Brides and Betrayal (Reconciled and Redeemed Book 1) (18 page)

Holly had looked so peaceful - sad but peaceful.
God, she should be the one suffering, not me!

A knock on the door pulled him from his thoughts. “Come in.”

“The cars are starting to arrive.” Grace said. “I am going to head back to the room, and Chris and the groomsmen need to...”

Kissing his sister on top of her head, he chuckled. “I know. We’ve been over this three times since last night.”

“Okay,” Grace giggled. “I’m...I’m just so happy.” She wrapped her arms around Hunter’s waist.

Hunter held his sister, growling a warning to God that she should never have to experience his pain.

Hunter went downstairs and met the groomsmen in the hallway.

Christopher beamed at him. Despite his best efforts to not trust this man, Hunter couldn’t help but like him. Nevertheless, it didn’t stop Hunter from warning his future brother-in-law.

“We are back here.” He ushered the group back to one of the spare bedrooms, but put a restraining hand on Christopher’s arm. Though Hunter appeared nonchalant, there was no mistaking the thinly veiled threat in his words. “I just wanted to make it clear that you better honor my sister with your life. I will not have you chucking aside your vows the second your fascination with my sister grows cold.”

Christopher laughed despite Hunter’s threat. “You must not think much of your sister if you assume I could ever grow tired of her. She is...” A smile wreathed the man’s face as he continued. “Grace is everything her names implies. Not only is she beautiful, but she is compassionate, forgiving, and caring. She brings beauty to everything she touches.”

Mollified for the moment, Hunter surveyed Christopher again. He saw himself for a moment – full of love and hope, eager to marry Holly and change the past through their marriage.

How did that turn out?

Hunter pinned the young man with another cold steel stare. “Like I said when you came to ask for her hand in marriage, I give you my blessing, but heed my warnings. You better never hurt her.”

The unflappable stare faded from Christopher’s face. Rather than fear, Hunter was shocked by the look of confusion, and even more shocked by the young man’s admission. “I can’t promise that - no more than she could promise the same to me.”

“What do you mean...?” Hunter roared, prepared to stop the wedding right here before it even began.

“I am bound to hurt her.” Christopher shrugged. “But I can give you my word that I will love her no matter what.”

Hunter stared at the young man, who went on to explain. “Marriage isn't about
better-nots
. Conditions mean that you have an out - a way to leave if things don't work out like you planned. Marriage is about unconditional love - meeting each other halfway and learning to bend with life.”

Clapping a hand on Hunter’s shoulder, he smiled. “We are going to hurt each other and do things we regret. Love really begins - true love really shows up when you move past those things together as one.”

The words of the young groom would torment Hunter all morning.

Moments later, Hunter welcomed his old friend, Kyle Ashcroft, and showed him into the back yard where the wedding planner had transformed the yard into an intimate and flowery concoction. He barely heard his friend’s words as he scanned the crowd, hoping to catch a glimpse of Holly.

“Is she not here?” Kyle’s handsome face held a smirk.

Hunter looked in confusion at his friend. “How did you...?”

“Grace...and the look on your face.”

Hunter looked away, shrugging with feigned indifference. “I really didn’t expect her to be here.”

“But you were hoping.” Kyle raised a knowing eyebrow at him. At that moment, Hunter regretted his sister’s decision to have his old friend officiate their wedding.

Kyle’s words penetrated his thoughts. “Looks like we are getting the signal. Let’s talk after the reception.”

As Kyle headed up to the front, Hunter headed back to meet Grace. Knocking on the door, it was opened moments later by one of the bridesmaids.

“Are you ready?” Hunter asked his sister over the woman’s head.

Grace nodded her head, and Hunter stepped aside as women filed past him. Holding out his arm for Grace, he prayed,
God, I don’t know if You will hear me, but make her happy, give her what I could never find.

As the wedding procession made their way down the aisle, Grace whispered, “Is she here?”

Hunter shook his head. “It is your day. Stop trying to play cupid.” Nevertheless, as Hunter walked Grace down the aisle, he scanned the crowd, hoping to spot Holly’s fiery halo of hair in the mix of heads that were turning to watch the bride walk toward her groom.

