The Sweet By and By (5 page)

“Sorry, Jade,” the reverend said.

“No, no, it's okay.” If that was the worst that happened . . . Jade relaxed her shoulders. The room opened up. The air circulated, and her heart ceased to throb.

“So how are the wedding plans coming along?” The reverend folded his hands on top of his cluttered oak desk.

“Good, good.” Max shifted his position, stretching his left leg. “Jade?”

“I'm a two-witnesses-and-justice-of-the-peace kind of girl. Max's mom has done most of the planning.”

“You're marrying a wise woman, Max.” Reverend Girden gave her a knowing smile.

“I don't know how I deserve her.”

No, it's me. I'm the lucky one.

“Haven't seen you two at church lately.” The reverend got right to business.

“No, I guess we've . . .” Max shifted carefully again with a side peek at Jade. Why look at her? She didn't have an excuse. “Uh, we've been busy.”

“My wife, Darnell, raves about your shop, Jade. She bought an antique grandfather clock from you.”

“I remember. One of my first big spenders.”

“And me on a minister's salary.” He chuckled. “Darnell captured my heart the first time I saw her, and I've found it hard to deny her anything ever since. She's a good woman.”

“I fell in love the first time I walked into the Blue Umbrella.” Max cupped his hand over Jade's. “That old Five & Dime where I used to buy jawbreakers and ice cream now had the most beautiful woman.”

“But I wasn't for sale.”

The reverend rocked back in his chair, fingers clasped over his middle.

“I had to ask her to dinner to get her to even look my way.” Max grinned.

Jade's eyes watered. If he only knew. The night he pushed open the Blue Umbrella's front door and asked her to dinner, the brittle bandages wrapped around her scarred heart had finally begun to fall away.

“What about you, Jade? Was it love at first sight?” The reverend peered at her.

“Me?” She tightened her fingers around the tips of Max's. “He was standing in front of Sugar Plumbs, holding a tall coffee and telling stories that made Mae Plumb belly laugh.”

“Love is a wonderful thing . . . a wonderful thing. And weddings . . .” The reverend searched through his desk drawers. “Ah, here.” He held up a compact black binder. “Weddings are my favorite part of the job.”

“Better than funerals,” Jade said, running her moist palm over her jeans.

“Not always.” Reverend Girden flipped open the notebook. “We had a parishioner pass about four or five years ago of cancer. Never saw such grace and peace on a person. On hard days, I'd stop by her place just for a bit of sunshine. Even in her pain, she reflected the light of Jesus. During her funeral, for about a good thirty seconds, I was physically jealous. Mrs. Dover stood in the full, unveiled presence of Jesus. And I was stuck on earth.”

Full, unveiled presence of Jesus? What was he talking about? Jade ached to ask, but when he looked at her, the flutter in her chest stole her voice and tugged her gaze to her shoes.

“This is my marrying book,” he said, patting the cover, “with different ceremony and wording options.”

“I don't think we want anything fancy, do we, Jade?” Max slid forward slowly, a pinch in his expression, angling to see the book.

“I just want us to be honest and sincere in what we pledge.” Once, she'd fiercely loved a boy who'd promised his love
forever
. But his
forever
only lasted six months.

“Whatever you think is best, Reverend,” Max said.

The reverend jotted a note. “How are you two doing otherwise? Getting along all right? Weddings can be trying on a relationship.”

“We're doing well.” Max squeezed her hand. “What do you think?”

“I think November fourteenth can't come soon enough.” Allowing a stranger, a holy man, to probe into their relationship made Jade uncomfortable.

“Have you talked finances? Who does which chores? Where to spend holidays?”

“Max can do the finances,” Jade offered. “I have my fill with the shop.”

“We seem to have a good routine.” Max shrugged. “When we're at her house, she cooks and I clean. At my place, I cook and she falls asleep on the couch.”

The reverend laughed.

“I'm close to my brother and sister, but”—Jade glanced at Max, squeezing his fingers—“holidays aren't a big deal in my family. The Bensons' home seems to be a nice place for holidays.”

