He saw her to the door with a promise to be in touch.
The next applicant looked physically better suited to the hard work ahead and she was more than willing to pitch in, no matter how difficult or dirty the work. Rachael Nagel was in her midforties, a rancher’s wife who’d done her share of lifting and hauling, but she was a little scary. She had that pinched look of disapproval and began questioning him before he could get a word in edgewise. “You’re not going to be one of those liberal preachers, are you?”
Liberal was just about his middle name. Noah’s father was all about fire and brimstone, hell and damnation, and was probably the main reason Noah was not. “Um, I’ve been considered liberal by some, conservative by others. Tell me, Mrs. Nagel, do you by chance play the piano or organ?”
“Never had time for anything frivolous with a ranch to run, but I raised seven children with a firm hand. I can make sure the doctrine of the church is followed to the letter.”
“What a wonderful gift,” he said. “I’ll be in touch.”
“You oughtn’t keep a dog like that in the church,” she pointed out. “You’re gonna end up with problems.”
“And where do you suggest I keep her?” he asked.
“Since you don’t have land, you could get an outdoor kennel. Or tie it to a tree.”
Noah knew right then Mrs. Nagel wouldn’t work out.
His third applicant was Ellie Baldwin. Noah was sitting behind his desk when she walked into his ramshackle office. He paused before managing to get to his feet to greet her. She looked young, early twenties at best. And tall—almost six feet—without her shoes and hair. Most of that six feet was legs, which were sticking a long way out of a short flouncy skirt, her feet slipped into high-heeled sandals. She had very big hair, a ton of coppery curls that were streaked with gold and that fell to her shoulders and down her back. Not only was her yellow sweater tight and revealing, but a little bit of her purple bra was showing at the low décolletage…on purpose. This was a look he’d been seeing for a while—this showing of the bra, a push-up bra no less. He couldn’t deny it was a lovely sight, but he didn’t usually see this immodest style in a church.
She had a crinkled-up piece of newspaper in her hand. “I’m looking for Reverend Kincaid,” she said.
“I’m Noah Kincaid. How do you do?”
“You’re—”
“The pastor. And you must be Miss Baldwin.”
Her eyelashes were thick with black liner and mascara, her cheeks rouged, her lips red and glossy, her nails long and painted blue with sparkles, and a glance down those long legs revealed the polish on her toes matched her fingertips. She smiled at him when she came into the room. Then she turned away abruptly to take the gum out of her mouth, though he couldn’t tell where it went. But the image of her smile was immediately tattooed on his mind—it was beautiful. Also hopeful. But what was she thinking, coming to a job interview in a small-town church dressed all honky-tonk? And he thought, Aw, Jesus. Why me?
He stuck out his hand, hoping a wad of gum wouldn’t be left in it. “How are you?”
“Fine, thanks,” she said. “Have you filled the job yet?”
“I have a couple of promising applicants. But let’s talk about the job,” he said. He had a twinge of guilt—no way could he, a single minister of thirty-five, hire someone like this. People would never understand. Or worse, they’d assume they did understand. This interview was going to be a waste of time.
“Awww, is that your dog?” she asked, smiling down at Lucy.
“Meet Lucy,” he said. At the sound of her name, she lifted her head.
“Is she really old? She looks very tired.”
“She’s recovering from a bad accident. I found her by the side of the road and, presto, I became her new owner,” he said. “The job,” he went on, “isn’t limited to office work. As you can see, there’s a lot of renovation and repair going on here. This church won’t be ready for a congregation until some very heavy and very dirty work gets done. A couple of months’ worth, at least.”
She nodded. “Right,” she said. “Fine.”
His eyebrows lifted. “If you don’t mind me saying so, you look kind of fragile for that kind of work.”
She laughed and her whole face brightened. “Is that so? Well, this fragile girl has cleaned up a lot of dumps and lifted more than her share of heavy stuff, Your Reverence.”
He cleared his throat. “It’s Noah. Please. I’m not the pope.”
“I know that,” she scoffed. “I was being funny.”
