Page 115 of Free to Believe
“There’s one lesson Dee taught us I think you forgot along the way though.”
“What’s that?”
“That love built on respect, trust, and faith is the everlasting kind.” Her face wet with tears, she looks up at me. “After all, isn’t that the kind of love we have for Dee? The love we have for each other? The love we’ve fought for?”
The powerful burn in the back of my eyes can’t be held back. Tears spill down my cheeks. “Yes.”
“Then remember that kind of love transcends death, sister. You can’t kill that kind of love.” Cassidy reaches up and brushes away my tears. “So, this will be the only time I say this. Stop believing you’re not worthy of it, Emily Delores Freeman, because you are.”
Cassidy’s words and ensuing emotion must have distracted me from Jake and Jenna’s arrival because my ears catch the sound of something that has my breath stopping while my heart pounds furiously in my chest. I’m stunned so completely, I don’t notice the gentle smile on Cassidy’s face. The sound has me so entranced because it’s something I haven’t heard since the week of the accident—Jake teasing out seductive notes on the sax.
Jake playing to the entire mansion isn’t just to entertain them. Down to my soul, I know it’s a statement of intent. It’s to show them he’s not afraid to lay his heart out on the line for the Freemans to see it. He’s telling them—me—he’s telling me his heart’s in the spot where the sax is how he wants to express himself.
A little bluesy.
A little sexy.
A lot in love.
“Oh, God.” I’m sobbing. My hand comes up over my mouth just as Jenna bursts into the room.
“Em! You have to come… What’s wrong?” she demands.
As I race past her without saying a word, I hear Cassidy say, “Nothing, baby. Let’s give them a minute of privacy.”
“Ugh, that’s what Caleb said you’d say.” Jenna’s voice is barely registered as I throw open the mansion door.
And there he is.
In a dark green fisherman’s sweater and jeans, Jake’s on our front porch playing his heart out. When he sees me, he winks, but his lips keep blowing.
I’m desperate to throw myself in his arms, the anticipation making it worse as he moves around me, occasionally nudging me. I stand there shivering in the freezing cold, awed by the talent of the man before me.
I’m even more shaken by the love.
When he finishes, he carefully detaches the sax from his neck. I don’t say a word as I wait for him to put the shiny instrument in its case and stand in front of me. When I feel his arm slide around my waist, I quiver. When his hand slides through the curls at the nape of my neck, my lips part. Which must be exactly what he wanted as he lowers his head and his—warm from the workout he gave them on the mouthpiece of the sax—touch mine. Sliding my hands up his chest, one of mine cups his jaw. The other threads through his thick hair.
When we pull away, the cold air leaving our mouths swirls between us like smoke from the chimney atop the mansion. In the lights strung around the portico, I can see the crinkles in the corners of Jake’s eyes as he smiles down at me. “If that’s the kind of greeting I get when I visit you at work, I’ll pick you up every day I’m here.”
Sliding my trembling fingers from his jaw to his lips, I feel him kiss them. “Only for those I love, Jake.”
His eyes close as his head bows. Shoulders shaking, he whispers, “What did I do to deserve you?”
I duck so I can see his face. His eyes are as wet as mine were when Cassidy just handed me these words. “Love is built on respect, faith, and trust. You’ve always had the first, we can only pray for the second, and you fought for the third. As long as you keep doing that, I don’t know how I won’t love you.”
Jake buries his head into my shoulder while swaying me back and forth. His choked “If it’s all right, I’ll always love you” comes out as we’re swaying in each other’s arms on the porch to music only we can hear.
It’s a long time before we go inside to join the others.
And that night, my bed holds a man who will go to any lengths to make me believe.
Epilogue - Emily
Four Years later
Jake and I are standing in the Gampel Pavilion as Jenna crosses the stage to accept her degree in business from UCONN. Michelle is on the other side of Jake wiping tears from her eyes, leaning against her new husband, Eric.
Freely letting my own tears fall, I’m trying to hold the phone as steady as possible so my family can watch on FaceTime while crowded around Cassidy’s computer in her office.
