Chapter 16
Chapter Sixteen
Tessa looked at the clock on the wall again, trying to focus on the book she was reading. She’d had to force herself to quit looking at her phone, even though she would hear the chime if she got a notification. Caleb should be back by now shouldn’t he?
The front door creaked and she looked over at the archway to the hall. Pops came into view, holding the wall and toeing off his boots.
“All good here?”
She set aside the book she hadn’t really been reading. He’d been worried about leaving her alone to go out and check the livestock. “Quiet. Did you see Gus outside?”
Pops nodded. “He’ll be right behind me.”
The dog could come and go from the mudroom door, through the laundry room, into the house via his dog door—the heavy duty, weatherproof kind he had to push open, but which didn’t let the cold in, or the heat of summer.
“Did you try to call your dad?”
Tessa followed him to the kitchen. “He’s supposed to call me when he’s being discharged so I can go get him.”
Pops glanced over before he pulled two mugs from the cupboard. She took a seat at the little kitchen table. He set a mug of coffee in front of her and sat across the table.
“He isn’t even sorry.” She touched the handle of the mug but didn’t lift it. “He’d probably say he did the right thing, and considering what he had in his safe maybe it is. But he lied to me.”
“It’s always hard when trust is broken, or you realize someone isn’t who you thought they were.”
She nodded. “This is big stakes, national security stuff. I’m not supposed to be privy to things like that. I’m a regular person in a small town. I don’t live on that…scale.”
“We’re all important.”
“But I like my life. I like that it’s small and local. It isn’t a bad thing.” She sniffed. “Caleb is an amazing person who has withstood a whole lot the past few weeks. He’s determined to do the right thing.”
They’d talked a little last night, before he went to sleep on the couch. She admired him more now than she even had before, which was a lot.
“The fact my dad is involved?” Tessa shook her head. “He isn’t who I thought. It’s like he wants to be part of this, so he can be important. Play a role in it. Maybe relive some of the glory days of being a Marine—if that’s even a thing.”
“And if he needs that?” Pops shrugged. “Might not be a bad thing to have another good person in the world fighting for what’s right.”
Tessa shook her head, but she agreed. “It’s more like…” She wasn’t sure she knew how to explain it.
“He misrepresented himself.”
She nodded. “That’s it. He told me he was one thing or lived like he was one thing. Now I find out that isn’t the truth?”
“Forgiveness is a command we’re asked to follow whether the other person is repentant or not. He’s your father, and a pastor. It’s going to have to be something you contend with the Lord about.”
She lived in his house, and under his leadership, but as an adult and not a child, it wasn’t like her father told her what to do.
As long as there was love and respect between them she figured integrity looked like following the Lord, doing what He asked her to do, and giving her father the space to do the same.
She would rather be falling head over heels for Caleb, enjoying the first blush of romance without the fate of the world hanging in the balance.
Or without God apparently needing to grow her character through this thing with her father, where she needed to tackle their relationship going forward before she committed to Caleb.
Tessa wanted to be swept off her feet.
The kind of romance where she could enjoy herself and forget about her cares for a while.
Kind of like the joy of Christmas morning.
It always followed a Christmas Eve service at church that was the result of weeks, or sometimes months, of work.
Knowing that was all done meant she could enjoy Christmas day at home with her family—Pops and her dad.
When all the tears, the drama, the conflict, of the past year faded and she could rest and celebrate.
She’d thought that what was happening between her and Caleb might be different.
As if she could finally let go and enjoy her life, knowing God had given her the desires of her heart.
The things she’d been praying for over the past…
she didn’t even know how many years. Since she’d first realized what romance was, and that God had ordained it.
Thank You for bringing him back here. It felt a bit self-serving to pray for what she wanted when he had a job to do, and a case to finish. Protect us all from harm. Your will be done—not mine. She had to be content, no matter what happened.
Whether Caleb chose her or not.
Outside, Gus started barking but the sound abruptly cut off. She glanced toward the window while Pops stood, striding fast to the mudroom door. It creaked on its hinges and the door snapped shut.
Tessa heard movement in the front hall and twisted back that way.
What she saw had her scrambling out of the chair and backing up on unsteady legs before her mind even realized what she was looking at.
“You.” Her voice sounded thin and shaky inside her head, over the rushing sound in her ears.
The FBI agent, Bruce Edwards, stepped into the kitchen from the hall, a gun in his hand. Looking rumpled. Blood on his thigh, running down the outside of his pant leg. He’d tied something over it and the material looked like a T-shirt. It was soaked with blood.
The look on his face was crazed. “That’s right. Me.” He motioned at her with the gun. “Your boyfriend and I are going to have a reckoning. He owes me and I intend to collect.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She shook her head, wondering where Pops and Gus were but also praying they didn’t come in. Tessa didn’t want them to get hurt.
“Take a seat.” He motioned toward the table with the gun.
Tessa couldn’t move. He raised the gun to the ceiling and pulled the trigger. She hunched in on herself, screaming.
