Firestorm (29 page)
Authors: Lisa T. Bergren
“How much?” he asked, crossing his arms.
“Fifty bucks, it seems.”
Logan fished around under his jacket and pulled out his wallet. He frowned and showed her the contents. “I’m afraid I’m running short. Would you accept twenty?”
She pursed her lips. “I guess you’ve earned a family discount,” she quipped, taking the bill from the wallet.
“Such a deal,” he said, pulling her into his arms. “All I had to do was marry the woman, and I get more than a fifty-percent discount on dances.”
“Someday,” she said, “you can dance with me for free.”
“A dance with you, my love,” he said, looking down at her tenderly, “is worth any amount. And a lifetime of loving you is a priceless treasure.”
Reyne smiled happily back into his eyes. “That’s so sappy, it’s perfect. I won’t try and top it.”
“Please don’t,” Logan said merrily.
She hugged him fiercely to her, and as they swayed to the music, they glanced around the room at their well-wishers. When Reyne spotted Matthew, dancing solemnly with his daughter’s tiny feet on his, she thought again of Beth and how great it would have been to have her there. And then she thought of the moonlit spring and the Eternal One who had brought them all together in his own, sweet timing.
Beth had been the one who had urged her to take this step. To trust and love and live each moment for all it was worth.
For you and my husband and my God
, she promised Beth silently.
I will never let fear get in the way of loving again
.
Thank you, my dear friend
, she whispered
. Thank you
.
Dear Friends:
Thank you for the many letters and notes you have sent me! It was the continuing clamoring to hear more about Rachel and Dirk and the Elk Horn Valley (
Refuge
) that made me return for
Firestorm
. Writing can be a lonely business at times, and your notes of encouragement come to me as gentle hugs from unmet friends.
This has been a crazy year. Our daughters—Olivia, who will be six years old at press time, and Emma, who will be three—keep us hopping! And I just resigned from my beloved editing job, deciding to concentrate more on my faith and family and my fiction. Life, it seems, is a series of transitions. I just get comfortable in one spot, and then God decides it’s time for me to learn new things. For a security hound, this comes as a hard lesson. I like to surround myself with the familiar and comfortable, rather than branching out and risking again. Yet when I do, I always am glad for that push out of the nest. This, I found, became Reyne’s journey of discovery too.
Isn’t that what crisis and troubles bring you? I find that in confronting my fears I lean most heavily on Christ. From that I draw incredible comfort and strength, and I seem to discover over and over yet another level of relationship with Jesus.
The firestorms of life are a gift in a way. And I celebrate that the God who helps us through is always present in my life, as he is in yours.
Every blessing,
Write to me via my Web site!
www.LisaTawnBergren.com
or the old-fashioned way:
c/o WaterBrook Press
12265 Oracle Boulevard, Suite 200
Colorado Springs, CO 80921
One body
…
One community
…
One shared search for a lasting love
T
HE
F
ULL
C
IRCLE
S
ERIES
by Lisa Tawn Bergren
Available now at your local bookstore!
R
EFUGE
(Book 1) • When Rachel Johanssen dared Beth Morgan to answer a personal ad in
The Rancher’s Journal
, she never thought her citified friend would become a rancher’s wife. Now Rachel, too, is falling in love with the glorious Elk Horn Valley—and with Dirk Tanner, a rugged Montana rancher who makes it his home. Rachel’s young friend Jake Rierdon has taken a shine to ranch life as well—and to beautiful young Emily Walker. But shadows from the present and past threaten to destroy both couples’ chances for a future.
T
ORCHLIGHT
(Book 2) • After inheriting her family’s lighthouse and mansion on the coast of Maine, heiress Julia Rierdon—sister of Jake Rierdon (
Refuge
)—sets out to restore the estate with the help of a mysterious stranger. Motorcycle-riding Trevor Kenbridge is gorgeous, infuriating … and just the man she needs to help her renovate the home. He may also be the right man to claim her heart.
P
ATHWAYS
(Book 3) • Doctor Bryn Bailey—cousin to Trevor Kenbridge (
Torchlight
)—has come to Alaska to tend those who cannot reach healthcare through the traditional routes and, with the aid of bush pilot Eli Pierce, begins to take trips into remote areas accessible only by plane. Then one evening during a freak storm their small plane goes down in the wilderness, putting Bryn on a desperate search for pathways back to civilization, to God … and to love.
T
REASURE
(Book 4) • Ever since she roomed with Bryn Bailey (
Pathways
) at Harvard, nautical archaeologist Dr. Christina Alvarez has been obsessed with finding her ancestor’s sunken treasure ship. Only one man—Caribbean treasure hunter Mitch Crawford—can help her, and he refuses to do so. But Christina’s fight to win Mitch over may lead them both to a treasure more valuable than either of them ever dreamed.
C
HOSEN
(Book 5) • As supervisor of the Solomon’s Stables dig in Jerusalem, archaeologist Alexana Roarke—grad-school friend of Christina Alvarez (
Treasure
)—knows she is in significant danger. Yet she will let nothing impede her excavation, not even the concern of handsome, world-renowned news correspondent Ridge McIntyre. Her stubbornness, however, could cost Alexana her life—and a future with the man she loves.
F
IRESTORM
(Book 6) • As a forest firefighting crew boss, Montanan Reyne Oldre—friend to Rachel Tanner and Beth Morgan (
Refuge
)—once led a team of courageous firefighters into a blaze that ended in tragedy. Now that the flames of love have begun to flicker between her and smokejumper Logan McCabe, Reyne must face the fears from her past and battle the raging firestorm that burns in her soul.
