“Please, Jeremy, don’t do this.
Don’t tear this church down.”

“Why? Would you open it back up, sing songs on Sundays, serve potluck once a month? It’s an old building, Beth.”

“It was my mother’s church.” She bit down on her bottom lip and shrugged. “Don’t you feel it, Jeremy? After all these years, don’t you feel it?”

Man, she was able to set him on his heels the way no other woman ever had. Because, yeah, he felt it. He felt the past. He felt God. He felt faith. It hit him every single time he walked in this building. He felt hundreds of prayers that had been said, probably most of them for him, his little sister and his mother.

But all of those good memories got lost, tied up with the bad.

“Sorry, Beth.”

He turned and walked away, knowing there would be tears streaking down her cheeks, knowing she’d nearly collapse with sadness and frustration over his stubbornness.

And he also knew that she’d understand why he was doing this.

BRENDA MINTON

started creating stories to entertain herself during hour-long rides on the school bus. In high school she wrote romance novels to entertain her friends. The dream grew and so did her aspirations to become an author. She started with notebooks, handwritten manuscripts and characters that refused to go away until their stories were told. Eventually she put away the pen and paper and got down to business with the computer. The journey took a few years, with some encouragement and rejection along the way—as well as a lot of stubbornness on her part. In 2006 her dream to write for Love Inspired came true. Brenda lives in the rural Ozarks with her husband, three kids and an abundance of cats and dogs. She enjoys a chaotic life that she wouldn’t trade for anything—except, on occasion, a beach house in Texas. You can stop by and visit at her website, www.brendaminton.net.

The Cowboy’s Homecoming
Brenda Minton

www.millsandboon.co.uk

He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most

High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.

I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge

and my fortress: my God; in Him will I trust.

—Psalm 91

This book is dedicated to all of the strong women

out there, and to the women wanting to be strong,

that they find their strength.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Epilogue

Letter to Reader

Questions for Discussion

Chapter One

People were never who or what you thought. That’s a lesson Beth Bradshaw knew from experience and she had the scars to prove it.

She had even learned things about herself that took her by surprise. Like the fact that she could be strong. She didn’t always have to do what pleased others. Sometimes she did what pleased her.

The fact that she was the person sitting on a horse in front of Back Street Church, determined to talk Jeremy Hightree out of his plans for the building was a big moment for her. It was a mountain climbed. It was a fear tackled.

Someone had to do it. So, shaking in her boots, remembering the last time she was here, she sat and contemplated the confrontation.

The horse beneath her shifted, restless from standing. She waved at flies buzzing the animal’s neck and ears but her gaze remained on the run-down church in front of her. Things changed, that was part of life. She’d obviously changed since the years spent attending this little church with her mother.

Jeremy Hightree had changed. She knew he’d changed because only huge changes could bring him back to Dawson, Oklahoma, with the plans he had for this building.

The church had been untouched and neglected for too many years. The lawn had grown into a field of weeds. The exterior had faded from white to gray and the paint was chipped and flaking off. After one hundred years of service, the tiny church with the tall steeple had become a forgotten piece of the past.

So why should she care what Jeremy planned on doing to a forgotten piece of Dawson history? The question rolled through her mind as she dropped to the ground and led the chestnut gelding up the sidewalk, metal hooves clip-clopping on concrete. She looped the leather reins around the handrail and walked up the crumbling concrete steps to the porch. The door stood wide open but she didn’t go in. She glanced around, looking for Jeremy, her heart hammering a chaotic rhythm, afraid she’d see him. Afraid she wouldn’t.

But this wasn’t about seeing Jeremy. Her heart did a funny skip forward, asking her to rethink that last thought. But she wouldn’t. She couldn’t. This had to be about the church, not schoolgirl emotions.

She took a hesitant step inside the church. It took her eyes a minute to adjust to the dim interior. Filtered light from the dirty stained-glass windows caught dust particles that floated in the air. A bird glided through the building and landed on the pulpit. Her great-grandfather had made that pulpit. The wood was hickory and the stain was natural and light. A cross had been carved into the front.

Her history in this town was tied to this church. And she had ignored it. She took a deep breath, breathing in dust and aging wood. For a minute she was eight years old again and unscarred, still smiling, still believing in fairy tales and happy endings.

Jeremy was still the little boy who pulled at the ribbons on her new dress and teased her about the freckles on her nose.

But she wasn’t eight. She was twenty-eight. Her mother had been dead for eighteen years. And Jeremy wasn’t a little boy. He was the man who planned on destroying this church.

Eighteen years of pain tangled inside, keeping her feet planted in the vestibule. The little room where they’d once hung their coats was now draped in spiders’ webs, and mice ran from corner to corner. The old guestbook still rested on the shelf where it had been placed years ago. She flipped through the pages and stopped when she got to her name written in a child’s penmanship. She remembered her mom standing behind her, smiling as Beth scrawled her name, proud that she’d learned to sign it in cursive.

Too many memories. She didn’t need all of them, she just needed to know the truth. If it was true, she would find a way to stop him. She walked down the aisle of the church, her booted feet echoing in the tall ceilinged building. She stopped and waited for everything to settle, for the memories to stop tugging at her. In this memory, her mom was next to her, singing. The piano rocked to a Southern gospel hymn. And behind her…

“Bethlehem Bradshaw, I’ll tell on you.”

His voice was soft in the quiet sanctuary. She turned, amazed that he could still unsettle her. He stood in the doorway, sunlight behind him, his face in shadows. She didn’t need to see his face to know him. She knew that he had short, light brown hair and eyes the color of caramel toffee. She knew his smile, that it turned the left side of his mouth more than the right and always flashed white teeth. He walked with a swagger, his jeans hanging low on his hips and his T-shirt stretched tight across the shoulders of a man.

He was no longer a boy. He was lethal and dangerous. He had plans to destroy something that she wanted to protect.

“Why would you do this?” She hated that her voice shook. She despised that she wanted to run out the back door. The closer he got, the harder it was to breathe, to stand her ground.

She wanted to pound her fists against him and beg him to stop, to leave town and forget this church and whatever he had against the people of Dawson. Instead she stood, frozen, unable to do any of those things. Weak. She hated being weak. And afraid.

“Why would I do what? Tease you?” Jeremy Hightree stopped at the second pew from the front of the church, the one where she’d sat with her mother so many years ago. He leaned against it, hip against the side of the wooden bench.

He had always teased her, she wanted to remind him. He would sit behind her and pull ribbons from her hair. He’d once dropped a plastic spider in her lap during Sunday school.

And he had picked a ragged bouquet of wildflowers the day of her mother’s funeral and pushed them into Beth’s hands as she walked out the doors of the church with her brother Jason and her father. His brown eyes had been rimmed with red from crying and she had wanted to hug him because her mother had always hugged him.

Her mother had defended him. He was the son of her best friend from grade school. Other people had called him a dirty mess. Her mom had called him a little prince.

Beth’s feelings had fallen somewhere in between.

She stepped down off the stage, closer to him. One thing was for certain, he wasn’t the dirty little boy anymore. He was a man who had traveled. He had won two world championships; one in bull riding and another in team roping. Little girls had posters of him in their bedrooms and little boys wanted to be him when they grew up.

He’d built a business from nothing.

So why this? Why now? It took a few minutes to gather her thoughts, to know how to respond to him. She needed the right words, the right emotions.

“Why the church, Jeremy? You could buy any piece of land you wanted. You could leave the church and never think about it.”

One shoulder lifted in indifference. Instead his gaze shot away from her and his jaw clenched. He was anything but indifferent.

