Jenna Mindel - Courting Hope

“Your mother sent you, didn’t she?”

Hope nodded.

“We were finally getting some distance.” Her father’s face looked worn.

“I know.” Her heart tore in two. They may have accepted Sara’s death, but Sinclair’s return reopened the wound and made it feel fresh and sore, like a torn scab.

“Let’s see what your mother has cooked up, huh?”

Hope followed her father out of his workshop. The dog flew past them, barking the whole way, toward a candy-apple-red Camaro that pulled into the driveway.

Sinclair.

“What’s he want?” her father growled.

“I’ll send him on his way.” She glanced into her father’s metal-gray eyes, which looked hard as steel.

Her father slowed her down with a touch of his hand. “Wait. I want to hear what he’s come to say.”

Hope focused on Sinclair as he made his way toward them up the long gravel drive. What did he think he was doing here? The dog trotted alongside him with her tail wagging. Gypsy had always loved Sinclair. Everyone had loved Sinclair.

Once upon a time, Hope had, too.

“Gypsy, come!” She grabbed the dog’s collar and put her in the house.

“Who’s here?” Her mother stepped onto the porch, wiping her hands on a dish towel.

“Sinclair Marsh,” Hope answered, then watched her mother’s expression change to tense concern.

When Sinclair stopped near the porch, the air turned thick and heavy with emotion. There were things that had never been said. Forgiveness that was never granted.

Hope would never forget that day she’d returned from shopping to the horrible scene enfolding in the living room. The police had asked Ryan questions while her father had tried to console her mother. Sinclair had stood alone, looking pale and guilty.

This wasn’t going to go well.

“Mr. and Mrs. Petersen. I didn’t call first, because I figured I should say this in person.” Sinclair looked directly at her father.

“Say what?” her father asked with impatience.

Her mother stepped down to stand next to her husband in the driveway. They’d always thought Sinclair irresponsible. They used to tell her he was a young man they couldn’t trust. Seeing them standing so stiff, the two reminded Hope of a stone wall. Like a permanent fixture of the landscape, her parents were bound to be hard to move.

Hope stayed on the porch and watched and waited.

“I wanted to let you know that I’m the new pastor at Three Corner Community Church.”

“We heard.”

“And...I’m sorry.” Sinclair didn’t waver in his stance. He met her parents’ stone-cold stares without flinching.

“Three years and you’re sorry.” Her father’s voice was low with sarcasm and hurt.

Hope noticed the skin on Sinclair’s neck flush red. This wasn’t easy for him, either.

“I can’t change what happened or my part in it. But I wanted you both to know—” he glanced at her “—the three of you to know, that I’m done running from it.”

Hope watched her father. He looked like a tractor that had been worked too hard and might blow a gasket. And yet Sinclair hadn’t looked away. He faced them with an honest humility she’d never seen in him before. There was no sense of challenge in him, no cockiness.

“That’s what you’ve come to say?”

Sinclair gave a quick nod. “That’s it.”

“Okay then, you’ve said it.” Her father stuffed his hands in his pockets. Conversation over.

Only Sinclair didn’t take the cue right away. He looked like he might say something else but thought better of it. With a tight upper lip, he gave her mother another stiff nod. “Good night, then.”

The three of them watched in silence as Sinclair walked down the drive, got back into his car and pulled out.

Hope released the breath she’d been holding. Not nearly as bad as she’d thought.

“Hope, if you were smart, you’d rethink working there.” Her father stomped up the stairs and entered the house.

Hope didn’t move. She didn’t speak, either. She might say something she’d regret. It didn’t matter that she’d felt the same way today; she was tired of orders and expectations.

She was too old to still live at home, but how could she leave her folks? Her father refused to talk about what had happened, and her mom did her best to keep things even-keeled. And Hope got lost in the mix of trying to please them.

Glancing at the dozen flowerpots she’d helped her mother fill with red geraniums, Hope opened the screen door and went inside. The door closed with a snap behind her.

Her mom caressed her shoulder and smiled. “Give him time, Hope.”

Time? They’d been doing this agonizing dance for too long. She silently followed her mother to the kitchen sink to wash her hands for dinner. No matter how much it might hurt her parents, Hope wasn’t about to quit. Not when the preschool hung in the balance. She’d walked away from so much in her short life, she couldn’t walk away from that. Not without a fight.

Chapter Two

The next morning, Sinclair rushed through the office entrance. He had a box of his sister’s cherry almond scones ready for a peace offering. He glanced at the clock on the wall and grimaced. Nine-thirty. He’d wanted to make it in by nine.

Hope stood near the coffeemaker, looking pretty in a filmy blue top over a white skirt that kissed her knees. The girl he remembered wore shapeless clothes that hid everything. Part of him wished for the old Hope who didn’t have this power to distract him.

He stepped forward, but kept his voice soft. “Morning, Hope.”

She finished stirring creamer into her coffee before turning to glare at him. “How could you do that?”

He didn’t bother with the pretense of asking what she meant. He knew. “I had to face them.”

“Did you really? On your first day? You couldn’t let Judy’s news sink in a little and give them a chance to process it?”

“They deserved to hear it from me.”

“So you go on a search-and-destroy mission to make the Petersens bleed all over again?”

He set the box of scones on her desk. Did he get it all wrong? He’d prayed so hard before making the decision to go to Hope’s house. He’d wanted to clear the air and offer his remorse. Show them that he meant business and was serious about his calling. Looked like he’d botched it. “I’m sorry.”

She made a rude sound. She’d always been able to make him feel like an idiot.

“I’m trying to do the right thing here.”

Her shoulders drooped and all the fight blew out of her as quickly as it had raged. “I wish I knew what that was.”

He stepped forward to touch her shoulder, but he let his hand drop to his side instead. He’d lost the right to offer her comfort when he’d lost her as a friend. When Sara had died.

“They want me to quit.”

“Your parents?” Of course that’s who she was talking about.

She nodded but wouldn’t look at him.

He’d seen a glimmer of softening in Teresa Petersen’s eyes last night. There was hope for forgiveness yet. But he couldn’t rush. That had always been his problem. He rushed too much.

“You still do everything your parents want you to?” He didn’t mean to lower his voice, but his challenge came across pretty clear if the scowl on Hope’s face was any indication.

She still toed the family line. Always responsible, Hope had a servant’s heart that could be taken advantage of. Sinclair regretted that he’d been on the using end far too many times in the past. He remembered calling on Hope for a ride home after he’d partied too hard on summer break. He’d even asked her to pick out Christmas gifts for his mom and sister a couple years in a row. And she’d done what he’d asked because she was a giver instead of a taker like him.