Page 32 of More Than Meets the Eye

She held his gaze for a moment before her smile slipped away and her attention floated down to the road in front of her. “I . . . disturb them.”

“What do you mean, disturb?” He kept his voice deliberately neutral even as anger rose inside him at the cruelty of people who should know better.

“You heard those girls. Eerie Evie.” Her voice clogged as she struggled to get the awful name past her lips. “They’ve called me that since school. They’d throw rocks at me during recess when the teacher wasn’t looking and threaten to tie me to a tree and burn me at the stake if I looked them in the eyes. So I stopped looking at them.

“Not everyone is as heartless as Ethel and Hortense, though,” she rushed to explain, as if she could feel the tension radiating up his arm beneath her fingertips. “I’ve been here long enough now that most people are used to my strange eyes and pay me no heed. There are even a few I consider friends, like Charlotte Clem and Mrs. Bishop. She was my teacher for a couple years before she married.” A small grin tugged the corners of Eva’s mouth upward. “She made Hortense stand in the corner for a full afternoon one day when she overheard her awful taunts.” The twinkle returned to her beautiful, mismatched eyes. “Best school day ever.”

Logan smiled even as he inwardly railed. This kindhearted woman was defending the townsfolk with pitiful evidence. Two friends. Two. Both older than her. Both in mentoring roles. People who were supposed to make those in their care feel welcome. Did Eva not have any friends her own age?

The truth hit him hard in the gut. She didn’t. The Hamiltons kept to themselves, just as the saloon owner had told him. No visits to town. No shopping excursions. No social calls. Eva’s closest companion was an ugly black boar with a ridiculous red bow.

“It’s usually better in church,” she said, “but I hide my eyes there, too, because it’s easier for everyone to worship if they don’t have to worry about certain . . . distractions.”

He wasn’t going to let that one slide. “People deal with distractions all the time during worship, Eva. Random thunderclaps. A cricket hopping across the floorboards. A baby fussing. If they can’t handle a beautiful woman smiling at them from the back pew, they should contemplate their own weakness instead of passing the blame to someone who cannot change the appearance God gave her.”

Eva stumbled to a halt. “You . . . you think I’m beautiful?”

“Don’t go changing the subject on me, Evangeline Hamilton.” Logan shook his finger at her, aiming for a little distraction of his own. Her looking at him all shy and hopeful like that was making his own weakness abundantly clear. “I’m not done taking you to task for all that hiding.”

She nibbled her lip and glanced away, then resumed her strolling pace.

Logan sensed the truth lurking behind the silence, yet he didn’t want to press her too hard. So he just walked beside her. Steady. Patient. Supportive.

He might not verbally press her, but he wasn’t about to change the subject, either. Few people could let quiet stretch for long unchallenged. They had a little over two miles left. He could wait.

Before they’d traveled a hundred yards, Eva inhaled and broke the silence.

“Several years ago, a man visited from another town—a man of some importance, I assumed, by the way everyone treated him with deference. A revival preacher, someone told me later. He was asked to lead a prayer during the service.” She slipped her hand free of his arm, but Logan refused to let her withdraw from him. He reached out and clasped her hand, lacing his fingers through hers and holding tight. She glanced up at him, questions burning in those lovely eyes of hers.

Logan smiled in encouragement. “What happened with this man?”

Eva turned to focus on a spot farther down the road. “He approached the pulpit, his leather Bible clasped firmly in his hands. He scanned the crowd, his face harsh and judgmental, as if ready to call down fire and brimstone on anyone who dared fidget or yawn on his watch.”

So many details. Which meant there was a lot of emotion attached to them. They’d lodged in her mind and not given in when time tried to siphon them out.

“He had just invited the congregation to bow their heads,” she continued, “when his attention reached the back pew—reached me. His eyes flew wide, then narrowed in accusation. He clutched his Bible to his chest like a shield and pointed a bony finger at me. ‘Demon child,’ he said. ‘How dare you defile the house of the Lord? Begone!’”

Outrage fired Logan’s veins, stealing his ability to speak or even move. He halted abruptly, snapping Eva around and leaving Shamgar to bump his chest against the back of Logan’s shoulder. The only thing that kept the imminent eruption inside him from blasting free was the sad little smile curving Eva’s lips.

“You should have seen Zach.” She shook her head and even managed a small chuckle. “He was halfway down the aisle, ready to physically remove the old man from the pulpit and the building itself, when four men leapt from their pews to restrain him.”

Logan would have cleared his path.

“Mr. Clem managed to smooth things over, got the man’s son to escort him back to his seat, then publicly apologized to me and our family.”

Not before the damage had been done. What on earth would lead a man of God to say something so vile?

“Charlotte told me later that the old preacher’s mind had been slipping for some time. The family had tried to hide his deficiencies, but after the episode in Pecan Gap, they forced him to retire and kept him at home, where his outbursts would cause less harm. It’s sad, really, if you think about it. After all those years of godly service bringing lost souls to Christ, he didn’t deserve to have the good forgotten simply because he misspoke while in a confused state.”

Didn’t deserve . . . ? Logan gaped at her. How did she forgive so easily? Confused or not, that man had hurt her with his cruel words, yet she felt pity for him. Compassion. Sure, Jesus taught his followers to love their enemies, but Logan didn’t think anyone actually did so. Tolerate them, maybe. Refraining from actual violence against them seemed loving enough to his way of thinking. But Eva? She took things to a different level, one he’d thought only existed in sermons and books. Not in real life.

Yet the truth of it lay written on her beautiful face. She’d forgiven that old man. Completely. A shadow of leftover hurt and embarrassment might cast an occasional pall over her, but it didn’t define her. Didn’t control her.

An uncomfortable sensation jabbed at Logan’s chest, but he tamped it down. Eva was still speaking. He needed to focus on her, not wear out his brain analyzing his own motives.

“It took several weeks and a dozen or so visits from the Clems before I felt up to returning to services,” she admitted with a sheepish glance his way, as if afraid he would think less of her for being human. “Zach threatened never to darken the doors again, but he wasn’t about to let me go without him, so we reclaimed our pew a couple months later.”

“And you started hiding your eyes to keep some other closed-minded dolt from sticking his foot in his mouth?”