unwanted trinket. Clenching his jaw, he slammed the hammer into the head of the nail, driving it in place. He wanted that woman to know the price he’d paid for her negligence. The orphanage had provided the basics to sustain life, but no affection, no encouragement, no joy, merely existence.
She sent a yearly birthday greeting to the orphanage addressed to Jacob, not even using his last name, as if Smith was a lie. Those cards didn’t diminish her desertion. Merely proved she knew his location yet never bothered to see him. Never bothered to reveal his roots. Never bothered to make sure he survived.
As he pounded shingles into place, his mind drifted back to the winter he was seven. He’d fallen from a tree on the orphanage grounds. With pain searing his broken arm and emptiness branding his heart, he’d lain on the frozen earth staring at the bare branches, silhouetted against a cloudless sky. A boy surrounded by people, yet starving for love, he’d cried out for his mother. No one came.
From that moment, Jake dropped the pretense he’d clung to and faced the truth. He had only those postcards. Postcards couldn’t hold him. Postcards couldn’t wipe away his tears. Postcards couldn’t atone for her abandonment.
At last he’d quieted, then struggled to his feet. Cradling his broken arm against his chest, he’d shuffled toward the orphanage, a vow on his lips.
Never again would he care about that woman. Never again would he deceive himself into believing that one day she’d come for him. Never again would he hold on to hope for a family.
His arm had mended. But in the sixteen years since that day, nothing had proved him wrong.
Even as an adult, when he knew circumstances might’ve made her coming for him difficult, even impossible, he couldn’t find it in his heart to excuse her.
The postcards had been postmarked Indianapolis. Once, just once, a card had come from Peaceful. He’d kept all those postcards. Just to remember the town names. Not that they meant anything to him.
As he hammered another nail home, his stomach clenched. In truth, he’d studied each stroke of the pen, compared the handwriting to his own, searching those pitifully few words for some connection. Never finding one.
After his exoneration and release from prison, he’d spent a month in Indianapolis, searching birth records, locating every Smith he could find, but he hadn’t turned up a clue. For some reason, he had the strong feeling she’d sent the postcards from there to throw him off her trail and he’d find her in Peaceful.
Well, if she’d found peace in this town, perhaps he would, too. Once he’d given her a huge hunk of his opinion. Not charitable of him, but the best he could do with all the bitterness burning inside him.
He didn’t wish her harm. He didn’t even want to disgrace her. He merely needed her to know the penalty he’d paid when she’d swept him under the rug of her life.
The beat of his heart pounded in his temples with the rhythm of his hammer. If there was a God and He was the Author of Life, as some claimed, He hadn’t gone out of His way to lend a hand to Jake’s life story.
Not in the circumstances of his birth.
Not in those years in the orphanage.
Not in the injustice exacted in that courtroom.
He sighed. Why not admit it? He wanted to see his mother with a desperation he couldn’t fathom, yet couldn’t deny. He wanted to meet her. See if they shared a resemblance. Learn the identity of his father. Maybe then he could move on with his life. If only he had a way to make his search easier, a sign with an arrow pointing in the direction to turn. He huffed at such absurdity. What would the sign say? This way leads to Jake Smith’s mother?
“How’s it going?”
Whirling around, Jake scrambled for footing, scraping his knuckles against the hot shingles.
Mrs. Mitchell looked up at him, eyes wide with alarm. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you, but dinner’s ready.”
“My fault, I didn’t hear you coming.” He forced his lips into a grin that pinched like ill-fitting shoes. “Your timing’s perfect. I just replaced the last shingle.”
Her eyes lit. “Oh, now I won’t have to cringe at the first peal of thunder.”
Forcing his gaze away from that sparkle in her eyes, that sweet smile on her lips, he tucked the hammer into his belt. She drew him like a mindless moth to a candle’s flame, a lure that would prove as lethal.
“Any damage inside?” he said, barely able to concentrate with her peering up at him.
“My bedroom ceiling’s cracked. I moved the bed to ensure that I won’t awaken one morning blanketed in plaster.”
Knowing the danger of entanglement, yet unable to stop himself, he said, “Can’t have a chunk of ceiling marring that pretty face of yours.”
The apple of her cheeks colored, but her eyes turned wary. “You men know the words a woman likes to hear.”
Why didn’t an attractive woman like Callie Mitchell appreciate a compliment? “I’ll take a look at the ceiling when I’ve finished the porch.” Jake pivoted out onto the ladder, descending the rungs two at a time, the ladder vibrating with each footfall.
By the time he’d reached the bottom, she’d dashed over and gripped the sides. He all but bumped into her coming off the last step. Wide-eyed and obviously shaken, she quickly moved aside. When had anyone worried about his safety?
“I’m accustomed to ladders and this one’s sturdy.”
“Even a careful man can meet disaster, Mr. Smith.”
No doubt she referred to her husband’s fall, but her remark summed up his life. “Your words don’t give a man much hope.”
Her eyes narrowed, as if trying to see inside of him. “Hope doesn’t come from words of mine. Hope comes from God’s Word.”
A man couldn’t manufacture something he didn’t believe. “I don’t see a point in opening a Bible.”
“Without God’s Word to point me in the right direction, I’d lose my way.” Mrs. Mitchell looked at him with eagerness. “You might give the Bible and church a try.”
“From what I’ve seen, churchgoers aren’t likely to offer clemency.” The words shot out of his mouth before he could stop them. What about this woman made him bleed his innermost thoughts?
Her gaze bored deeper. “Do you need clemency?”
Jake removed his hat and slipped the handkerchief stuffed inside into his hip pocket then swiped the sweat off his brow in the crook of his elbow. It didn’t take a genius to recognize prying. “Reckon we all do.”
A flash of remorse traveled her face. Her eyes lifted to the roof, filling with anguish and self-reproach that pushed against his core. If he didn’t know better, he’d believe Mrs. Mitchell shoved her husband off the roof. Well, he had no interest in getting involved with her or her problems. Yet she looked so fragile standing there fighting back tears.
An overpowering urge to tug her to him, to tell her everything
