A Love So Strong by Arlene James

Author:Arlene James
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Steeple Hill
Published: 2006-10-14T16:00:00+00:00

Nicole closed the door to her bedroom and put her back to it. The red shawl that she’d draped over the lamp on her bedside table cast a dim, rosy glow over the cheap French Provincial furniture. It corresponded fittingly with the warm glow around her heart.

She ought to be steaming, considering what Marcus had done tonight, urging Beau to call the authorities the minute her back was turned, but she couldn’t stay angry with him. He tried so hard to do what was best, and like most men he couldn’t conceive that what he thought was best might not be. Her mother used to say that her father couldn’t help it if he saw the world through the eyes of a man. That’s why they needed wives, after all. And Marcus was no exception.

Because he considered every situation carefully—she never doubted that he prayed diligently over every issue— Marcus naturally assumed that the first answer he hit upon was necessarily the right one. He didn’t understand yet that her perspective was every bit as valid as his.

She knew that in Marcus’s world calling Family Services and letting them deal with her father was only reasonable, but in hers it was tantamount to dumping her problems on them when she’d vowed never to do so. It wasn’t that she didn’t see his point or that his point didn’t have validity. It wasn’t even that she couldn’t see a time or a circumstance when his solution would make more sense than hers. It was just that they hadn’t gotten there yet, and God willing, they never would.

That didn’t mean that Marcus wasn’t the sweetest, dearest man on earth anyway for trying so hard to help them.

She peeled off her robe and dropped it over the chair beside the door wandering over to the bed and plopping down. Tired, she fell back against the pillows and stacked her hands beneath her head, considering. If her life wasn’t so complicated right now, she’d go after Marcus Wheeler so hard he wouldn’t know what hit him, even if he did think she was too young.

Wrinkling her nose, she rolled onto her side, tucking her hands beneath her cheek.

She wasn’t too young. She understood why he thought that, though. A minister had to be a sober, responsible sort, which just meant that he needed brightness and childlike enthusiasm in his life more than most others did. He wouldn’t see it, of course, precisely because he was sober and responsible. Nicole, on the other hand, made a concerted effort to seek brightness and hold on to all the innocent enthusiasm she could for as long as she could.

She wished she could give that to Marcus.

“He’s a good man,” she whispered, only realizing at the last moment that she was talking to God. “He deserves all the good things in this world, and I’d give them to him if I could, but I can’t, so You’ll have to do it. Please.”

After a few more moments, her prayer

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