Page 115 of To Believe In You
Matt would never be so cautious as to take a ride when he felt fine, would he?
But he had been the one to call 911, and he wasn’t nearby to consult now.
The way he’d avoided naming his reason for coming hinted something other than business had brought him to her house. He might’ve wanted to smooth over not telling her about Awestruck himself. Or, who knew? Perhaps he wanted to rekindle a relationship. But she’d seen how well he was doing without her. Meanwhile, disaster seemed to follow her. Especially in her love life, if Shane was any indication.
Right now, the paramedic seemed like the best judge of what she needed. Maybe all this time she’d been longing for the wrong thing—love—when what she really needed was the guidance of a disinterested stranger.
“Okay. You’re the pro.” She leaned back on the gurney and let the ambulance whisk her away.
32
Hostage situations sure had a way of upsetting plans.
Matt had gotten off work early thanks to Adeline. She’d come to Key of Hope and offered to cover his last two lessons so he could go check on Lina. Despite the security system and having sent a guard to see Lina home safely, Adeline had worried Shane might find a way to bother her.
Matt’s reasons for taking Adeline’s offer weren’t so noble. He had suspected Shane had what he wanted—the jewelry—and would leave Lina alone, but he couldn’t pass up a chance to take back what he’d said about not having a future with Lina.
Unfortunately, Adeline had turned out to be right, and his visit ended when he and Lina were each carted off to the hospital.
If he’d earned any points for saving her life, they must not have counted for much, because when he’d texted to ask how she was doing, she hadn’t opened the door to connecting. Instead, she’d reported that she’d been given a clean bill of health and would be staying at Adeline’s for the night.
Meanwhile, Tim had barged into Matt’s room and hovered while Matt had answered investigators’ questions and awaited the results of his chest x-ray. After diagnosing him with a bruised rib, the doctor offered a prescription. Sudden twists or breaths caused stabbing pain, but Matt opted to make do with over-the-counter meds. With that, the doctor had released him.
Now, Tim was driving Matt back to Lina’s to collect his car.
If only she’d be there so Matt could try his errand again.
“The morality agreement didn’t cover nearly enough situations.” Tim worked his fist around the steering wheel as he accelerated down the dark highway.
Matt bounced a fist against his knee. “What about today strikes you as immoral?”
“You could’ve died, and then where would we be?”
“I’d be in heaven.” The sun had set before the ambulance had taken him from Lina’s, and night had deepened while they’d been in the hospital. Above the shadowy countryside, stars glittered. “You’d probably be talking Philip into coming back.”
“Seriously, Matt, for once in your life, act like a sane person who would mind dying.”
“The gun wasn’t even loaded.” A fact the police had uncovered, confirming Lina’s conviction that Shane never intended to shoot anyone. He had intended to flee the country, based on the passport the police found when they picked him up a few counties to the north.
For the hundredth time, he thanked God Shane had been apprehended.
Now, Matt’s biggest regret was having severed his relationship with Lina in a moment of despair. A few days of despair, actually. He pressed careful fingers over the tender spot in his ribs. Convinced he had too many wrongs to right and was too likely to make more unfixable mistakes, he’d gone and made another misstep by cutting loose the one woman he wanted a relationship with.
Except their broken relationship wasn’t unfixable. As the true righter of his wrongs, God could accomplish what Matt couldn’t. A man learned a lot from staring down the barrel of a gun.
The dash lights cast a faint glow over Tim’s scowl. “You didn’t know about the gun until hours later. It’s not okay for you to act like a man with a death wish. It’s bad for business.”
As if Tim hadn’t spent the entire wait in the ER working on a press release because of the boost the publicity would give Awestruck. Business didn’t worry Tim. He’d claimed a sane person would be afraid of death. Had the close call scared him?
“My belief in heaven makes not fearing death perfectly sane.”
“You can’t bank everything on a fairytale.”
“It’s not a fairytale. Look around. This complex world didn’t just happen.” He peered out again at the quiet night. At the innumerable stars. Tim wanted to call faith a fairytale? Wasn’t Creation more unlikely than any storybook plot? “If you lived your whole life during the day, would you ever guess there were entire galaxies waiting beyond the blue sky? People with the right tools could tell you about stars, but would you believe in them?”
“Science is different. There’s proof.”
“You’ve seen proof of God too. You know I didn’t have it in me to change. I am who I am today because of God. Gannon, John, and Philip would all tell you the same thing—they wouldn’t be where they are without faith.”
