Chapter 9

Copyright 2000, 2006 by Elizabeth Delayne



Someone screamed . . . shouts, echoes of sound and horror.

It was dark, dark around the lights, and the lights moved, white robes swirling in the night. Fire and lights. Heat. Sparks of fire.

She cried out, first for her mother. She'd lost sight of her mother. She cried out again for her father. He'd find her. He'd save her.

Fire burned. Roared. Sweeping ringlets of smoke circled through the night sky. The air was bitter, burning. The flurry of robes quickened, swirling around her in a mad dance.

People were shouting, chanting, yelling, grunting.

Screaming. A woman screamed.

Please stop! She cried. Please stop , she wept.

Erica screamed as she was pushed. She fell helplessly to the ground. Her palms scrapped against the ground, pain pinching in little bites.

Then she was lifted, into the white robes, up to her father's face. The swirling slowed. There was fear in his eyes, but safety in his arms.

"Daddy!"

"I've got you—" he said, catching his balance as he was pushed out of the way. Erica buried her face in his cloak. There were new visions from the perch in his arms. Masked faces, dark eyes, raised arms of anger and .

He reached out and there was her mother, her face a mask of fear and disbelief. Anger.

Glass shattered, exploded.

And a woman wept.



Erica jerked awake, frozen for a moment in fear. The screams softened into faded echoes. The bright light of fire dissipated, leaving the dim lights of the sleepy first class cabin. She settled against the cushioned leather seat and listened to the air controlled calm in the cabin.

She was safe. The only sounds were those of the aircraft. The constant blow of air from above. The gentle murmur of words nearly faded into silence as people slept into the nigh.

She could hear the light tapping of someone working on their laptop. It made her think of Jonathon.

The seat beside her was empty—a blessing. Erica gazed out the window into the clear night sky, down at the ground so far below the plane's flight. She was tired, but she couldn't sleep, knowing images awaited her. She would have to talk to her mother. She would not comprehend it—truly comprehend the images until she talked to her mother.

But even then she might never understand.

Talking to her mother would have to wait. She wanted it to be a conversation held in person, as much for her mother's sake as he own. The past few days alone and in prayer had strengthened her, though the questions were still multiplying.

Erica wanted to talk and pray with Amber first. So she was on a plane to Portland when she should be heading to New Orleans.

When she wanted to head to Jonathon.

She'd had time in the past few days to process their time together. He'd been attentive and supportive, helping her breath in fresh air of calm, of peace, of hope. And yet, there was something quietly deceptive about him.

She'd asked him once why he'd left the force and he'd given her a pithy response about just needing to do something else for while. At the time, she'd taken the answer, too wrapped up in her own security to question his.

Now she wondered if the truth was something he'd simply not shared with her.

Was it something he was keeping from her? She just wasn't sure.

She knew that cops went through things, saw things, did things . . . that would change anyone's life. She knew his life as an officer was a big part of him, even now as he hid from it. It escaped through his writing, not just his talent as an officer, but his love and patience for the job.

And there was a dark, quiet, almost violent side she knew he tried to hide from her. It wasn't that she was afraid of that side of him, but she did question it.

She thought of Emma, the older woman who'd brought them together months ago at a random gala. The woman was oddly perceptive. She'd looked at Erica and seen, or maybe simply guessed, that she'd needed someone, something. So she'd gone over and brought Jonathon, purposely matching them together.

And if God had seen fit to bring them together using an excited older woman with a heart for romance, and maybe even eyes of compassion that could see all the way to the soul . . . and if Emma had seen the need for someone like Jonathon in Erica, what had she seen in Jonathon that had brought him a woman like Erica?

So, why had he needed her that night months ago now, at the reception when Emma had introduced him, to distract them both? What made him need those few moments of escape over a billiards table, or the exhilarating afternoon at a baseball game, or the quiet chatter of a late night limo ride?

He’d called again, pointedly left her a new number. A cell phone. It seemed he was tired of missing her calls.

She picked up the phone, intending to reach him this time.

* * * * *

Jonathon ignored his new cell phone. After leaving his father, he’d gone to a corner store, picked one up in a fit of frustration, then left the number on Erica’s voicemail. Still, he shut off the ringer without looking at it. He’d slipped and called Paige, left his new number with her.

In case she needed to reach him.

She didn’t need to reach him, he thought bitterly. It wasn’t his responsibility anymore. Besides, he still wasn’t ready to talk to her. He wasn’t ready to talk to his father.

Though he needed to. He had never been able to hold back from him for long. They’d been through too much. Felt the same emotions.

In that, his father was right.

If it was Erica—the only person he wanted to talk to at the moment—he didn't trust himself. Not yet. Not when he could taste the bitterness like bile in the back of his throat.

What would she say if she knew about the darkness trapped inside?

