Lakeside Redemption by Lisa Jordan

Author:Lisa Jordan [Jordan, Lisa]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Christian, Contemporary, Fiction, Love Stories, Romance, Women's Fiction
ISBN: 9780373879342
Google: BuRyBgAAQBAJ
Amazon: 0373879342
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2014-12-16T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Nine

The stench of cheap perfume and yesterday’s booze saturated the air. Staring at Gina passed out on the ripped and stained couch, Zoe had no choice but to make the call. It was the kind of call she couldn’t take back.

If anything happened to Gina, Zoe had no one to blame but herself.

When her friend called last night from The Sassy Cat and begged her to come down, Zoe refused. She wanted nothing to do with the seedy lounge on the edge of town known for bar fights, drug deals and worse.

But the strands of fear tangled with desperation in Gina’s voice had pushed Zoe to find her keys and confront her friend in the dimly lit parking lot adjacent to the bar’s lot reeking of stale beer and emptiness. She simply couldn’t violate her sentencing agreement by stepping onto the property, couldn’t risk her freedom, or destroy the trust she’d built with her family to follow her friend inside the bar.

Last night’s confrontation looped over and over in her head. No matter how many times she replayed her conversation with Gina, she couldn’t help but feel like she should have done more. She begged Gina to come home with her, but her friend insisted she had no choice.

Since leaving Agape House about a month ago, it hadn’t been as easy for Gina. The last time Zoe talked with her, Gina mentioned the struggles of living with her mother, how her coworkers whispered behind her back, how the girls went to their grandma instead of to her. She believed the kind of people inside The Sassy Cat offered her more grace than the ones who attended church on Sundays.

But Zoe knew they didn’t. They took what she was willing to give away, even her newly found pride and self-respect, but Gina refused to see it that way. And look where it got her.

Now Zoe had Gina’s daughters to consider. The three girls—ten-year-old Savannah, seven-year-old Daisy and four-year-old Lucy—huddled together in the overstuffed floral chair that probably looked great in the ’80s and watched her with large eyes edged with fear. Canned laughter from some program on TV echoed in the background.

How would their lives be affected if her call caused their mother to go back to jail for violating her parole?

She paced, stepping around a pile of crayons dumped by an open coloring book, a half-dressed Barbie doll, an assortment of multicolored rubber bands and a loom that littered the floor, along with empty fast-food wrappers, dirty dishes and a pile of clothes overflowing from a broken clothesbasket.

Gina needed help, and right now, Zoe was the only logical person who could make that happen.

She had no choice. She had to make the call.

She pulled her cell phone out of her pocket and tapped Mom’s name in her list of contacts.

“Hello?”

“Mom, I’m at Gina’s. I need you.”

“What’s going on?” A guarded tone filtered through her words.

Zoe glanced at the girls and kept her voice low. “Gina needs help.”

“I’ll be right there.

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