“Ah. And so you were,” he admitted. “So, not only do I need an office set up and some appointment, phone, and calendar management, but also help with moving furniture, painting, cleaning, et cetera.”
“Got it,” she said.
He leaned forward. “Ms. Baldwin, why do you want this job?”
“Isn’t it a good job?” she asked. “There wasn’t much to the ad, but it sounded like a decent job in a decent line of work.”
“Sure. And you’re drawn to this line of work because…?”
“I need a change. Something a little more secure. Less stressful.”
“And your last or current job is…was…?”
“Dancer. The hours don’t work for me. I have kids. They’re with my ex right now, but I’d like a job I can do while they’re in school. Y’know?”
“But do you have secretarial experience?”
“For when we’re done plastering and painting and moving furniture? Sure. A lot. I have a list of previous jobs,” she said, pulling a pretty tattered, folded piece of paper out of her purse.
He glanced at it. He didn’t see dancer on there but, without asking, he suspected he knew what kind of dancer. Just the way she was dressed, decidedly not churchy, suggested way too much. But, she had also worked for a real estate broker, a property manager and a “Lawyer?” he asked, surprised.
“Uh-huh. Nice guy. I did a real good job for him. You can call him—he’ll tell you. He said he’d write me a letter of recommendation anytime I ask.”
“And you left that job because…?”
She looked away a bit uncomfortably. “He liked my work, I promise. But his wife wasn’t real crazy about me. But call him!” she said, looking back at him. “I did a good job there.”
The girl had worked everywhere. Everything from a loading dock to a convenience store. “How could you do all this stuff?” Noah asked, perplexed.
“Two jobs,” she shrugged. “Office work during the day, for the experience and benefits. Then a second job, part-time, at night and on weekends. I worked at a convenience store at night till it got held up, then I cleaned business offices with a cleaning crew. I have a lot of experience.”
“Loading dock?” he asked, glancing up from her résumé.
“For a big retailer. It was kind of temporary, till I could get a job that didn’t break all my nails.” And she smiled at him. “I don’t think there’s anything you could throw at me that I haven’t done.”
“Great,” he said. “Can I keep this?”
She looked a little panicked. “Could you just copy down stuff? Names and numbers or whatever you want? I had to go to some trouble to make that up and I only have the one copy.”
“Of course,” Noah said.
“I should probably get copies,” she said. “I don’t have a computer, myself. A friend helped me do that up.”
“No problem,” he said. And he made a point of copying some things off the page, though he had no intention of following up. When he looked up at her again, it was difficult not to notice that chest. He couldn’t escape the feeling those boobs were going to poke his eyes out. “Tell me something—any chance you play the piano or organ?”
“Organ? No. But my gramma taught me the piano, and hymns were her favorite. I could manage, probably. If I had time for a little practice. It’s been a while.”
“Church hymns?”
She grinned. “It’s what I grew up on, believe it or not.”
“Really?” Noah said, intrigued. Then he found himself just staring at her for a long, mesmerizing moment. “Um,” he started, collecting himself, “where do you live, Ms. Baldwin?”
She leaned forward, and her boobs nearly fell out of that tight sweater. He could feel his eyes bulge and his hands itch with temptation. “Ellie is fine,” she said. “I mean, if I don’t have to call you Your Reverence, you can call me Ellie. I have a place in Eureka right now, but I’d like to get my kids out of there. I’d like to move them someplace small and friendly where they can grow up safe, you know?”
“Do you mind me asking, how old are your kids?”
“Danielle is eight and Trevor is four.” She smiled proudly. “They’re amazing. Beautiful and smart and…Well,” she said, straightening. “Of course I’d think that. They’re also very healthy. I shouldn’t be missing work because they’re sick or anything.”
He was speechless. “You don’t look old enough to—” He stopped himself. It was none of his business.
“I started the family too young, I know that. But I’m sure glad I have them.”
After a moment of silence he said, “Yes. Absolutely. Well, listen, you have some very good qualifications here. Can I get back to you?”
