The Rebel and His Bride (6 page)

“I’m fine. It’s just been a heck of a day. I won’t keep you any longer, I’m sure you’re anxious to be getting home. I know you’ve got to wash your hair.” He got to his feet and held out his hand to help her up. He watched her brush nonexistent dust from her skirt, then said, “I’ll walk you to your car.”

“No need, Rev. I’m parked right outside the front door.”

“Will you be at the baseball game tomorrow night?” he asked suddenly.

Annabelle blinked, confused by his abrupt question. She knew, of course, that the church had a baseball team, sponsored by the volunteer fire department. She guessed Gregory was the coach. “I guess I’m going,” she said. “As I recall, Gran always goes. It’s before choir practice, isn’t it?”

“Yeah. Wear jeans.”

“For what?”

“With Sebastian on vacation we need someone on third base.”

“I don’t play baseball.”

“It’s a real simple game,” he said dryly. “You hit a small white ball with a stick and run around this field, trying to get back to where you started from before the ball catches up to you.”

Annabelle couldn’t prevent a smile. “I know how it’s played, Gregory. I’ve just never played.”

“Okay, then I’ll pull Bill Parker from the out-field and put him at third and you can play right field. Since most batters are right-handed, they tend to hit more balls to left field. You might not have to catch one at all.”

Part of her really wanted to do this. She didn’t know why, though. “I’m not sure, Gregory.”

“Come on, Annabelle. I’d hate for the church to lose by forfeit. It’s going to be hard enough to win with Sebastian gone.”

“I’m probably not going to be any good.”

“Oh, you’re a natural. I can tell.”

“You’d say that to Gran’s pet pig, if necessary, to keep from forfeiting, wouldn’t you?”

He smiled. “What can I say? So, tell me, would a bribe work?”

“Try me.”

“You play and I’ll send over a whole gallon of fudge-swirl ice cream.”

“With praline chips?”

“Of course.”

“You’ve got it.”

“See you at six, then, at the ball field behind the fire station. You’ll be terrific, you’ll see.”

She hadn’t been terrific, Annabelle thought the next evening as she tried to wipe red dirt smears from her jeans. But she hadn’t been terrible either. She’d missed a couple of balls hit in her direction, but had made one nice catch. She hadn’t hit the ball at all, but had walked twice. All in all, she’d had fun. It had been interesting to watch Gregory too.

He was the coach, as well as the pitcher. He played hard, he played to win, but he played fair. He made sure everyone who turned up for the game had a chance to play, even when they were down by two runs and it was Lem Petrie’s turn to bat. Gran said that Lem Petrie couldn’t hit a baseball if it hung in midair and waited for him, but Gregory put him in and cheered louder than anyone. And when Lem struck out as usual, Gregory
clapped him on the back and good-naturedly grumbled about the umpire’s lousy eyesight.

Annabelle realized she would have liked Gregory, had she just met him that day. Part of her wished she had just met him. Still, she found a little—the barest amount—of her emotional armor eroding.

More emotional armor eroded over the next two weeks. Annabelle felt comfortable in White Creek. She liked taking evening strolls with Gran and having neighbors wave and say “Howdy.” Even the people she didn’t know always seemed to have a kind word and a friendly smile.

In Raleigh, even though her apartment building only held six apartments, she hadn’t known any of her neighbors. Not even well enough to speak if they saw each other in the laundry room. She found herself wondering if it would be the same in Norfolk as it had been in Raleigh. Suddenly the idea of living in Norfolk wasn’t nearly as appealing.

Norfolk became even less appealing when she thought about leaving Gran. Despite her eccentricities and the streak of mischief a mile wide—or maybe because of them—Annabelle genuinely enjoyed being around her. And she reminded herself that, though Gran might deny it, she wasn’t getting any younger.

She toyed with the idea of staying in White
Creek and commuting to Norfolk. That would be nice, she thought wistfully, but she wasn’t sure about being around Gregory. Though, she had to admit she’d been able to relax around him recently. On the rare occasions when she was able to forget he was an ex-lover, she even found herself liking him more and more. She liked the easy manner he had with the kids. At the baseball games every Wednesday, she liked his sense of friendly competition and sportsmanship.