He didn't want to know. He imagined she would want to comfort. To give comfort with energy and emotions that were already hard pressed and hurting.

Jonathon knew how she would feel. It was how he felt himself.

He walked the dark streets of his old beat, careful and fully aware as always of the danger and darkness. He'd found corpses, heard gun shots . . . and run from his own failings right on this street of cement and brink, garbage cans overflowing at the front stoops of apartment buildings.

He was still running. Angry, he admitted, fighting the anger he felt for his father. No, not toward his father, exactly . . . more toward himself. More toward his past.

More toward God.

He wanted to scream. He wanted to go out to his lake house, where no one would hear, and scream. Scream until he wept.

And weep until he hurt no more.

He stopped, dropping to a set of steps swept clean and buried his face in his hands. His breath was ragged and raw.

He had to hold himself together. He had to stay sane. Because underneath the entire war for his control was his heart, his love for both Erica and his father.

God, please . . .

It was all he could get out. It was all he could ever get out when confronted with his past.

The confrontation with his father wasn't the first, but it was by far a drawing line. Stay or move on. Stay or move on. His father had drawn the line.

He drew another deep breath, unwilling to fight the war inside of him. Unwilling to give up the responsibility and guilt.

* * * * * *

Erica curled up on Amber's sofa, wrapped in a familiar faded quilt that Amber's grandmother had stitched half a century ago, holding a cup of coffee with both hands. Amber had picked her up from the airport the night before, sending her off to bed to sleep instead of pounding her with questions about this sudden visit. She hadn't slept much, mostly tossing and turning, dreaming of her father and Jonathon, deftly afraid of mixing one dream with another.

Now, with morning sunlight peeking through the windows, she sat with her best friend, detailing the emotions and memories that she was still trying to put together for herself. The lights were off, leaving the room shadowed. The only sound seemed to be the ceiling fan circling up above.

Erica had just put into words the dream that had haunted her for years. For so long, she'd pushed it back, refusing to analyze it … putting it off, as if it had come from a movie. Now, as she faced it for the first time aloud, she voiced that it was part memory, part reality that she had been escaping from all these years.

Amber just sat beside her, watching her with compassionate eyes. "How do you know that it's not a dream?"

"It’s always been there," Erica responded slowly, "I know part of it I dreamed before. I remember for years after getting up at night and locking the door, afraid of the Klan. I never understood it—the fear or the images, so bright. So dark."

"Do you think, maybe, that your dreams and fears are mixing in with the newspaper articles or movies?"

"I wanted to think so—but there are too many pieces fitting together."

"Except for the fact that you knew your father," Amber pointed out pointedly.

"I thought I did. And maybe I do. I don't know. It was so long ago and I was so young. How can any of this make sense?" she closed her eyes and took a deep breath, focusing on the smell of coffee from the mug she held in her hands. It was a familiar scent, as deeply rooted in her memory from when her father would drink coffee at evening, sitting out on the back porch—as deeply rooted as the images that flashed in her memory.

"I had dreams, when I was little. Confusing, disoriented dreams of yelling and screaming and men in white robes. I think they started not long after my father died—but I can't be positive. It always starts with me walking through the town square with my mother, late at night. Things start exploding. My mother disappears and I spin around and around looking for her, calling out for her and I get lost in a sea of swirling white robes … like the ocean, buoying me up and down through a sea of white. Men are shouting … someone’s weeping … glass shatters. How can it be that real if it’s only my imagination?"

"Then my father's there, rescuing me. I always thought it was because I believed that only he could. Yet, if it’s reality … why was my father one of the ones in the robes?"

She swallowed back a sudden lump in her throat, and met her friend's concerned eyes with her own turbulent ones.

"The most real memory that I have of my father is a picture of him that I despise."

* * * * *

Jonathon awoke the next morning from where he had crawled when weariness had finally pressed him to stop. At the time, he hadn't been thinking. If he had, he wouldn't have stopped here. He wouldn’t have remembered how to get in without really thinking about it.

He looked up, from the pew at the front of he sanctuary where he'd slept, at the sweeping ceiling of the old church he knew so well. It seemed like a different lifetime that he had come, here, to this place, not just on Sundays, but on anytime and for anything that was needed. He'd led groups, especially the youth, he spoken in church; he'd helped out with the maintenance and the constant repair.

Something could be said for new churches, he supposed, with their perfected white walls and grand sanctuaries with sparkling white windows and twinkling chandeliers, but he'd always believed that there was so much more beauty in an older church like this one. The architecture was bold, but aged, like something most people visited on a tour in a different city. He thought of the Sunday morning he’d spent with Erica, sitting in the old church, feeling like the prodigal on his way home.

Half afraid of what he would find.

The majority of this church’s members were aging, but dedicated. The newer members were remaining, he hoped, from the bold little youth group that had reached so enthusiastically into the city. The last few times he'd been there the church had been alive and hopeful and growing.

