What had happened in the past was just that—in the past. It was time to move on.
From the hall came the sound of a door closing. “Quinton?” Besides the housekeeper, he would be the only one in the house at night.
There was no answer. She got to her feet.
In the middle of the night, a ringing phone brought fear. Adam reached to his left to pick it up. “Yes?”
“Adam, I’ll be at your door in five minutes. Krane escaped.”
“How?! Krane was supposed to be under lockdown in a secure mental facility.”
“They were transporting him to the hospital after what they believed was a suicide attempt. The guard thought he was unconscious, turned his back, and was nearly killed.”
“Sara?”
“No one at the ranch is answering. Teams from the regional office are on their way now.”
Adam could barely breathe. Chicago to Texas. Whatever was happening would be over before he could get there. He had left Sara there, considering her safe. “We’re hours away.”
“I know.” Dave’s voice was rough. “Meet me downstairs. We’ll get there as fast as we can.”
“Thomas.”
“Hello, Sara. I told you we would meet again.”
The fear held her frozen by her desk. He was in the house. She looked nervously past him to the open door.
Krane smiled. “Don’t worry. We won’t be interrupted. Quinton should learn to watch his back.”
She was on her own. The handgun was in the top drawer. Dave had ensured she knew how to use it.
He followed her glance and gestured to the chair. “Sit down.”
To put the desk between them, she moved to the chair.
He pulled open the drawer and withdrew the handgun. He set it down on the desk, temptingly close, taunting her to reach for it. “I hear you did a very flattering portrait.”
“I did a portrait.”
He flipped open a folder lying on the desk, scanning a page. “About me?”
She nodded.
“Writing a book?”
He smiled at her silence.
“Truth or fiction?”
Rage had overtaken the fear. “There are no words for your evil.”
His laugh made her skin crawl. “I’m mad. All the doctors say so.” He gestured to the doorway. “After you.”
“No.”
“Sara. Shall I kill Quinton first? You are coming with me.”
He would kill to make her come. He had always wanted her, only her. It was the past all over again. Only now she wasn’t a child.
Lord, give me the courage to trust Your security! If the days of my life have already been numbered by You, then You decide what happens, not this man I fear so much.
Dave would stop him. Adam. Someone would.
And God was here. With her.
She wasn’t going to fear Thomas Krane. Not anymore. Not at the price of her faith. Whatever the outcome, she’d already won this fight.
Sara moved around the edge of the desk, keeping her distance, walking toward the door.
“Drop.”
The terse order came from in front of her.
Sara hit the hardwood floor and heard the shot fired.
She didn’t look behind her. She didn’t want to see the result. “Quinton.” She knew the outcome from the fact he lowered his gun. He was bleeding from a gash on his temple.
“Sorry to be late to the party.”
She reached his side and helped him sit down. “Thank you.”
The phones were dead. By the time she found her cell phone, she could hear the approaching helicopters.
“Adam.” Sara walked into his arms, closed her eyes, and held on.
The conference room in the hospital had become her private sanctuary. She had been watching the dawn lighten the sky. Waiting for Adam and Dave to arrive.
Her long night was over.
In every way.
“I’m sorry I wasn’t here.”
She tightened her hold. “It’s okay. God knew what He was doing.” It could have been a long standoff, another set of memories to give her flashbacks, a crisis that would have pushed away any hope of a future. Instead, it was over. God had removed the threat forever. She had seen the man she feared. He was different than the childhood memories she had of him. Not as tall, not as big…and he bled, he died.
Already the past had a different emotional feel. She thought about the cellar, and it was Kim she remembered, not Krane. They were memories of a childhood spent with her sister. Good memories, no longer blocked by the event that had shut everything else out.
There wasn’t a reason to fear what would happen when God was the One taking care of her.
Dave rested his hand on her shoulder. “Quinton said you have already given your statement.”
“I have.” Concerned at how shaken her brother looked, she reached for his hand. “I sent you back to Chicago. Will you please let it go? There won’t be any images to forget. I never looked back. It’s finished.”
Dave stroked her cheek. “Come back with us?”
Sara looked back at Adam and smiled. “I was just waiting for an invitation.”
CHAPTER 18
Adam met Ellen at the door with a smile and eased back King Henry who had come to greet her too. “You made good time.” He took her coat, draping it over a chair. Since they had arrived back in Chicago two weeks ago, Sara had been helping Ellen with her final wedding preparations.
“Sara thinks I’m doing some shopping while she has lunch with Dave. Are you sure you want to do this?” The package she held was thick.
Adam had thought about it long and hard before he had made his request. Sara had finished the final chapter of her book. “Yes, I’m sure.” He accepted it, felt its weight, and set it on the end table. “How are the arrangements coming?”
Ellen laughed. “She doesn’t have a clue.” She leaned down to greet Henry.
“I appreciate what you’re doing.”
“It’s been a pleasure. I’m having such fun. Anything else you have thought of?”
He already had the list written.
Ellen glanced through it. “Not a problem. I’ll just conveniently have another ‘I forgot about’ stumble tonight. It’s driving Sara crazy.”
