Waking Up in Charleston by Sherryl Woods Read Free Book Online

“That’s why I want to go home. I need to think about what you said before we meet with Reverend Webb again on Sunday.”
    “Do you want to get together tomorrow and talk some more?” Danny asked.
    She shook her head. “No, you’ve given me some more to think about and I need to wrestle with it on my own. I’ll call you if I change my mind. Otherwise I’ll see you when you pick me up for church on Sunday.” She lifted her gaze to his. “Have you talked to your folks at all?”
    He shook his head. “Not yet. You?”
    “No.”
    “Do you think we should tell them before Sunday?” he asked. “If Reverend Webb wants to see them, too, we should probably give them time to absorb all this.”
    “I want this to be our decision,” Mary Louise argued. “You know they’ll get all weird, and the next thing we know, they’ll be making all the decisions.”
    “I suppose you’re right,” he admitted. “But it’s not really fair for them to be blindsided.”
    “Maybe we can just meet with Reverend Webb and decide what we’re going to do, then go tell them together,” she suggested. “First yours, then mine.”
    “Why mine first?” he asked.
    “Because mine might kill us,” she said, only partially in jest. “Or you, anyway.”
    Danny pulled the car to a stop in front of her house and cut the engine, then rested his head on the steering wheel. Mary Louise sat beside him, fighting tears. When Danny finally turned toward her, his eyes were damp, as well.
    “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I wish I were as excited about this as you are.”
    “I wish you were, too,” she said, reaching for him. “But we’re going to figure this out, Danny. I know we will. And when we do, it will be what’s best for all of us.”
     
    Amanda was pretty sure a person could go straight to hell for having the kind of thoughts she was having on Saturday afternoon as she watched Caleb struggle to wrestle the armoire she’d bought at a flea market into her new bedroom. What kind of joke had God been playing when he’d created a minister with broad shoulders and rock-solid abs that belonged on the cover of a fitness magazine?
    She’d noticed the man’s muscles far more than she should have during the months they’d worked side by side to build her new home. He had a very dangerous habit of stripping off his shirt when the sultry Charleston temperatures climbed. She wasn’t the only woman working on the house whose mouth had gaped at the vision of male perfection he’d presented. Add in Maggie’s taunting remarks just the other day, and Amanda’s imagination had traveled in a very steamy and unsuitable direction. Just last night she’d had a dream about him—about the two of them—that had left her lying awake, restless and hot.
    Amanda figured it was ironic that she felt such stirrings of desire only when she was around the most inappropriate man in all of Charleston. Then, again, maybe this was God’s way of showing her she wasn’t dead, after all, without putting her heart at risk in the process. Being attracted to Caleb was safe, thanks to his profession. He certainly wouldn’t be trying to tempt her into some casual liaison, that was for sure, and a fling was all she could imagine for herself for the foreseeable future.
    And when it came down to it, she was the last womanon earth any minister would want. She didn’t really believe in God, at least not a benevolent one, mostly because of the way she’d been brought up. Her father’s bitterness over her mother’s death had instilled the impression that only an uncaring God could have allowed such a thing to happen. Even as she’d grown up and started thinking for herself, Amanda couldn’t disagree. As much as she’d loved her father, she’d missed having a mother. She’d felt cheated out of something important. With no one else she could think of to blame, she’d pointed her anger toward God and kept her distance.
    Despite her apathy, Bobby had insisted