Andrew, sorry about that.”
But the youth minister only waved away the apology, his focus on Charity’s retreating car. A smile lit his face when he finally turned back to Rick. “Did you hear me, man? It’s a boy.” It didn’t seem to matter to Andrew that he looked like he hadn’t slept since the Fourth of July and his hair had hat head, minus the hat.
“Oh, that’s great.” Rick stepped forward and gripped the other man’s hand. “Congratulations.” Andrew’s laughter was so contagious that Rick couldn’t help joining in, despite his sour mood.
“It all happened so fast. He’s so tiny. It was exciting and scary. You just wouldn’t believe—”
“Is the baby okay?” Rick interrupted, trying to decipher the cryptic dialogue. “Is your wife okay?”
Andrew beamed as he breathed deeply and started again. “He’s great. Serena’s great. Eight pounds, twelve ounces. Him, not her. A head full of dark hair. That’s the both of them.” He stopped to chuckle at his joke. “Seth Michael Westin. Our boy.” He stepped away long enough to pass blue bubblegum cigars out to several crew members before handing one to Rick.
What did that kind of joy feel like? Rick couldn’t begin to guess, and he refused to let himself wonder and risk wishing. “What good news,” he said when he could think of nothing else to say.
Rusty saved him from further platitudes by hurrying through the framed area where they would eventually hang glass double doors. Never one to worry about his manly-man image, Rusty wrapped Andrew in a bear hug that had to hurt.
“Brother Andrew, don’t tell me you got yourself a boy.” He slapped the youth minister’s back when he finally released him.
“Sure did.” Andrew stuffed a plastic-wrapped gum cigar into the other man’s mouth. “He’s a keeper, too.”
Rusty pulled the candy out of his mouth and twirled it in his fingers. “What does your sweet step-daughter think of her baby brother?”
“Tessa hasn’t met him yet. I’m going to shower and then pick her up from Robert and Diana Lidstrom’s, so we can go visit Mommy and Seth.”
“Did the delivery go okay?” Rusty asked the question casually, leaning against the sawhorse in the relaxed pose of a seasoned father of three. “Any complications?”
“No, it was real easy—at least for me.” Andrew laughed again. “But it was strange having Charity as the labor and delivery nurse.” He glanced back to the drive Charity had just exited.
“Isn’t she great?” Rusty must have missed the way Rick tensed and Andrew startled when he said that. “She was in there when Tricia had Max two years ago. Didn’t even break a sweat when Max came breech and ended up in an emergency C-section.”
As the two sang more of Charity’s praises, Rick stepped away from both the conversation and comments he couldn’t reconcile with the scrubs-wearing shrew, who had made his acquaintance with a sledgehammer. At least he’d moved far enough away that they wouldn’t expect him to comment when Andrew wondered aloud why the object of their discussion had just raced from the church lot.
“Probably some woman thing,” one of them said, with the other buying that easy explanation.
Rick didn’t believe there was anything easy about understanding what made Charity Sims tick—double time. But then why was he wasting precious seconds thinking about that irrational woman? Just who did she think she was, anyway, being the censor and church police, all rolled up into one?
Everything about her was ironic, her name most of all. Charity. He couldn’t imagine anyone less charitable. And that sun-kissed exterior of hers couldn’t have been more incongruent with the dark inside he’d glimpsed. Without invitation, long tresses of golden thread appeared in his thoughts. She’d worn her hair tied back, but a few strands had escaped, making him imagine a riotous mane had it all been set free. But the green-gold eyes he envisioned next, their superior expression judging and convicting him with a single glance, cleared his thoughts of such nonsense.
This woman was a perfect example of why he kept his personal relationship with God just that—personal. She reminded him of those biblical Pharisees, praying out loud on the temple steps for show while they didn’t know the Father at all deep inside, where it counted. Was she just like them, a hypocrite play-acting her faith for an audience? She’d certainly deserved applause for that performance on the church lawn.
“Boss, if you’re planning to daydream all morning, then the rest of us would like to head off on our Labor Day weekend.”
Rusty’s chiding sent Rick slamming back to earth, bringing resentment along for the ride. “Funny, I thought my foreman and crew didn’t have to be led by the hand.” The words were barely out of his mouth, and he already regretted them. Rusty Williams was his best friend—his only friend. He’d never let anyone else get that close. “Hey, sorry—”
But the foreman shook it away with a wave and grin. Good ol’ Rusty. Rick moved back to his power saw as the table saw across the building site roared to life. As he marked a two-by-four to be cut, he concluded he wouldn’t waste any more energy thinking about the motivations of the annoying Charity Sims.
He would focus on more important things like completing this center project on time and proving that R and J Construction was ready to add more commercial projects to its residential work. Instead of worrying about that woman’s contradictions, he would concentrate on the irony that the Hickory Ridge project presented. In order to push his company firmly out of the red column and into the black, he had to work in the one place he had long disdained—a church.
Charity parked in the garage but couldn’t convince her body to climb out of the car. That made no sense at all. She needed to get her thoughts in perspective, and who better to help her than Mother? Laura Sims would applaud her, first for her dignity in facing the Westin issue and later for her fortitude in putting that nasty general contractor in his place.
Why did that certain approval hold so little appeal for her today? Again, she wondered whether she’d been right to reproach the builder in front of his crew, even if he had been wrong. She still could see the shocked expression on his bronzed face and the contempt that had trailed so closely behind it. Could she possibly deserve his derision?
The squeak of the interior garage door helped her shake the image that filled her with humiliation rather than the holy vindication she would have expected.
“Charity, dear, you’re not planning to spend the whole morning in the car, are you?” Laura stood in the doorway, wiping her hands on her apron. “I’ve been holding breakfast for you, and here you are letting it get cold while you sit behind your steering wheel.”
“Sorry, Mother—”
“I should think so. I didn’t even get a call that you would be late. I deserve that much consideration. You know how I worry.”
As much as she resented her mother playing her, Charity felt her strings being plucked and recognized she had no choice but to produce a melody. “I don’t know what I was thinking. I should have called, but I didn’t want to wake you. I know how you like to sleep in on Saturdays.”
She would have mentioned she was twenty-nine years old—plenty old enough to care for herself—if she’d thought it would
