Authors: Kendra Norman-Bellamy

When Solomon Sings (15 page)

BOOK: When Solomon Sings

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Lucas scratched his chin. “So he's what, forty-six? Forty-seven?”

“Forty-six.”

Another uncomfortable silence followed. It was broken by a comment from Lucas that took Shaylynn by surprise.

“That's not so bad.”

Shaylynn looked at him and opened her mouth to speak, but Alice's voice beat hers to the punch.

“It's not?”

“No.” He reclaimed his fork as though he was satisfied now and ready to resume eating. He picked up a big chunk of cake and said, “I'd rather he be fifteen years older, than five years younger.”

“But he's old enough to be her father,” Alice debated.

Lucas chewed his dessert until it was broken down enough for him to speak clearly. “Not any father I'd ever want to meet. I'm not saying that there aren't fourteen- and fifteen-year-old kids out there with kids of their own, but it's not the norm. Besides, isn't Archibald about that much older than Beth?”

Alice gave it some thought, and then nodded. “Yeah. Actually Archie is seventeen or eighteen years older than Mary Beth. She's a year younger than me, and he's got to be near seventy-five.”

“See? And it works fine for them. They've been married for thirty-plus years, got four children and probably seven grands.”

Here they were again; comparing her to people she was clueless about. A laugh rose in Shaylynn's throat, but she washed it back down with a few swallows of orange juice, and then reached for the pitcher in the middle of the table to pour herself a refill.

“You seem happy. Do you love him?”

Shaylynn almost lost her grip on the heavy glass container at Alice's unexpected question. She finished her task, and then placed the pitcher back on the table before answering. “Yes. Very much.” The expression on Alice's face prompted Shaylynn to make an observation of her own. “You look surprised.”

“How can I not be? I mean, I'm happy for you, dear, but I can't help but remember a time, not so long ago, when you swore that you'd never fall in love again. And now, not only are you obviously in love, but this sounds serious. Are you planning to marry this Solomon? Is that why you wanted to talk to us ... to see how we felt about your decision to remarry?”

Quite honestly, Shaylynn didn't know why she felt the need to talk to the Jessups. It was probably because they were about the closest things to parents that she'd ever had. Prior to moving to Atlanta and spending so much time around Ella Mae, Alice had been the only mother figure Shaylynn had known since the death of her grandmother when she was just eighteen. And since she'd never had a decent father figure in her life, Lucas had been the only man to even come close to playing the role. If she coupled that with the fact that they also knew Emmett and her relationship with him, it just seemed natural for her to look to the two of them for parental-type advice.

“I haven't made a decision to remarry,” she replied quietly. “Not yet anyway. I can't really make that decision without first being asked.”

“But you think he's going to ask?” Luke's question sounded more like a statement.

Shaylynn nodded. “At least, I hope he does.”

“Wow,” Alice whispered.

“He must be some kind of man,” Lucas commented. “How does the love you have for Solomon compare to the love you had for Emmett?”

Shaylynn wanted to correct him. Her love for Emmett wasn't a thing of the past. “Had” was the wrong word to use. She still loved her former husband and always would. The devotion she now had for Neil in no way erased or replaced it. Shaylynn couldn't explain it, but it was as though God had enlarged her heart so that it could make room for Neil in a major way without having to eliminate Emmett. Shaylynn wanted to say all of that to Lucas, but she knew he wouldn't understand. She didn't quite understand it herself, but she knew it was so.

Instead, she indirectly answered Lucas's question by saying, “You know, all of my saved life, I've heard preachers talk about Boaz in the Bible. And every time I hear a single Christian woman make mention of her desire to marry, she always uses Boaz as the model. She says, âI'm waiting for God to send my Boaz.'” Shaylynn looked at Alice, and then at Lucas. “I guess Boaz is supposed to be the biblical figure with all the qualities that a woman would want in a man. But that's not the biblical name that makes my heart race, so all of those sisters ... they can have their Boaz. I'd rather that God gives me my Solomon.”