Her face fell. “Yeah,” she said. “Sure.” And then she stood. “I wish you’d take it kind of serious. I need the job. I’ve looked everywhere for a job I can do while my kids are in school and it’s hell, you know? Sorry—you probably don’t say hell…”
He felt a smile tug at his lips. He almost said, Hell if I don’t.
“Really, I could do just about anything,” she said. “I’m a very hard worker.”
“You’re very qualified,” he said with a nod. “I’ll be in touch.” He stuck out his hand.
Eyes downcast, Ellie took it limply. “Thanks,” she said, looking totally disheartened.
While Ellie made her own way out of his office and the church, Noah stayed behind his desk. He hadn’t really expected to immediately find someone he could hire, anyway. In fact, he thought the search would probably be long and difficult. But the last thing he’d expected was to interview someone who could do the job, and do it in a push-up bra and short skirt. Whoa, he thought. He was actually having a reaction. He shifted in his chair to get comfortable, trying to ignore his body’s response. Nature was a practical joker.
Reflecting on the past several weeks and remembering Ellie’s dejected posture as she left the interview got Noah thinking. When his wife, Merry, died a few years ago, the grief bit hard and the adjustment was terrible; marriage really worked for him and the loss was devastating. Merry’s death left him a thirty-year-old widower, just about the last thing he ever envisioned for himself. For a year he felt like a pebble banging around inside an empty tin can and then, with George’s encouragement, he headed for the seminary.
Noah had nurtured a lifelong aversion to the ministry because of his father whom he considered a mean-spirited hypocrite. Jasper Kincaid was a semifamous preacher who had his own cable television mission in Columbus, Ohio. Big-time church, big-time money, big-time fame and power. But Jasper had treated his wife and son with indifference, and that was on a good day. They were too often the objects of his anger and recriminations. No way was Noah ever going to follow in those footsteps.
“Stop judging how everyone else treats their faith and study your own,” George had counseled. “It took a bloody ton of it to get where you are today.”
Indeed. While still a teenager, Noah had fled his Ohio roots and headed for the Pacific Northwest. He worked as a laborer anywhere he could get work, but fell in love with the fishing industry, with the ocean and the livelihood it offered. While he worked, he also studied—sometimes as a part-time student, sometimes full-time.
His mother, too loyal and kindhearted to ever defy his father, stayed in touch and even visited. She wanted to give him money to assist with his education, but Noah refused. His mom met Merry only once and, for the first time in his life, Noah saw his mother weep with happiness that Noah should find a young woman so full of love and joy. Only two years later, his mother came, alone, to Merry’s funeral.
Noah and his father had spoken only once in the past seventeen years and that was at his mother’s funeral a year ago. He had no desire to reconcile with Jasper. He considered it a matter of survival.
Noah had been at his desk about an hour, trying to write up a schedule for himself but doing nothing but thinking and remembering, when he looked at his watch. Three o’clock. There wouldn’t be a crowd at Jack’s at this time of day and he thought maybe a cup of coffee was in order. He gave Lucy a pat on the head and promised to be back soon.
When he walked into the bar, he was surprised to see Ellie Baldwin seated at a table not far from the empty hearth. A cup of coffee sat in front of her, her hands were folded in her lap and she gazed out the window. Instead of looking brassy and sexy, she looked a little lost. Noah lifted a hand in her direction, but she was deep in thought and didn’t even notice him. So he went up to the bar.
“Hey, Noah,” Jack said.
“What’s she doing here?” Noah asked.
Jack shrugged. “Disappointed, I think. But what are you gonna do?” Jack put a mug in front of Noah and poured coffee without being asked.
“Disappointed?” Noah asked.
“She said she didn’t get the job.”
“I said I’d get back to her about that,” Noah said.
“Maybe that’s not what she heard, Noah.”
“Hmm.” He took a sip of coffee. “How about two slices of pie, right over there.”
“Sure thing,” Jack said.
Noah migrated to Ellie’s table. He stood there until she looked up at him. Oh, man, he was in trouble. Her eyes were red rimmed and wet, her mascara a little smeared. Grant that I may not so much seek to be understood as to understand. “You mind if I join you?” he asked.
She straightened and her eyes immediately cleared and narrowed. She was one tough customer. “Knock yourself out,” she said coolly.
