AllFreeNovel
Share Us
How could he possibly respect her after that?
“Janie . . .” He whispered her name, wrapped it in tenderness. Delivered with a hint of longing. It seeped past the anger and resentment and shame, calling to her heart.Come home.
Even so, a hardness remained lodged in her chest. “I’m not a quitter.”
“No, you’re not.”
“Then quit trying to make me one.”
Hunter’s silence met her harsh tone. Then, “I’m sorry I pushed you into this.”
He was sorry?
He wasn’t allowed to be repentant! He was supposed to be a bully so she could continue being mad at him, and that would fuel her to the end of this stupid bet!
Janie gripped that surge of anger, even as she knew it was irrational. “Well, I’m in it. And I’m finishing it.” She pulled the phone from her ear and smashed End.
And as she let tears trickle down the side of her face, the sense of her own foolishness filled in where anger had left a void.
Pray, daughter . . .
Mama’s prescription from weeks before crept into her self-induced misery. Maybe it was about time she took the medicine.
Hunter stared at the skeleton of his vision coming to life. Evan had told him they’d have the lodge completely dried in by the end of the week. It was happening so fast. He should be floating on the helium of success. And part of him was thrilled.
But there was the other part that acted as a lead weight to his euphoria. The part that plunged deeper into hopelessness for every day that Janie had been gone. Eleven, as of 9:22 that morning. If one kept strict accounts.
Usually, Hunter didn’t. Only when it came to Janie. And then . . .
Then he’d kept track of everything, whether he wanted to or not.
The day he’d first dared to hold her hand—a whole fifteen days after he’d hauled her close and whispered that he’d needed her. They’d wandered together down the trail from the cabin one summer afternoon, and he’d slid his fingers along her palm, then woven them with hers. Hazel had been somewhere else—Hunter didn’t remember where or why—but it’d been an exhilarating moment snagged with only Janie. His heart had floated on a rush of pure, intoxicating adrenaline.
From that moment to the first time he’d touched his lips to hers—thirty-eight tension-filled, longing-drenched days. For a sixteen-year-old kid, that had seemed like an agonizing length of time. From that first kiss to when he’d given her a ring and a promise to come back—just over two years.
And from the day she’d given him back that ring . . .
That last one, Hunter didn’t like to keep count. Only that every day since had been tinged with anger, disappointment, and heartache.
Which brought him to the eleven days of torture since Janie had gone off on her adventure with Grady, the Game and Parks guy. Eleven days of Hunter living in the depressing fear of the pair of them falling in love. Eleven days of Hunter’s imagination tormenting him with visions of moonlit kisses and promises whispered in the vast beauty of a red rock canyon and a vivid painted sky.
Those were supposed to be his kisses. Those promises had already been given—to him!
As defeat threatened to give way to another spasm of resentment, Hunter turned his mind toward God.How do I deal with this?
As soon as the query lifted from his heart to heaven,Trust the Lord with all your heart; do not depend on your own understandingscrolled through his mind.
He’d forgotten about that.
But would God make it all turn out the way he wanted?
Hunter pondered the journey in Job that the men’s group had been taking. Because of a cosmic battle unknown to the man, Job’s life became a whirlwind of disaster. And yet he found the strength to say,Should we take the good from God’s hand and not the bad? And at the end of the story, after all the questioning, and arguing, and railing, and lamenting, God revealed Himself and restored the man.
Why did bad things happen? Sometimes, this side of heaven, man would never know.
Would Hunter’s plea for Janie’s heart to come back to him be approved? Maybe, maybe not. But faith in God, the kind of trust that saysYour will be donewould lead him to sayYou are good, and You do good.
Did Hunter yet have that kind of weighty faith?