“Let’s talk about something other than this church. Funny how people have neglected it for years and now everyone wants to talk about it. It was a public auction, Beth. Anyone could have bought it. I was the only one who showed up to bid.”

“I know. I guess we all thought someone else would take care of it.” She hated admitting that to him and then begging him to let go of his plans.

He moved a few steps closer and Beth stood her ground. She didn’t back away. She wouldn’t let him get to her. And he could. She shivered and remembered. The memory was soft, sweet, jagged with emotion.

It was the briefest moment, the briefest memory. Yet she’d never forgotten. They had as much history as this church. They’d grown up together. They’d shared a childhood.

“I’m sorry how things turned out with Chance.” His voice changed, got a little rougher, a little less velvet than before.

“You couldn’t have known.” No one would have guessed the abuse Chance was capable of. But it was over. The divorce had been finalized fifteen months ago.

Jeremy must have known something. He had tried to warn her what Chance was like. The day she left town, he’d seen her waiting at the park and he’d tried to tell her. But she had been desperate to escape.

“Beth?” His voice pulled her from the memories, from the darkness, back to the present and the problem at hand.

“I don’t want to talk about Chance.”

“I understand. And I don’t want to talk about the church. It isn’t personal, you know. It’s a business decision.”

“Is it really? It seems personal to me.”

He crossed his arms over a muscular chest. “Maybe it is a little personal. I’m tired of this memory and I’m tired of this church standing like a beacon on this hill.”

“That’s a little drastic, don’t you think? This church hasn’t been a beacon in a dozen years.”

One shoulder lifted again. “I don’t know, maybe. But it’s my story, not yours.”

“This church meant so much to…” She wasn’t going to beg him. She breathed deep, willing herself not to cry.

“It meant a lot to your mother.”

His tone had changed again. The rough edges were gone. She looked up as he stood straight again and took a few steps in her direction. His steps were slow, calculated.

Had she really thought she could talk him out of this? A shared moment gave her no claim over him. Memories didn’t give her a right to assume he would listen. His story in this church mattered to him, not the memory of a kiss they shared a dozen years ago.

“Yes, it did mean a lot to her.” But Beth had only been inside the building a handful of times since her mother’s funeral. Eighteen years. After her mother’s death her father had caught her here once and dragged her home.

Jeremy watched her. His smile faded a little. His eyes narrowed as he stared hard. His Native American heritage was evident in the smooth planes of his face, tanned a deep brown from working outside. But almost everyone in Dawson shared that heritage, that ancestry. Redheads, blonds, brunettes; hair color and eye color didn’t dictate a lack of Native American ancestry. The people of Dawson were proud of that heritage, proud of their strength and resilience.

They were known for bouncing back, for not letting the past get them down.

The past was tied to everything, though. It was the shadow of pain in Jeremy Hightree’s eyes. It held her own heart captive. It was the fear that clawed at her chest and woke her up in the middle of the night.

“I’m not sure what to tell you, Beth. Your mom meant a lot to me. But this church is…”

“What? Tell me what this church ever did to you?” She pinned him with a stare, hoping to make him squirm. Instead his expression softened, as if he understood her pain, and was hiding his own behind anger.

She remembered the boy with the bouquet, the one she’d wanted to hug. She couldn’t allow herself to compare him to that boy. “Tell me, Jeremy, what will revenge do for you?”

Well, now, the kitten had grown some claws. She stood in front of him, pint-size with dark eyes that flashed fear and fire simultaneously. Her dark brown hair hung in pigtails. She picked that moment to lick lips that trembled. He smiled and for a few minutes he didn’t quite know what to say to her, because he was picturing her as a cornered kitten, shaking in her boots but ready to swipe at him. He had a lot of questions for her. He had questions about her life, about Chance Martin, about Dawson.

Instead of asking questions he shook his head and considered walking away. She’d mentioned revenge. He really didn’t like that word.

And when she’d said it, his decision didn’t feel as good as it had even an hour earlier when he’d stood outside picturing this hill without this church, without the memories that had been chasing him down, biting at his heels.

“It isn’t just about revenge.” He shrugged and smiled at Bethlehem Bradshaw. He’d always been a fan of her full name, not the shortened version. The full name had meant something to her mother. And her mother had meant a lot to him. She’d done more for him than people would ever know.

That loyalty struck a raw nerve with him right now. Because Bethlehem’s mamma was gone and here was her daughter begging for something that woman would have wanted. She would have wanted this church to remain standing.

But he thought she would have cried at its condition now, because it hadn’t been used in years and no one had cared to keep it maintained. She wouldn’t have wanted that either.

Of course she would have told him to forgive.

Forgive his mother for being the town drunk. Forgive Tim Cooper for a tiny indiscretion more than thirty years ago and not owning up to it. As far as Jeremy was concerned, Tim Cooper didn’t need his forgiveness. That was between Tim and Mrs. Cooper.

Jeremy had a truckload of bad memories. He’d learned early to fight for himself and his little sister. At eight he could make a mean box of mac and cheese. By the time he was ten he could sign his mother’s signature on school permission slips. He learned to braid his little sister’s hair and wash her clothes.

His sister, Elise, was married now. She and her husband owned a convenience store in Grove. They sold bait to fishermen and coffee mugs to tourists. Elise was big on forgiveness, too.

“It looks a lot like revenge.” Bethlehem’s soft voice intruded into his memories, shaking him up more than a green Oklahoma sky on a stormy afternoon.

“Bethlehem, I’m not sure what you want me to say.”

“Say you won’t do this.”

“I can’t say that.” For the first time since he’d bought the church, he had the biggest urge to forget his plans. Because of Beth.

“Why not?”

Jeremy shook his head to clear the thoughts. “I have plans for this piece of property.”

He needed a bigger shop for the custom bikes he’d turned from a hobby into a business, an extension of the chain of motorcycle dealerships he owned.

“Do you have plans or are you just angry?”

He leaned in and then he regretted the move that put him a little too close to Bethlehem, close enough to see the flecks of gold in her brown eyes, close enough to get tangled in the soft scent of her perfume.

Man, she was summer sunshine. She was sweet, the way she’d been sweet at sixteen. A guy couldn’t forget a kiss stolen along a creek bank on a summer night.

Time to think fast and get the kid he’d been back under the control of the man he now was. And she wasn’t making that an easy thing to do.

“Let me ask you a question. How many times have you been to church in the last dozen years or so?”

She turned pink and glanced away from him. “We’re not talking about me. And I do go to church.”

He smiled at that. “Yeah, we weren’t talking about you. But now we are.”

Because there was a scar across her brow. It ran into her hairline. A matching scar ran jagged down her arm. She shifted, uneasy, and crossed her arms in front of herself. This church wasn’t the only thing he’d like to tear down. If he ever got hold of Chance Martin, he’d probably do the same to him.

But he doubted Chance would ever show his face in Dawson, not if he wanted to live. Because Jeremy figured he probably wasn’t the only man in town that wanted to get hold of that coward.

Beth’s arms dropped to her sides and she took a few steps toward the door, her eyes shifting from him to the exit. He got that she needed to breathe, and he let her have the space.

At the door she turned to face him again.

“Don’t do this. Please.” A tear streaked down her cheek.

He let out a sigh and shook his head. “Bethlehem, I’m sorry. I know why this church means something to you. It means something different to me.”

“I know and I’m sorry.”

“Right.”

“I’ll buy it from you.” She spoke with renewed determination, her dark eyes flashing. “You don’t need this land. Do you even plan on staying here?”