“Wow.” Alice stretched the word out longer this time.

Lucas sat back in his chair and crossed his arms in front of his chest. “Emmett was one of the most tenacious young men I'd ever known. He was bold and driven. He was fearless and selfless. He had a giving heart and a kind spirit. All of those different attributes brought about major changes to the city of Milwaukee and to the state of Wisconsin. Most of the issues he pushed during his time in government here are still in place today. There were people who loved him and people who hated him. But even those that hated him to death,
literally
, didn't hate him out of simple hatred; they hated him out of fear. They feared what a person with Emmett Ford's passion, drive, and influence might accomplish. They weren't ready for it, and the only way they knew to stop it was to snuff out his life.” In one quick motion, so as not to burn his hand, Lucas used his index finger and thumb to extinguish the flame of the candle nearest him. It was the perfect visual example.

Shaylynn used her thumb to wipe a tear that fell from her eye, and when she looked at Alice, she saw her using a napkin to do the same. Shaylynn turned back to Lucas. He smiled, and then handed her a handkerchief that he fished from his pocket. As if asking permission to continue, he held Shaylynn's hand for a moment as the handkerchief was being passed. Her returned smile granted him silent authorization.

“I still think about my young friend quite often. Emmett's father was rich. Attorney William Ford is still one of the most recognized names in this city. With all that Emmett's family had, he could have taken the easy road in life. He didn't need any of us, but we needed him. The city of Milwaukee needed him, and he answered the call. To this day, I don't think I've ever crossed paths with a manâespecially one of his young yearsâwho has done as much for people of all races or made as big a difference in their lives as Emmett. And even eight years later, people speak well of him. They remember him for the mover and shaker that he was.”

Lucas rubbed his hand over his clean-shaven chin. “I hope this doesn't sound sacrilegious or anything, but when I think of him, I think of Jesus. Jesus' Father was rich too, so He could have chosen the easy way out. He didn't have to fool with us. He didn't need any of us, but we needed Him, so He sacrificed it all for our needs. He, too, changed lives and reached across ethnic and social lines and did a lot of good for a lot of people, only to have His life snatched away at an early age ... all because of fear. Neither people nor other political leaders could find a way to control Emmett, so they killed him. Neither people nor other religious leaders could find a way to control Jesus, so they killed Him.” Lucas shook his head and finished with, “Fear is a dangerous thing.”

Shaylynn looked at Lucas in a new light. He wasn't one to occupy a church pew every Sunday morning, but it was clear that he did, in fact, know something about the Lord. As far as his analogy was concerned, Shaylynn had never thought of it like that, and probably never would have even shaped her mind to compare her husband to her Savior. Everything Lucas said was true, but there was one big difference that just wouldn't let her fully agree with his correlation. Jesus was faultless. Emmett was flawed. As wonderful as he was, Emmett wasn't even close to being the perfect vessel that Jesus was when He walked the earth in human form.

“I guess I'm saying all that to simply say this,” Lucas added. “If you can have a man in your life as dynamic as Emmett was, and still somehow, even this many years later, find another who you not only love as you loved Emmett, but possibly even more than you loved Emmett; I say you should go for it.” He raised his coffee cup in the air as if making a toast. “Alice and I were witnesses to your life with Emmett. We saw how much you loved him and how much he loved you. Most people only get one chance at that kind of love, Shaylynn. If you're one of the few who gets a second chance, you'd better not let it pass. Not for anything in the world. I've never met Solomon, but I just saw the look on your face when you spoke your heart, and after seeing that, I don't even feel like I have to meet him. If my blessing is what you're looking for, you've got it.”

“Mine too, dear,” Alice said, raising her cup as well.

Fresh tears rolled down Shaylynn's face, and her vision was cloudy as she picked up her own glass and raised it toward the center of the table to meet with theirs. “Thank you,” she whispered.

