Page 92 of Boston
She may as well have been made of metal and been holding him in a vise grip for how solid and real and strongly she held him. She said nothing and everything all at the same time, and Cash tucked his head into the soft space between her shoulder and her cheek and said, “I’m so sorry.”
“Yes,” she said, and they parted. He looked at this good woman who had raised him during a very difficult time of his life, and pure love washed over him. “I know you are. I’m just so glad that you’re home.”
Cash swallowed, trying to box up all of his emotions. Ty squirmed, and he leaned down to set the boy on his feet.
“Do you think he’ll forgive me?” he asked.
Faith scoffed and turned toward the back wall of windows that also showed the lake and the back deck. “Your father is as stubborn as a mule.” She shook her head and looked at him, softening all over again. “But there hasn’t been a day gone by since you went to dinner in Jackson that he hasn’t knelt down morning and night and begged God to bring you home.”
She leaned over and said, “Grace, take Harmony into the living room.” She passed over the chunky baby, and Grace barely seemed to be able to hold her. She wobbled for a couple of steps, and then she managed to make it into the living room.
Faith linked her arm through Cash’s. “I know he can be hard to approach, so I’ll go with you.” She reached up with her free hand and wiped at her eyes.
Cash nodded, already crying himself.
“Another thing he’s done every day,” she said as they went toward the back door. “Is tell me that there’s nothing to forgive, and he just wants you to text him. Lord, all the hours he spent looking at his phone.”
That only doubled and then tripled Cash’s guilt, and he couldn’t contain the sob that wrenched its way out of his throat. He expected to find his dad on the deck, but he wasn’t there.Faith led him past the patio furniture and the fishing poles, the paddle boards and the kayaks and the pile of life jackets, all a testimony that children lived here, enjoying the lake in the summertime.
Faith went down the steps with him to a narrow path that ran right along the edge of the lake. She stopped and nodded forward. “He’s just right there.”
Cash looked but didn’t see his father, and then suddenly, like a shadow rising out of the earth, he appeared on the path from where he had been sitting on a bench. And just like every time Cash climbed on the back of a bull, everything inside of him told him to flee.
Get down. Go.
That happened now too.
Cash had stayed on plenty of bulls, while others helped him tie his hand to it, and he got his feet in the right place, and the gate opened. And he rode.
He had to do the same thing here.
He took the first step down the path toward his dad. He moved slowly at first, and then picked up the pace, desperate for this eight-second horror to be over. He ran the last ten yards to his father, who opened his arms and received him as if this were a happy reunion, instead of the other way around.
Cash grabbed onto his father’s shoulders and gripped him tightly as he sobbed into his neck. Daddy simply held him for a couple of long minutes, and then he said, “Hello, boy,” and Cash knew that he was loved beyond measure.
“I’m sorry,” he said, pulling away. He wiped his face, everything hot and filled with liquid. “I’m so sorry, Daddy. I didn’t mean any of that stuff.”
It took him an extra moment to finally look his father in the eyes, and all that he did was nod. “I know,” he said. He reached up and cupped his hand behind Cash’s head and pulled himcloser. He touched his forehead to his, and Cash let his eyes drift close. “I know,” Daddy said again. “Even if you did mean it, it’s okay. I’m willing to do better.”
“There’s nothing to do better,” Cash said.
Daddy pulled away with that dangerous, disbelieving look on his face. He looked over Cash’s shoulder to the house and then back to him. “Will you please forgive me?” He swallowed hard and Cash recognized the signs of his father’s emotions as he’d been dealing with them for weeks.
Cash simply looked at him, wanting—andneeding—to believe that the power of forgiveness could cleanse his soul of the bitterness and resentment and anger that he had been carrying. No, he hadn’t meant to say anything about feeling neglected and abandoned, because what good would it have done?
Daddy couldn’t change the past.
“Yes,” Cash said, letting the beauty of forgiveness wash through him. He wanted God to forgive him, and therefore he could not withhold it from another person. “Like you said, there’s nothing you could have done better.”
Daddy nodded just one time. His smile still safely tucked out of sight. “Come on then,” he said. “Let’s sit down and talk.”
He turned and went back to the bench, and Cash followed him, ready to tell him everything and seek his advice, because Daddy had always been an exceptional listener and extremely helpful in prodding Cash in the right direction. He had no doubt that Daddy would do so again today.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-SEVEN
Bailey McAllister glanced over to the ten dozen doughnuts riding shotgun in her SUV. She needed to get back up the canyon before her parents had a riot on their hands. She’d never volunteered to drive down the canyon for much of anything, but when her mother had said that someone needed to go get the doughnuts in the morning, Bailey’s hand had shot up.
