A Hope Undaunted (7 page)

Luke gave him a sideways glance and arched a brow. His gaze shifted to the swinging door Katie had just barreled through. He lowered his voice to a whisper. “Oh, I don’t know, seems pretty cool in here now.”

Brady smiled and swiped a sip of his tea. “Don’t worry about Katie. She’ll warm up to you – eventually. You know she’s always been a little touchy where you’re concerned. But honestly, Patrick’s right. Working with you at the BCAS will be the best thing for her.”

“Yeah?” Luke let loose with a low chuckle and angled to face the man who had mentored him at the age of fourteen, the friend who had taught him about God. “Why?”

“Because other than Patrick, you’re one of the few who stood up to her, challenged her.”

“Drove her crazy?”

Brady grinned. “Yeah, that too. And trust me, Katie could use a little challenge right about now. I’m afraid the older Marcy gets, the more she coddles her. And her sisters are so busy with their own families that when they do spend time with her, they’re more interested in getting along than butting heads. But you? No, not only are you someone who brings out the worst in her, but as her future boss . . .” Brady rolled his neck to work out the kinks. “You also have an opportunity to soften the worst in her.” A lazy smile eased across Brady’s face as he gave Luke’s shoulder a friendly pat. “That is . . . if you can.”

The door squealed open, unleashing a noisy barrage of children ushered in by Mitch and Charity, who each toted a tub of ice cream. Faith and Katie were hot on their heels, birthday cake aflame and steaming coffeepot in hand. Luke leveled his gaze on Katie, noting her stiff smile and the clamp of her jaw.

A soft chuckle reached his ears as Brady leaned forward and thumped his arm. “I have all the confidence in the world in you, Luke my boy, honestly I do. But if it’s all the same to you . . . I’m hoping you’re a praying man.”

“Promise you’ll talk to him, Mother, please? My life will be over if I have to spend the summer with Cluny McGee.” Katie’s voice was frayed as she washed and dried an ice cream dish and put it in the cupboard. With a labored sigh, she returned to the kitchen table where she commenced to flipping through the latest issue of
Vogue
magazine.

Marcy laid her granddaughter’s forgotten doll on the table and squeezed Katie’s shoulder. “He goes by Luke now, Katie, and of course I will, you know that. Although I do agree with your father that it could be a fun experience.” With a not-so-reassuring smile, she patted Katie’s cheek and moved toward the door. The resignation etched on her mother’s face did not bode well for Katie’s cause. Marcy turned, her eyes tender. “I promise I’ll try, but you know your father once he’s made up his mind.”

Yes, she knew. She drew in a deep breath and blew it out with a blast of frustration, her stomach tightening at her mother’s tentative tone. “It just isn’t fair, Mother. Father’s like a dictator with everything Steven and I do, and you know it.”

Marcy’s smile seemed tired. “Yes, your father is stubborn and certainly adamant about discipline, but he loves you and Steven with every breath in him, and although it may not seem like it at the time, he’s only looking out for your own good. We both are.”

“Good? Banishing me to some dreary office in the city where a cocky man can lord it all over me like Father does, day in and day out? No, thank you. This is exactly why I want to be a lawyer, Mother – to blaze the way for women who think they need a man to take care of them. Women like Mrs. Rhoades at church – everyone knows that tyrant she lives with beats her, but will she leave? Not on her life.” Katie’s jaw quivered with anger. “And in the end, it will probably cost her hers.”

Her mother’s tone was quiet. “Your father is nothing like Benjamin Rhoades, Katie Rose, and you know it.”

“No, he isn’t, and I love Father, I do, but he’s just as controlling as every other man out there. Just look at Mitch and Charity – he refuses to let her work at her own store.”

“She has children to care for, Katie – ” Marcy began.

