A March Bride (A Year of Weddings Novella) Page 5

  “Nice to see you have your list of excuses memorized. So tell me, are you planning on being a bachelor the rest of your life? Or perhaps taking up Lady Genevieve’s offer to marry, produce an heir, then get a divorce?”

  “Don’t be crass.”

  “Nathaniel.” Stephen stood, towering over his brother. “Do you love her?”

  “It hurts to breathe when I think of life without her.” Nathaniel rose to his feet, gently pushing his brother back a step. “But I have to be realistic. Maybe I should let her go.”

  “You are a coward.” Stephen headed for the door. “If you lose her, it won’t be because of this citizenship writ or all of the things she has to give up to be your wife. It won’t be because you’re some magnanimous chap who freed the bird who wanted to fly. It will be because you’re afraid.” He eased open the door. “And that will mark your reign for the rest of your life.”

  Two days.” Mama passed Susanna in the kitchen, her hair wet from her shower, curling in ringlets about her head. She flashed two fingers. “Then I’m kicking you out.”

  “Kicking me out? Fine, I’ll live with Aurora in her tent.”

  Aurora, a former hotshot DC lobbyist, was a multimillionaire who lived on dimes and nickels in a tent in the woods. A kind of spiritual savant, she doled out her millions as she saw the need, along with divine messages from God.

  Real ones. Bone-chilling ones.

  She’d been a voice from heaven in Susanna’s life when she first met Nathaniel, then only Crown Prince, visiting the island.

  “For the life of me, girl . . .” Mama opened the cupboard for a coffee mug, then poured from the big pot Daddy had set to brewing before he headed off to get fresh fish for the day. No fancy machines for them. They still used the old-fashioned percolating kind.

  “Besides, I came home to see Granny and Gracie.”

  “Well, you’ve seen them. They’re fine. Why don’t you just go back to Brighton and marry that boy?”

  “Really, Mama? You think it’s just that simple. That I’ve not thought this through a hundred bazillion ways?” The smooth, uneventful flight over on Royal One had given her entirely too much time to think.

  Why did the citizenship request bother her so dang much? And more than that, why did she slip off her engagement ring and leave it behind?

  Had her head already decided and her heart was catching up?

  Susanna shoved her cereal bowl forward. There was still over half a bowl left, but she’d not really been hungry since she’d left Brighton. Her attempt at having breakfast was merely a reach for some kind of normalcy.

  “I just can’t help but wonder if maybe I didn’t rush into this because I was stinging from losing Adam. Maybe I got swept up in the magic of it all.”

  “Poppycock. You didn’t even know Nate was a prince for two weeks. Y’all were friends. Then he left. Shot out of here when his father died and you didn’t see him for five months.”

  “What’d you do, keep a diary on my love life?”

  Mama tapped her temple. “I got more in here than cobwebs and spiders. And never in my life have I seen you ‘swept up in the magic’ of anything. Not even Disney World.” She laughed. “You met Cinderella and like to drove me crazy asking, ‘But what’s the girl’s real name, Mama?’ ”

  “Well, she didn’t look like Cinderella to me.”

  “That’s what I’m saying, Suz; you’re a realist.”

  “Which is why I’m here now. I’m being a realist. Come on, Mama, in all your life, did you ever see me as a royal princess?”

  “No, but when I saw you with Nate, I pretty much knew he was the one. You love him and it’s written all over your face every time you hear his name. And the same goes for him. You should see him when you walk into a room. The rest of us are no more than buzzing flies on the wall. He adores you.”

  “Love. Adoration. Fine. But they don’t make an enduring marriage.”

  “Know what your problem is, Susanna?” Mama rapped her knuckles on the island counter. “You’re scared.”

  “Two minutes ago I was a realist.” She snapped a couple of grapes from the fruit bowl in the center of the island.

  “A scared realist.” Mama snatched hold of Susanna’s left hand. “What’s this? Susanna Jean, where is your engagement ring?”

  Shoot, she’d forgotten about her bare left finger. And wasn’t Mama quick on the draw? Susanna had been hiding her left hand since she arrived home, but all this talk of being scared caused her to lower her guard. “I left it in Brighton.” She curled her hands into her lap.

  “Oh, have mercy—”

  “Mama, Nathaniel and I both needed to think about what we’re doing. Yes, it’s down to the wire, but there’s also a lot on the line. I left the ring in my suite at Parrsons House in case, for whatever reason, you know, I didn’t go back. Hey, Nathaniel has just as much to think about as me. He could call any second to break off the whole thing. So don’t put this all on me. Besides, I didn’t want to be responsible for a two-hundred-year-old royal family heirloom.”

  In truth, her ring finger felt cold and empty, and she missed the beautiful antique designed for Queen Anne-Marie. She regretted her impulsive, childish decision.

  She hoped the ring remained safe in her bedroom where she had left it. And that Nathaniel didn’t find out.

