Page 39 of To Bring You Back
“Are you dating at all?” The question came out measured.
“No, because I’ve changed.”
The answer he’d desperately wanted to hear—she wasn’t dating—but she’d paired it with a riddle.
“You’ve changed into what?”
“A better Christian.”
So he was a grace abuser, and she thought closing herself off to love made her holier.
If he said more now, he would insult her as much as she’d insulted him. “Let’s get you back.”
They made the drive in silence. When he pulled up to the curb a block from her house, he left the car in gear. Because of it, when she tried her handle, the door was locked.
He found the unlock button but hesitated to press down. “Maybe the reason you’re so afraid of people finding out about our past is because if they knew, they might ask the same questions about you that they ask about me. You’re afraid of the scandal, afraid grace won’t catch your free fall. You’d rather make redemption about works and how people perceive you because you have some control there, but whatever scaffolding you’re rigging to get yourself to God won’t reach. Only the cross of Jesus will do that.”
She glared at him with her head at an angry tilt, her fingers clutching the door handle.
He peered into the backyards as he hit the unlockbutton. As angry as he was, he hated the thought of her navigating those shadows alone. “Can I walk you home?”
“And risk them catching us together?” She opened her door, and the light in the car came on. She moved fast to get out.
“Text me when you’re in.”
She shut the door, and darkness returned as she disappeared into her neighbor’s garden. Gannon stayed at the curb until his phone pinged.
In,she’d texted.
Lock your doors 24/7. And don’t do anything you don’t want photographed and analyzed by people you’ve never met.
Will do and never do.
She had once. He shifted into gear and pulled away.
11
Adeline could message Drew instead of walking down the hall to his office, but she needed a distraction from her thoughts about the night before.
Gannon still had feelings for her after all these years. She hadn’t expected that. Nor had she expected him to find fault in her theology. Her stomach had been tight and uneasy ever since.
She tapped on Drew’s open door. “Darlene called. The hospital is keeping Henry another day.”
“Okay.” He typed something on his computer, then rolled his chair to reach his planner on the door-facing side of his L-shaped desk. He made a note, probably to visit Henry.
With Drew’s neatly ordered bookshelf of spiritual wisdom nearby, this seemed like the place to talk about what Gannon said, but she wasn’t sure how to word the worries that had kept her from sleeping. Most of what she’d said, she believed, but she didn’t know what to make of Gannon’s answers, and she’d gone too far saying Drew thought Gannon might not be a Christian.
Unaware of the words she’d put in his mouth, Drew dropped his pen on his planner and folded his hands. “What else is going on?”
“At what point do you think the things we do disqualify …” No. That wasn’t right, and voicing the full question would’ve had her in tears.
The left side of Drew’s mouth quirked into a smile as he waited.
She gulped and looked for a way into the conversation that bypassed emotion. “Gannon says he’s right with God, that he repented for what happened with Fitz and is forgiven.”
“Ah.” He pointed to a chair opposite the desk. “Talked to him?”
She sat and scraped the textured armrest with her thumb. “Last night. He says he isn’t dating Harper and never has. I believe him, but I’m not sure about the part where he repented over what happened with Fitz. If he regrets it, why does he talk about it so easily? It’s like he’s not embarrassed or anything.”
