Page 51 of Rescued Dreams
“I’ll text you the info tomorrow. Then if she needs it, she can go stay there,” Meg said. “You’re right that you don’t owe her anything. She doesn’t need to be part of your life unless you want her to be.”
“Thanks.” Implementing a healthy boundary was one thing, but being reassured by your friend that it was the right thing to do meant a lot as well. “Sorry I woke you.”
“I’m not. You’re going through a lot right now.” Meg paused. “Have you thought about…praying about it?”
Amelia said, “I thought we agreed you weren’t going to push your beliefs on me.”
“Am I being pushy? It was only a question.”
She knew how Meg felt and that she saw sharing with Amelia as an imperative. That the outcome was life or death—Amelia’s.
Amelia stopped at a red light with barely any cars around her. “I don’t even know where to start praying. What on earth would I say?”
“It’s just a conversation. Talk to Him. Because the only peace you’re going to feel that actually lasts or sustains you through what’s happening is the peace that comes from God.”
“So it’s like a survival thing?” It sounded like a way to get through the bad stuff.
“It’s that when you need it,” Meg said. “But when you don’t need help through something hard, He is still there, and God wants a relationship with you in the good and the bad. He’s the one in control of everything.”
“And everything I’ve been through is my fault.”
Meg said, “Amelia, you made some bad choices. But you also made some good ones. God is the one you can rely on to guide you, and He brought you back to Last Chance County for a reason. So He could put people in your life who care. Who want to help. You can’t do this alone. You need the people around you, and you need Him.”
Amelia was used to pushing back when people talked about faith. There was so much of it swirling around her in the firehouse that she’d tried to tune it out.
But she had to admit Meg’s explanations made sense.
Her friend said, “God wants to give you more than you can imagine. He wants you to have the best, because we all know how bad things can get. He wants to be a safe place for you to go and the source of peace you’re looking for.”
Amelia drove to her neighborhood, trying not to dismiss Meg’s words, because that was what she always did.
“God wants to give you the things you’ve only dreamed of.”
No one knew those, because Amelia had never shared them with anyone. Even Meg didn’t know the things Amelia had wondered if she could have.
“All you have to do is start talking to Him.”
“I guess then I wouldn’t have called you and woken you up. I’d be praying, and you’d have two things you wanted.” Amelia chuckled, bringing a lightness to the conversation. There was something about what Meg had said that didn’t weigh heavy the way some things did.
“You can call me anytime, girl. You know that.”
“Thanks, Meg.” Amelia pulled into the long drive that ran down the side of this monstrosity of a house and drove slowly toward her cabin. “I’ll let you sleep now.”
Amelia passed the big house and didn’t see any sign that Kane and Maria were staying inside. No lights on. But that was by intention since they didn’t want intruders to know anyone was waiting there.
She’d never had family worth anything after her stepdad died.
Ridge had lost his grandpa, a man who’d shaped who Ridge was even after the older man’s tragic death. His family were the kind of people who showed up to help each other out, and it said a lot about the kind of man he was. The man she already knew him to be.
If she were going to pray, she’d pray she measured up to the woman he thought she could be.
EIGHTEEN
Ridge put the last dish in the dishwasher and turned it on. He wiped down the kitchen counters, because it was much nicer to wake up to a clean kitchen than stuff everywhere and food dried on the Formica.
This was the first house he’d owned, and he’d discovered he liked it a lot better than renting apartments. Maybe because he didn’t have to be here alone. Until they grew up a little more and left home for college, or got a place of their own, he’d have the twins here.
Ridge went down the hall and knocked on their door.
