Brides and Betrayal (Reconciled and Redeemed Book 1) (14 page)

“Maybe that’s the problem.” All traces of anger were gone, and in their place, was a weariness. “Maybe she doesn’t really feel bad, and maybe I am not sorry she’s gone.”

Grace just stared at him for a moment, then, grabbing her purse, she started to walk out the door. “You keep telling yourself that and let me know when you have yourself convinced.”

After she left, Hunter eased his frame down into the sofa. It seemed like the days in his life were just a succession of worthlessness - a parade of misery, anger, and pain, one after the other. As much as he didn’t want to admit it, life had stopped the moment he read that message from Seth. Hunter was a ghost of his former self, and he had no intention of trying to resurrect the old Hunter.

He pulled on the chain that hung around his neck that he kept hidden under his shirt. He looked down at the gold band with a cross made of small diamonds. Holly had replaced his lost wedding band with this one on their second anniversary.

Love endures all things.
It was the inscription she had engraved on the inside of the ring. A summed-up version of 1 Corinthians 13:7.

Letting the ring slip off the chain, Hunter slid it onto his finger. The metal was cold, but the ring felt natural there. With seconds the cold dissipated to warmth, and he closed his fist around the ring.

He closed his eyes and leaned his head on the back of the couch. A part of him would love to slip back into their marriage just as easy as he slipped this ring on. A day or two back in his life, and he could pretend that the coolness of these past months would dissipate just like the coolness of the metal of the ring. He could warm again to her seductive smile, slip his fingers through her silky copper hair, and feel the strength of her love which had pulled him from the darkest part of his life.

But she wasn’t the same twenty-one year old girl who had wormed her way past his defenses. She wasn’t the one stripping away his fears about his first bride’s betrayal, she was the one committing her own betrayal. His mom, his first wife, and now Holly - he’d loved them all, but they all had betrayed him. Love does
not
endure all things.

Rising, he tore the ring from his finger and strode to the kitchen, throwing it in the trash.

It was time he moved on, time he stopped dwelling in the past. She had ruined their future, so why shouldn’t he have it with someone else?

He made it halfway up the stairs before he retraced his steps and dug the ring out of the trash. Rinsing it off in the sink, he bent his head and let the tears fall, mingling with the water swirling down the sink.

H
olly sat in the workshop with her father as he worked on a dresser. Despite her rough time as a teenager in this house, the workshop held happy memories - probably the only ones from that time.

When Marcy would rant about her sinfulness, she would come down and watch her dad work. He was usually silent – they had little to speak about when she was younger. However, when her dad worked on the furniture, there was always a peaceful expression on his face.

Watching him now, that same serenity surrounded him as he sanded the dresser he was working on. However, there was something else – something that let him keep that same peace even when he left the workshop. Holly had seen it a couple of weeks ago in the store, and she had felt it at lunch this afternoon, despite the awkwardness she felt.

Holly had gone with the Buckners to church that morning. It had been uncomfortable at first and she had almost left. Marcy had been warm and welcoming, but Holly had chosen to remain withdrawn. Holly knew she should forgive them, but she keep wondering if she hadn’t endured so much during her childhood, would she have made the mistakes she did with Hunter?
Probably
. Holly couldn’t stop the negative thought from escaping.

“Thank you for coming today.” Her father’s words pulled her from her thoughts.

She swirled the ice around in her glass of tea, ruminating on her emotions and if she would share her thoughts with her father. She had agreed to come today because she wanted that feeling - she needed that feeling of acceptance, love, and worth - the stirrings of which she felt when Jen and her father had stopped by the boutique a couple of weeks ago. Though she wanted to shrug them off in anger, her need surpassed her bitterness from the past.

“I almost didn’t come.” She sipped her tea before adding. “I wasn’t sure how welcome I would be.”

Her father stopped sanding the dresser. “You were always welcome here.”

At her dubious look, he added, “When I brought the news to Marcy about you, her heart was broken for you and your situation. But her heart was also broken because of what I had done to her. I had turned my back on her and then kept that secret from her for years.”

“I have a hard time believing she felt bad for me. She made it clear she never wanted me here.”

Dad laughed, “No, you weren’t exactly on her top ten list of things she wanted for Christmas. You have to understand, there was a physical reminder of my sin sitting across from her at the dinner table every day. While her mind saw you for what you were, a young woman who had been through a lot, innocent of her parents sin, her heart saw you as a constant reminder of my betrayal.”

She scoffed about the innocence part.
I’m not innocent
.

“Receiving forgiveness is easier than releasing it – especially after a betrayal as hurtful as mine.”

Holly shrugged, thinking about how apologetic Marcy had been today.

“Ah, there it is.” Her father said as he swept aside the dust from the sanding. She went to stand next to him. “Getting to the bare wood beneath all the paint, scars and markings – that is my favorite part. It reminds me of Psalm 51.”

Aside from church this morning, it had been since before her affair that she opened her Bible.

Her father continued. “Verse seven says, ‘Purify me from my sins, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.”

The Scripture pierced her heart, and before she could stop it, a tear slipped down her cheek. “I would love that.”

Her father looked at her quizzically. “You know that God’s grace and mercy are available to anyone who wants it.”

“I know.” She said, but the truth was, she knew that in her head, but her heart had a hard time believing God would truly forgive her for her affair. She had done so much damage.

As if sensing her thoughts, her father said, “This dresser was caked with layer upon layer of paint that each new owner thought would look better than the last. There were scratches from wear and tear, and I had to replace the bottom of two of the drawers because they had been misused.”