“Be careful not to tip your hand. If she suspects, I’ll really land in the doghouse,” he said with a rueful glance at his husky.
“Don’t worry. I’ve been waiting a lifetime for a chance to set her up. She won’t suspect a thing.” Ellen glanced at her watch. “In keeping with that, I had better run. If I’m not loaded down with shopping bags, she’ll be wondering what I’ve been doing.”
“Thanks, Ellen.”
She gave him a knowing smile. “Would you quit worrying? Sara’s head over heels in love with you. I’ll call if I have any questions.”
Adam walked with her to the door and showed her out. He hoped Ellen was right. He was taking an awful gamble with this plan.
He paced back to the couch and looked at the box Ellen had brought. Now or later?
He rubbed the back of his neck and went to get himself a soda. Now. If he put it off, he would only wonder more.
He settled at the dining room table and cut the tape sealing the package. Sara’s latest manuscript. Ellen had made a copy for him while Sara was otherwise engaged. Adam didn’t like going behind her back, but he had weighed the options and accepted the risk. He needed to know the truth.
He would prefer to know what he was asking Sara to talk about before he raised the subject. The fact that Thomas Krane was dead did not remove the need for them to talk about her past. He didn’t want to walk her into a minefield without knowing what was there. If he could lessen the impact of her words by learning the details now, it was worth the price.
She had titled the book Kim.
He started reading, turning pages of the manuscript slowly as the afternoon wore into the evening.
Several times he had to stop and walk awa
y, heading to the living room to get away from the words. The truth was even worse than he had feared.
When he turned the last page shortly after eight, dusk had long since descended on the city and the lights twinkled back at him.
God, I can’t handle this.
There were the facts of what had happened, there was the turmoil that had gripped Sara’s life since then, and there was the hit it had made to her faith.
There was a point in time when Kim died that Sara thought she was going to die too. And she wanted to die. The guilt of not being able to save her sister had been overwhelming. Sara spent a lifetime fighting the guilt of being the one to survive.
It was clear from her epilogue that with the death of Thomas Krane a chapter in her life had closed. Kim was part of her past. A twin. A friend. She had faced the options when reviewing the evidence, looked at what had been possible for her to do, and finally accepted as fact that she had done all that could have been done.
Adam straightened the manuscript pages he held.
He didn’t love her any less; he probably loved her even more.
Did he need to change his plans?
God, if this isn’t going to work, I need to know soon.
He had set the plans in motion, gambling that he could get the answer he hoped for. Now, knowing what he would be asking Sara to overcome…. He had never made such a risky move in his life.
Sara came back from Texas ready to compromise, to find a way to have a future together. He had set in motion preparations for a day he hoped she would never forget. But he was hesitating, postponing the conversation they needed to have about children.
It had shaken him to hear Sara was in danger again, to know he was too far away to help. Having suffered through those long hours of uncertainty, he now understood Sara’s hesitation to have children. He had to weigh his desire to have children against the risk he would be asking her to accept. If something ever did happen, he would be putting her in a position that would break her heart.
Father, I want this to work. It’s released to You—all of it. Children. Marriage. You know what she can handle.
He loved her enough to let that go if God asked it of him.
He knew now what he needed to tell Sara.
It was late. Dave would be annoyed. Adam reached for the phone anyway. “Dave, how are the plans going, buddy?”
Laughter came back from Dave. “Would you relax? Everything is under control.” It reassured Adam just to hear his friend’s voice. Dave at least thought his plan was good.
“Ellen, hold still or we are going to have to redo your tiara. Trust me, your train lays out fabulously.”
Ellen stopped moving so Sara could get the last bobby pin in place. “I don’t know what I would have done these last couple weeks if you hadn’t been here, Sara.”
“Gone crazy by the look of it. You’re only getting married, you know. It’s not something really big or anything,” Sara teased back.
The dress was beautiful. When Ellen had first started looking for a gown shortly after her fiancé proposed, she knew exactly what she wanted. She had a picture of a gown from a designer collection, and she spent days looking for something similar. Sara showed up at Ellen’s apartment one day with a box, opened it, and produced the original. “Consider it a commission for all those books you’ve helped me write.” The dress won over Ellen to accepting the gift.
The time helping Ellen with her final wedding plans had been filled with laughter. Their days had been hectic with last-minute details. They often crashed on the couch late at night to commiserate and laugh about the complexity of it all.
Sara was grateful for a reason to be busy. Adam had her confused. There was a distance between them she didn’t know how to deal with. They needed to talk about her past. Talk about children. Neither discussion would be easy. It felt like he was deliberately avoiding time when they could talk privately. Sara didn’t understand it. After the wedding was over, she would have to pin him down and find out what was wrong.
There had been one profoundly sad day in the last two weeks, the day Ellen set aside to read the book Sara had finished, the same day Sara returned to Kim’s grave to say a final good-bye. It was hard to do, for in writing the book she not only wrote about the kidnapping but about her friendship and fights with her twin. They were so close. The need to remember Kim was never going to fade, but the loss was finally being accepted.