It actually got to the point that she was able to sit in the same room with him after Sunday dinner and not feel the urge to flee, or at least it wasn’t so overwhelming that she couldn’t ignore it. It became a habit for him to show up after play rehearsal—ostensibly to lock up after her—but he usually brought her a cold can of soda and they’d sit on the church porch for a few minutes and chat. Annabelle was careful to stick to talking about the kids and the play.

He seemed friendly and comfortable. Almost. There were still odd moments when she found him watching her with that expression in his eyes that drove her crazy. She sensed that he wanted something from her, but couldn’t figure out what it was. Her physical awareness of him was still there, too, but she tried to ignore it. Unfortunately, she wasn’t very successful.

After the next-to-the-last rehearsal, Gregory showed up, as usual, right at nine o’clock. He was wearing jeans and an old college sweatshirt with
the sleeves cut off. She stared at the sweatshirt, her stomach tight. God, she remembered that shirt. She’d given it to him at Christmas. Their first and only Christmas together.

As soon as the last child had left, she turned to Gregory and said, “You kept it.”

He glanced down at the sweatshirt. “You had one like it. Marty accused us of trying to look like the Bobbsey twins when we showed up for the frat’s Christmas party both wearing identical sweatshirts and blue jeans.”

“And even the same color tennis shoes.”

“Yeah. I’d forgotten that.”

“I’m just surprised you still have it after all this time.”

“I kept everything you ever gave me.”

Annabelle fell silent. It was gone, she thought. That comfortable feeling. Chased away with that one sentence and a nine-year-old sweatshirt. The itchy feeling beneath her skin was back, along with the questions in Gregory’s eyes. Or maybe the questions had never really gone away and she had been fooling herself into thinking they had.

Time to go home. “I, uh, can’t stay to chat tonight. I have things to do.”

He nodded and handed her the soda he’d brought. “You may as well take this with you. I have to tinker with that air conditioner again, anyway.”

Gregory stood in the doorway and watched Annabelle as she got into her car and drove away.
Sighing heavily, he went back inside the church, hoping to coax a few more gasps of cold air from the cranky air conditioner.

After a few minutes he sank down on the nearest pew and leaned his forehead on his hands. Over the past couple of weeks he had begun to think he might get through Annabelle’s prickly exterior. Tonight, though, the prickles seemed to be back. In full force.

Not that it mattered. She was under his skin, as thoroughly as if they’d never been apart. He wished he could say he was happy about it, but the truth was he wasn’t sure how he felt. All he knew was that his life had been great until Annabelle came back. Well, okay, maybe not great, he admitted, but certainly fulfilling. And if he hadn’t been exactly happy, then at least he’d been satisfied. Until now.

Now she made him realize that no matter how much he loved being a minister and loved the honest, earthy people of White Creek, that didn’t make up for the lack in his own life. It didn’t make up for the empty house that greeted him at the end of each long day.

When he sat in his cozy little den working on his sermon, it was to the echoes of emptiness all around him. There was no sweet female voice humming in the background—not that Annabelle’s voice had ever been sweet, it was too full of sparkle and sass—no high-pitched giggles of children in the distance. There wasn’t even the snuffle and
sigh of a dog sleeping in the middle of the floor, just the occasional scratchings of Sebastian and Danni’s strange cat when he came to visit.

When he pitched for the church baseball team, lots of people cheered him on, but no one special, never anyone special. When he lost a member of his flock, the death always cut him like a knife. He spoke words of comfort to everyone else, but there was no one to comfort him. And when he went to bed and tossed and turned half the night, he could only think it was because he was sleeping alone in a bed meant for two.

He wondered what it would be like to have someone there for him—someone who cared that he’d had an exhausting day, who cared when he hit a home run or had to conduct the funeral for someone who had not only been a member of his congregation, but a valued friend as well.

He lifted his head and stared up at the small chandeliers that had graced the ceiling of the century-old church for fifty years or more. Had he only now realized how empty his personal life was, or had he known it all along and simply tried to convince himself that his work was enough?

With a swipe of his hand through his hair, he slowly got to his feet. He could hardly bear the thought of going home to the little house he’d just admitted was unutterably empty. He glanced at his watch. It was only nine-thirty. Maybe he’d just go upstairs to his church office and sit. And sit. And
stare out the window at the dark night that seemed to match his mood.