The reverend rolled out his bottom lip—
I see
—and jotted a note. “What about children? Believe it or not, a lot of couples get married without talking about children. How many and when?”

Jade drew her hand away from Max's and sat stiff-backed against her chair.

Is this where it all hits the fan?
She tightened her jaw and chest, dug in her heels, and leaned against her soul's closet door.

“We've discussed children as they relate to the big picture,” Max said, “but without details. I'd like children anytime, really. I'm thirty-six . . . Jade?”

“Sure.” She tipped her head.
Anytime.

“Do you have children from past relationships? Max, I know you don't, but Jade? Any ex-husbands, fiancés?”

“No. None.” How was this any of his business?

“You two have discussed past relationships, hurts, and pains?” Reverend Girden's fire-blue gaze burned through her.

Jade felt exposed, and as if her Secret roll-on was completely letting her down.

“We've talked. Some.” Max rubbed his hands together, resting forward with his forearms on his thighs.

“Our pasts don't matter much to us, Reverend,” Jade said with a rise of confidence.

“Right,” Max said. “We consider our relationship a clean slate. Who she was with before me doesn't matter.”

So he
was
listening that evening she rambled on about her life beginning the day she met him and the past being more of an anchor than a revelator. It sounded so wise and philosophical, but the dozing Max had merely muttered “Mm-hm” from a subconscious state of twilight.

“Interesting.” The reverend rocked back and forth in his seat. “So Jade doesn't know you've been engaged, Max?”

“Well, yes, she knows about Rice, yes.” Max rubbed his thumb over hers. “Kind of hard to hide it since Rice grew up here . . . but Jade knows that relationship is ancient history now.”

“How about you, Jade?”

“You mean besides grade-school crushes?” Jade laughed, flipping her hair away from her face, shrugging with her palms open. “I've been waiting all my life for Max.”

Max stretched across his chair and kissed her cheek. “Thanks for finding me.”

“I understand where you two are coming from, and I've seen cases where couples talk too much about their past loves and experiences, but communication is the key to a strong relationship. If I had a dollar for every couple who could solve their problems with honest, open conversation, I'd be sailing my yacht in the Caribbean. Don't be too cautious with this past thing.” He shook his head, searching under the papers on his desk. “Hidden things have a way of coming to light. Ah, here it is.” He flashed a gold pen.

“I'm confident in our relationship and communication, Reverend,” Max said.

“Good, good.” The reverend shuffled through the papers again. “I'm not usually this disorganized. Here we go.” He held up a printout this time. “Your wedding is on the fourteenth; all set, ready to go. Just one thing—Max, I'm sure you're aware of the church's desire to unite men and women in marriage who are of the same faith.”

Max tipped his head to one side and scratched behind his ear. “Y-yes.”

“Jade, do you have a certificate of baptism confirming you've accepted the tenets of the Christian faith?”

“Certificate?” Once again, her Secret roll-on was breaking down.

“Yes. Or a letter from your pastor confirming your profession of faith.”

“Reverend, just take her word. Jade's a good woman.” Max patted her arm.

Made her feel like the old gray mare.

“What's the name of your home church, Jade?” Reverend Girden scribbled on the found paper with his found gold pen.

“Um, it was, um, my granny's church. Prairie City Community Church in Iowa.”

The reverend gazed at her from under his brow. “Have you been baptized, Jade? Made a profession of faith?”

“Formally? No. But I do believe in God, Reverend.”

“I see.” He closed his marrying book. “We don't like to unite people merely because they are spiritual or believe in God, but because they have the common foundation of a profession of faith in Jesus Christ.”

“Reverend.” Max rose to his feet. “Where are you going with this?”

“Max, I know you've professed faith in Jesus Christ as a boy, but I'd like to know where Jade stands before I unite you two in the covenant of marriage before God and the congregation. Certainly, you understand faith is an essential part of a successful marriage.”

“Jade can believe whatever she wants.” Max maneuvered around to the back of the chair, bending slightly forward until he could square away his back. His pain didn't seem to hinder his defense abilities. “I'm not demanding she convert.”

For a long, hard moment, no one spoke. Jade perspired and shot Max a dozen mental messages.
Let's go.