There were flowers on Kim’s grave the day she visited. The card bore Adam’s signature. Sara sat down on the grass and grieved in a way she had never done before. There were so many things she missed having with her sister. The double dates. The talk of boyfriends. The joy of growing up together. It was a necessary grief. She left the cemetery carrying one of the flowers from the bouquet Adam had left.
Ellen’s mother came to join them, indicating it was time for them to move upstairs. The bridesmaids, all from Ellen’s extended family, went to meet their escorts. The music was starting. “Ready?” Sara asked Ellen.
“Yes. Maybe. Sara, if I stumble over the words, you’ve got to cover for me. Drop your bouquet, something.”
Sara had to grin. “Your nerves are showing.”
“They’re dancing. Listen, Sara, when you eventually get married, take my advice, make it a short engagement.”
“I’ll do you one better. I’ll probably elope,” Sara replied, half serious, thinking about the last few hectic days. She walked with Ellen up the stairs, holding the train of her wedding dress.
Dave smiled as they joined him. “All ready?”
“Yes.”
She didn’t see Adam as she walked up the aisle and wondered where he was. He had brought her to the wedding. He looked fabulous in his tux.
To her relief, the wedding went smoothly. Ellen’s voice was calm and clear, the photographer covering the wedding, discreet.
Less than an hour from the start of the service, they were standing together in a receiving line at the back of the church. Sara was very aware of Dave in his tux standing directly behind her. Security was quite tight all around the wedding since there were several dignitaries in attendance.
Halfway through the line of people, Sara was beginning to hope for any sort of commotion or distraction to occur just to give her hand a break.
The line eventually began to dwindle, but she knew the night was far from over. Her duties as maid of honor had barely begun. At the reception, she was going to be swamped with details to ensure Ellen didn’t have any hassles.
She turned to greet the last guest, her smile one that had been politely pasted on her face for the last hour.
“You look like you could use a break.” Adam caught her hand in his and smiled. “Ellen, we’ll be back in a couple minutes.”
Sara didn’t protest. She would take any time with Adam she could get. “Where have you been?”
“Finishing some details.”
She found herself being led back into the church, to the padded pews at the front of the sanctuary. Adam tugged over the pianist’s bench so he could sit facing her.
“I’ve got a simple question for you.” His smile made her heart lift. “Will you marry me?”
“Adam…”
“Hear me out.” He bent his head and took a deep breath. “I’ve read your book. Ellen got me a copy. I know what you’ve been through.”
Sara flinched, not prepared for that news.
“I can deal with what I’ve read, Sara. It doesn’t change what I think about you…what I feel. I love you. I love you more deeply than I can figure out how to put into words.”
Tears welled in her eyes; Adam gently brushed them aside. “I know how hard it’s going to be for you to trust me in the way I am going to ask, but I need you to think about something for a minute. You’ve believed the truth of Isaiah 41:10 all your life. ‘Fear not, for I am with you, be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my victorious right hand.’ You’ve held on to
it as your source of strength. I’m offering a compromise. We let God decide if we have children. He will be fair to both of us. He knows your fear, and He knows my dreams.
“I trust God enough to have Him say to me, ‘Adam, I’m sorry, but for the good of your wife, you will not have children.’ “
His hand brushed along her face. “Are you willing to trust Him if He says, ‘Sara, you can handle the child I’m giving you’?”
“It may still be months or years before I can take that risk.”
“I know that, honey. But I think God can work out any miracle He desires to. Please, say you’ll marry me.”
Sara closed her eyes, considering everything God had taught her, and when she opened them, her eyes were shining. “If you’ll have me, for better or for worse, then yes, I’ll marry you.”
Adam kissed her.
They broke apart when Dave made his presence clear with a chuckle.
Sara looked up and Ellen was there beside her. “Congratulations! But there is no way I’m letting you elope.”
Sara couldn’t help the laughter. She glanced back at Adam. “When do you want to get married? Just so I can officially put it on Ellen’s calendar.”
“Today,” Adam replied smoothly.
Sara was stunned. “Are you serious?”
“I’ve got the license in my pocket, and Ellen just happened to call the designer who made her dress to find out which one had been your favorite when you were looking for hers—it’s waiting downstairs.”
Sara looked from Adam back to Ellen. “You didn’t.”
Ellen smiled. “Adam can be quite persuasive. Come on, I’ll help you change.”
“But guests, family, friends?”
“By the time you get changed, the important ones will be here,” Ellen assured her. “Our best man is going to keep the reception at the country club moving along until we all arrive. Come on, Sara. This way you’ll have all the finery and not a single bit of the hassle. You won’t even have time for pre-wedding nerves. We are all prepared. Why do you think I’ve been running around so much the last two weeks? We’ve even got napkins printed for the occasion.”
Sara started to laugh. “Yes, okay.” She leaned forward and kissed Adam again. “This is crazy, but you’re on. I rather like the freedom to be impulsive these days.”