“You’ve got dirt in your hair.”

Gregory spun around. “Annabelle?”

She waved a hand at his head. “You’ve got streaks of dirt in your hair.”

He looked down at his hands, noting the black grease stains on them. Fishing a handkerchief out of his back pocket, he began wiping at the smears. “I thought you’d gone.”

“I left my purse here.”

“Oh.” Great, he thought. Grab her attention with your sparkling wit, why don’t you?

“I sort of figured you’d be gone by now, but thought I’d check and see. Don’t you ever go home?”

When there’s a reason, he thought. “Uh, yeah. I just wanted to make sure the air conditioner was cooling properly.”

She raised her eyebrows. “Don’t you think you might want to close the windows first, Rev?”

“Oh, right. I was just getting to that.”

A speculative look on her face, Annabelle watched Gregory as he strode from window to window, pulling them closed and fastening the latches. For a moment, when she’d first walked in, she’d noticed the strangest expression on his face—lonely, maybe, or sad—and she couldn’t help but wonder what had put that gray bleak look there.

Gregory came back over to her and handed her
the purse she’d left at the front of the church. “Here. I, uh, good night, then.”

For some reason she couldn’t fathom, Annabelle was suddenly in no hurry to leave, even though she hadn’t been able to get out of there fast enough half an hour ago. Maybe it was because she was bored and there was nothing good on television. Or maybe it was because her grandmother had gone to Lute’s house to watch rented videos and eat popcorn. And maybe it had something to do with the lingering shadows in Gregory’s eyes. She set her purse on the nearest pew and strolled up the center aisle. Gregory followed her.

She stepped up behind the pulpit. “So this is what it’s like up here.” She glanced down at the small shelves just beneath the podium and pulled out a comic book. “Your secret’s out,” she said, waving it in the air. “I didn’t know you read Galaxy Avenger.”

“A lot of things you don’t know about me now, Annabelle,” he said lightly. “Including my choice of reading material. Though, if I’m not mistaken, Charlie Osgood, the choir director, confiscated that from one of the boys in the junior choir a couple of weeks ago. I guess he forgot to give it back.”

She leaned back against the railing that ran the length of the choir loft. “Likely story. So what is your choice of reading material now? It used to be environmental journals.”

“Still is. Though I manage to get in a few
sports magazines once in a while and I find time to read the occasional novel.”

“What, no
Preacher’s Weekly
?”

“Actually, it’s
Minister’s Quarterly
.”

“Do you still read Tony Hillerman and Tom Clancy?”

He nodded. “And Clive Barker, Dean Koontz.”

Annabelle made a tsking sound. “A minister reading horror. Whatever would the board of deacons say?”

Gregory grinned. “Well, they usually ask me to please read faster. They tend to borrow my books. So how about you, Annabelle? You still read science fiction and romance?”

“I do. Though I manage to work in a little Dean Koontz myself, on occasion.”

Gregory raised his eyebrows. “
You
reading horror? You couldn’t even watch late-night horror movies without hiding your eyes.”

“Like I said before, that was long, long ago.”

“In a galaxy far, far away. I know. You always did have a thing for
Star Wars
.”

“Maybe it was Harrison Ford I had a thing for. Did you ever think of that?”

“Personally, I always thought it was Darth Vader. Tall, dark, and electronic.”

Annabelle’s expression softened with memories. “I remember when you dressed up like Darth Vader for that Kappa Delta frat party.”

“And you dressed like Princess Leia and spent
the afternoon trying to pin your hair in those big twists over each ear, until Marty suggested you try oversized earmuffs instead.”

“And remember when the policeman stopped us because your taillight was out? When he walked up to the car window, he didn’t even bat an eye.”

Gregory chuckled. “All he said was ‘The Empire can’t expect to take over the galaxy if it can’t keep one measly little car in working order.’ ”

They both smiled at the shared memory, then Gregory said, “I’m glad you came back tonight. I’ve been wanting to thank you for taking the time to work on the play with the kids. It would have been too much for Clara Walling and Elsie Wilson to handle, particularly with Buddy getting married soon. Elsie is so distracted with the wedding, and that leaves most of the burden on poor Clara. Besides, I think it’s good for the kids to work with a young adult for a change.”