Emerald Fire (Christian Romance) (The Jewel Series) (7 page)

In life, Maxine had never, ever liked Jacqueline. In fact, she sometimes imagined some kind of slimy wormlike alien had inhabited Jacqueline’s insides, feeding itself on her rudeness, carnality, and avarice. So unlike, she thought, the Spirit whose fruits include such things as kindness and self control.

Now, the woman was dead and had to answer to her Maker. The fact was that Maxine wasn’t here for Jacqueline. She was here for Barry. She started forward, stopped long enough to sign the registry, then quickly moved toward the usher who stood sentry by one of the several sets of massive double doors leading to the sanctuary of the church. Her heels made no sound on the carpeted floor.

The usher didn’t return her smile, but opened the door for her. She slipped into the sanctuary and stopped.

Every seat appeared taken. She slipped back out again and spoke in low volumes to the usher, trying to determine if moving up to the balcony would prove worthwhile. In whispered tones, he informed her that she would find the balcony just as full as the main floor, so she slipped back into the room and stood against the back wall.

She could not see her family, but knew that the front rows on the left side were reserved for Barry’s family. Tony would be seated as close to Barry’s parents as possible since he was Barry’s best friend. Maxine often felt the men acted like fraternal twin brothers. Tony considered Barry family in the same way he considered Robin’s sisters family, and to him the differing last names meant absolutely nothing.

She decided to walk along the far left wall until she spotted them. She started to move to the far side of the room so that she could sneak along the wall but just as she took her first steps, Barry took the podium.

At six-nine and nearly three hundred pounds of muscle, Barry looked like the professional football player that the Super Bowl ring on his left hand proclaimed, but Maxine knew football had only been Barry’s shortest path to his law degree, and he had never looked back or regretted retiring from the game. Fitness was center to his life, though, and he still kept in very good shape. She could not help admiring the way he filled out his dark charcoal suit from his broad shoulders to his thick limbs.

Not wanting to distract him by walking to the front while he was speaking, she resumed her position against the back wall just beside the door and watched her best friend eulogize his late wife. As he faced the crowd, Maxine realized he’d shaved off his goatee, and she wasn’t certain if she liked the clean-shaven look or not.

She hadn’t seen him in weeks. She tried to remember the last time she’d talked to him. Mid-September, maybe. She’d called to see if he had a ticket to an upcoming Patriots game.

“I have a client who would probably give me his first born if I could get him tickets,” she said.

Barry had been very abrupt and distracted. “No. Someone else has my tickets this week. I can’t help you. I have to go.”

Despite her occasionally trying to get in touch with him since then, she hadn’t heard from him.

She watched Barry pull a small sheet of paper out of his jacket pocket. On either side of the massive stage, large screens provided a close-up view, and the person manning the camera zoomed in on Barry’s face. Maxine couldn’t help but stare at the handsome man, his strong features hard as stone. He raised one of his massive hands and rubbed his forehead. Maxine noted the Super Bowl ring he sported on his left ring finger in lieu of a wedding band.

She watched him close his eyes and take a deep breath before opening them again, focusing on some point in the crowd near the front. She almost gasped out loud, nearly tried to take a step back, at the intensity of his stare – even from a distance she could see it.

He cleared his throat and put away the paper. “I had a nice speech prepared. Something impassionate and just the right amount of emotional, but it’s all just a bunch of hogwash.”

A murmur rippled through the crowd as hundreds of people bent their heads together and started whispering. Barry gripped the podium with both hands and leaned down toward the microphone. “I would probably have kept up whatever pretense I needed to keep up to save my parents and sisters any kind of embarrassment, but marrying Jacqui eighteen years ago was probably embarrassment enough so that anything that happens now probably won’t even faze them.”

The murmur changed to a full gasp, and now people sat forward, on the edges of their seats, ready for more. “The truth is, I always loved my wife. Even when she gave me absolutely every possible imaginable reason to stop, I still loved her. I always prayed that she would come to know Christ, that I could witness to her. But God chose not to answer that prayer. I don’t understand why. So, in that mission, I failed. I have absolutely no doubt that I will answer for that one day.”

Barry bowed his head. Maxine felt her heart hurting for him. She could almost see the emotions he struggled to hold in check.

The population of the church murmured continuously. It sounded like a constant quiet hum. Maxine wasn’t sure how much time passed before Barry said, with his head still bowed, “As you all sit out there in your funeral best, let me go ahead and confirm whatever rumors I must to keep this town in gossip for a few days. Yes, Jacqui was pregnant when she died.” Suddenly, the church turned so silent it was almost a roar. Barry continued, ruthlessly, his voice even, a monotone. “Of course, the baby wasn’t mine.”

Maxine felt her knees turn to water.
Oh, Barry. What are you doing, Barry? Please stop, Barry. Please don’t.

He continued, “Apparently, she was really in love this time. Our divorce was quietly in the works. I have absolutely no business eulogizing her today. So I won’t stand before you and say anything I don’t mean. I won’t be joining you at the graveside. In fact, I have just enough self respect left in me to turn the podium over to Charles Mason, the father of that unborn child and Jacqueline’s future husband. Charles? You have the floor.”

No one murmured as Barry stormed off the stage. The mood of the entire room was that of complete shock. The giant flew down the stairs. His footsteps clapped like nearby thunder in the deafening silence.

Maxine slipped back out the very same door she had entered and moved very quickly across the outer narthex to the double doors leading to the outside. She stepped into the cold December air and made it halfway down the church steps when she heard one of the doors above her slam open hard enough to hit the outer wall.

She looked behind her but kept going down the steps just to keep her momentum going. “Hey, Barry,” she said, holding up her car keys. “Need a getaway driver?”