Now there was just one more person Shaylynn needed to share her heart with if she was going to move forward with Neil, and she was going to need Lucas and Alice's help with getting that done too.

FOURTEEN

Two weeks had passed since Neil had discovered the jaw-dropping paperwork in CJ's office, and every day since the find, he had stared at the shabbily scribbled words, trying to make a decision on what to do next. Neil felt like a common thief, and rightfully so. He had left his best friend's home with the unauthorized note tucked away in the back of the folder that he had actually gone there to pick up. Every time his phone rang and he saw CJ's name on the caller ID, he wondered if his crime had been uncovered. When CJ asked him to stop by his office before leaving church last Sunday, Neil was sweating bullets. All CJ wanted to do was invite him and Shaylynn to dinner. The guilt he felt wouldn't even allow Neil to accept the kind gesture, but as overwhelming as the guilt was, it wasn't enough to make Neil return the stolen evidence.

“Borrowed ... not stolen.” Neil had been saying that aloud almost every time the thought entered his head. “It's not stealing as long as I take it back. Which I will. Once I'm done doing ... whatever I'm gonna do with it. I'm just borrowing it.” If he said it enough, maybe he'd be able to convince himself. After all, it couldn't be all bad. God had led him to this paperwork. He
must
have. There was just no other explanation. It was only after Neil had prayed for a way to break Emmett's spell on Shaylynn that this information virtually fell into his lap. It was too much to be coincidental. God's hands were all over this.

Drug laundering ... prostitution ... you name it ... was unfaithful to his wife during entire marriage. . . loved call girls ... bought women like most men bought suits ... dirty politics ... paid by drug lords ...

The words that Neil stared at were haunting him. “Emmett was scandalous. A liar, a cheat, and a common criminal.” In his dreams, saying such words was a lot more satisfying than doing so in real life. Neil had longed for this chance; the chance to shatter Shaylynn's image of a perfect man; a man who was the only barrier to her giving him her entire heart. But now that he had all the ammunition that he needed in order to smash the image into smithereens, Neil felt caught between a rock and a hard place. He pulled a peppermint from the dish on his desk, opened the wrapper, and popped the candy in his mouth without once breaking his thoughts.

Whether he outright revealed this newfound information to Shaylynn, or somehow figured out a cunning way to feed it to her without her knowing it was coming from him, the woman he loved would be devastated. And as badly as Neil wanted to put Emmett Ford to rest once and for all, the last thing he wanted was to break Shaylynn's heart. He just wanted to break the attachment her heart had to this man. There had to be a way to do one without doing the other.
But how
?

Neil drummed his fingers against the surface of his desk as he thought back to over a year ago. He recalled the day that he'd asked CJ to use his connections as a former law enforcement officer to do some kind of background check on Emmett Ford. Neil knew of the two Jamaican-born men who made up the partnership of Kris-Cross P.I., the name that was scribbled near the bottom of the sketchy notes that CJ had jotted. He was sure that it was CrossâVictor Crossâwho CJ had gotten to dig up the information that his eyes had been staring at for days. Victor and CJ were DeKalb County police officers at the same time, and to this day they remained friends. A couple of years after CJ put down his police badge to pick up his clergy collar, Victor had left his public servant's position as well, and had joined his cousin, Kristoff Nain, in a private detective agency that they called Kris-Cross P.I. And Neil knew that if CJ asked Victor to do a little personal snooping for him, he would have done it, and all the barely legible scribbles on the paper were proof that he'd sniffed out a mile-long trail of stench.

Neil also remembered the day that CJ called to inform him that he had, in fact, discovered some not-so-pleasant essentials about the former Mayor Emmett Ford, but by then CJ's conscience had kicked in, and he'd told Neil that he wasn't going to help him destroy Shaylynn's loving memories just to satisfy his insecurities. CJ said God wouldn't be pleased with Neil's self-serving, merciless mission. He'd said if Neil and Shaylynn's relationship was truly God-ordained, it would blossom righteously and without the mudslinging. “God is not the author of confusion,” he'd said more than once. And, as was usual in most cases like these, CJ had been right, and once Neil won Shaylynn's heart on his own merit, he'd forgotten about CJ's confession to finding fault in the man Shaylynn thought was so ideal.

