Anna Louise listened to the rambling diatribe all the way through to the end, then sighed wearily. The caller hadn’t said anything she hadn’t heard a hundred times before. From her own pastor in Tennessee to her colleagues at seminary, just about everyone had told her she was wrong to insist on becoming a preacher. They didn’t understand that the calling had been every bit as powerful for her as it had been for them. Or if they did understand that much, they thought she should have been satisfied with a more traditional role.
“Teach Sunday school,” one friend had suggested.
“Graduate from seminary, if you must, but just take a chaplaincy in a hospital. Folks are used to being cared for by women there. They won’t blink an eye if you come to pray with them. Just don’t force yourself into a job that God never meant to be held by a woman.”
She’d countered that one by reeling off passages of Scripture of her own. Unfortunately she couldn’t fight an anonymous caller who left messages and never confronted her face-to-face. Listening to the all-too-familiar criticism didn’t frighten her nearly so much as it exhausted her. She wondered if there would come a day when she would no longer have the strength to fight those who opposed her, people who shared Pastor Orville Patterson’s beliefs.
She doubted that had been Orville on the phone. He didn’t waste time with anonymous harassment. He was vocal and obvious about his objections. She doubted there was a soul in the entire Shenandoah Valley who didn’t know where Orville stood on the subject of her being pastor of the Kiley church and his five-year fight to have her removed. Up until now, though, he hadn’t had the votes. Those two new pastors had seemingly changed the balance of power.
Erasing the message, she drew in a deep breath and made up her mind to go to Willow Creek, after all. Somehow the prospect of spending a night alone in this house, perhaps getting even more threatening calls, was more than she could bear.
Upstairs, she put on her swimsuit under a pair of knee-length shorts and a shapeless blouse that she knotted at the waist. Only at the last second as she drove up the hill did she wonder if she wasn’t leaving the frying pan to jump straight into the fire.
* * *
Richard spread a blanket on the bank alongside Willow Creek where it curved behind Maisey’s property and formed a cool, shimmering pond. He moved the heavy picnic basket to the middle of the blanket. When he looked up, he spotted Maisey making her way along the bank, lugging a folding chair. He rushed to take it from her.
“I told you I’d come back to get the chair,” he scolded.
“It doesn’t weigh much more than a feather,” she argued. “Besides, I feel better when I’m being useful.”
“Wasn’t fixing this picnic useful enough? That basket weighs a ton. What’s in there, anyway? Did you make a batch of biscuits that turned out like bricks?”
“Very funny. You know my biscuits always turn out light and fluffy.”
“Then how many ham-and-biscuit sandwiches did you put in there? Enough for the whole town?”
“I know how you eat, young man, especially after you’ve put in a hard day’s work. You’ve been tussling with the wallpaper for the parlor all day. And Anna Louise can usually be persuaded to eat several.”
“I told you she wasn’t coming,” he reminded her.
“We’ll see,” she said, just as he had to Anna Louise earlier.
He’d had time to think about it since then and had decided that he’d been overly confident about her having a change of heart. “Do you want to wade a bit now or are you hungry?” he asked Maisey.
“You go for your swim. I think I’ll sit right here in the shade and rest a bit.”
Richard was in the middle of the creek, enjoying the way the refreshingly cool water slid over his bare skin when he heard Anna Louise’s voice.
“Well, I’ll be,” he muttered, his gaze fixed on her as she sashayed into view. He kept his eyes on her as she chatted with Maisey, then slowly stripped off her shorts and blouse to reveal a black, one-piece bathing suit that she obviously thought was sedate.
Somebody ought to explain to her that she was still baring enough skin to make a man’s heart thunder in his chest. And what was covered wasn’t exactly a mystery. That suit molded itself to her in a way that revealed every tantalizing curve, from her generous bosom to her nipped-in waist and her rounded bottom. He dove beneath the surface of the creek in the misguided hope that the water would cool his suddenly overheated brain.
Finally he surfaced and a ripple in the the water warned him barely an instant before Anna Louise swam into view beside him with long, clean strokes that cut smoothly through the water.
“I’m surprised to see you,” he said as she stood up and brushed the strands of red hair back from a face that was so breathtakingly perfect it almost brought his heart skidding to a halt. He studied each feature, lingering at her full, tempting lips, before finally settling his gaze on her eyes. That’s when he detected the faint hint of dismay. He had a gut feeling that it wasn’t his blatant survey that was troubling her.
“Are you okay?”
“Sure,” she said blithely. Too blithely.
“What’s going on, Anna Louise? Something’s wrong. I can see it in your eyes.”
She shook her head, spraying him with droplets of water. “Nothing I can’t handle.”
He was troubled by the sense that she was all bravado. “Would you ask for help if you needed it?”
“I’m not a fool,” she said stiffly. “Of course I would.”
He gave a curt nod of satisfaction. That would have to do for now. He forced a challenging note into his voice. “Race you to the willow tree at the curve.”
Her expression relaxed at