She ran her hand upon the smooth blonde wood, pure and natural in its stripped-down state.

Her father placed his hand over hers. “Holly, that is how we are. We have our own thoughts and plans for our life, we get scratches from the decisions we make, and sometimes we are broken from not living as we are supposed to.”

He handed her a sanding block. “When we let God have his way into our repentant hearts, He sands down all that junk we let into our lives, he bleaches out the stains, taking us back to our clean, pure natural hearts.”

She contemplated telling him about her affair. He would understand.

“I know that, but...”

Her father finished her sentence. “You have done something that you think God is unable to forgive you for.”

“No, I mean...Yes, but I know he’s able to do anything.”

“But you feel that you are unworthy.”

She nodded. “I keep telling myself that isn’t the way He works, but then I think about what I did...”

“You know, when I had to confront my past sin, I thought the same thing. I felt guilty for being happy that you were here. I saw the pain I had caused my own wife. I was tormented because of how your mom died.” His voice was barely a whisper and tears formed in his eyes. “I did that. My selfish actions all those years ago caused two deaths.”

Holding her hand again, he confided, “Talk about feeling unworthy of redemption. I not only felt unworthy, but I don’t think I would have been able to accept it at that time.”

Holly looked down at their hands on the beautiful wood of the dresser. She finally asked. “How did you move past that feeling?”

“One day at a time, replacing the devil’s lies with God’s truth. When condemnation would swoop in, I’d chase it away with the reminder of God’s redeeming love - love that was able to cleanse me of all the stain of my sin, but also ferret out the cause of those sins. I didn’t just turn my back on my wife, I turned my back on God when I chose my own emotions, passion, and desires above His.”

“And then you were able to receive forgiveness?”

“I had already received forgiveness - it was a matter of accepting it and forgiving myself.”

She looked down at the dresser again. Clean and free - that is what she wanted to feel. Part of her knew that it was lies from the devil that kept whispering to her that she couldn’t be forgiven. But if she were truly a Christian, wouldn’t she have never had an affair in the first place?

Her father walked over to his work table and came back with a tattered Bible. He opened it to Romans 6. “Read it.”

She read the passage which told of how we were no longer under the power of sin. The verses seemed to just drive home her point. She thought back to when she had been in Seth’s arms. She had allowed sin to push her and push her. She knew it was wrong, but she had kissed him anyway until he caved. She hadn’t just allowed it, she had pursued it.

She looked away from the Bible, tears stinging her eyes. Her Dad cupped her face. “What is going on in your head? I can see condemnation, not conviction.”

With a sob, she broke down and told her father what she had done. Gathering her in his arms, he let her cry it out until all her tears were spent.

“The sins of the father...” He whispered against her hair, his face mirroring her pain.

“No, it isn’t your fault. I made those decisions.” With a sniffle, she added, “But that is what I’m talking about. I knew better, and I still went ahead, fully controlled by my sin.”

“Oh, darling, is that what you took away from that passage?” He turned the Bible and pointed to verses twelve and thirteen. “See, it is speaking of not giving in to sinful desires by giving yourself completely to God.” Her father read verses twelve and thirteen out loud. “‘Do not let sin control the way you live; do not give in to sinful desires. Do not let any part of your body become an instrument of evil to serve sin. Instead, give yourselves completely to God, for you were dead, but now you have new life. So use your whole body as an instrument to do what is right for the glory of God.’”

Holly shook her head. “But I did just that - I became an instrument of sin.”

“Yes, but that was because you were not giving yourself completely to God.” Her father went on to explain. “See, here in verse sixteen it says whatever you obey is what you will become a salve to.”

She shook her head, not getting his point. “When you were upset with your husband, when you were feeling unworthy because of your past, you became a slave to your emotions. You didn’t give those emotions completely to God.” He again pointed to verse thirteen.

“I opened a door.” She said, remembering how it had begun with her emotions, then moved onto comparing Seth and her husband, until it grew. And through the whole process, she hadn’t turned to God once.

“But you can close it now. Turn back to God and let him cleanse you. Let Him sort out all of those jumbled emotions.”

Holly hesitated before asking the next question. “What if Hunter won’t forgive me?”

Her father sighed, and drew her in his arms, whispering against her hair. “I know you would like that more than anything else, but this doesn’t have anything to do with him.”

She pulled back and raised an eyebrow at his statement.

“Worrying about Hunter, Seth, me, your mom...” he shook his head. “That is what got you into this problem. Focus on God and don’t take your eyes off him. Humble yourself before him and go where he asks you to go - leaving everything else up to him.”

“I just want him back, Dad.”

Her father turned back to the dresser. “Refinishing a piece of furniture takes a lot of time and patience. The most important and time-consuming part of it is the preparation process. Sanding off the old paint, bleaching stains - the finished product is only as good as the preparation process.”

Holly crossed her arms over her chest, understanding what he meant but not sure if she liked it. “So you are saying I have to be patient and let God work in my heart - trusting Him no matter what.”

Her father nodded his head. “Submitting yourself wholly to Him means that you will not turn away, even when He asks you to walk where you are most afraid to tread.”

Her shoulders sagged even further at his words. “Without Hunter.”

“T
his has got to be the worst idea ever!” Holly exclaimed, her face pale.

Anya laughed. “It is the best idea. You cannot just sit around and pine for him the rest of your life. It is time you go get your man back.”