“No, I’m not staying here, not full time. I have a home in Tulsa.”

“Then don’t do it. What will it accomplish? Who do you want to hurt?”

He brushed a hand over the top of his head, over hair cut short, and moved it down to rub the back of his neck.

“I’m done with this conversation, Bethlehem.”

“It’s a building. It didn’t do anything to you.”

He looked around, remembering. She was wrong about that. This building tied into a lot of anger. That anger had pushed him to battle it out on the backs of bulls. It had put him on a motorcycle, racing through the desert at speeds that would make most guys wet themselves like little girls.

When he looked at this building, there wasn’t a good memory to hang on to. He glanced away from her, away from the second pew where her mother had sat, and he called himself a liar.

Good memories included potluck dinners when he got to sit with Bethlehem and her mother. He had other good memories, like the smile she gave him when she was fifteen and he’d just won a local bull-riding event. She’d smiled and then hurried away with her friends, giggling and shooting glances back at him. Hers had lingered longest and when he’d winked, she’d turned pink and nearly tripped.

“Bethlehem, I am going to tear this church down.”

“I feel sorry for you.”

“Yeah, lots of people do.” But he didn’t want her to be one of them.

“I’ll do what I can to stop you. I won’t let you tear it down.”

“What would you do with it, Beth? Open it back up, sing songs on Sundays, serve potluck once a month? It’s an old building. It should probably be condemned.”

She shrugged and smiled a soft smile. He knew he was in serious trouble then. He got a feeling she was about to pull a one-two punch on him.

She stepped close, her smile pulling him closer.

“Don’t you feel it, Jeremy? After all these years, don’t you feel it?”

Yeah, he’d seen it coming. No other woman had ever set him on his heels the way she could. Because he knew exactly what she meant and, yeah, he felt it. He felt the past. He felt God. He felt faith. All the things he’d been ignoring and it hit him every single time he walked into this building. He felt hundreds of prayers that had been said, probably most of them for him, his little sister, and his mother.

He remembered Sunday school teachers who had brought him cookies. The pastor back then, Pastor Adkins, and his wife had bought Jeremy and his sister school clothes and Christmas presents.

But all of those good memories got lost, tied up with the bad, when he remembered Tim Cooper on the front pew with his family. Each Sunday they’d showed up in their van, wearing new clothes and happy smiles. When he’d been about six years old there were only a few Cooper kids. As the years went by, the clan grew. The Coopers had about a half dozen kids of their own. They added about a half dozen adopted children.

Jeremy had sat two pews back across the aisle, without a family to have Sunday lunch with, without a dad.

“Sorry, Bethlehem.”

He turned and walked away, knowing there would be tears streaking down her cheeks, knowing she’d nearly collapse with sadness and frustration over his stubbornness.

As he walked out the back door his phone rang. He shielded the display and shook his head. He really didn’t want to deal with this today. Bethlehem had just about done him in.

But if he didn’t answer she’d call again. And again. There was always a crisis in his mother’s life.

“Hi, Mom, what do you need?” He held the phone to his ear and walked across the overgrown lawn to the RV that he’d been living in.

Horse hooves on pavement caught his attention. He turned to watch Bethlehem ride down the road at an easy trot. Her hand came up and he knew she was wiping tears from her eyes.

That made him not much better than Chance Martin.

“Jeremy, this is Carl Duncan.” A county deputy on his mom’s phone. Great.

“What can I do for you, Carl?”

“I’m sorry to bother you but we’ve got your mamma down here at the jail. Someone called her in for a disturbance.”

“Did she have clothes on this time?” He brushed a hand across his head and looked down at the ground, at his scuffed work boots and at a little black snake slithering a short distance away.

“Yeah, fully clothed but drunk enough we’re considering sending her to the E.R.”

“Do what you have to do and I’ll be there in about thirty minutes.”

He slid the phone back into his pocket and turned. His attention landing on the eyesore that used to be Back Street Church. The steeple still stood and a cross reached up, tarnished but intact.

It bothered him, that Bethlehem had made him remember more than he’d wanted to. She’d forced him to recognize other things about this building, this church. She’d made him think about the good things that had happened here.

But it didn’t matter. He’d bought this land to raze a church and build a business. He wasn’t going to give up on his plans, his dreams, not for Bethlehem or anyone else.

Next week Back Street Church was going to be nothing but a memory.

Chapter Two

The horse flew up the driveway, hooves pounding the ground and neck stretched forward. Beth leaned, reins in her hands, her legs tight around the horse’s middle. They flew past the house, past the garden and the barn. She pulled the horse up at the fence and then just sat there on the gelding, both of them breathing hard.

“Take it easy on that colt.” The gruff voice didn’t lecture, just made a statement.

Beth turned to smile at Lance, her dad’s ranch foreman.

“He’s barely winded.”

“He’s needed a good ride, that’s for sure. Where you been?”

“Riding.” She slid to the ground, the reins still in her hands. Lance took the horse and led the animal to the barn. She followed. The ranch foreman was getting older but he was still burly and fit. He hitched up his jeans with a piece of twine and his shirt was loose over a T-shirt. He glanced back, his weathered face so familiar she wanted to hug him just for being in her life.

“Your daddy has been looking for you. He said he called your phone three times.”

“I didn’t have a signal.”

“The only place in Dawson with a weak cell signal is Back Street.” Lance turned, his gray eyes narrowed. “You weren’t up at the church, were you?”

“I’m twenty-eight, not twelve.”

“I think I know that. I’m just saying, you don’t need to mess around up there. And you aren’t going to be able to stop Jeremy Hightree from doing what he plans on doing.”

“Someone has to stop him.”

“Well, the city of Dawson is trying to take care of that. Let them.”

“I’m afraid I’m just going to have to help them.”

She took the horse’s reins from the ranch foreman and led the gelding down the center aisle of the barn. She grabbed a brush off a hook and crosstied the horse. Lance flipped the stirrup over the back of the saddle and loosened the girth strap.

“You can’t stop him, Beth. He’s got thirty years of mad built up in him.”

“He needs to get over it.”

“Right, and men always listen when a woman tells them to just ‘get over it.’” He said it in a girly voice and shook his head. It was funny, that voice and big old Lance with his craggy, weathered face. Lance had always been there for them. He’d always managed to make her smile. When she was a teenager and thought the world hated her, and she hated it back, Lance had been the one who teased her out of the bad moods.

The horse stomped and Beth ran a hand down the deep red neck. The animal turned and nibbled at her arm before lowering his head to enjoy the loss of the saddle and the feel of the brush across his back.

“I think I’ll ride him next weekend in Tulsa.”

“He isn’t ready for barrels.”

She brushed across the horse’s back and then down his back legs. “He’ll be ready.”

“You’re as stubborn as your dad. Maybe Jeremy has met his match.”

“What about Jeremy?” This voice boomed. The horse jumped a little to the side.

Beth bit down on her bottom lip and then flashed a smile, as if she hadn’t been talking about anything important. “Nothing, Dad.”

“Right, nothing. I saw you racing up the drive on that horse. Where have you been?”

Her dad walked a little closer. She stood straight, the brush in her hand, and faced him. She’d been backing down all of her life and she couldn’t be that person anymore.

“I went to talk to Jeremy Hightree about the church. I have to stop him from tearing it down.”

The harsh lines around her dad’s mouth softened and he looked away, but not before she saw the sorrow. It still felt like yesterday. Shouldn’t it be different? Shouldn’t eighteen years soften the pain? She’d been without her mother longer than she’d been with her. There were times that her mother’s smile was a vague memory. And more times that she couldn’t remember at all.