He pulled out a chair and set his coffee cup in front of him. “You seem upset, Ellie. Was it something I said?”
“It was something you didn’t say,” she replied.
“Oh? What was that?”
“You’re hired,” she said.
“I thought I should give all the applicants a fair shot.”
“Are you kidding me? I sat in my car outside waiting for my turn. I saw the other applicants—all two of them. One could barely get up the stairs; not a good bet for moving furniture. The other one had such a mean schnobble, she could break glass with her face.”
“Schnobble?” he asked.
“What my gramma used to call a sourpuss. Now, that’s a church lady, all right—if you’re looking for one as mean as a junkyard dog.”
He laughed before he could reel it in. “Who knew you were checking out the competition.” Jack brought the pie, put it in front of them and got the heck out of there. Noah lifted a fork. “Pretty accurate, too. But I told you I’d get in touch.”
“If you do, it’ll be to say I didn’t get the job.”
He was quiet a moment, then he said, “Have some pie. Nobody makes pie like Preacher.”
“Preacher? You made the pie?”
“No, the cook—he goes by the nickname Preacher. That could lead to problems.” He nodded toward the plate. “Try it.”
“Thanks,” she said. “I’m not hungry.”
“Give it a chance, you’ll be amazed. And between bites, tell me why I don’t get the benefit of the doubt.”
Slowly, reluctantly, she took a bite of blackberry pie. She chewed and swallowed, but clearly the ambrosia of Preacher’s pie was lost on her. After one bite, she put down the fork and her hands went back into her lap. Noah had to concentrate to focus on her eyes. That cleavage was killing him. “No hard feelings,” she said quietly. “I haven’t had much luck in the job market lately. I think it’s made me a little cranky.”
“Well, what are you looking for?” he asked, digging into his pie.
“Anything proper,” she said. “It’s like I said, it’s for my kids.”
“And they’ll benefit from their mom having a proper job?”
She chewed on her bottom lip for a moment. “Look, it’s kind of personal—my kids are going through a hard time. I don’t think I should talk about it. No way I want people to know all that stuff…”
Noah considered this for a second and against his better judgment he said, “If you feel like talking about it, Ellie, you can trust me with a confidence.”
“How can I be sure of that?” she asked with a lift of one eyebrow.
He sat back and smirked. “I’m a minister. I took Secret Keeping 101.”
“But you’re not my minister,” she reminded him. “It’s all pretty messy.”
“And of course I never hear anything messy in this job,” he said sarcastically. “I don’t mean to pry. I was just offering you a chance to—”
“I lost my kids,” she blurted. “My ex-husband filed for custody and got it. It shouldn’t have happened, but it did. I was dancing in a club where some of the girls take off their clothes sometimes.” She shrugged. “Not sometimes—all the time. They think the more they’re willing to take off, the better the tips, and that was usually true.” She swallowed and looked away, her eyes threatening to fill again. “My tips were about average.”
“You were an exotic dancer?” he asked.
She looked back at him. “There was nothing exotic about it.”
Truthfully, she looked like someone who’d be more than comfortable taking it off. Noah was hardly shocked; while he was working his way through seminary, he had a casual little ministry down on the docks. His best customers were bums, strippers, homeless people, addicts and others.
“Are they okay with their dad?” Noah asked with as much sensitivity as possible.
The question got an instant reaction out of her. Her face became angry and hard, erasing some of the youthful beauty buried under too much makeup. “He’s not their dad. He was their stepdad for less than three months, and this isn’t about giving them a good life, it’s about holding them hostage. He wants me, that’s what he wants. I dated him for quite a while and I thought he was a nice, normal guy, but he’s not. He’s weird, abusive, mean and controlling, so we got out.
“After we left him, I found myself a real nice setup—I rented half a duplex next to a great lady who could keep the kids at night while I worked. I needed the sitter, she needed the extra money and we had a good arrangement. She was super to the kids, they hardly knew I was gone. I fixed dinner and left at six, she got their baths, read with them and put them to bed, then she’d nod off on the couch till I got home. It was one of the first times I could afford both the rent and the babysitting on just one job. But Arnie wanted us back. He doesn’t like it when things don’t go his way. Taking my kids away from me was the only thing he could think of. He’s one of those people who has to be in charge all the time. In control.”
