Authors: Terri Blackstock
Tags: #Fiction, #Christian, #Suspense, #General, #Thrillers
I
t’s never as bad as it looks, pal,” Sam said to Clint. It was nearing two in the morning, and Clint felt as if this day had lasted a year. He sat alone on the grass, forearms propped on his knees, and Sam came to join him, a folded lawn chair in each hand.
Clint didn’t answer. As close as he was to Sam, he didn’t want to talk. But that had never swayed Sam before.
“The grass is always greener on the other side,” Sam said, slumping into his chair and offering Clint the other. Clint reluctantly got up, dusted off his jeans, and plopped down.
“One in the hand is worth two in the bush.” The line was delivered with great somberness. Clint gave Sam an annoyed glance, but still chose not to speak.
“Yeah,” Sam said on a yawn. “Every cloud has a silver lining. That’s the kind of guy I am.”
Clint issued a barely audible moan. “I guess I should feel lucky that you didn’t put a tune to those little nuggets of wisdom.”
Sam laughed. “I figured you were miserable enough.”
Clint shrugged. “Miserable. Is that what they call it?” He looked into the wind, letting it ruffle his hair. “You know, Sam, life was no bed of roses when I was a kid. But it was okay. You feel better about yourself when you make it, with obstacles behind you that most people never have to face.” He stopped and swallowed, and contemplated the stars. “Adversity always makes us stronger, and I keep telling myself that. But lately it seems that I’ve run out of positive sides. Everything keeps blowing up in my face. The rules of the game seem to keep changing, and I can’t keep up with them.”
Sam cocked his head, listening. That was the thing about Sam. He could listen like no one else.
“I don’t know if I ever told you,” Clint went on, “but my dad was a construction worker. Died when I was five. Fell from a building he was working on. My mother had to support my kid brother and me after that, and it wasn’t easy. And then when my brother got sick …” His voice trailed off at the helpless memory of the little boy dying, and his mother’s grief. Swallowing, he continued, his soft voice doing battle with the rustle of the warm wind. “Well, things were never the same after that. But we did the very best that we could. She always taught that there is one plumb line to discern right and wrong. Everything has to be lined up against it, and if it doesn’t line up, then it’s probably wrong.”
“And what’s that plumb line?”
“The Word of God,” Clint said. “And there have been days when I’ve wanted to bail—just throw up my hands and run away. I fantasized about getting Sherry to meet me in Costa Rica or somewhere, but it was no good. God put me in that house on that night to witness that murder for a reason. And I have to play this out.”
“I’m sold, buddy.”
“Yeah, but Sherry isn’t.” He stopped and sighed. “Ah, Sam. Am I doing the right thing, or am I reading the plumb line wrong?”
“What do you think?” As usual, Sam’s answer was nonjudgmental, noncommittal.
“I think it’s tearing Sherry up. And it’s tearing me up. I never expected it to hurt quite this much.”
“What did you expect? For it to be easy?”
“No.” Clint leaned forward, propping his elbows on his knees and staring up toward the house. Was Sherry sleeping, or was she lying awake in torment like he was? Was she crying? “I just never expected to have to make such a sacrifice. My whole life is just dangling. I thought going back for Sherry would get it back into focus. I thought …”
“That she’d understand? Give her a break. She’s probably scared to death. She’ll come around.”
“Will she?” Clint held Sam’s eyes for an eternal moment, seeing ghosts instead of a friend’s concern. “What if she’s changed? What if eight months has dulled some of her feeling? What if we can’t get it back? What if that Rivers jerk in there thinks he’s going to win her back on his mission of mercy? Her champion, her …”
“And what if you’re nuts? Anybody can look at that woman and tell she’s still crazy over you. What if all this has made it stronger? That’s the thing about living on the edge. You don’t take things for granted. If anybody knows that, I do.”
Clint heaved a sigh. “All I want is my job, a family, a home where the most exciting thing that ever happens is that the washing machine breaks down. I’m not like you. I don’t thrive on adventure.”
Sam uttered a high, disbelieving laugh. An owl hooted in the distance, joining in the mirthless exchange. “Is that how you see me? As some clown who thrives on adrenaline? Forget it, Jessup. That picture you just painted looks pretty good to me too. Danger is not all it’s cracked up to be.”
“It’s the sacrifices, Sam,” Clint sighed. “The awful sacrifices. And the wondering … wondering whether it’s worth it. Whether you’ve sacrificed more than you intended. Whether you should run like crazy while you still can.” He looked at Sam, bracing himself for an argument, hating himself for needing one.
But Sam didn’t argue. “Nobody can tell you what to do, buddy. It’s your life and your choice. I don’t know what to tell you. I don’t even know what I’d do in your place. All I know is that you have enough sense and enough courage to do the right thing, whatever that is. Maybe it’s running off and taking Sherry with you, so you can start that family without constantly looking over your shoulder. Maybe it’s seeing this through to the end. I don’t know.”