“Sit!” His yell echoed in the room.
Tessa scurried to the table and sat. “Whatever you want, just take it and go.”
Maybe he wanted her life, but it might be better if he just killed her and ended it quickly. Would he give her the consideration of killing her in a way that would be instantaneous? She couldn’t find the words to ask.
Special Agent Edwards. Bruce—that was his name.
“Bruce—”
“I didn’t give you permission to speak.”
She hesitated.
“Hands on the table.”
She laid her palms on the table, her fingers splayed.
“If you move I’ll put a bullet in that pretty face of yours. Which would be a shame.”
Tessa gritted her teeth, no weapons she could use to fight back. Nothing she could say that would resolve this. And yet, she still had all the power contained in a simple prayer to her Creator. She had the power of God to stand firm no matter what happened.
She said, “What do you want?”
His lips curled as if her question amused him. Edwards shifted and winced but pulled out a chair across from her the way Pops had done. Such a different situation. She wished she could run—or call the sheriff.
Was that what Pops was doing outside? He didn’t always carry his phone on him, but she hoped he had it right now. The older man had to be doing something, or he’d be back in by now. Gus hadn’t come back in and he wasn’t barking.
Please have a plan. She needed Pops to get help.
Edwards said, “Payback.” With the gun in one hand, he pulled a phone from his inside jacket pocket and dialed.
He set the phone on the table in front of him while it rang through the speaker. Someone picked up and a man said, “Is it done?”
Edwards answered, “It will be soon.”
“Enough screwing around. Get me that envelope.”
“Yes, sir.”
The line went dead.
Edwards stared at her. Did he expect her to offer him the envelope, or tell him where it was? She had no idea where Caleb had stashed it, or if he had it on him.
Edwards said, “One more step, old man, and I’ll blow her head off.”
“You shoot her, and they’ll be scraping you off my kitchen floor.” Pops’ voice came from her right, but she didn’t take her attention from the gun pointed at her.
Edwards chuckled, a low and throaty sound. “So you’re the one who raised Caleb Rourke.”
“It’s in the blood.”
“More than you know, old man.”
“Oh, you’d be surprised what I know,” Pops said.
Tessa felt a tear leak from the corner of her eye and slide down her cheek.
Edwards said, “Leave that shotgun in the hall and come take a seat with the lovely Tessa.”
“Thought you wanted the envelope.”
Tessa gasped. Was he just going to hand it over?
Edwards shifted in his seat. “You know where he put it?”
“Like I said, you’d be surprised what I know.” He paused. “Let Tessa go, and I’ll get you what you want.”
“How about you get me what I want in the next two minutes, and I’ll keep from shooting her?” Edwards sounded deadly serious.
Tessa inhaled sharply.
“Even if I get you the invoice and the photo, we still know. You can kill me and destroy those papers, but Caleb isn’t here.
He won’t keep quiet. Senator Colin Chathers might be the guy Kessler picked to put in the White House, someone who’ll do what Kessler wants, but that’s not a plan’s gonna succeed, son. ”
She bit the inside of her lip, then said, “You’re backing a losing side, Special Agent Edwards, so you can just cut your losses and go. I’m sorry, but you aren’t going to get Kessler what he wants, and whatever you try doesn’t matter. Caleb already beat you. He won.”
His eyes flared.
“All that’s left is for you to surrender your life to Christ. To admit that you’re a sinner.
You’ve broken God’s law and, just like any of us, there’s no way you can be holy enough to live up to His standard.
We all fall short. We can’t keep all the commandments, because we fail all the time.
But God’s grace means He gifts us salvation in spite of the fact we don’t deserve it.
That’s how good He is. And in His kindness He sent his Son. That’s what Christmas is all about.”
Tessa didn’t know where on earth all that had come from. She knew it all inside and out, but had she ever shared her faith like that before?
Edwards stared at her. “Are you people for real?”
“You’re fighting a losing battle.” Pops still held that shotgun, but low and pointed at the floor. “Unless you get on the right side. Doesn’t mean there won’t be consequences for your actions, if you’ve broken the law then you need to face justice. But you’ll have the peace of God in your heart.”
“I’m gonna kill you both.”
She wanted to tell him the verse that said to live was Christ and to die would be gain, but Tessa couldn’t voice the words aloud even if she believed them.
Every day was a gift of God. It was Christ working in her life so that she could return that gift and live for Him in her small way. If she died here and now, she would gain everything she’d ever wanted. Heaven, and the presence of God for eternity.
She’d never thought she’d have peace about dying. She certainly didn’t have it when it came to the death of someone she loved. They were stronger than her.
Tessa wasn’t sure she would live through a loss like that. Not after watching her mother die.
“Killing us won’t change the truth,” Tessa said. “God loves you. No matter what you’ve done. He died for you.”
More tears rolled down her cheeks.
She had no idea how this situation would turn out but whatever happened, God had her in His hands.
No matter what.