize to you on her behalf as well as my own. And I … I know you won’t forgive me, I don’t expect that. I’d never ask for it. But I… I hope you’ll find it in your heart to forgive your cousin, to accept her back into your life. I know that won't be easy, that things will be difficult among us all for a while. But she's also your family, your blood—”

  “A sad fact she seems to have forgotten!”

  Giles sighed. “Okay, I… I can see that this is too tender a wound, it won't heal so quickly. Nor should it.” After a long, uncomfortable silence, Giles added, “I’ll leave you to digest and consider, for the wisdom of the Lord to inform you of the true path, the way and the truth and the light.”

  “I already know these things,” Jodi pointed out. “What I don't know is the way of the other.” She glanced down to her feet, and she knew her meaning was clear enough to Giles. He didn’t seem interested in being further insulted, even considering how insulting he'd already been to her.

  “Very well,” he said. “I… I know we'll have time to discuss this at greater length at a time when reflection and reason can lend a more civil tone to things. But remember one thing, my fair Jodi:Family is what matters most and, in that interest, I hope you will reconsider the tartness of your position.”

  He stood and stepped out of the parlor, turning to add, “I’ll see myself out.” With that he turned, his boot heels clacking against the hard pinewood floors. The front door opened and closed, and Jodi found herself alone. She’d never felt lonelier.

  Jodi sat with the truth, her blood running cold in her veins. There had been too many months of doubt for her to be floored, but she still felt as if she'd been punched in the stomach. She could hardly breathe, and she wasn't sure she wanted to.

  How could he do this to me? He knew how long I’ve been waiting, how everybody knew we were to be wed. What will I tell them now? What wil
l they think? And what about my parents? What will they think, of me and of Giles? And what will the community make of them, parents who failed to marry their daughter off, losing the groom to the daughter of their own family?

  But there was no point in refusing to accept it now, terribly tempting as that had been as the months had crawled on. Jodi had to face the fearful fact that she was alone—at twenty-three years old, she was quickly approaching the age of a spinster. She would be a disgrace to her parents and a laughingstock among their neighbors.Or worse, an object of pity.

  No, Jodi told herself, I won’t be that; I won’t be either one!

  Jodi started to think about her best friend, Amy Harper, now Mrs. Clinton Burnett of Angeldale, New Mexico. She could easily picture her red, curly hair, that stubborn smile.

  Amy wouldn’t take this, Jodi thought, though who would ever have turned away from marrying her? And if they had, she surely wouldn’t pity herself, sitting slumped in the parlor and staring at her sad reflection in the mirror. She’d be out there living, finding a new man, a new start, a new life.

  That’s what Amy did, Jodi reminded herself. In the last year, she went out as a mail-order bride and seems to have found every happiness. In the meantime, I’ve spent the year here in Providence, Rhode Island, doing chores at home and waiting to be jilted in favor of my own cousin!

  Jodi sighed, the silence of the parlor seeming to tell her that there had to be another way, another life. The course seemed clear, and the time perhaps long overdue.

  Chapter 3

  Jodi sat down at the roll-top desk in her bedroom and pulled out a fresh piece of paper. Usually she’d be sitting down to a happy chore, dipping the pen into the ink and scratching out a fine litany of good will and best wishes. And though she still had those aplenty for her old friend Amy, she had little of them to enjoy for herself.

  She didn’t want to get into the details of what had happened; just to review them for herself was painful enough, but to have to explain them to her best friend was just too much. And Jodi knew it would have been painful for Amy, too.

  No, Jodi told herself, better to spare us both.

  So it was with a heavy heart but an even hand and a caring mind that Jodi did what she had to do in a way she felt best about; not with dishonesty, but with discretion.

  Dearest Amy,

  I hope this letter finds you well. I have so enjoyed our communications over the past year, since you went out to New Mexico. I do hope and rest in certainty that you and Clinton Burnett have found the happiness together which we both knew you’d find. He did seem like a good man, from what little I knew or know even now. But God has His way of creating perfection among we, the imperfect; joy among the joyless, company for the lonely.