And here he was now, wishing that the hurt and pain would die off . . . inches from wishing his own life away.

I don't know what to do , his heart cried out, as he lay still on the wooden pew and stared up at the sweeping ceiling. I don't know what to do .

Let go. Let it go. He heard his father say.

The panic, the hurt, and the anger were riding his conscious. The darkness … the shouts of fear. The gunshots … and his own tears.

But the one who calls Himself by I AM does not live in the ceiling, or in the sky .

Those were his own words, given to a group of young teens that had trusted him at one time. His words, to a group of kids that had equated God with being up and seemingly so far away from their crowded and dirty inner city streets.

It was what he felt now.

I couldn't have been wrong.

Jonathon pushed up and rolled forward until he was on his knees, his face pressed into the worn carpet. He was weary. Tired of fighting, tired of hiding. Tired of looking into the mirror and seeing the man he had been, who'd been full of fire and hope—and not knowing how to face himself, let alone face God.

He wanted to be strong, for himself and for Erica, but how could he be strong when he was so weak?

He didn't know how long he stayed in the awkward position. Time rotated around and around as the memories played over and over with the questions. He didn't move until he heard footsteps, the all too familiar tread of his pastor.

Jonathon stayed on the floor, but pushed himself up. He leaned against the seat of the pew, facing the altar. Reverend Wilkerson would know he was there. The man would have known the doors were unlocked, and known that only a select few knew where to find the hidden key and punch in the correct code for the alarm.

"Hello, Jonathon," the man said as he stopped at the base of the first pew, his voice welcoming showing no surprise. The pew creaked as he sat down. In the silence, the both looked at the altar together. It was simply made, with a simple, but beautiful cross leaning back to rest against the oversized podium.

"Your last book was a page turner. And the picture on the back the most honest I've seen."

"There's been a lot of crawling to do."

"We all do crawling. Some of the best living is on our knees. Our hands digging into the soil made alive by our tears."

"And some crawling isn't living," there was the bitterness, upfront and spoken, Jonathon thought, but he'd never been anything but honest with his pastor. And that was something he refused to change now.

"You should have visited, Jonathon. You could have called me to come to you."

"I just . . . didn't know how."

The quiet settled around them again, as easily as it had years before. Jonathon sat at the feet of his pastor, feeling much like a young boy at the feet of his father. He looked up at the podium, one he'd seen so many times before, and he felt numb. He felt so numb.

"I don't know who I am anymore."

"Maybe not, but there are many young men and women who remember you, who pray for you. Two of which stood on the edges of the wrong crowd, who witnessed the same destruction you did, who turned away from their old lives then, and who stand now, because of you, as pillars of this church. They did that, because they knew you. Because they'd seen you. And because you'd shown them someone they'd never known before."

"Sam and Christina."

"I wanted you to see them. I wanted you to see them before I told you."

Jonathon folded his arms over his knees and stared at his hands. "I couldn't have faced them. I couldn't even look at myself for a long time."

"So you created the Burstin trademark look."

Jonathon chuckled, despite the unsteady emotions inside of him. "So you noticed."

"We all did," the aging pastor laughed himself. "Many of those single young women had quite a discussion group started over you."

"Marissa?" he asked, almost hesitantly, speaking of the woman he'd told Erica about.

"She's good. She was married a year ago to Paul Peterson. You may remember him. I'm sure she would like to see you. She's been worried about you."

Jonathon nodded, his eyes sliding shut in misery. He remembered Paul, a single businessman who'd wondered into the church one Christmas season when Marissa had been his. It made him smile for Marissa and the memories he had of Paul.

"You should know . . . I'm trying to deal with this. To understand this. A few months ago, I met an incredible woman . . . and I want so much to be able to be free. Nothing will be right between us until . . . ."

"Until is a big word, Jonathon. Is she a believer?"

"Yes. Amazingly, yes."

"Amazingly?"

"I haven't, exactly, been paying attention in the past few years."

"You haven't exactly associated with many people, I bet," the older man sighed. "Jonathon, give yourself a break. Admit to yourself and to God that you're angry. Accept that it's okay to hurt and to be angry and afraid. Then turn to Him. Even in anger, turn to him. One of the things God wants from us most is pure emotion. He gave it to us. He wanted us to be beings of feelings, strong feelings like His."

But the one who calls Himself by I AM does not live in the ceiling, or in the sky .

“I feel like I’ve spent the night struggling with God … and I’m still defeated.”

“Ah … your need to read the story again, son. Jacob didn’t win the battle. He just held on. He held on until he got the blessing.”

Moments later, Pastor Wilkerson rested a hand lightly on Jonathon's head, and even though the words were not spoken aloud, Jonathon felt prayed over. He didn't move. He stood between the raging emotions that screamed for him to run, and others that battled against the love he felt for Erica, egging him on to fight. He waited and hoped, unable to pray himself, for the storms to calm.