  “I’d like to wring that boy Adam Peters’s neck for doing this to you. Making you scared to hang on to anything worth-while because it might be ripped from your hands.” Mama’s hand smacked the counter. “Listen to me. You let fear keep you with Adam about ten years too long. Now fear is driving you from Nathaniel.” Mama reached for her coffee cup, her eyes glued on Susanna.

  That’s the way she did it—she eyed a person until they confessed their deepest, darkest sin.

  “Actually, Mama, fear is also making me wise up. This citizenship issue put everything in a fresh light.” Susanna leaned against the counter, watching the sunlight wash the kitchen window. “Let’s say I do this one last thing, in a series of one last things I’ve had to do to marry Nathaniel. There will be no going back. I’ll forever be a citizen of Brighton Kingdom and never, ever again a native-born American citizen. Should we break up, for whatever reason, I’d have to immigrate back to my own country.”

  For a brief moment, she felt justified in her dramatic exit from Brighton. After all, Nathaniel and the Parliament had asked a dramatic thing of her.

  But what hit her afresh in the cozy old kitchen where she taught her baby sister to bake chocolate chip cookies was how bold and rash her move was when she slipped off Nathaniel’s ring. Just how true was her commitment? How deep was her love?

  “This ain’t the kind of fear that makes one wise up. This is the kind that makes a girl run. You always ran to your garden as a kid to hide when you were afraid—which is exactly what you’re doing now.”

  “Thank you for that, Professor Glo. I don’t need your pop psychology. Besides, I ran to hide from you and Daddy when you got to fighting like wild animals, throwing dishes and four-letter words at each other.”

  Many of Susanna’s girlhood evenings were spent hiding in her secret garden, her closet, hiding from the storms raging inside her house.

  “I make no excuse.” Mama sipped her coffee. “We were young and foolish when we got married. Divorce was the best thing that ever happened to us.” Mama smiled. “ ‘Cause then we met Jesus, got healed, and remembered why we loved each other in the first place. But, Suz, you’re grown now. You understand these things. Your teen years were pretty darn good as I recall. Daddy and I both apologized for your childhood. Did all we could to make it up to you. This fear is on you. It’s yours to deal with no matter where or how you came by it. You stayed with Adam because you wanted a safe plan. And we see how well that didn’t work for you. Now you’re leaving Nathaniel to hide in your garden—this one just happens to be all of St. Simons. Marrying that boy is probably the safest plan you ever came by. Hear me now, Suz. If you let fear clip your
wings now, you will never fly again.”

  Susanna made a face. “Never fly again? Don’t be so dramatic, Mama.” She moved out from under Mama’s stare and carried her soggy Cheerios to the garbage disposal.

  But Mama took hold of her shoulders and turned her around. “Fear is nothing but a big ole fake roar. You let it trip you up and, next thing you know, a mewing kitten will have you hightailing it to the hills. That’s the way fear rolls. Don’t look for it to play fair.”

  “Fear also teaches you a lesson,” Susanna retorted. “Get a swat on the behind, you learn to behave. Touch a hot stove, you learn to keep your hands to yourself. Get burned by love, you understand that nothing, not even the truest of intentions, is a sure thing in this life.”

  “So this is how you’re going to be? Cynical?”

  “I prefer the term ‘realist.’ ”

  Mama started to reply, but her old Motorola cell phone buzzed from the counter. “Hold that thought. This might be your granddaddy with an update from the doctors.” Mama answered as if it might be granddaddy, but her expression and tone changed as she conversed in low, clipped sentences. “Yes. Certainly. Of course. I see.”

  “Who is it?” Susanna slipped her arm around Mama’s shoulder. “Is it Granddaddy?”

  “Shhh.” Mama waved her off, shaking her head, pinching up her face as she listened. “You can send it to my e-mail address. Yes, that’s the one.” Snatching up her purse from the kitchen table, Mama started for the garage. “We can manage from our end, yes.”

  Susanna trailed after her, unhooking her old bike from the pegs on the garage wall. “Mama, who is it? Is everything all right?”

  She nodded, holding up one finger, closing her eyes, moving her lips as if memorizing what she heard on the other end of the call. “Thank you for calling.”

  “Who was that?”

  “Restaurant business.” Mama hopped behind the wheel of her truck without a backward glance at Susanna and fired up the engine. With a push of the remote, the door rose, creaking and moaning. Mama shifted into reverse. “See you later, Susanna Jean.”

  “Yeah, sure, see you later.”

  Susanna watched her leave, straddling her bike, feeling unsettled about their kitchen conversation. As if there were more to be said.

  Was her commitment to Nathaniel true? Strong enough to endure criticism from bloggers and royal watchers? Strong enough to give up everything, including her citizenship? Susanna pedaled down the driveway onto Stevens Road, heading for Frederica.

  What she didn’t know, the Lord did. “If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God.”

  The saline island breeze carried a lingering hint of winter, but the early morning sun promised a clear, warm day.

  Susanna slowed as she approached the low stone wall surrounding the Christ Church grounds, her heart aching for a touch from the Spirit.

  What was it about the unseen that made sense of the seen?

  Settling her bike against the wall, Susanna passed under the ivy-covered entrance—a pitched roof covering over wooden seats—and stepped into the glorious atmosphere of the historic church grounds.

