Page 73 of With You Here
He turned his stare to all-warning.
She laughed. “Fine. I’m sorry Monk Marshall.” Her grin disappeared behind the lip of her mug. “You’re taking this entirely too seriously, in my opinion. Don’t you Christians have some sort of saying like God destines your steps or some such rot? If you think the two of you are ‘meant to be’”—she raised her hands for air quotes—“then isn’t your God powerful enough to make sure everything works out?”
An invisible fist jammed into his diaphragm, knocking the breath out of him. Kayla was right. He’d been so worried about howhewas going to convince Amber of the power of their feelings for one another that he forgot the One who’d brought them together in the first place.
One day he’d learn to trust first. To let He who keeps the universe in motion have first and last control of his life. For now, he was thankful that God used even unbelieving, annoying little sisters to talk sense into him.
Everything would be okay. Even if he and Amber never came together, he’d be okay, because he trusted in Someone who saw the end and the beginning. Who knew his heart and Amber’s, and Who could do more than he could even ask or think.
Time to sub you in, Father. I’m out of this game and trusting in You to win her heart for me.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Holy Roman Empire, 1527
Light called out of the darkness. Slashed across Christyne’s closed eyes and stabbed at her mind.
Heat.
So much heat. In her throat. Her chest. Her stomach.
She burned. Fire inside her. Scorching her.
Must breathe.
She opened her mouth, expecting more water to flow in. But, nay.Air. Blessed air. She sucked in, filled her lungs. Pain shot through her. Stabbed her without mercy. Her chest seized. Throat spasmed. Coughing overtook her body.
Was that a warm hand upon her shoulder? She looked up past the liquid that filled her gaze, her chest constricting and causing her whole body to shudder.
Concerned blue eyes stared back at her. Lorenz? How was it possible? She had seen him enter the water. Be carried down by the stone around his neck.
Her stomach rolled and pitched. A sick sensation raced up the back of her throat. She turned her head in time to lose the contents of her stomach upon the ground. Her muscles convulsed. Tightening over and over. More of the lake exited her middle and muddied the ground beneath her.
Her arms shook with the effort of holding her head above the ground. She gasped in air, collecting every small breath like a greedy beggar. The air only flamed the heat scorching her throat and middle, but even so, her lungs never seemed to fill.
“Praise be to God,” Lorenz whispered. He placed his arms around her shoulders and pressed her back to his chest.
She leaned against him, comforted by his strength, and closed her eyes as she willed her pulse to slow. Though it felt like daggers slicing her throat to use her voice, she spoke. “H-how?” How had he managed to break free of his bindings? To escape his watery grave and save her as well? These were the questions she tried to push past her swollen lips, but no words formed beyond the first.
He settled her more firmly in his arms and turned her so he could look into her eyes. “Your father.”
Her sire? He had a hand in their survival? But was it not he who ordered their deaths to begin with? If he wished to save them, why cast them into the lake?
She ran her tongue across the top of her mouth, her mind pushing for more answers but her body too spent, her pain too great to fight for the words she sought.
Lorenz traced a finger across her brow, pushing sodden locks of hair from her face. Just as she had oft done to him when he was in her care.
She looked up and caught his gaze. His eyes. Oh, those eyes that had so captivated her when she first beheld them. They held her now. Softened along the corners and peered deep into her soul.
What did he see? Could he glimpse the depths to which her feelings for him had plunged? Or the confusion over her sire’s betrayal? The uncertainty of what her future now held for her? Questions churned in her middle, threatening to once again overwhelm her with sickness.
“In secret, your father pressed a blade into my hand by the lakeside and bestowed upon me your safekeeping henceforth.”
Her father? Was that what he had been doing instead of bidding her farewell?
Lorenz looked away, a vestige of doubt washing across his stalwart countenance. The knot in his throat bobbed. “I thought I had not proved myself worthy of such great a reward.” His regard returned to her and his voice quivered. “I thought I had lost you, my angel.”
The burning within her became a sweet ache. To have such a man gaze upon her as he did soothed the hurt that flowed through her. Though her muscles had been spent, she rallied her strength and lifted her hand. Pressed her palm against his cheek. “You could never lose me.” For though her father may have given her physical safekeeping to Lorenz, she had already bequeathed him her heart.