Neil had remained confident and sure of himself until recent months. Until lately, hearing Emmett's name slip into a conversation every now and then was no big issue, but now, every single mention of him was like claw-length fingernails against a chalkboard, and the demons Neil thought he'd conquered had returned, and with them they seemed to have brought reinforcements. He hated what this was doing to him. Neil wished that he could just be the bigger man and overlook it like the rest of the world seemed to think he should so easily be able to do, but he couldn't. This eternal love that Shaylynn had for her former husband was one of the most frustrating things Neil had ever dealt with in all his life, and it was impossible to pretend that all was well. Emmett had to go. Plain and simple.

A sudden knocking noise was accompanied by the words, “Knock-knock. Are you busy? Can I come in?”

Neil choked on the remains of the peppermint in his mouth when he heard Shaylynn's voice, which seemed to come out of nowhere. He looked up to see her standing in the doorway of his office, knocking on the doorframe. Neil couldn't speak. The sounds of several hard coughs echoed off the walls of his office as his body attempted to clear his windpipe. Gaining some level of control, he inconspicuously turned the unauthorized document face down on his desk.

“Are you okay?” Shalylynn's voice amplified her concern. She rushed inside, tossed her handbag on his credenza, and headed to the water cooler alongside the wall, where she filled a small cup and delivered it to him. “Here. Drink some of this.”

Neil's brown skin had turned a shade of red. It was more from shame than the lack of oxygen. He took several swallows from the cup, and then managed to croak out a “Thank you,” before downing the remaining fluid. Even in his near-strangling state, Neil took note of how nice Shaylynn looked in her charcoal grey scoop-neck sweater, black wool wide-leg capri pants, and long, high-heeled grey boots. She topped it off with the coat he'd bought her for Christmas, and the ensemble looked like something straight out of a fashion catalogue. The only thing that kept it from being a flawless image was the all-too-familiar silver chain around her neck. Although it hung too low inside her sweater for him to see the ring that was suspended on the end of it, he knew it was there.

Shaylynn took the cup from his hand and quickly refilled it. “Did I startle you? I'm sorry.” She handed the full cup back to him.

Neil shook his head in a silent lie, and then made the untruth verbal. “You didn't. I was eating.” At least that part was true. He cleared his throat and pointed at the glass dish where he stored his favorite candy. “It went down the wrong way, that's all.”

“Well, you were certainly engrossed in whatever you were looking at when I first arrived. I stood at the door and watched you for a minute before I said anything. You were looking so intense that I started to just back away and leave. What are you working on?” Shaylynn reached for the single sheet of paper, but Neil's hand became a bullet. When he slammed his palm against the paper to prevent her from turning it, Shaylynn was clearly taken aback.

“Sorry... .” Neil's mind searched for words to justify his desperate reaction. “It's confidential.” When she looked like she wasn't quite convinced, he cleared his throat and added, “This is information that CJ found out about ... a parent of one of the children here. The father of one of our students has ... a criminal history, and it's something that has to be kept private.”

The doubt that was once on Shaylynn's face was quickly replaced by alarm. “Criminal history? So what does that mean? Does that put the children here at risk?”

Neil knew that the bulk of her worry was directed at only one of the children at Kingdom Builders Academy. Shaylynn had to be one of the most overly protective parents he'd ever met. “No, suga.” Neil smiled, partially because he was glad that the explanation that his racing brain had to come up with on such short notice was actually an honest one. “The children are in no danger. For one, the crime he committed is something that happened a long time ago, and secondly, the child's father is ... well, he doesn't live anywhere near here. It's just some old news that was brought to our attention that has to be kept confidential.” When Neil saw Shaylynn nod her understanding, he stepped closer to her and used his hands to brush back her braids. “You know that I'd never let anything happen to Chase, right?”