* * * * *

When Jonathon walked into the precinct hours later, Paige spotted him.

"Jonathon!" she cried, taking in his disheveled appearance, wearing the same shirt and jeans he'd worn the day before, a little more wrinkled. She left the officer she'd been talking to without a word and jogged toward him, her eyes concerned, her lips pressed together.

"I'm okay," he muttered running his fingers through his hair. He glanced up, taking a deep breath, blinking back the emotions and weariness, "Dad still here?"

"No."

Her eyes, sharp as ever, looked him over.

“You have a message. A Agent Paren with the FBI called. He said it was important." She watched him. "It's not about this is it? This case with me."

Jonathon shook his head, recognizing the name of one of the officers he'd kept in touch with since they'd contacted Erica and her mother. He glanced at the hand Paige lay on his arm, her fingers strong, her fingernails clipped to a neat, but thin white line, then looked into her eyes. What he saw there, the worry and strength made him frown.

"I'm not in trouble."

"I know that . . . but can you take on anymore?"

"I didn't take it on. It's just there."

All of it is , the words, unsaid, hung between them—as did the bitterness he'd tried to swallow back.

"Jonathon . . ." Paige murmured, searching his eyes with her own, pleading with him silently, then dropped her head and turned away when his expression remained unchanged.

"Paige," he breathed, and watched her turn back. "Don't stop praying for me. I'm going to be okay."

She smiled, understanding what that plea had cost him. "You're still my partner, Jonathon. What we have is more than the badge. If you think I'm giving up on you, then you don't remember those nights we stood at each other’s back."

Oh, he remembered, and he’d put her strength in several different characters throughout the years. He smiled a little and watched her walk off. If anyone knew how he felt, it was Paige.

Or his father.

Why couldn't he share his pain with them?

Let it go, his father had said … hold on, his pastor had begged.

His cell phone beeped and startled him. He tugged it out, fumbled with it before he flipped it open, and sighed when he saw the familiar number. Erica .

"Hey—Where are you?"

"Portland—visiting Amber."

“Not home.

“Not yet. I needed some time.”

Her voice seeped into his weary system that suddenly seemed overcharge. The welcomed feeling he felt at the sound of her voice grated over the rough edges. He took a deep breath, trying to settle his system. "You okay?"

Erica frowned on her side of the line, having heard the edge in his voice.

"I'm okay," she said carefully and took a deep breath of her own. "I’m not sure I’m ready, but I’m headed back in the morning. I’ll have to face her sometime." She hesitated. "Are you … okay? You sound . . . tired."

Funny, she thought, for lack of a better word. He sounded odd. Angry, maybe.

"I am tired, frustrated a little with the book. That's normal," Jonathon closed his eyes and prayed she hadn't heard the whisper of bitterness that had coated his words—or felt the lie that now sat between them.

In Portland, Erica frowned. She was alone, the lights turned off, the blinds closed. The sunlight drifted in though the holes in the blinds. "Jonathon, what's wrong? If it’s because I didn’t call … I’m sorry. I just didn’t …"

"I'm not … I can’t talk about it right now."

"I guess … it’s a bad time for both of us. A bad time for starting something here."

It was on the tip of his tongue to agree. He was certainly over his head. A fight might settle things for awhile, put their relationship at a distance he could handle.

He'd been holding back long before he met Erica . . . and look at how far he hadn’t traveled in the last five years. No healing, no going forward. What was wrong with him? He was stuck in quicksand, feeling dirty, tired, and weary of trying to pull himself out.

He thought of what he told his pastor. I met an incredible woman . . .

He closed his eyes, concentrating on the sound of her voice, of the soft plea and hope in her voice. "We’ve had our share of lumps since getting together—but we’ll get through."

"Jonathon, this isn't one of your books. You and I don't have to figure out the next clue before the next chapter. You don't have to be the hero that walks through the smoke alone or strong in the last few paragraphs."

Just hold on and let go … somewhat of a paradox … Words of his pastor … words of his father, mixed up, but still calling to him.

Over and over.

“I had a fight with my Father … over a lot of things. I don’t know that I can put it into words. I just need …”

You … he wanted to say, but that wasn’t completely true. He needed what he had found that morning when they’d visited that old church in Atlanta. Companionship … belief …

With God.

“I’ll work it out.”

He smiled. She suddenly seemed so confident, no longer the girl in the middle of the ballroom, but the one he’d spared with across the pool table. “You don’t have to work anything out.”

“Sure I do. It’s my turn.”

“Then talk to me. About anything. Anything else. Let’s just be—for just a few minutes.”

She was silent for while, dealing with the absolute weariness in his voice. “Can we pray first?”

“Yeah,” the laugh of sudden relief nearly bubbled up and out. “We can pray first.”


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