The Chase by Debra White Smith

Author:Debra White Smith
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2011-09-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Thirteen

Early the next morning, Sonny Mansfield sat at his computer, staring at the screen. He’d worked into the night, trying to compose the e-mail for Blake’s adoptive parents. Not happy with his efforts, he resumed the task this morning before breakfast.

The clang of pots and pans, the sizzle of bacon, the smell of hot coffee all beckoned Sonny to abandon the task and indulge his growling gut. But so far, the letter still held his attention. He stared at the words he’d penned and once again grappled with the same line. After telling the Wickmans’ who he was and referencing the attached photos from the past and present, he’d begun to detail the circumstances of Blake’s birth.

Sonny explained that Blake’s birth mother still wasn’t in a position to broach contact due to the fact that “Her church isn’t a forgiving church.” He breathed and scrutinized the line as he’d done the night before. Shaking his head, Sonny hit the backspace button and erased the words. After a good minute of finger drumming, he positioned his hands above the keyboard again and tried to come up with the words that would best describe Karen’s situation without stating the actual problem.

Another five minutes slipped by, Sonny rewrote the same line he’d already deleted: “Blake’s birth mother isn’t in a position to contact him because she’s afraid her family and her church will find out, and her church isn’t a forgiving church. This is also the reason she hid the truth about the circumstances of Blake’s birth. She didn’t want her parents or her church to know that she made willful choices that led to his conception. I guess she just couldn’t take their rejection,” he added.

“Knock, knock,” Tanya called from the bedroom doorway.

Sonny looked up and returned his wife’s smile before his gaze slid to the steaming cup of brew she held.

“I brought your coffee,” she said.

“Thank you,” he enthused. “The smell was about to drive me batty.”

Tanya entered the room, set the cup on a coaster near the desk’s edge, and gazed at the screen. “This letter is driving you batty, isn’t it?”

“More or less,” Sonny said before sipping the hot coffee. He and Tanya took turns cooking breakfast every other morning. Sonny enjoyed the mornings she made the coffee. Somehow, hers always tasted better than his.

“I woke up last night around one, and you were still working on it.”

“Actually, I had been to bed and got back up after midnight and tried again.”

“What’s the problem?” she asked. Resting her hand on the back of Sonny’s chair, she leaned in for a perusal of the words.

“I just don’t know how to say what I need to say without making Karen and her church look like a bunch of hypocrites.”

“Yeah, that last paragraph is pretty direct, isn’t it?”

“Problem is, it’s all the absolute, unadulterated truth.”

Tanya chuckled. “The thing I like about you, Sonny, is that you’re about the most honest person I’ve ever met. You just lay it out there.”

“Is there any other way?” he questioned.

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