Clint looked at his hands. “Either way, a lot of people get hurt. If I do what Sherry wants and skip out, I’ve wasted eight months of your life, and the time Eric Grayson and Breard have put in …”
“Hey, pal. Stop right there,” Sam said, pointing at him. “I was doing my job. If I hadn’t been doing it for you, I’d have been doing it for someone else. Don’t hang this on me or Grayson. It’s your ball game. If you want to declare it a forfeit, it’s your choice.”
Clint leaned back in his chair, his neck on the aluminum back. Was it really his choice? If he abandoned that plumb line now, how would he live his life? If God had put him where he was for a reason, who was he to buck God’s sovereignty? God had the power to take care of the Givanti trial and protect them all. And he had the power to use all of this for good. Clint couldn’t let Sherry’s damaged faith damage his own. Maybe, instead, God meant for him to help her rebuild it.
That is, if he could keep her from bolting, herself, after it was all over. If it came to it, could he bear to live without her?
Even if she could live without him. After all, she had done well enough for the past eight months.
What do you want, Jessup?
he asked himself. Did he want to know that she had shriveled up and nearly died with grief? Or did he simply want to know that there hadn’t been a moment when she’d turned to someone else. Someone like Gary Rivers.
Someone she might turn to again.
M
adeline slept like the dead, but that luxury didn’t come easily for Sherry. She lay on top of the covers in the big bed next to her friend and stared at the high ceiling, wishing for privacy so she could weep without being heard. She couldn’t get over what she’d learned tonight. The danger, the lies, the betrayal …
And she had believed Gary Rivers was her friend. He seemed to care months ago when she had begged him to help her find Clint. With sympathy and a listening ear, he had pretended to “pull strings” to find Clint. And when he had come to her, backing up everyone else’s story about Clint’s cold feet, he had seemed honestly sorry. Why hadn’t she seen it? Why hadn’t she suspected him of knowing where Clint was all along? She remembered the night he had shown up on her doorstep, summoning all his charm when he’d asked her to have dinner with him. He’d played on her memories of their past relationship, but he hadn’t been able to get past her memories of Clint. She had turned him down gently, despite Madeline’s protests. Had Madeline been in on it too? Had everyone in her life betrayed her? Had that entire chapter of her life been nothing more than a sadistic lie, a lie supervised by her father?
She closed her eyes and cursed herself. Wes told her that Eric had always been good at manufacturing lies, and that a man who was cold enough to abandon his wife and children could never change. She had wanted to believe differently, to prove to Wes that he was wrong. But he wasn’t.
Had her father sent Gary to her to get her mind off Clint, whose life he counted as over? Her father had thought it better to make her believe that Clint had simply stopped loving her than to tell her that he was sending him into hiding and that he might never make it out.
Might never make it out!
The thought played over and over in her mind, making her stomach cramp and her head throb.
She sat up on the bed and looked helplessly around the dark room. She wasn’t going to sleep until this tension found an outlet. She needed some air, some peace, some release. She turned her watch until she could see its face in the hall light. Three-thirty.
Quietly, she got up and put on her shoes. Despite the darkness, she would go out, she decided. She would slip out of the house and try to breathe. And if she could find a place, she would try to jog off some of the knots in her muscles.
She saw some guards sitting at the table in the kitchen. Quietly, she slipped past them. Outside, the air was hot and muggy, and the wind skipping across the ground was unsympathetic. It was the kind of night that forebode disaster. Sherry looked up into the opaque sky and wondered if anyone up there really cared about the sufferings of Clint or her. She searched herself and found that she still believed there was.
Faith is just a flimsy means of self-betrayal,
she had told Clint. But had she really believed it? Hadn’t she always had faith in him, deep down inside her somewhere?
She started to walk aimlessly, then broke into a run, despite the fact that she still wore jeans and shoes not meant for the sport. Her feet pounded the dust and dirt beneath her, and humidity encompassed her, but she ran the length of the house, and her breathing came in dry, sobbing gulps.
Suddenly, as she rounded the side of the house, she heard a clicking sound. “Freeze!” a voice commanded.
She did as she was told. Before she could protest she was slung against the house, and a man’s hands were sliding over her body, searching deftly for a weapon. “Please,” she said, cursing herself for being careless when she’d known better. “Please …”
Immediately the frisking stopped, and she turned around to look into Sam’s steely eyes. “Lady, are you crazy?” he grated. “I could have killed you! I thought you were …”
“I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking.”
“You have to think, Sherry. We’re not playing here.” He let her go, and she tried to catch her breath.
“I never said we were playing. Nobody’s having fun. And you can point that gun somewhere else!”
Sam dropped it to his side. “Where were you going, anyway? Trying to pull another vanishing act?”
“No,” she answered. “I was tense. Frustrated. I couldn’t sleep, so I was trying to run some of it off. I didn’t expect anybody to jump out of the shadows and pull a gun on me. Don’t you ever sleep?”
“Not much,” he said. “I was in the kitchen, and I heard you out here sneaking around. You’re just lucky it was me.”
“Excuse me while I go count my blessings.”