He stopped – totally stopped – halfway down the stairs. She reached the bottom and turned fully around to look at him. “You probably have about three seconds left before my brother-in-law comes racing through those doors.”

Barry glanced back, then took the last ten steps in three massive strides. “Let’s go,” he urged. They reached Maxine’s car as the doors to the church flew open again. As Maxine buckled up, she heard Tony calling Barry’s name.

She pealed away, tires chirping on the cold pavement. She looked over at Barry, who grabbed the seat belt behind him and clicked it shut just as she turned onto the main road and darted into traffic. “Where to, big guy?”

Barry rubbed his face with both hands. “I don’t care.” He sat quietly for a moment, staring out the car window, then pointed at a restaurant sign. “That’s fine, there. I haven’t eaten today. Pull in and park around back so they don’t see your car.”

MAXINE
parked the car behind the restaurant and grabbed her purse as she slid out of the car. Barry put a hand on the small of her back to lead her to the door. Catching their reflection in the glass, she thought they looked like a very serious, very handsome couple. She, in her long black funeral suit, he in his charcoal suit with crisp white shirt and staid gray tie – they matched well.

Even with her six feet of height and additional three-inch heels, Barry towered over her by several inches. Barry leaned around her and grabbed the door handle, scanning the street behind him as he opened the door for her.

They didn’t speak as the hostess seated them and handed them menus and the waitress brought them ice water and took an order for coffee. Maxine’s eyes skimmed over everything on the vinyl coated menu within seconds and she folded it and set it aside. She ran her finger over the condensation on her water glass as she leaned back in the booth and looked at Barry. He looked very tired. His blue eyes seemed a little dull, his mouth a bit pinched, his color off.

“I’ve missed you the last few weeks,” she murmured just to break the silence.

He peered at her over the rim of the menu before tossing it down. He propped his elbows on the table and rubbed his face then ran his hands through his close cropped blond hair. “It’s been a difficult time.”

Maxine nodded. “I gathered.”

He leaned back against the booth and crossed his arms over his massive chest. He released a deep breath. “We’d been living separate lives for years; different bedrooms; different holiday plans …”

Maxine raised an eyebrow. “Why?”

Barry shrugged. “I don’t know. I needed a wife or a hostess sometimes. She needed money to support her lifestyle. She could throw a killer dinner party, and that kind of networking really helped my law firm.” He sighed and threw an arm over the back of the booth. “It worked for us. When she told me she was pregnant, I just kind of shut off.”

Maxine could hear the hurt in his voice. Deep hurt. Her heart twisted and she felt tears burn the back of her throat. Barry continued, “I realized that there’d been some small hope inside me – for years now – that if I lived a righteous enough life and if my righteous life witnessed to her, that one day she’d come to know the Lord and that would change things. We could really be married and start a family together.”

She watched his finger tap to the beat of an unheard rhythm on the back of the booth. “At first, we tried to reconcile. For the sake of the baby, I was willing to forgive. I was making plans about how we could work it out. Then the baby’s father decided he was really in love with her. He left his wife and Jacqui went running to him without looking back. He was there when she died.”

The waitress started toward the table, but Maxine lifted a finger and gave a brief shake of her head to ward her off. Barry continued, “Probably once a year I would read the commands of God for husbands and realize that I wasn’t where I should be, and I’d pray for help. But it seems like whenever I did that, she’d flaunt some lover in my face and I’d go right back to apathy.”

Maxine tried to grasp the extent of what he was saying, but she couldn’t. As deeply faithful to God as her sister and husband were, as deeply faithful as Barry had always been, Maxine simply didn’t feel it. She liked church, she prayed at family meals, she attended church functions, but this abounding faith that those around her professed to have seemed to have missed the boat with her. Not knowing what else to say, she simply said, “I’m sorry.”

“Yeah.” He met her eyes and smiled. “Everyone’s very sorry.” His smiled turned into a wry smile. “I’ll probably be sorrier when the impact of what I did today sets in.”

Maxine sat back and gripped her hands in her lap, strangely wanting to reach out to him and comfort him with just a touch of her hand. “If you were trying to avoid gossip, you kind of managed the opposite of your intent.”

“Everyone knew. Why keep up such an absurd pretense?” Barry looked over his shoulder and caught the waitress’ eye. He waved her over. “I saw him sitting there and realized that he was the one really mourning. Apparently, they were really in love and all gaga over the baby.”

“Does he have kids?” Maxine wondered.

Barry nodded. “I understand he has two but they are both teens. Still, makes you wonder.”

Maxine had no idea what it was supposed to make her wonder about but she nodded in agreement anyway. The waitress approached, pad and pencil in hand. “What can I get you?”

Barry gestured with his hands. “I want a huge steak – the biggest you have. And some grilled vegetables. Do a double order if you need to. And an iced tea. No sweetener.”

The waitress looked at Maxine who smiled. “Just a plain salad, no meat, with some oil and vinegar on the side.”

When the waitress left, Barry raised an eyebrow. “What’s with the rabbit food?”

Shrugging, Maxine took a sip of water. “I eat like a rabbit and workout five days a week and still seem to be losing a battle with something. Nature, I guess.”

If she’d been standing, he would have looked her up and down. She could tell the way his eyes moved over her that he was processing her size and shape. “I’m sorry, Maxi, but I’m not seeing you losing a battle with anything.”

She felt a flush of heat tinge the tops of her cheeks. “Well, working out helps.”

“What kind of working out?”

Maxine knew Barry had a private gym in his home that could rival any fitness club’s setup. “Twice a week, I go to a spinning class, and twice a week I do a cardio-kick class.”

He snorted and smiled his first genuine smile since they sat down. “Cardio- kick?”