Love, Honor, and Betray

throughout the vestibule and down the center aisle were also occupied. God had truly blessed DeliveranceOutreach and Curtis’s overall ministry. When Curtis had first started out as a new pastor down in Atlanta, he’d only had maybethree hundred members. Then he’d taken a position at Faith Missionary Baptist Church in Chicago, which had a membership ofthree thousand. After that, he’d become the pastor of Truth Missionary Baptist Church, and they’d had a large membership,too. But after being ousted from both the latter two congregations, Curtis had made the decision to found his own church outhere in Mitchell, a smaller city about ninety miles northwest of Chicago. He and Charlotte had worked diligently toward gainingthe trust of every Mitchellite they could, and from the looks of the crowd they had clearly succeeded. They had a huge following,and once they moved into a larger facility, Curtis had no doubt their membership would grow tenfold. He knew this becausefolks regularly came up to him in public, saying how they just couldn’t deal with struggling to find a parking spot and thenfighting to get a seat inside the sanctuary. But then they would go on to say how they couldn’t wait for the new buildingto be completed so they could finally start attending service, and in some cases, people couldn’t wait to join.

The choir finished singing and took their seats, and Curtis went to the podium.

“This is the day the Lord hath made, so let us rejoice and be glad in it.”

“Amen,” everyone said.

“You know, for the last few minutes, I sat here scanning every single pew and couldn’t help but give God a lot of praise andmuch thanks. I know we’re overcrowded, and that it’s not the most comfortable situation for any of us to be in, but if youcan just hold on for another four months, we’ll finally be moving into the new building Memorial Day weekend.”

Applause echoed from every direction, and Curtis smiled.

“It’s been a long journey, but one I believe has been very well worth traveling. As a congregation, we’ve had a number ofups and downs, mainly because of some very selfish mistakes I made in my personal life, so I just want you to know how muchI love and appreciate all of you. I want you to know how indebted I am to each of you for remaining by my side and not givingup on me.”

There was more applause.

“I also want to remind everyone about the business meeting two days from now, as we’ll be giving an update on the final stagesof the building process. We’ll share what our overall sanctuary capacity will be, which thankfully is a bit more than we’doriginally talked about, and we’ll also discuss a few surprises and answer any questions you might have. Elder Jamison hasput together a wonderful agenda, so I hope you will all plan on being here.”

“What surprises?” he heard a woman say and many other members chattering.

“Oh, did I say ‘surprise’?” he said teasingly, and everyone laughed. “Well, since we were planning to tell you on Tuesdayanyway, you may as well know that we’ve added on a full café, an amazing coffee shop, and a Christian bookstore.”

The congregation was thrilled and spoke among themselves accordingly, but what saddened Curtis was the nonchalant look onhis wife’s face. She looked as though she couldn’t care less about the news he’d just announced, or anything else for thatmatter, and now Curtis knew it was time—time they had a heart-to-heart conversation about Curtina. Time they got everythingcompletely out in the open and dealt with this troubling dilemma. It was time they both stopped pretending that all was wellinside the Black family household—when it clearly wasn’t.

Chapter 3

As soon as they’d left the church, they’d driven straight over to Aunt Emma’s to have Sunday dinner, but now they were homeand Charlotte was stuffed. Aunt Emma, of course, had done her usual and cooked way too much food, but everything had tastedwonderful. The corn bread and turkey dressing, candied yams, green beans, macaroni and cheese, and a to-die-for banana pudding.

“See you later, Mom,” Matthew said, rushing into the bedroom and kissing her good-bye, the same as he did every Sunday afternoon.“See you later, Dad,” he said, bumping fists with him. “I’m out.”

“You be careful, Matt,” Charlotte said. “Because you know how nervous you make me whenever you’re out driving around.”

“Aw, Mom. I’m not a baby, and I’m only going over to Elijah’s.”

“Still, you be safe out there. And absolutely no text­ing when you’re behind the wheel.”

“Listen to your mother,” Curtis said, smiling, and Charlotte knew it was because he thought she was a bit too overprotective.He did agree with her about the “no texting” policy, but he was a lot more lax about everything else. He didn’t worry nearlyas much as she did, but he was a man and couldn’t be expect­ed to.

“I hear you, Mom, and I will,” Matthew yelled from downstairs.

“He’ll be fine,” Curtis said.

“I know, but it’s just that he’s my baby, and teenagers never take enough precautions. He’s a good driver, but I still worryabout him.”

Charlotte unbuttoned the jacket to her gold-buttoned knit suit and slipped off her skirt. Then, she removed her pantyhoseand put on a velour sweat suit. When she’d taken her church clothing inside the closet, she came back into the bedroom, preparingto go down to the family room, but Curtis stopped her.

“Hey, we need to talk. We need to do it today, and that’s why I asked Aunt Emma if she could keep Curtina for a couple ofhours.”

Charlotte wasn’t sure what this was about exactly, but she sat down on the side of the bed. Curtis sat down next to her.

“First of all, I know you’re still not happy about Curtina having to move in with us, and I’m really sorry about that. Sowhat I want to know is how I can make things better for you. All you have to do is tell me, and I’ll do whatever I can.”

At first Charlotte just looked at him, debating