Courting Hope. Jenna Mindel

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СКАЧАТЬ was he trying to kid? He reeked with the same reckless charm he’d always had. All show and no substance, like the ridiculously fast car he’d driven since high school.

      “That car will do you no good come winter, you know.” Hope sounded like somebody’s mother. No, worse, someone’s grandmother.

      Sinclair’s smile widened. “I know. I’ll figure it out.”

      He was good at doing that. He constantly lived with a no worries now, figure it out later mentality. She remembered a youth rally they’d attended, and Sinclair had confided in her that he’d been called to the ministry. He’d bragged to her that he’d pastor a church someday, but she’d laughed at the idea. Hope hadn’t believed he’d follow through. Yet here he was, her new pastor.

      He walked toward her. “I’m worried you might quit.”

      “I might.”

      “Please don’t.”

      “Why?” Hope enjoyed watching him squirm for an answer.

      Then he looked at her with intense eyes and said, “Because I need you.”

      How many years had she dreamed of hearing those words come from him? Hope swallowed hard and looked away. Sinclair Marsh never needed anyone.

      “That bothers you.” His voice was laced with empathy.

      “You bother me.” Hope didn’t want his understanding. She didn’t want anything from him anymore.

      “I’m sorry to hear that.” His voice softened.

      Was that regret she read in his eyes? She quickly looked away again. “How ’bout you do your job, and I’ll do mine.”

      “Our jobs cross. We’re going to end up in the middle of that intersection quite a bit. What then?”

      He made a good point. How in the world were they going to go about their day-to-day duties without crashing into each other? “We’ll just have to deal with it.”

      His gaze softened further. “Hope—”

      She held her hand up to stop him from talking about Sara. “Don’t go there.”

      “We have to. Eventually.”

      “Maybe, but not today.” Hope turned and headed for the church office.

      * * *

      By the time Hope made it home later that afternoon, her emotions were all over the place. She felt rubbed raw. All afternoon she’d been aware of Sinclair’s presence. At the coffeemaker or the laser printer. The last straw had been hearing him on the piano upstairs in the sanctuary. The guy had played heart-wrenchingly beautiful music for a solid hour. By four o’clock, she couldn’t take it anymore and left work half an hour early.

      Sitting in the driveway, Hope hesitated before getting out of her car. Looking at the white farmhouse where she’d grown up and still called home at the ripe age of twenty-seven, Hope wondered how she’d break the news of their new minister to her folks.

      With a sigh, she got out and trudged toward the house. Her mother met her at the side door, letting out their black-and-white shepherd mix named Gypsy. “Judy called.”

      Hope cringed. Did they already know? “What did she want?”

      “Why didn’t you tell us the church hired Sinclair Marsh?”

      “Because I just found out today.”

      “Why didn’t they bring you in on the decision?”

      Hope let her head fall back. “I don’t know, Mom. I was on vacation. Besides, the board found interim pastors without my input, so I guess they didn’t need it. Can we talk about this later? I’m beat.”

      “Your father’s not happy.”

      Hope didn’t expect that he would be.

      “I think you should talk to him.” Her mom gave her a ghost of a smile.

      She didn’t feel encouraged. “Now?”

      “He’s in the barn.”

      Hope left her purse on the bench against the wall in the kitchen before she plodded back down the porch steps. They had a small farm with a whole lot of cattle for beef. An oddity, considering the surrounding fruit growers. Entering the barn, she spotted her father in his workshop with a blowtorch and soldering wire.

      She slipped into a nearby chair and waited. It didn’t take long for one of the barn cats to find its way onto her lap.

      When her dad finished mending the metal, he flipped up his safety glasses and looked at her. His eyes were red. Could be from the work, or something else?

      “Hi, Daddy.”

      “You gonna quit?”

      “No.” She stroked the calico cat’s fur. How could she?

      “Don’t expect us to go there.” Her father slipped his glasses back in place. Conversation over.

      Hope watched her father finish fixing whatever it was for one of the tractor engines. He had kept the tractor that had crushed Sara. Her father’s rationale had been that it wasn’t the tractor’s fault it flipped.

      True. It was Sinclair’s. And Hope’s for not being there to stop her sister from doing something so stupid.

      Hope often wondered if it would have been easier on her dad if she had been the one under that tractor. Sara had been his kindred spirit—the one who wanted to take over the farm someday. Sara had been the one who knew how to help. Her little sister didn’t need to be told what needed to be done or shown how to do it. Sara just knew.

      Hope didn’t know. She’d tried, but she couldn’t fill the empty void Sara left behind.

      “Put those in the box over there, would you?” Her father handed her his safety glasses.

      Hope gently shooed the cat down and brushed off her skirt. She laid the glasses alongside a few other pairs and closed the lid, careful to keep the edge of her skirt from brushing the greasy side of the workbench.

      “You should have changed your clothes before coming out here.”

      Hope shrugged. “It’s okay.”

      “Your mother sent you, didn’t she?”

      Hope nodded.

      “We were finally getting some distance.” Her father’s face looked worn.

      “I know.” Her heart tore in two. They may have accepted Sara’s death, but Sinclair’s return reopened the wound and made it feel fresh and sore, like a torn scab.

      “Let’s see what your mother has cooked up, huh?”

      Hope followed her father out of his workshop. The dog flew past them, СКАЧАТЬ