His anger burned throughout the ceremony and throughout the reception. She had told him she wanted to move on. She had made that clear. Holly just wanted his forgiveness so she could sleep at night, but he wouldn’t give her that satisfaction.

As the bride and groom were preparing to leave, he wrapped Grace in a protective hug. “I hope you are happy.”

“I hope you find peace.” She countered. Pulling back from his embrace, she kissed him on the cheek. “You didn’t read mom’s diary, did you?”

“I started to, but....”

“Read it. For me.” With that, she wrapped her hand in her husband’s, and they took off in a shower of well-wishes toward the waiting limo.

Soon afterward, the guests began to trickle out. “Are you ready for that talk?”

Hunter chuckled as his friend came up behind him. “What do you expect, Kyle? Do you want me to confess my sins to you?” He pointed at the Bible in Kyle’s hand. “Just because you are a pastor now doesn’t mean anything. You forget, I know all of your sins.”

Kyle laughed. “Nothing of the sort. I just want to have a talk with an old friend.”

The pair walked outside to the backyard where the servers were beginning to break things down. Hunter worked a muscle in his jaw. “So how much did Grace tell you?”

Kyle chuckled at his friend’s reluctant question. Sitting down in one of the chairs, he said. “Enough to know that you’ve been betrayed and you can’t move past that pain.”

Hunter sat down, leaning back in the chair next to Kyle. “I want to....” He waved his hand as if he were swishing away a mosquito. “It doesn’t matter. She said she wanted to move on but she needed my forgiveness.”

“Ah, that is a stickler for you.” Kyle said. “As I remember, you always held a grudge against your mom for her sins. Then there was Janessa....”

Defensive, Hunter threw back. “I seem to remember a young man in college still stinging from the betrayal of his high school sweetheart. You are no stranger to betrayal.”

A shadow crossed over Kyle’s features. “Lauren.” Her name on his lips spoke of his love and his pain. “She left me without so much as an excuse, a reason - even a goodbye. She just disappeared right after graduation and I found out two years later that she was married.”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to bring up the pain.” Hunter said, feeling bad for lashing out at his friend, especially in the face of the pain that so clearly shown on his friend’s face.

“Don’t be. Her betrayal hurt - still hurts.” Kyle looked at Hunter. “But I’ve forgiven her.”

Hunter scoffed. “The pain on your face says otherwise, my friend.”

“Yes, there is still pain. Forgiveness isn’t about removing the pain; it is about refocusing.”

“So you are saying, despite the pain you are still going through, you have forgiven her.” Hunter shook his head. “No offense, but I don’t see how you are going to convince me that you are over all of it.”

“I don’t think I ever did, or ever will, get over it. That kind of hurt - that kind of betrayal - it just doesn’t go away. But we can choose to offer mercy and try to understand things from their point of view.”

Hunter just stared at his friend.

“In my case, Lauren has a strict father. He never approved of us. His iron will was always dogging us, and she probably bent under the pressure of it.”

Hunter thought about Kyle’s words. Holly had been trying to tell him her side of things, but he had been too angry to hear her. With a sigh, he admitted to himself that he’d also been too jealous beforehand to have her trust him with her tender memories of her childhood.

Kyle’s words penetrated his thoughts. “Plus, you can’t hold judgment in your hand. The scriptures say we’ve all sinned and ....”

Hunter cut off the scripture reference. “I didn’t commit adultery.”

“But you did hurt her.”

“So she sins and I am the one who is wrong? Where did I fail - she was distant and aloof for our marriage - no matter what I did. You didn’t see me hopping into someone else’s arms!”

“Making a marriage strong takes two people who are willing to become one. That requires compassion, compromise, and a whole lot of bending. Failing to do this makes a marriage weak and susceptible to temptations - like adultery.”

Hunter opened his mouth to argue, but Kyle interjected. “Her sins are hers – she must confess and seek forgiveness from God. Has she done this?”

“Yes, she has.” Hunter mumbled.

“And she’s obviously sought forgiveness from you.”

Hunter merely grunted in reply.

“If you focus on the pain, the pain will rule over you. You will build walls up that will keep you from her and that will keep you from God. Forgiving is about removing any walls that will hinder your relationship with God.”