But her dad missed Elena Bradshaw more than all of them. And missing her meant he disliked Back Street Church as much as Jeremy.

“Dad, she loved that church.” Beth had never been brave enough to say it, to put it out in the open. This was the new Beth Bradshaw, the woman who took control. The woman who wasn’t afraid. Much.

Her dad raised a hand and turned away, his profile a dark shadow against the bright, outside light. She’d always thought of him as the strongest man in the world. What little girl didn’t think that way? As a child she’d tried to match her steps to his. She’d always tried to please him. She had never wanted to hurt him.

“Please, Dad, we have to stop him.”

He shook his head and walked out the door, away from her, away from memories. She took a step to follow him, to get him to help. Lance’s hand on her arms stopped her.

“Let it go.” He released her arm. “Let him have his memories. That church has been empty for years. It isn’t all you have of your mom.”

“I know it isn’t. It’s about more than her memory. It’s about Jeremy’s anger at a building. It’s about…” She sighed. It was about her mom.

“Yeah, it’s about that building. Everyone in town is talking about it. They all have a reason they think it shouldn’t be torn down, Beth. The truth is, they could have done something to save it.”

Beth watched her dad walk across the driveway to the house and then she turned to face a man who had been a second father to her. Lance was her mother’s second cousin somehow twice removed. He’d taught her to come home strong after the third barrel, to not be afraid as she rushed toward the gate. He’d taught her to rope a calf. He’d taught her to let go of pain. He’d tried to keep her in church, having faith.

“I don’t have anything to remember her by, Lance. Everything is boxed up and hidden. Her pictures, her jewelry, and even the quilts she made. He boxed it all up. I don’t know if he burned it, gave it away or threw it in the Dumpster.”

“He shouldn’t have done that. Sometimes a person hurts so bad they don’t know what else to do. They box up the pain and I guess your daddy boxed up his memories right along with it.”

“She loved that church.”

“She sure did. And she loved her family. She’d want those memories unboxed.” Lance untied the horse and led him down the aisle of the barn. A horse whinnied from somewhere in the distance. The gelding, Bob, whinnied a reply.

It had been years since Beth thought about the day her dad had started packing everything into boxes. He’d been crazy with grief, pulling pictures off the walls, yanking quilts off beds. Everything that reminded him of Elena Bradshaw had been packed up and hauled off while Beth cried and Jason stoically helped their father.

Lance placed a strong hand on her shoulder.

“I’ll feed this horse for you. I think it’s about time you talked to Buck about the box she left you. It’s yours, Beth. She’d want you to have it.” He put the horse in a stall and latched the gate. “And you know this horse isn’t ready for Tulsa.”

She nodded, still fighting tears, still fighting mad that everyone else always seemed to have answers, to be in control, and she always seemed to be fighting to be strong.

It was a fight she planned to win.

“Yeah, I know.”

“Go talk to your dad.”

She walked out of the barn and across the dusty driveway toward the house. A lone figure in the garden bent over tomato plants that were just starting to flower. She stopped at the edge of the garden.

“I’m not going to help you save that church.” He bent to pick a few weeds.

“I’m not here to talk about the church. I’d like the box my mother left for me.” She shoved her hands in her pockets, no longer brave. The deep breath she took did nothing to calm nerves that were strung tight. “If you don’t mind.”

Her dad turned. He stood straight, his hat tipped back. He was tall and broad, his skin weathered by sun and time but he was still strong.

“What brought that up?” her father asked.

Beth had imagined anger, not a question like that. She didn’t really have an answer. “I think it’s time. I want to have something to remember Mom by.”

“It’s just a box of stuff.” He shrugged. “I’ll bring it down from the attic.”

She wanted to rush forward and hug him, but he turned back to the tomato plants. She’d won the battle but it didn’t feel like a victory. She whispered “thank you” and her dad nodded. After a few seconds she walked away.

As she entered the house, she remembered the day her mother had sat them down in the living room and explained that she had taken her last treatment. The memory was followed by one of the day they took Elena off life support.

Beth stood in the living room for several minutes and then she walked back out the front door. She pulled keys out of her pocket and headed across the yard to the garage and her truck. It was starting to make sense, why Jeremy would want to do this. Even if she didn’t want him to, maybe she understood. Her dad had shoved his pain into boxes and stored them in the attic. She’d run away. Jeremy needed to see that church gone.

As much as she understood, she still planned on finding a way to stop him.

The police station was a long, rectangular building with metal siding that looked more like a forgotten convenience store. In an area like this, they didn’t need much for a police station. The occasional robbery, traffic violation or intoxicated driver, those were the extent of the crimes. His mom had probably committed each one, more than once.

Jeremy pulled his truck into a parking space next to a patrol car and he sat there for a long minute because he dreaded going inside. Why had he come back to Dawson? Oh, right, for revenge.

He’d been running from this life for years. He’d done a good job of putting it behind him. He had a successful business building customized motorcycles. He had two world championships. He’d done commercials for cologne and they’d made posters of his ugly mug to sell at rodeo events.

No matter how far he’d gone or what he thought he’d done right, one person knew how to pull him right back into the gutter. A shadow moved in front of the door. On the other side of the glass deputy Carl Duncan waved and motioned him inside.

He’d been fifteen when he bailed Jane out the first time. He’d used his money from lawn jobs and he’d borrowed a car from a neighbor. Back then Carl had been his age, just a kid trying to make a better life for himself. The cop at the time had been Officer Mac. He’d retired years ago.

That was a memory that made him smile. Officer Mac had been a farmer who carried a badge for extra money. When he’d seen Jeremy in that car, he shook his head and told Jeremy he was going to pretend he didn’t see an underage driver behind the wheel.

Jeremy pulled the truck keys from the ignition and shoved them into his pocket as he got out of the vehicle. At least he had his own car these days.

He walked across the parking lot, stopping to glance up at the sky, another way to kill time. There were a few dark clouds, nothing major.

Carl pushed the door open. A woman screamed from somewhere at the back of the building. That would be Jeremy’s mother. He knew that awful sound and knew that her eyes would be red, her hair a wild mess. They’d been through this more than once.

“What did she do this time?” He grabbed a seat from behind one of the desks and sat down.

“She was in the convenience store trying to convince them you’ve stolen all of her hard-earned money.”

“That would get me a cup of coffee.”

They didn’t laugh. Carl sat down on the edge of the desk and shrugged. “She’s coherent. Sort of.”

“Right. So what do I do with her, Carl?”

“Take her home.” The cop shrugged. He didn’t have answers, either. “Maybe put her in a home. I don’t know, Jeremy. I’m real sorry, though.”

“Me, too.” Jeremy loosened his white cowboy hat and then pushed it back down on his head. “Yeah, maybe a home. She might actually get sober.”

“Right, that would be good. She looks a little yellow.”

Her liver. He didn’t know how it had held up this long.

“Do I owe you anything?” He pulled the wallet out of his back pocket and Carl shook his head.

“No, there weren’t any charges. I just brought her in to keep her from doing something crazy. Are you really going through with the church situation?”

It always came back to that. The people in this town ought to be thanking him for getting rid of that eyesore, not questioning his motives. Considering that the church had been one step away from being condemned, he didn’t know why everyone had a problem with his plans.

His mother screamed again. “Get me out of here! I didn’t break any laws. I’ll get a lawyer.”

Jeremy laughed, shook his head and stood. “I’d better get her home before she hires a lawyer.”

