Page 3 of Caleb's Salvation
My gut screamed it to me.
“I’m sorry, Cal,” Eli said, finally. “This was a mistake. Maybe she’ll take the hint you’re not thrilled to have her here and go home.”
She lied about her age. She lied about her child.
“I really needed to get picked…”That’s what she’d said.
No, I thought, she wasn’t going anywhere soon. I took a step, then another until I was sitting in the passenger seat of the truck with her in the back of the cab.
She didn’t say a word other than to croon softly to the baby.
Neither did I. Yet still, it happened. My world was changed.
* * *
Vivienne
I held Sam close as I studied the cabin. It was pretty sparse, but it was a roof and there was a heat source. Sam would sleep with me and as long I ate, he ate.
“I know it’s not much,” Eli said, dropping my bags, which was everything I owned, just inside the door. “This is where the other women stayed and they seemed to do all right.”
Because there had been four men, four profiles. I hadn’t thought of the other three. Only Caleb’s picture had spoken to me from the monitor of a computer situated in the library where I’d been trying to escape from the heat.
I’d sat down with Sam tucked against my chest and signed onto Facebook to see if there was someone, a friend, I might ask for help. Someone not from my father’s church. Instead, I’d seen this ad for an all-expenses-paid, round trip contest to Alaska for a blind date.
Alaska, where it wouldn’t be so blistering hot all the time.
I hadn’t thought anything of it. It was more curiosity than anything else that had me clinking on the link. Then I saw their pictures and something about Caleb…
A widower, it said in the profile. No details, nothing more than basic facts about him and his life in Alaska for the past seven years. It was his face. Stoic and resigned to life, but also with a sense of gravity and responsibility. That he was the boss was evident.
He would help me.
I don’t know why I thought it. Why I became so convinced it was true. But after three nights in a homeless shelter, it seemed like a certainty that I was right. That he would pick my profile, fly me to Alaska and keep me and Sam safe.
Despite his greeting, I still didn’t think I was wrong. He was an older man. I’d been told I was pretty. Obviously, I was young. Maybe all I had to do was charm him, seduce him. Make him feel like he was a king. Didn’t all older guys want to date younger woman to make themselves feel young?
Is that who you are now, Vivienne?
I didn’t want it to be true. But I also knew nothing was about what I wanted anymore. Everything was about me and Sam surviving.
“Am I the last one?” I asked Eli. “The last woman coming up here?”
Eli shoved his hands in his jeans pockets and nodded. “Yeah, you’re the last one.”
“And this cabin. Is it rented?”
Again, he nodded. “For the next two weeks it’s yours. Uh…I’m not sure…the whole blind date thing...”
Caleb was still sitting the truck. Stubborn, I thought, but he would come in eventually. My gut told me he wouldn’t be the type to drive away without checking to see that I was settled.
“Don’t worry about that,” I said with huffed laugh. “I knew what I was doing when I lied about Sam. Knew any man probably wouldn’t take too kindly to being lied to. I guess I was hoping… It doesn’t matter. How did the other ladies make out?”
Eli smiled. “Well, Shelby was the first to come. She’s my girlfriend now. She’s got a cabin next to Zeke and Eve’s place not too far from here. Zeke and Eve are locals and Shelby is a nanny for their little boy. Kate went back home. Jackson’s pretty broken up about it, so who knows? Maybe he’ll do something about it. But Jenny bought a place out in the woods. Wants to start up a business of bringing folks out here to hunt and hike and stuff. She and Ark are just friends, though. If you ask my opinion, it’s because Ark has a thing for our inspection engineer, Olivia. Don’t let the fighting fool you with those two.”
I didn’t follow much of what he said, but one thing stuck out. “So most of them stayed.”
“Don’t get ideas in your head.”