“Who are in school eight hours a day. I’ve heard Charity say she would love to work at the store with Emma, even for just a few hours, but will Mitch let her? Not on your life. And he bought the store for her when they got married, for pity’s sake. Instead, he rules with an iron fist, just like Father. And Collin? You and I both know the battles he waged over Faith’s job before she got pregnant with the girls. No, Mother, you are not going to convince me that it’s not a man’s world out there, and I for one think it’s time for a change. In the last decade, women have gotten the right to vote, taken charge of their own future in the workplace, and have broken free from Victorian dictates to forge their own morality – ”

“You mean their own promiscuity,” Marcy said with an edge to her tone. “The flapper lifestyle is hardly a lifestyle we condone, young lady, nor one that will make you happy.”

Katie’s shoulders slumped in defeat. “I know, and I don’t embrace everything espoused today, really I don’t. Alcohol and cigarettes and lewd behavior only cheapen the woman’s cause, in my opinion, not to mention that it gives men what they want without any commitment.” She blew her bangs from her face. “But a little more freedom would be nice, don’t you think?”

Marcy chuckled. “You and I have all the freedom we need, young lady – your father provides us with a comfortable life, and we would do well to remember that.”

“Mmm . . . ,” Katie said with a fold of her arms. “I look forward to the day when I can provide my own comfortable life and do as I please.” Her frustration escaped in a bluster of air. “Without the restraint of my father
or
my husband.”

“Well, I have no doubt that if anyone can achieve that, Katie Rose, it will be you. But until then, there’s a good chance you’ll be working at the Boston Children’s Aid Society this summer whether you and I like it or not.”

Katie started to speak, but Marcy held up a hand. “And, yes, I will talk to your father, but I wouldn’t get your hopes up. He seems to think that you’ll thank him for this in the end.” Her mother’s face looked tired, but her tone had the slightest inflection of tease. “Of course, you could always pray about it, I suppose . . .” She blew her daughter a kiss at the door. “I’m heading up to bed now, so would you mind waiting up for Faith?” She nodded her head toward the smudged Kewpie doll she’d laid on the table. “Abby forgot her baby tonight, so Faith’s on retrieval. Apparently it’s Collin’s turn to read the girls a story before bed. Good night, darling.”

“Sure, Mother. Good night.” Katie sighed as her mother departed the room, reflecting on her comment about prayer – the last thing on her list of solutions. She picked up Abby’s Kewpie doll and pressed its two chubby palms together with a scrunch of her nose. Sometimes she wished prayer were as important to her as it seemed to be for the rest of her family. That would make life so easy – putting one’s cares into the capable hands of a loving Father, as her sister, Faith, was so fond of saying. Katie tossed the doll back on the table. Well, if her heavenly Father was anywhere as stubborn as her earthly one, she wasn’t too sure she wanted his help anyway. For the moment, it seemed far safer to put her faith in herself and her abilities rather than some long-distance God with a long list of rules.

“Sweet saints in heaven, it’s like a steam bath out there.” The screen door creaked as Faith hurried in, one fist flapping the front of her blouse to create a breeze. She shoved a limp strand of auburn hair away from tired green eyes and gave Katie a weary smile, her breathing winded. “Of course, it could have been the three blocks I ran to rescue Miss Kewpie, I suppose.”

Katie jumped up with a smile. “Sit. How about a lemonade? You look like you could use one.”

Hesitation flickered across Faith’s features as she glanced at the clock, then relaxed into a smile when she dropped into a chair with a groan. “Actually that does sound pretty good, Katie, thanks. Mother in bed?”

“Yes, I think this heat wrings her out worse than it does Lizzie, and Father headed up a while ago. Something about a headache, I think.” Katie poured a cool glass of lemonade for Faith, then one for herself before settling back in her chair. Faith drained half her glass in one thirsty swallow. She clunked it down on the table with a grateful sigh. “Oh, that hit the spot – thanks. A headache, huh? Mmm . . . now that you mention it, Father did seem a touch cranky at dinner.”

Katie’s lips skewed to the right. “Oh, you noticed, did you? Can you believe he’s making me spend my summer working for that annoying twit?”

“I thought Luke seemed rather nice.” Faith’s smile was gentle.

“Nice?” Katie’s tone raised several octaves. “See, that’s the problem with that pest – he always treated everyone nice but me. A regular Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Charmed the socks off of my family, but treated me like dirt.”