Carl nodded and headed down the narrow hall. He stopped at the farthest door and pulled keys from his pocket. “Mrs. Hightree, I’m letting you out now. Can you settle down for me or do I need to keep you overnight?”

“You can’t keep me overnight. I didn’t do anything wrong.”

“Public intoxication.” Carl slid the key in the lock. “Or public nuisance.”

He unlocked the door and she stepped out of the room, a pitiful figure in a housedress, gray hair sticking out in all directions and a gaunt face. Her attention quickly turned to Jeremy. She frowned and stomped her foot.

“I’m not going with him.”

“Mrs. Hightree, you don’t have a choice.”

She flared her thin nostrils at them and shook her head. “I have choices. I can walk out of here. I can head on home without his help.”

Heat crawled up Jeremy’s cheeks. After a lifetime of this, a guy should be used to it. It wasn’t as if her behavior took people by surprise. What did surprise him was how old she looked, and how bad. He’d seen her less than a week ago and she hadn’t looked this old.

She had been a pretty woman twenty years ago. Thirty-one years ago she had obviously turned some heads. He pushed that thought aside because now wasn’t the time to get caught in the muck.

“Mom, we’re going home.”

“Janie, my name is Janie.”

He grabbed her arm, loose flesh and bones. “Right, Jane.”

He hadn’t called her mom since he was ten and he’d found her passed out in the yard when he came home from school. That had been enough to take the word “Mom” right out of his vocabulary.

“You don’t have to hold me. I’m not going to run.”

“No, but you might fall down.”

She wobbled a little, as if to prove his point. “There’s nothing wrong with me.”

Jeremy shot a look back at Carl. The cop stood behind them, sorry written all over his face. “Thanks, Carl. You’re sure there weren’t any expenses this time?”

“Not this time. Do you want me to call the hospital in Grove? Maybe she should be seen?”

“I’m fine, I said.” She jerked her arm free from his hand. “I don’t need either of you holding me or telling me what to do. I just need to go home.”

“I’ll take her home.” Jeremy opened the door and motioned his mother through. “See you later.”

“Yeah, we’ll see you around. Maybe we can meet for lunch at the Mad Cow tomorrow?”

“Right, and you can try to talk me out of what you all think is a big mistake.” Jeremy smiled, and Carl turned a few shades of red, right to the roots of his straw-colored hair. “I’ll meet you for lunch, but if everyone was so worried about this church, why didn’t you all do something sooner?”

“Yeah, I guess you’ve got a point there, Jeremy. Maybe we just thought it would always be there.”

“It would have fallen in, Carl.”

Carl stood in the doorway while Jeremy held on to his mother to keep her from falling off the sidewalk. “My grandpa goes up there once a month to check on the place. I think a lot of the older people in town would love to have it opened up again, but nobody had the money and the younger families have moved away.”

“Call me and we’ll talk over burgers at Vera’s.”

Carl nodded. “I’d appreciate that.”

Jeremy escorted his mom out the door and down the sidewalk. She weaved and leaned against him. Tires on pavement drew his attention to the road. Tim Cooper. Yeah, they’d have to face each other sooner or later. They hadn’t talked since the day Jeremy learned the truth. The day Tim Cooper wrote him a check, because it was the right thing to do.

Jeremy opened the door on the passenger side of the truck. Jane wobbled and her legs buckled. When he tried to lift her up she swatted at his hands.

It took a few minutes but he got her in the seat and buckled up. They headed down the road, toward Back Street but then turned east. The paved country road led to a tiny trailer surrounded by farmland. It had two bedrooms and a front porch that was falling in. More than once he’d tried to get her to move. But this was her house and she didn’t want his money.

It was the only thing she’d ever owned. This trailer was her legacy. He shook his head as he drove down the road. He thought about how he’d envied the Coopers and their big old ranch house.

His mom choked a little and leaned. Great. Her body went limp and she fell sideways. He eased into the driveway of the trailer and pulled the emergency brake. He put the windows down and waited while she got sick on the floor of the truck.

Maybe they would head for the hospital. He pulled her back in the seat and wiped her mouth with the handkerchief he pulled out of his pocket. “Mom, are you with me?”

She shook her head and mumbled that he was as worthless as his father. Yeah, she was with him. He shifted into reverse and glanced in his rearview window. A blue truck pulled in behind him. Great, what he didn’t need was a big dose of sympathy in brown eyes that dragged his heart places he didn’t want to go.

But that’s what he was about to get.

“Leave me here,” his mom mumbled without moving from her prone position on the seat next to him.

“I can’t leave you here. You need help.”

“Since when do you care?”

“I don’t know, since forever, I guess.” And he’d proven it time and again. His mom passed out as Beth rapped on his driver’s side window.

Beth shouldn’t have stopped but she’d seen Jeremy’s truck at the police station. She’d watched in her rearview mirror as he helped his mother down the sidewalk. For a few minutes she’d listened to the smart Beth who insisted she should drive on home and forget it. But the other Beth had insisted she put her heart on the line. And that’s why she was looking through the window of his truck into eyes that were slightly lost and a lot angry.

His window slid down. “Imagine seeing you here.”

“I thought you might need help.”

“No, we’re fine. I’m taking her to the hospital.”

In the seat next to him his mother made a grunting sound that resembled a negative response. Obviously she didn’t want Beth around and she wasn’t interested in going to the hospital.

“Do you want me to ride over there with you?” She regretted the words the minute they were out. No one in their right mind would volunteer. But she had gone and done it.

His mother leaned to the floor again. Jeremy groaned and reached in the backseat of the truck for a towel that he tossed on the floor. “You wouldn’t happen to have a bag or a bucket in your truck, would you?”

“Give me a sec and I’ll check.” Beth hurried back to her truck. She pushed through the contents in the toolbox in the bed of her truck and found a small bucket, a roll of paper towels and a spray bottle of window cleaner.

She returned to the passenger side of Jeremy’s truck and opened the door slowly, carefully. Jane Hightree was passed out, leaning toward her son. Beth handed him the bucket and then she sprayed the floor down and covered it with paper towels.

“Beth, you don’t have to do this.” His voice was quiet and a little tight with emotion. She glanced up as she pulled on leather gloves.

“I don’t mind. I’m good at cleaning up messes.”

“Yeah, well, I usually clean up my own messes.”

She ignored him and cleaned, tossing it all in a bag she’d pulled out from under her truck seat.

“I appreciate the help.” Jeremy reached for the passenger seat belt, pulling it around his mother, even though she remained prone on the seat. “I’m going to take her to Grove.”

“Do you want me to go?”

He shook his head and then looked up, smiling at Beth. “I can handle this, but thank you.” He released the emergency brake and his hand went to the gearshift.

She nodded. “Let me know what happens with your mom.”

“I’ll do that.”

Beth closed the door and walked back to her own truck. As she climbed behind the wheel he backed out of the drive and headed down the highway. Beth went the opposite direction, toward her brother’s house because being strong on her own wasn’t easy. When she’d confronted Jeremy at Back Street Church she had meant to talk him out of something, not put herself in his life. She had to keep her focus on what was important. The goal wasn’t to get tangled up in his life, it was to save the church.

Chapter Three

Beth finished her phone call and sat down at the table with a cup of coffee. After helping Jeremy with his mother the previous evening, she’d had a long talk with her brother Jason about ways to save Back Street Church. Thanks to his wife Alyson they had a very clear idea of how to accomplish their goal. They’d learned that the building had turned 100 the previous year.

