Page 2 of A Whim and a Prayer

“Then why don’t I feel that way?” She sniffled as she swiped at a single tear that slid down her cheek.

His ribcage slowly rose and fell with another heavy exhale while he gave her a gentle squeeze. “Because, Winifred Doe,” he said softly, leaning to press the gentlest of kisses to her head, “you’re listening to people instead of to God.”

“The witless chase whims and fancies.”

~ Proverbs 12:11

“The heart of man plans his way,

but the Lord establishes his steps.”

~ Proverbs 16:9 ESV

“Many are the plans in the mind of a man,

but it is the purpose of the Lord that will stand.”

~ Proverbs 19:21

Chapter One

Boston, Massachusetts, August 1946

“A toast … to Henry’s blue moon!” Seventeen-year-old Winifred Dennehy raised her glass of punch while she watched her older brother, Henry, sweep his new bride, Amy, ’round and ’round in their first dance of the night. She sighed, wishing she could find a love like theirs.

“What d’ya mean?” Nose in a scrunch of persistent freckles, Winnie’s cousin and best friend, Abby McGuire, lifted her glass along with the rest at the “unmarried cousins’ table” in the elegant ballroom of the Charles River Country Club.

“I mean,” Winnie emphasized with a clink of Abby’s glass and a twinkle in her eyes, “Mama swore it would take a blue moon for any woman to tie Henry down, and she should know”—Winnie’s lips squirmed as she shot a sideways glance at her mother, Charity Dennehy, seated at the official “O’Connor” tables along with Grandpa and Grandma, aunts and uncles, her married cousin Gabe, and Winnie’s married sister Hope—“she’s been trying to do it for the last twenty-four years.”

“Oh, amen to that!” A soft giggle parted from Abby’s older sister, Bella, who was the spitting image of her mother, Aunt Faith, with shoulder-length auburn hair, green eyes, and just as spiritual. “Mama always said that Henry was Aunt Charity’s comeuppance.”

Abby bumped Winnie’s shoulder with her own, a bit of the devil dancing in her gray eyes as she tossed a stray dark-brown curl over her shoulder. “Along with you, of course.”

“Ha!” Winnie plopped her chin in her hand as she stared at Henry and Amy, her flaxen hair styled with a center part and soft curls billowing onto her shoulders à la Hedy Lamarr—the gorgeous brunette movie star she always wished she looked like. “Next to Henry, I’m an amateur, but I sure do my best.” Another sigh of longing parted from her lips. “And I sure wouldn’t mind if my ‘blue moon’ came along.” She bumped Abby’s shoulder back with a wink and a whisper. “Especially if his name is Brayden McCarthy.”

“What’s a blue moon?” one of the younger cousins asked with an owl-blink of eyes.

“It’s actually the second full moon in a single calendar month,” Winnie’s twelve-year-old sister Julia sagely replied, her studious nature always making Winnie smile. “And it’s not really blue.”

Winnie couldn’t help but grin. Julia was like a wise old woman in a little girl’s body and so darn sweet, Winnie never begrudged her being the “good daughter” in the family, along with their older sister Hope. Because the truth was, just like Mama and Daddy and everyone else, she adored “Ju-ju-bug.”

“But in this context,” Julia continued, “it’s an expression that means something very, very rare”—she paused, her somber look suddenly edged with a hint of a smile—“like Winnie getting along with Mama.”

“Hey, I get along with Mama!” Giggles rounded the table as Winnie feigned offense before offering a sassy wiggle of brows. “She just doesn’t get along with me.”

“Uh, not to change the subject …” Abby’s sister Delaney peered around the ballroom with a chew of her lip, “but … where’s Beckett?”

“Mmm … I’m wondering the same thing.” Winnie issued another weighty exhale, this one fraught with concern, wishing her best friend wasn’t so darn diligent with his job. “He’s working late again,” she said with a nip of her lower lip, hating to see him work himself to the bone. She shot a squinted glance at the ballroom entrance doors. “I knew he was going to miss dinner, but he promised to be here by the time the dancing started.”

“Oh, good!” Bella, Delaney, and Abby all said at the same time, their affection for Beckett almost equal to Winnie’s own.

Almost.

Huffing out a heavy blast of frustration, Abby speared her cousin Will—Aunt Katie and Uncle Luke’s oldest at age twenty-two, and cousin Teddy—Aunt Lizzie and Uncle Brady’s oldest at nineteen—with a hard look. “You know, we wouldn’t have to rely on poor Beckett if there were other gentlemen who would ask us ladies to dance.”

Lounging back in his chair, Will slid Abby a half-lidded smile. His brown eyes sported a tease as he cuffed the back of his short, neat haircut tamed with Brylcreem in typical college style. “If I’ve told you once, Abs, I’ve told you a million times—cousins don’t dance with cousins.”

“Says who?” Abby responded with a lift of her chin, her fearless pluck one of the many reasons she was Winnie’s best friend.