“I'm not trying to be the bad guy here, Max.” Reverend Girden flipped open his Bible and handed it to Jade. “I just want Jade to know Jesus loves her. He has a destiny for her. Read verse seventeen. Yeah, there, Psalm 139.”

Her voice didn't engage at first, a swell of emotion crashing over her. Clearing her throat, shifting in her chair, Jade blinked her eyes clear. “‘How precious also are Your thoughts to me, O God! How great is the sum of them.'” She closed the book.

“You're always on His mind, Jade.”

She nodded, a cold tear slipping down her cheek, dropping from the edge of her chin.

“Reverend.” Max white-knuckled the back of his chair. “We're less than five weeks away from the wedding. I don't want you or anyone coercing Jade into a belief system just so we can get married in the church.”

Reverend Girden rose, shoulders taut as he towered over his desk. “I can't ask her to make vows before God if she doesn't believe.” He tapped his gold pen against the desk absently. “I need to know where she stands. Perhaps you'd be happier with a civil ceremony. Judge Anders does a fine job.”

“I told you, I believe in God.” Jade shot to her feet. “I do, Reverend. I attended church with my granny, attended Sunday school.” She lifted a medallion from beneath the ridge of her sweater. “My Paps gave me these praying hands so I'd remember Jesus prayed for me.”

“Jade, can you tell me what's in your heart? Do you know God is glad over you?”

The reverend didn't get it. God would never want her. Not if He was truly good. He couldn't possibly. Inviting her in would darken the splendor of His beauty.

“What's in my heart? That I love Maxwell Benson. That I want to spend my life with him. I can't believe how lucky I am to have found him.”

Max wrapped her in his arms, kissing her cheek.

“Why not take a few classes with me, Jade? Be sure of your salvation,” the reverend said.

“Jade, no, you're not required.” Max shoved her chair aside and opened the door. “The Bensons founded this church. Paid to have the west wing addition.

And I believe we can be married here if we want.”

“Max, yes, but there is a requirement for a religious ceremony—”

Down the main sanctuary aisle, his footsteps echoing, and out to the parking lot, Max fumed. He aimed his key fob at the Mercedes like a light saber.

“Max, calm down.” A sour taste swirled in her throat. “I don't mind taking classes if—”

“He's got some nerve.” Max fired up the engine.

“For what? The reverend seems to think marriage is more than pomp and circumstance. Why can't he ask his questions?”

“Because he challenged our integrity.”

“And you challenged his. Call it even.” Light from streetlamps fell over Jade's legs as Max turned out of the parking lot, heading toward Main Street.

“He's a man of the cloth. Wouldn't you check a new client's credentials, or make sure a new attorney actually passed the bar?”

“It's not the same.” Max stopped at the four-way, gunned the gas, then fired across the small intersection.

“Not to you and me, maybe, but to him.”

“Don't defend Reverend Girden, Jade. Are you hungry?”

“A civil ceremony is fine. I have a frozen pizza at home.”

“I know, I know, but the Bensons and Mom's family, the Carpenters, have been members of First Baptist Congregation since 1890-something. It would feel cheap to not include God somehow. I'm okay with your faith. Why can't he be?”

“What you told him about me made me love you more.” Her eyes welled up.

“All true, babe.” He looked over at her. “I love you. Guess that's why it bothers me he's making such an issue of whether you profess faith in Jesus Christ or not.” One of Whisper Hollow's two traffic lights caught Max with a red at Divine Drive and Cherish Hill. As they waited for green, Max turned to Jade and pressed his lips to her forehead. “I think I'm addicted to you.”

Jade settled into the plush leather seat as the light turned green and Max eased toward the Blue Umbrella. She hung Max's confession in the secret room of her heart, and she'd visit there on the hard, blue days.

He loved her, and she was counting on him.

Four

Saturday morning, Beryl woke with a hankering for something she couldn't explain in a single word. Phantom scents and sounds from the old house lingered around her—the clatter of her mother in the kitchen frying eggs and bacon, the scent of brewing coffee and a hickory fire.