They were still digging but it was possible the building could be saved by having it listed on an historical registry. The phone call Beth had made would set the plan in motion.

And she didn’t know how she felt about what she’d done. As much as she didn’t want the church torn down, she also didn’t want to hurt Jeremy.

It seemed that no matter what, someone would get hurt. Either Jeremy or the people in town who cared about the future of the church. He had plans for a business. Beth saw the church as a connection to her mother. Others in town had similar stories and reasons for wanting the building to remain standing.

She took a sip of her coffee and reached for the box sitting on the table in front of her.

Her dad had finally given it to her the previous evening after she’d gotten home from visiting Jason and Alyson. Now that she had it, though, she didn’t know what to do with it. She’d left it sitting on her dresser last night, untouched. Thirty minutes ago she had carried it into the kitchen. She’d been staring at it while she ate her cereal and then made the phone call to the historical society.

She let out a shallow, shaky breath and reached for the box. It was just a plain metal box. Her mother had intended for her to have this eighteen years ago. Eighteen long years, with so many mistakes, so much heart-ache in between.

Would her life have been different if her mother had lived? Would Beth have made different choices, taken a different path? Those were questions that would never have answers.

She lifted the lid of the box and a sob released from deep down in her chest. Tears followed as she lifted her mom’s Bible from the box. Her mother’s most prized possession. Of course her dad wouldn’t have wanted Beth to have that Bible. He would have seen it as the root of all their problems; the same way he blamed Back Street Church for her mother’s death.

He had needed to blame something, or someone. He had picked the church Elena turned to when the doctors told her there was nothing they could do.

Beth opened the Bible and stared through tear-filled eyes at her mother’s handwritten notes in the margins. Reading those notes, it was as if her mom was there, teaching her about life. There were notes about faith, sermons, and verses that were her favorites.

She closed the Bible and placed it on the table. There were other things in the box. Her mother’s wedding ring. A book of devotions. Her journal.

The journal was leather bound. The pages were soft, white paper that had yellowed with time. The writing had faded but was still legible. Beth flipped through the pages. The last half of the journal was blank. But the final entries, pages and pages of entries, were written to Beth.

She skimmed several but paused on the one dated August 5.

Dearest Beth, you’re barely ten and I know this isn’t going to be easy for you, but I want you to know that I love you and God has a plan for your life. Don’t give up. Don’t forget that your daddy, even if he’s hurting and angry, loves you. And don’t hurry growing up. It’ll happen all too soon. Love will happen. Life will happen. Don’t rush through the days, savor them. Love someone strong.

Love someone strong. Beth closed her eyes. She didn’t know if she’d ever really been in love. Chance had been a mistake, an obvious mistake. He’d been her rebellion and a way to escape her father’s quiet anger. Now she realized her dad had been more hurt than angry. But at eighteen she hadn’t cared, she had just wanted to get away from Dawson and the emptiness of her life.

Her life was no longer about Chance. It couldn’t be about what she’d been through. Instead it was about what happened from this day forward.

Jeremy Hightree didn’t understand that. He still saw the church as a connection to his troubled childhood.

Maybe her mother’s words could change his heart. She put everything back in the box but she didn’t replace the lid. She wouldn’t do that. It was a silly thing but she couldn’t put the lid back on the box. Instead she carried it down the hall to her bedroom and placed the box on her dresser.

She walked out the French doors of her room, onto the patio that was her own private sanctuary. She stood in the midst of her flowers and the wood framed outdoor furniture that blended with the surroundings.

When she came home a short year and a half ago this had been her healing place. She’d planted flowers and she’d hidden back here, away from questions and prying eyes. In this garden no one questioned the jagged cut on her face or the arm that had needed to be reset.

This morning she was escaping from other emotions. Her mother’s memory, Jeremy’s plans for the church, her own fears.

She really needed to slow down. Everything was coming at her in fast forward. It was time to pray and plan her next move, before she rushed forward and did something she would regret.

At last she had fallen to sleep. Jeremy stood at the door of his mother’s room and waited for her to move, to wake up and yell again. She’d done a lot of that since the previous evening when the hospital had transported her to the long-term facility a short distance from Grove, and only five minutes from Dawson.

She’d done so much screaming this morning that the nursing home staff had called him to see if he could calm her down. Surprisingly she had calmed down immediately when she saw him.

He sighed and turned to go.

“Jeremy, how are you?”

Wyatt Johnson walked down the hall. Jeremy shrugged one shoulder and turned his attention back to his mother’s room, to the bed, and to the thin figure covered with a white blanket.

“Do you need anything?” The two had gone to school together. They’d ridden horses together and roped calves together. Wyatt’s horses and Wyatt’s calves. They’d been friends, even though Jeremy hadn’t been a part of Wyatt’s social circle. They’d traveled to rodeos together and fought their way out of a few corners together.

“No, we don’t need anything. It looks as if she’ll be here for a while.” For the rest of her life. Her liver was damaged from years of alcohol abuse. Her brain wasn’t much better.

There must have been a time when she’d been a good person. He really tried to remind himself of that; of the reality that she had fed him and cared for him.

Or he liked to hope she had.

When he thought of gentle touches, it sure wasn’t his mother he thought of.

“I’m sorry.” Wyatt leaned his shoulder against the doorframe. “Guess there isn’t much more a person can say.”

“Nope, not much, but thanks.” Jeremy turned from the room and headed down the hall, Wyatt Johnson at his side. Jeremy stopped at the nurse’s station. The woman behind the desk looked up, her glasses perched on the end of her nose. “I’m leaving.”

“We’ll call if there are any problems.”

“Right.” He stood there for a minute, wondering if there was something else he should say or do. The nurse continued to stare at him. She finally lowered her gaze to the papers she’d been reading.

He guessed that was his cue to move on. So he did. Wyatt moved with him. When they got to the door Jeremy punched in the code and pushed the door open.

“Wyatt, I don’t want to talk about the church. Not now.”

“I hadn’t planned on bringing it up.”

An alarm sounded. Wyatt reached past him and pulled the door closed. He pushed other buttons on the keypad.

Jeremy stared at the closed door, at his truck in the parking lot and then shifted his attention back to Wyatt. He couldn’t be mad at a guy who’d gone through the things Wyatt had gone through; losing his wife, raising two little girls on his own. And then falling in love with a preacher’s daughter. At least Wyatt’s situation had a decent ending.

The single life was good enough for Jeremy. He dated women who wanted nothing more from him than a decent meal and a dozen roses to end things. That philosophy kept his life from being complicated.

He hadn’t seen too many happy relationships in his life and figured he was a lot better off than the friends who’d started believing they needed to settle down and have a family. Wyatt didn’t look too worse for wear, though.

“Looks like it might storm.” Jeremy nodded toward the southern sky. It was Oklahoma, so there was always a pretty good chance it might storm.

“Yeah, looks that way. We’re under a tornado watch until this evening. No warnings, yet.” Wyatt pulled keys out of his pocket.

“Yeah.” Jeremy ran out of things to say about the weather.

Wyatt grinned and tipped his hat back. “I know you don’t want to talk about the church, but you bought it and you had to know that’d stir up a hornet’s nest. I’ve known you a long time and you’ve always been fond of a hornet’s nest if you could find one.”

Jeremy told himself not to respond to his friend’s baiting. He smiled and kicked his toe at the ground. Yeah, he wasn’t going to ignore it.

“Wyatt, the church was for sale and I bought it. If people in Dawson are suddenly attached to a building they’ve neglected for years, that’s their problem. Someone else could have bought it.”