She smiled up at him, and Neil felt every muscle in his body tighten when she gently ran her hands up, and then down his arms. He'd determined a long time ago that his arms were two of her favorite things on his body to touch. His defined biceps were inherited blessings that had been passed along by his father. The natural shape of Neil's arms was deceiving. He seldom did any weight training during his gym visits.

“I know.” Her soft reply did nothing to calm his rampant emotions.

By the way she looked at him, Neil knew that she wanted him to kiss her, and he was all too happy to deliver. His lips were another part of his body that he'd concluded were among her favorites. Every time Neil kissed Shaylynn, he literally felt as if he had to hold her up under the pressure. Her body almost became limp upon impact. Knowing he had that effect on her made him feel seven feet tall. He pulled her closer as his lips continued to explore hers, so close that Neil felt like their two bodies were becoming one; like a passionate rapture had taken place and wherever they now were, there was no one else within miles.

“A-hem!”

The exaggerated throat clearing noise proved that Neil's far-away fantasy had been just thatâa fantasy. Neil was far more annoyed than embarrassed at being caught in the act. He grudgingly released Shaylynn and took a few steps backward before looking in the direction of his door. Neil's disdain for Margaret's bad timing was obvious. “Yes, Ms. Dasher?”

“Well hello, Ms. Ford.” Margaret walked into the office space holding a message pad in her hand. She temporarily ignored both Neil and his look of annoyance. “I didn't realize you were in here.”

“Hi, Ms. Dasher.” Shaylynn looked embarrassed enough for both of them. She used her fingers to wipe away the moisture that Neil's kiss had left on her lips. “You weren't at your desk when I arrived, so I just let myself in. I did sign the visitor sheet that was on the counter, though.”

“You didn't have to sign in,” Neil told her. He lifted her chin with his index finger, forcing her to look at him. “And you don't have to be embarrassed, either. At least you knocked, which is more than I can say for some people.” He darted a glance toward Margaret after saying that part.

“Well,
some people
work here,” Margaret replied with more than a little sarcasm. “And every day, ten minutes before the dismissal bell,
some people
come in to check with you to see if there are any last-minute tasks that she needs to do before leaving for the day.
Some people
don't usually have to knock, so she didn't think she had to knock today either.”

Shaylynn fidgeted, and then said, “I'm going to go andâ”

“No.” Neil caught her by the arm. “You don't have to leave, Shay.”

“Of course you don't,” Margaret said. “It's a workplace, but we don't
have
to work if we don't want to. And by all means, please don't leave on account of me, because if Dr. Taylor doesn't have anything for me to do, I just need to give him a couple of phone messages, and I can get out of your way. Y'all can go right on back to doing ...
whatever
.”

Neil balled his hand into a fist and squeezed hard. Where was that stress ball when he needed it?

“No, it's not that.” Shaylynn gathered her purse from Neil's credenza. “I didn't realize it was so close to the dismissal bell. I need to get to Chase's class and sign him out before all of the students are released and the halls get congested.” She looked at Neil, and he was sure that he saw tears in her eyes. That angered him even more. “I'll see you later,” she concluded.

“Okay.” Neil leaned forward and brushed his lips against her cheek. He wanted to say more; so much more. Not to Shaylynn, but to Margaret. He had to remind himself of where he was, and who Shaylynn was. She wasn't just his lady; she was the mother of one of Kingdom Builders Academy's students. Neil couldn't act out of emotion. Not in front of a parent, anyway. “I'll call you later this evening,” he whispered. “I love you.”

Shaylynn struggled to smile. “I love you too.” As she walked away from his desk and out the door, she avoided eye contact with Margaret.

Margaret looked at the door that Shaylynn closed behind her exit. “Well, you have a nice day too, Ms. Ford.”

BOOK: When Solomon Sings

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