Page 57 of Operation: Chosen

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, old man.” He looked away, his tired frame now rigid, ready for an argument.

“Ah, so we’re back to that?”

“You promised you wouldn’t lump me together with them.”

The accusation hit the mark, but what else could he think when there had been three bracelets lying on the bed? “Show me your monitor, and I’ll apologize. I know Gabby wouldn’t have forgotten to remind you to put it on last night, so don’t tell me it’s back at my house.” He tried to cross his arms, remembered one couldn’t bend, and finally thrust his fist to his waist.

Terrell raked his hand over the top of his short hair and sighed. “Look. I didn’t plan for this. Okay?”

“Plan for what?” He motioned for Terrell to join him in the living room. If Eric didn’t sit soon, he was going to start pacing.

“If I don’t do what Big E says, I’m dead. There’s a hit out on me. Jayzon told Big E he wouldn’t do it. We have too much history. Big E wants to take his place in the gang and he’ll get it if he kills me.”

“So, why the fire?” Eric would tackle the other huge issues with what Terrell had said after they dealt with this one.

“Big E told me he might change his mind about me if I did what he said. He was in my room. They broke in through the window that I escaped out of before. You can look. They pried it up with something from the barn. I’m not lying.” Sweat broke out along his brow. “I promise I’m not.”

“So, he made you go along with setting the fire to see if you would do as he asked?”

Terrell shook his head slowly. “No, man. He made me light it, and he made me put the monitors in the fire so that if anyone could get any prints off of them, they would be mine.”

Eric rested his head against the back of the sofa, feeling the weight of the world on his shoulders. He wanted to see Terrell succeed, but he never would with the other boys here. Micha, with the Board of Corrections, already said the group was all or nothing. If the other two came back, Terrell also had to. So, how could he save Terrell from ruining his life?

“We need to get you away from them. We’ll need to think of something. The police will be here shortly, which means your time at Wayside is drawing to a fast end. I’ll do what I can, but when they ask you what happened, you will be one-hundred percent honest with them and you’ll do whatever they tell you. Understood?”

“Yes, sir.” He hung his head. “I’m sorry.”

Everyone made mistakes in their life, but some mistakes were visible and life-altering. Worse, sometimes they created a domino effect, as they were with Terrell.

“I know you’ve got the strength to walk away from this. Someday you’re going to be talking to kids who are the age you are now, and they’ll look up to you for what you’re doing. We just need to get you to that point.” Connor had taken the boys in as a test for Micha so maybe he could pull some strings for Terrell. But only if Eric could convince Connor that Terrell wasn’t as guilty as he looked.

ChapterTwenty-Two

Counselling Terrell, that’s what she had to think about.Howwould she counsel Terrell? Ali walked in the narrow space between the rows of cabins, staying out of the way of the emergency vehicles and investigators. Police had already arrived and were talking to Big E and Jayzon. She doubted either of them would talk, or if they did, doubted they would tell the truth.

She’d heard the conversation between Terrell and Eric since she’d been following Eric to find out what had happened when he’d gone inside Junior’s cabin. The window to the living room had been open and neither of them had kept their voices down, so she’d heard the whole terrible situation.

Now she wasn’t sure what to say. Eric’s attention would be taken, and rightfully so, by Terrell’s circumstances. He wouldn’t have time to talk to her about her misgivings, but the wordforgivenessstill felt wrong.

She recalled the text from Connor when he’d been worried about where Eric was. It had been so strangely unexpected. How was it possible that she’d thought about her loneliness, then received proof that having people care was an option? There was the possibility it could’ve been a coincidence. She’d always found fate to be little more than preparation meeting opportunity. But this didn’t fit that. Connor had cared about Eric and sent him a text. That couldn’t have been prearranged. Connor couldn’t have known she would be having an existential crisis that very minute either.

But was one text enough to change her feelings on faith and religion? She wandered back to her cabin and in the front door. A chill swept over her the same as it did whenever she walked into her cabin. She headed back to her bedroom and opened the closet. It was even more full now after a few shopping trips. Leaving would be even more difficult than coming because she’d almost doubled the amount of clothing that had to fit in her luggage.

At the bottom of the closet was the plaque with the list of ten rules. She bent and lifted it off the floor. Number one wasfaith. She now knew just by watching how they treated the boys that they didn’t force faith on anyone. She wouldn’t be writing them up for abusing government funds.

On the contrary, she wanted to write grant requests for them to get more funding. Rule number two wasclean slate. She laughed two short choking laughs before she sank to the floor on her knees. Who needed a clean slate more than she did? She’d watched Eric work to give that very thing to Terrell. Over and over the boy had failed, then succeeded, then failed again. Eric had gone back to him every time, lifted him up, and kept him going.

Eric was the example, and he was showing her without shoving his faith down her throat what that clean slate really was. It was hope. It was the forgiveness she was so terrified of. It was becoming what she’d never been before in all her forty-two years. Free.

If she gave up on needing the perfect surroundings and the perfect clothes and the perfect job, then would she have the clean slate that Wayside offered? If she took it, she could finally whiteboard her memory of her ex-husband, her uncle, her mother, all the people who had let her down. Including her former self. She traced the etching on the wood with her finger. They weren’t the Ten Commandments Eric had told her about when they were young, but if she’d seen those hanging on the wall, she wouldn’t have read them in the first place.

Ali laid the plaque down on the floor and took a deep breath. “Ali Adeena Wellthorp, I forgive you. You were scared and made decisions that hurt people so you could avoid that fear, but you never succeeded. I forgive you for trying.”

She swallowed and felt a weight on her pressing in, not heavy, but present. Eric had talked about forgiving her and forgiving herself, but maybe she needed to forgive Eric too. He hadn’t done anything to win her back after she’d rejected him, but he hadn’t tried to prove her wrong either. If he’d come after her when she’d said no and asked her why—asked her to really define why she didn’t want to marry him when they’d been so happy—she wouldn’t have been able to answer him and may have told him the truth.

While she was at it, she needed to apologize for lying to him. He was a wonderful guy, and she hadn’t wanted him to love her anymore. In order to get him to move on, she’d said things that were untrue and hurt him. It was an awful thing to do, and now she knew that. Guilt stabbed at her, and she stared at the plaque, trying to gather all her thoughts.

Number nine,truth, stared at her, begging her to do the right thing. Eric needed to know, even though he’d already forgiven her, that nothing she’d said that day was true. Not even her refusal. She hadn’t wanted to say it. She’d wanted to believe they could live happily ever after, but she’d firmly believed that would never be possible for her.

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