Noah’s fork was frozen in midair. After all that, all he could say was, “Abusive?”
“Mean,” she said. “He doesn’t hit, but he’s real rigid, demanding as hell and says hurtful things. You don’t like what’s on your plate, you go to bed hungry after you’re called a whole bunch of names. You don’t snap to attention, and you’re called stupid and idiot. Don’t rinse the dishes and wipe the table just perfect, you go to bed without stories or playtime. There’s no TV in the house, no talking at the table, no playing outside unless an adult is standing over you. No sleeping together—that’s dirty.” Her eyes watered. “Trevor is only four! And even when I did manage to get a place where they had their own room, they were always crawling in with me! It’s what kids do!”
Noah couldn’t move. She was pushing some buttons he didn’t feel like having pushed. He started hearing his father’s voice. What do I ask of you besides respect and decency? You have to learn discipline and restraint for your own good before you’re completely lost! No dessert/football/summer camp/TV/friends/et cetera et cetera et cetera!
Her voice lowered and calmed. “Danielle is only eight, and she’s expected to make sure everything is perfectly tidy and clean. And if it isn’t exactly how he wants it, which she’s just too young to do, he calls her names and takes away privileges.” Her laugh had a hollowing. “They’re not things I call privileges—like dinner? Like reading before bed? A privilege? I call it a necessity. How’s Danielle going to grow up smarter than me if she doesn’t get to read?”
Noah cleared his throat. “And this is better for them than a mother who dances for a living?”
She shrugged and looked down for a second. “It was the kind of dancing I did, I guess.” But she met his eyes when she said, “I don’t see the problem. It’s not like I took the kids to the club. It’s not an illegal place.”
“And the judge awarded custody to their stepfather?”
Her lips curved in a cynical smile. “The judge isn’t such a good tipper, either,” she said.
Noah felt sick. He put down his fork. “How did the judge figure in this, Ellie? Did you know him before?”
“He came into the club sometimes. He asked to buy me dinner a few times and I said no—he’s an old man! And besides, we don’t date customers. I explained that, but he wasn’t happy with the answer. But he fixed me, didn’t he?”
“Did the judge tell you that if you found a ‘proper’ job, you could have custody again?”
“No,” she said, shaking her head. “He said he couldn’t, in good conscience, leave the children in the hands of a stripper when there was a better alternative. All he knows about Arnie is that he’s a principal for a private school. He doesn’t know the real Arnie. The real Arnie can have a mean mouth on him. The judge said this was just temporary—he’d look at the custody again in ninety days.” She glanced away. “Eighty-two and counting.”
“Are you seeing your kids?”
She nodded and that’s when things fell apart for her; she couldn’t keep the tears back. One big one rolled down each cheek. “Every Saturday, just during the day. They can’t even spend the night with me. They’ve never been away from me before. I’ve never spent a single night away from them since they were born, except to work! Do you know the only reason why I haven’t done something like snatch them and run? Because Arnie is obsessed with winning, with having his way. I believe he’d hunt me down and have me locked up. And that would be even worse for the kids than this.”
Noah’s pie sat untouched, as well. He didn’t feel so hot. “Have you tried to get help, Ellie? Like legal aid?”
“Sure,” she said. “They were very nice to me. But there’s not a lot they can do with the decision at this point. Their advice was to try to find an acceptable job. They said they’d go back to court with me, maybe even sooner than ninety days, and they’d make sure I got my kids back. And make sure Arnie didn’t get any visitation—we were only married three months and they’re not his kids. Once I have my kids back legally, I’m running for my life. I’ll go as far as I have to go. I’ll change our names. I’m never letting something like this happen to them again. I made a lot of mistakes…I know I’m not the best mother—the best mother wouldn’t dance for strange men. But I love my kids. I take as good care of them as I can and I love them. And they are, for God’s sake, going to be able to read before bed!”