“Someone else could have,” Wyatt said. “No one did.”

“Right. I bought it and I plan on building a business that might give a few people in Dawson the jobs they need.”

“That’s a decent idea. But you have two hundred acres across from the church. Why not build your business over there?”

“I’m building a house on that side of the road and I’m buying cattle.”

“Yeah, I saw that they finished framing the house yesterday. It’s pretty huge for one guy. Are you actually going to live in Dawson?”

Jeremy stopped at the edge of the sidewalk. “I’m going to be here part of the time.”

“The church means a lot to a lot of people. I know it doesn’t seem that way.”

“No, it doesn’t and I kind of wonder why everyone suddenly realizes the church means something to them.” Jeremy glanced at Wyatt.

“Pastor Adkins kept me in church after my dad’s big indiscretion. I guess Back Street is what got me where I am today.”

“Gotcha.” Jeremy processed the story with the others he had been told. “Sorry, Wyatt, I have to get back and get back to work.”

“Work?”

“Business doesn’t stop because the boss is out of town.” He gave Wyatt a tight smile. “I’m managing my business from a laptop in the RV and trying to help Dane with a flaw in a bike we’re designing.”

Jeremy had partnered with Dane Scott in team roping years ago. And more recently in the custom bike business.

“I’d like to come by.”

“If you want a cup of coffee or you’d like to see the bike we’re building, stop by anytime.”

“And don’t bother hitting my brakes if I’m there to talk to you about the church,” Wyatt added for him.

“Sounds about right.” Jeremy touched the brim of his hat and walked across the drive to his truck.

When he pulled up the drive of Back Street Church, Beth Bradshaw was sitting in front of his RV. He hadn’t expected her to be the one pounding his door down trying to save this church. But why wouldn’t she be the one?

Maybe, more than anyone, Beth needed to fight this battle.

He joined her on the glider bench outside his RV. She scooted to the edge, as far from him as possible. He tried real hard not to let that hurt his ego. He figured she had a lot of reasons. One might be that she hated his guts.

That didn’t sit well with him, the idea of her hating him.

He pushed the ground and the glider slid back and forth. Sitting there on the glider with her kind of felt like courting the old-fashioned way. The only thing missing was lemonade. She probably wouldn’t see the humor in that, but he did. The two of them as nervous as cats sitting on a glider, what else could he think?

He had to lead the conversation in another direction, away from courting Bethlehem.

“I kind of thought you might thank me for tearing this church down, Bethlehem.”

“Stop calling me that.”

“It’s your name.”

“No one calls me Bethlehem and you know it.”

He started to remind her that her mother had called her Bethlehem. Neither of them needed that memory. He glanced at the box on her lap. She had her hands around it, like a little girl holding on to a treasure.

She glanced at him, a cowgirl face with straight brown hair in twin braids and eyes that pinned him to the spot. She’d have him questioning everything about himself if she didn’t stop looking at him like that.

“Why would you ever think I’d want this church torn down?” Her words were soft, matching the look in her dark eyes.

He shook his head and reined in the part of him that wanted to give her everything.

“I don’t know, I guess I thought it was tied to a lot of memories that you’d want to be rid of, not memories you’d want to hang on to.” He eyed that box again, wondering why in the world she’d brought it here and what it would mean to him.

Jeremy’s words played through Beth’s mind. She settled her gaze on the church. It was weathered and beaten down, forgotten. She’d been riding past this church her whole life, and since she’d come home from California those rides had resumed. Sometimes she even stopped and sat on the front steps.

As a teenager, when she’d felt the most alone, she’d found peace here. He wouldn’t understand. He would think she was weak if she told him that she’d hidden here, trying to find answers, to find a way past the pain of losing her mom.

She cleared her throat.

“I brought you something.” She reached into the box and handed him her mother’s Bible. She had no idea why she wasn’t keeping it for herself.

He needed it more? Maybe because she hoped something in there would stop him. He wasn’t going to listen to her or anyone else.

Maybe he would listen to her mom. Her heart trembled a little, afraid of his reaction, afraid of her own reaction. He took the Bible from her hands.

“Beth, this isn’t fair.”

“It was my mother’s.”

“I can’t take this.”

“She would want you to have it. I think she would want you to know what she thought of you.” Her hands trembled as she reached, flipping the pages of the book in his hands. “There are prayers in here, for Jason and me. Also for you and Elise.”

He let out a shaky breath and she waited. He didn’t react. After a few minutes he stood and walked away, still holding her mother’s Bible. She considered going after him, trying to talk to him.

Her feet wouldn’t move in that direction. Besides, she knew when to let a man be. This was one of those times. He walked across the church lawn, head down, the Bible in his hands. He climbed the steps and walked into the church, closing the door behind him. It didn’t take a genius to know he didn’t want to talk.

Guilt flooded her. For years Chance had used God’s word to beat her into submission. She didn’t want to do that to Jeremy. She considered going after him and apologizing.

She watched the door, waiting for him to come back out. The wind picked up. The southern sky was dark. She shivered a little and watched as clouds moved. A band of gray on the horizon meant rain and it was getting wider. Before long she’d have to hightail it for home.

A truck rumbled down the road and pulled into the crumbling parking lot that hadn’t seen this much traffic in years. Jason’s truck.

Her brother parked and got out. He walked toward her, his smile familiar. The one person to hold her life together, her brother. He’d always been there for her. He’d done his best to make her smile during their mother’s illness and after they’d lost her. He’d been the one sending money to California as her marriage fell apart.

“What are you doing here?” He looked from the church to her and then at the darkening sky. “Did you know there’s a tornado watch and a severe thunderstorm warning?”

“I heard on the news earlier that we could have storms today. It’s May in Oklahoma, what’s new? What are you doing here?”

He sat down next to her. “Same as you. I thought I could talk him out of it. Or maybe offer him enough money that he’d walk away.”

“He doesn’t need money.”

“No, I guess he doesn’t.”

“He needs closure.” She bit down on her bottom lip, letting that thought settle in. “He’s a lot like dad. They both blame this church for their pain. Dad kept us away. Jeremy wants to tear the church down.”

“Interesting.” Jason crossed his left leg over his right knee and relaxed, as if it was just a pretty summer day and they were sharing iced tea on the front porch. Instead they were both casting cautious glances toward the southern horizon. “Where is he?”

“Inside the church.”

“Hmm.” Jason smiled, the way Jason did. He’d always been the one finding ways to make everyone laugh, to make them smile when they didn’t feel like smiling. When he’d stopped smiling, God had sent Alyson and she’d helped him find his joy again.

He’d learned that he didn’t always have to be the one lifting everyone else up. Beth loved her sister-in-law for doing that for him.

Sometimes she was jealous, that everyone seemed to be able to find someone to love them, to keep them safe. Her memories of a relationship were of abuse and fear, not safety or security. She had memories that no one would understand, so she didn’t share.

“Beth, be careful.”

“It’s a storm, Jason. I’ve been through a few.”

He shook his head and his smile faltered. “That isn’t what I mean and I’m pretty sure you know that. Jeremy has a lot going on in his life.”

“Right, and I’m not the best judge of character.”

“I just don’t want to see you hurt.”

“I know.” She smiled, for Jason. “I won’t get hurt.”

The wind picked up and in the distance jagged lightning flashed across the sky. Thunder rumbled and the humidity in the air was heavy. Jason pulled out his phone.

She glanced at the radar he’d pulled up on the screen. The big red blob was lingering over their area of the satellite map.