“I don’t remember that,” Faith said with a crinkle of her brows.

“You wouldn’t – you never see the bad in anybody. But trust me, I didn’t crown him King of Misery for nothing.” She leaned forward with elbows on the table and squinted, the awful memories all flooding back. “Remember the baseball game at Lizzie and Brady’s house when I gashed my knee?”

Faith nodded, her eyes suddenly solemn.

“The little beggar tripped me,” Katie said with certainty. She hiked her leg up to tap a small, white scar on top of her knee. “Fifteen stitches, remember?”

“Come on, Katie, it was an accident.”

Her gaze thinned. “So he said, but I know better. That twerp hoarded home plate like a vulture with an evil glint in his eye, and you’re not going to tell me that it wasn’t for one purpose and one purpose only – to send me flying.”

A smile flickered at the edges of Faith’s mouth, as if she were trying to stifle it. “He simply did what any great catcher would do, Katie, try to block the plate so you couldn’t score. Besides, you know how important sports and winning always were to the poor little guy. God knows he didn’t have much else going for him.”

“Well, not friends, that’s for sure, not with a nasty streak a mile long.”

“Come on, you’re going to have to do better than that. What else did he do to warrant your wrath?”

She jutted her chin. “In addition to pestering me when nobody was looking, you mean?”

Faith grinned. “Yeah, something where you can produce a witness.”

“Okay.” Katie leaned in with a retaliatory gleam in her eyes. “Once when I was playing hopscotch in the schoolyard with my classmates, that little pest rode by on Brady’s bike and yelled, ‘Hey, O’Connor, what’s new in the dog world?’ I was mortified.”

A full-blown laugh escaped her sister, who promptly put a hand to her mouth. “Sorry, but to me, that sounds like a boy with a crush rather than one who hated you.”

Katie gasped. “Bite your tongue!” She pressed a palm to her stomach. “I think I’m going to be sick.”

Rising with a chuckle, Faith washed her empty glass in the sink and proceeded to dry it, casting a wary smile in Katie’s direction. “Nope, Katie Rose, as a young woman who hopes to be a lawyer someday, I’d say you have no grounds for your case.”

Katie studied her sister for several seconds, the smile on her face fading along with the tease in her tone. She drew in a deep breath, avoiding Faith’s eyes as she idly traced the dimple of Miss Kewpie’s knee. “You don’t understand, Faith, he was . . . well, really hurtful to me.” A sudden malaise settled and she buffed her arms out of nervous habit, fingers trailing down to the tip of her elbows where the lesions had once been. She swallowed hard, remembering with perfect clarity the hurt she had felt that day – the day Cluny McGee had stabbed her through the heart. Seconds passed before she was able to even utter the words, and when she did, she expelled them in a weak and wounded whisper. “He called me a leper, a freak of nature,” she said, shocked that the very sound of those words still held the power to bring tears to her eyes.

Faith’s smile sobered into soft concern. She reached to place a gentle hand on her sister’s arm. “I’m sorry, Katie. That was a cruel thing for him to say, I know, especially after all the taunting you experienced in school. But he was just a boy at the time, and it was a long time ago. I’m sure he’s changed.”

Katie reflected on his harsh grip last night at the diner and suspected he hadn’t.
Nice girls don’t run with riffraff.
A chill skittered through her, and she quickly finished off the last of her lemonade. She thumped the glass on the table and faced her sister square on. “No, Faith, someone as ugly as he was to me doesn’t change deep down. Other kids didn’t know how much they hurt me with their barbs because I never showed them. But him – I actually opened up to him and told him how much it had hurt. For pity’s sake, he was the one who talked me into taking off the sweaters and knee socks, telling me it didn’t matter what others thought. I swear I never liked him from the get-go because he was a dead ringer for all those bullies who taunted me in school – always picking, pushing, doing everything in his power to try and control me. And then one day I finally let my guard down and confide in the little weasel, and what does he do? He turns around and wounds me with the most hateful words he can.” Katie rose to take her glass to the sink, shaking her head. “Nope, I’m sorry, Faith – Cluny McGee is one bad memory I will never forget or forgive.”