  I think I will always remember the worry I fostered for you on the day I told you Giles and I were to be married. You were so brave, so loving and supportive. But I couldn’t deny that I was worried for you, that you would ever find the happiness that I was so certain that I’d already found.

  Well, as for my happiness, it seems as if it’s not to be. No, my friend, I oughtn’t be less than honest with you; our happiness may yet be, but not together and not in one another. I do hope for his happiness, and my cousin Alice. I don’t know what my cousin would say to me, as we have not spoken. I will hope and pray that we do someday, though it strains my imagination to draw a vision of such a thing.

  Of course, my life offers limited options. I am here and so is my situation. The neighbors will be speaking of it soon and then widely. I don’t fear for gossip, of course, nor for scorn. I know Jesus loves me and will always stand with me; wherever I turn, he is there.

  But the others? Not likely, I don’t think.

  However, if this is what God desires for me, I will surely endure it. What care would I have for others when he who was to care for me most has turned his back? I cannot lie, my oldest and dearest friend, I have sorrow which I cannot turn from. But if this is my burden to bear, it will still be less than the suffering endured by others. I am determined to be grateful for the continued good health of my beloved mother and father, of you; even for my own health, to whatever advantage I can still put it.

  But as you know, my friend, we’re both well over twenty-one, two years beyond that sacred age. I’m well on my way to being the spinster we always imagined, but I’m glad you have escaped that fate. We oughtn’t have imagined ourselves growing up that way. Believe my words, Amy, you would not want to face the emotions and fears which stir in me now, and which I am afraid will never recede.

  I cannot feel sorry for myself, of course. If he would fall in love with another, then surely his love for me was not true. I do not blame my cousin for trickery, or Giles for shallowness. Perhaps theirs really is the true love God intended after all. Perhaps He has some other love in store for me, or perhaps none at all. But, like Job, I shall not lose faith, whatever may happen.

  But no matter my feelings about Giles, about myself, I must say I have missed you, my closest, dearest, and oldest friend. How much do I value your strength of will and character. I have always held your personal strength in the highest esteem. If I may be so bold, I’ve always found much in you to emulate; your ability to stand up to others, what some would have called your stubbornness. Do you recall on that day when you referred to yourself as a mule? But did I ever tell you that I always thought you were much more a mountain; tall and strong and unyielding, turning away any not up to the task?

  I only hope that all who dared come your way were up to that noble and rarified task. To know the heights of your soaring character would only enrich anyone as it has me. In truth, I long for that comfort even now, as it was when we were twelve and fourteen and eighteen and twenty-two.

  Of course, that’s not likely to be, with so much distance between us. But for me, no stretch of time or place can truly separate us, and I feel as if even now you are here with me, so great is your influence and my admiration.

  Please give my very best to your husband and wish him my complete and utter congratulations again on marrying the very finest person I have ever known.

  Yours in eternal friendship,

  Jodi.

  Chapter 4

  It was only a few nights later that Jodi was having dinner with her parents, Martin and Ellen Hoffman. Both were aging nicely, getting a bit rounder and bit grayer. Looking at them across the table, it was almost too easy for Jodi to imagine herself already resembling them, even at half their age.

  They glanced at her several times, wordless from across the table, surveying her thoughtfully. She tried to keep up a brave face, to betray their insight with some kind of noble cleverness. But after all those years and all the shared blood coursing in their veins, Jodi knew it was a fruitless effort.

  The only real questions were whether or not they’d ask, and how much they would say.

  Jodi tried to concentrate on her meal, roasted chicken crispy on the outside and tender within, rosemary and garlic giving the meat a delicious tang. The red potatoes were firm and buttery, the green beans still crisp and colorful despite being steamed to perfection.

  They kept eyeing her, Martin from over his brown handlebar mustache and Ellen from under her graying hair. They shared sad glances and then went on eating in silence as the minutes crawled past.

  Finally, her father Martin seemed to feel he had to ask, “And how have you been feeling over the past few days, Jodi?” She wasn’t sure how to answer, and in her silence, Martin went on, “You’ve been quiet as you go about your chores, and your mother and I quite understand why.”