“Great.” She watched the darkening clouds and trees leaning and swirling with the wind. “I guess this might be a good time to pray.”

A sprinkle of rain hit her arm. Beth looked up at the sky and then at the dusty, dry ground as the raindrops hit. It had been so long since it rained that the droplets bounced and didn’t soak in, not immediately.

Faith. She’d been through a drought, a long man-made drought, but faith was seeping back into her life. Her spiritual life had been a lot like hard, cracked earth, devoid of moisture. When faith started to return it was that same earth but with a trickle of water streaming through it, soaking into the dryness.

“We should probably go.” Jason stood, pushing his hat back from his face as he studied the sky. “This doesn’t feel right.”

“What, you don’t love that green sky?”

“Not particularly.”

She loved the rain. She loved storms. On the drive over a DJ on the radio, probably trying to be a comedian, had played the Jo Dee Messina song, “Bring on the Rain.” Beth found herself singing one line from that song, that she was not afraid.

The front door of the church opened. Jeremy stepped out on the porch. He was still carrying the Bible. Next to her, Jason made a noise and she shot him a look to silence anything he would say.

But he said it. “Is that Mom’s Bible?”

“It is.”

“Dad gave you the box?”

“He did.”

“And you brought the Bible to Jeremy Hightree?” Jason’s voice was tight, not really disapproving.

“I did. I just thought…”

“You might have pushed too far, Beth.”

“Maybe. But I don’t think so.” She met her brother look for look. “If this doesn’t work, I’m moving on to step two, and then step three.”

“I knew I shouldn’t have told you about the historical society.” Jason murmured, then smiled and waved to Jeremy.

Jeremy Hightree walked down the steps of the church. He glanced at the sky, watched for a minute and headed in their direction. He looked relaxed, in jeans, boots and a deep red shirt. But casual was a facade on this cowboy.

Rain was misting down on them and the wind was picking up.

“Jeremy.” Jason held out his hand. Jeremy took it, a quick handshake and then his gaze dropped to Beth.

She waited. And wished she was tall because then he wouldn’t have to drop his gaze to meet hers. She could face him, head on, eye to eye.

He held out the Bible. “I can’t keep this.”

“She cared about you.”

“I know she did, but this is something she wanted you to have.”

“We should go.” Jason shot a quick look at the sky. “Now!”

Her brother took hold of her arm and started to pull her toward the parking lot and their trucks. Her gaze shot to the southern horizon. Wind blew against them, slowing their progress and the rain hitting Beth’s face stung like ice against her skin.

A slow, loud warning siren sounded in the distance and she heard Jeremy yelling at them to stop.

Chapter Four

The tornado siren sounded as Jeremy watched Beth heading for her truck, Jason at her side. She turned to say something. Her words were lost in the strong gust of wind that hit, blowing leaves across the church lawn and small limbs from the few trees.

Jeremy scanned the horizon. A warning didn’t necessarily mean a tornado on the ground. Sometimes a warning was just a warning.

This time, though, things were a little different. He could feel the energy, the hum of the storm, the vibration of it. The deafening roar echoed in the distance.

“We should head for the basement.” Jeremy watched the sky as he yelled, cupping his mouth to get the sound across the wind.

Jason nodded and started back, his cell phone in his hand. Jeremy guessed he was probably calling his wife. Beth stood frozen a few feet behind Jason.

“Beth, come on.”

She nodded but she didn’t move. She was watching the sky, the wind blowing her hair. A gust caught her hat. She pushed it back down and held on.

Jeremy raced across the crumbling parking lot and grabbed her arm. “This is not the time to stand and watch.”

The roar increased in intensity. To the south the clouds were now tumbling and rolling, a dark mass of swirling destruction.

“Hurry.” He had hold of Beth’s arm and she was fighting him, pulling away.

“I can make it home.”

“Beth, head for the church,” Jason yelled as he pushed his phone into his pocket and turned, glancing at the dark clouds and then at his sister.

Jeremy cursed under his breath and picked her up. She was light in his arms and her protests were weak. Her arms went around his neck and he didn’t know if it was rain or her tears that soaked his shoulder.

“I can walk.” Beth struggled a little, and he held her tight.

“I know you can but…” He shook his head, not wanting to get stuck in the storm while she watched the clouds.

As they raced to the church, pieces of insulation fell from the sky. Jeremy ducked his head into the wind. That put his face pretty close to Beth’s. And she smelled so good he decided carrying her was about the best idea he’d had in a while. Or maybe the worst.

Jason was ahead of him, jerking the door of the church open. They raced through the building to the door at the back of the sanctuary. The basement was dark. The steps were narrow.

He hadn’t turned on electricity to the building. There hadn’t seemed to be a reason.

Jason pulled out his cell phone and lit up the steps with a patch of blue light. Jeremy held Beth tight and followed the other man down the steps. The basement held two classrooms and a kitchen/fellowship area that had seen better days.

“The back room,” Jeremy yelled, and he didn’t have to. The deafening roar had been left behind. The basement was pretty quiet, and a whole lot eerie. Jason glanced back and nodded. The room in the corner was the smallest and safest.

“Let me down.” Beth came back to life, fighting in his arms.

“Not until we’re in that room and safe. I’m not going to let you freeze up now, or have you head back upstairs to chase tornadoes.”

“I didn’t freeze. I just didn’t…” She shuddered in his arms. “Don’t grab me again.”

“I won’t. Once you’re safe I’ll never touch you again.”

Man, that wasn’t a promise he wanted to keep. As much as he didn’t want to admit it, she felt good in his arms.

He put her down in the corner of the room and slammed the door shut behind him. The windowless room cut them off from the rest of the world. Buried beneath the ground, it was nearly soundproof. Their cell phones glowed an unearthly blue.

He turned, surveying their shelter, flashing his cell phone around the darkness. He’d had Sunday school in this room as a kid. It had been painted white, to dispel the dark, windowless gloom. Posters of Jesus had hung on the walls to add color. There had been an easel with a felt board in the corner for paper cutouts of Jesus and the disciples.

Now the room was draped with spiderwebs that clung to his clothes. He brushed a strand from his face and hoped the resident hadn’t remained behind.

Back then he’d been a kid who knew how to pray. Man, he didn’t have a clue where that kid went. Somewhere along the way he’d started taking care of things on his own.

Lot of good that had done him.

He scanned the room looking for the flashlight he thought he’d left down here a few days earlier, when he’d been poking around in the old building, stirring up dust and memories. He’d left it in the kitchen.

“I have a flashlight out there.” He yanked the door open and ignored objections from Jason and Beth. The flashlight was on the counter next to an old avocado-green fridge. He grabbed it and raced back to the shelter of the classroom.

Jason shook his head when Jeremy walked in, flashing the light around the room. Jason had taken a seat on the edge of an old table.

“How long do we stay down here?” Beth sat on the stool in the corner of the room, shivering, her bare arms damp from the rain that pummeled them as they ran for the church. He flashed the light in her direction and she glanced away.

Jeremy pulled off the plaid shirt he wore over his T-shirt. He tossed it to her, as if it didn’t matter. But it did. When she held it in her hands and smiled it mattered a lot. She slipped her arms into the shirt and pulled it around herself.

He turned away, listening, waiting. Jason stood next to him, his cell phone up to his ear. Jason bowed his head, leaning against the wall. Jeremy put a hand on his shoulder, squeezing tight. “She’s fine.”

“Of course she is.” Beth smiled, her words sunny and bright in the dark room. “She’s Alyson and she’s probably in the basement praying like crazy for everyone else.”

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