Hunter ran a hand down his weary face. “It isn’t like I didn’t try. I want our marriage to go back to the way it was before she slept with Seth. I have prayed for that. Don’t get me wrong, I want to forgive her. I want to...but I just can’t forget.”

“I think you are asking for the wrong thing. Don’t ask God to make things like they were before - they were broken and obviously needed help. You need to ask God to heal your marriage.”

Hunter shook his head. “I think we are beyond healing....”

Kyle cut him off. “God can heal it if you are willing to listen to Him. He parted the Red Sea, demolished sin and death, and you think He can't fix your marriage?”

“I know He can - I just....”

“Jesus offered himself up for our sins - he paid the price - you are as clean as a whistle, but He paid the price. What makes you think you are somehow above forgiving? What makes you think you are worthy of withholding your mercy when you have received so much?”

Mollified, Hunter mumbled. “Well, when you put it that way....”

“I am not trying to be judgmental, but the Bible tells us we have been forgiven much, so we must love much. Love means forgiveness, and forgiveness means you have to be open to letting God work in your heart and in your mind, just as much as hers.”

Hunter just stared at Kyle. His friend’s words hovered over him, and he wanted to reach out for them, but whispers of his past - his mom, Janessa and now Holly – clouded his understanding. All had betrayed him - and the truth was, he somehow blamed God for that betrayal.

Kyle’s words pulled him from his thoughts. “Kyle, you need to stop looking at her and judging her by your mom’s sins. You need to stop looking at her and waiting for her to turn out like Janessa.”

Hunter looked down at the table, knowing that was how he had spent the first part of their marriage.

Kyle continued. “You need to stop punishing her for her sins, which she’s obviously sorry for. Stop looking at her like this woman who has betrayed you and start looking at her the way God sees her.”

Sarcasm dripped from Hunter’s tone. “How is that?”

“Redeemable.”

A
fter Kyle left, and the servants had cleared away all traces of the wedding festivities, Hunter sat in the office. His mother’s journal sat before him. He’d opened it several times, but he couldn’t bear to read it.

Redeemable
- the word whispered through his mind again. Was their marriage redeemable? How did his father sit by his mom’s side year after year, knowing how she had betrayed him?

Hunter swiped a hand down his face, dredging the tears off his cheeks in the process. He wasn’t going to fool himself. He was miserable without Holly, but he was miserable with her, too.

“Why have you given me this cross to bear?” He shouted to the empty room. Hunter waited, he listened for that small, still voice that used to whisper through his mind. How long had it been since he’d heard it?

I have not moved. You have.

He buried his face in his hands at the words. His eyes fell again on the diary.

He cracked it open and began to read. He read about the beginning of the affair with gritted teeth. He didn’t know what was worse, listening to his mother’s excuses about why she felt restless, or knowing there was a part of him softened to the excuses.

From the date of the entries, he had been only five. He vaguely remembered his mother brooding around the house, and then all of a sudden, she appeared happy again. This must have coincided with the affair. She was obviously feeling, as she put it, “fully alive, like I have never felt before.” But his heart softened a little when he read, “But I am also completely empty when I come home. I look into my son’s handsome blue eyes, so much like his father’s, and I know that my actions are selfish.”

This went on for several months, until the entries turned dark. She had decided she couldn’t live with the guilt any longer and she broke off the affair. The next entries were filled with sad passages, and his heart softened a little more at the guilt she was going through.

Then she had found out she was pregnant with Grace.

The glass of scotch slid from his numb fingers as he read, making a soft thud on the carpet, but he was oblivious to it all.

With all likelihood, the beautiful little girl that grows within me was conceived in a moment of selfish passion. My husband knows nothing of the affair. How can I tell him? He is thrilled that our marriage is getting back together. He can sense that I am trying - but he doesn’t know the reason I am trying so hard. I am callous, and I wish I could tell him. But these past few months have made me realize what a fool I have been. The fleeting passion I felt in Will’s arms are incomparable to the love and security that I feel with Edward. How could I have let my emotions carry me away into such a sinful place? Now I have this burden - this heavy weight of my actions hanging around my neck. I can tell my husband and be free of the burden, but I would just be placing it on his neck - and Hunter’s too. So I suffer in silence - penance for my sins.