She started to walk away. “You want to count your blessings?” he asked, stopping her. “Let me help you. Clint Jessup is alive. He’s healthy. He loves you. And he’s finally reached a point where there may be an end to this mess. You need more blessings?” he went on, keeping his voice low. “How about this? You’re alive, and other than a little 'frustration’that sends you flying out in the night like you’re invincible, you’re unscathed. I’d say you have a lot to feel lucky about.”
Sherry lifted her chin defiantly. He looked down at her, frowning. “Clint has enough on his shoulders without having to stop everything and mourn for his fiancée,” he told her.
“I’m deeply moved.”
“Don’t be,” he said, getting angrier. “It’s Clint’s need for you I care about. I feel compelled to keep you alive for his sake.”
The words were cold, stinging, and she glared back at him. Then, starting back to the house, she mumbled, “Madeline couldn’t be more wrong about you.”
Sam caught up to her in two steps. “What did you say?”
“She called you a pussycat. Said singing off-key was your only offense. I’ll tell her she was mistaken.”
A wistful look passed over Sam’s gray eyes, and he swallowed. “Yeah. You do that.”
And then he passed her and went into the house, as if he was the one who had been wronged.
Sherry stood staring at the door for a moment. Finally, out of fear instead of fatigue, she stepped inside the screened porch and started for her room.
Gary Rivers was leaning against the door that led from the porch into the house. Sherry ignored him and brushed past him, for they had nothing to say to each other. She’d had as much machismo as she could stomach for one night.
T
rue to his word, Eric Grayson showed up at Sherry’s house with police escorts. Though their sirens were off and their lights were dark due to the fact that it was the wee hours of the morning, their very presence put Wes on the alert. He was standing when his father came into the house.
“What’s going on?” he asked in greeting.
Eric, who looked so much like Wes that it was eerie, only stared at him for a moment. “It’s good to see you, son.”
“My name is Wes. Where is my sister?”
“Sit down,” Eric said. He lowered to a chair himself, and hung his hands limply between his knees. “Sherry’s all right. She’s in good hands.”
“Whose hands?” Wes demanded.
“Mine, sort of. And Clint’s. And a dozen cops who will protect her with their lives.”
Wes began to feel sick, but he kept his eyes riveted on his father. “I’m going to ask you one more time. What’s going on?”
“Clint’s our witness in the Givanti trial,” Eric confessed. “He’s been in our custody since it happened.”
Wes came to his feet. “You mean you knew where he was, and you let Sherry suffer? You could have explained things to her and you
didn’t
?”
“It was for her own protection. Knowing would have jeopardized her life.”
Wes’s teeth came together.
“Where is my sister?”
“Just listen, Wes,” Eric said. “Sit down and listen!”
Wes wouldn’t sit down, so Eric just looked up at him and tried to go on. “We thought there was only one person who knew Clint was the witness. If he’d told anyone else, it would have pointed to his own irresponsibility, and his life would have been in danger. We didn’t think he’d tell anyone, and when we found him dead a few days ago, Clint convinced us to let him come back until he was called to the stand. He was desperate to see Sherry, and he thought the trial might drag on for months. He couldn’t stand the thought of going any longer without seeing her. But it was a mistake, Wes. Apparently, someone else knew about Clint, and when they sent Sherry that note, we knew that Clint had to go back into hiding, and he had to take Sherry with him this time or she might be the object of revenge. Madeline had to go, too, because she was here when the letter came, and Clint didn’t think it was safe to leave her behind.”
Wes’s face reddened. “Are you telling me that some murderer is out to get my sister?”
“She’s safe, Wes. She’s protected. I’m seeing to it that she’s taken care of.”
Wes stared at him for a long moment, then raised an arm and sent a lamp crashing to the floor. “
You’re
taking care of her? The man who abandoned her when she was just a little baby? I’m supposed to trust you to do the right thing for her?”
“You don’t have any choice, Wes. You
have
to trust me.”
“I want to go to her. I want to make sure she’s all right.”
“You can’t do that. In fact, I’ve posted people to guard your house, just to protect you and Laney and the kids. You have to take this seriously, Wes. You have to be careful. People might come after you to get to me.”
“Why? I’m not anything to you. There’s no connection here at all.” His mouth trembled as he got the words out, and he slowly bent forward. “So help me, if anything happens to my family or my sister, you’ll have me to answer to!”
“I understand that,” Eric said.
“You think you’re a big shot, don’t you? Playing with other people’s lives!”
“No, son, I don’t. God’s still in control.”
Wes breathed an incredulous laugh. “Give me a break. Don’t use that God talk on me!”
“Sherry told me you’re a Christian.”
“That’s true, I am,” Wes said. “But I don’t believe you are.”
“God forgives, Wes.”
“Not everybody,” he said.
“Everybody who asks. I’ve asked him, and I’ve asked Sherry. And Wes, I’ve asked you.”
“Too late,” Wes said. He stormed out the door, pushing aside the cops guarding the house, and headed to his car.