  Tears flashed in her eyes as she cut across the lush, green lawn, still damp with the morning dew. She breathed in the crisp air, absorbing the sense that the Divine waited for her.

  She found a sunny but secluded spot at the far corner of the yard, away from the activity of parishioners arriving at the white clapboard church for morning Bible study, and settled down against the trunk of a maple.

  She waited before speaking, listening to the sounds around her—the distant voices going into the church, the cooing of mourning doves, the rustle of wind in the leaves.

  “Father,” she began, low and slow, addressing her prayer to her one true King, peace descending upon her soul. “Give me wisdom. Help me make sense of my own heart.”

  At the end of her petition, the world fell dramatically silent. No voices. No cooing. No shuffling leaves. Her thoughts remained tangled and knotted.

  Talk to me, Lord.

  Surely when she was stuck, God had a way out. An answer she never imagined.

  Stretching out her legs, Susanna folded her hands over her middle and studied the blue patches of sky through the tree limbs.

  The same blue as Nathaniel’s eyes. She missed him. Mercy, what must he be thinking of her right now?

  A fly buzzed around her ears and she batted it away.

  In the distance, she heard the slap of a car door followed by a murmur of voices and the crunch of heels on the brick path.

  If she were Nathaniel, she’d be doubting this relationship about now. What groom wouldn’t, with a fiancée who was so dramatic and over the top as to leave her engagement ring behind?

  If he found out about that, and she hoped he wouldn’t. She opened her eyes and sat forward. What was I thinking?

  Fear. Such a rude counselor.

  God, wisdom! Please . . .

  “I like to come out here myself to think and pray.”

  Susanna glanced right to see Reverend Smith approaching, dressed in khakis and a blue button-down shirt, his graying hair cropped close to his head.

  “Reverend! Hey . . .” She started to rise but he dropped down onto the grass next to her.

  “Mind if I join you?”

  “Not at all.” A fresh wash of tears flooded her eyes.

  “Beautiful day.” He propped his arms on his raised knees. In his midfifties, Reverend Smith had a youthful air, but his demeanor, his sermons, reflected his wise, contemplative life.

  “Yes, it is.” One more word, and she’d burst. Tears. Gushes. Sobs.

  “Mind if I ask you a question?”

  She shook her head.

  “What are you doing here? Aren’t you getting married in two weeks?”

  She brushed away the slight trickle of tears twisting down her cheeks. “Two weeks and three days.” She peered at him. “I think.”

  “You think?” He arched his brow. “Have you changed your mind? Because the hospitality ministry is very excited about the live broadcast we’ve planned for your wedding. There’s going to be a pancake breakfast. We expect a big turnout.” His soft laugh made her smile. “What’s going on? Care to tell me?”

  Susanna yanked at the blades of grass beside her legs and recounted the events of last Friday to her pastor, right down to her argument with Nathaniel and her impulsive decision to leave her ring behind.

  “Ah, I see. So the details were piling on, and then Nathaniel lit a fire under it all when he told you about your citizenship.”

  “Pretty much.”

  “But, my word, Susanna, you’re marrying a king.”

  “Not as easy as it sounds. It’s no movie, I tell you.”

  “Nor should it be. There’s a lot of responsibility with marrying any man, let alone a king.” The reverend patted her back.

  “Yeah, I guess so.” More tears.

  “Tell me, why is the citizenship issue holding you back?”

  “Because it means everything of me is gone. My nationality, my people, my culture. Is our love really worth it?”

  “Jesus felt it was.”

  “I’m not Jesus.”

  He chuckled. “But you’re called to be like Him. He gave up His citizenship in heaven to become a citizen of earth. He is wholly God, and wholly man, for the rest of eternity.”

  “Then Nathaniel should give up his citizenship for me.” She was being a brat and knew it, but just for the moment, she wanted to sound out this idea.

  “I don’t know much about royalty, but I guess he’d have to abdicate his throne to surrender his citizenship.”

  “Exactly.” More grass pulling. “And it’s not an option. I can’t be responsible for a nation losing their king. I’m no Wallis Simpson.”

  “Susanna, take a moment and raise your thoughts heavenward. What is God saying to you in this juncture?”

  “I don’t know. Why do you think I’m sitting here? I feel all jumbled up.”
>
  “Because you’re trying to understand with your head.” He patted his belly. “Listen here, in your spirit to the Holy Spirit. You’re familiar with the biblical character Esther.”

  “Jewish refugee in ancient Babylon. Very beautiful, married the king and became a queen.”

  “Sound familiar? Could you be a modern-day Esther?”

  “I don’t see how. My marriage to Nathaniel won’t likely save America from her enemies.”

  “But your marriage to Nathaniel may save other people. You’ll have access to leaders the rest of us can only dream about. You are stepping onto the world stage, Susanna. Your very presence influences people. Don’t you see what God is doing?”

  “Now you sound like Nathaniel.” She peered at the reverend. “But how can a redneck girl from Georgia be an influence?”

  He smiled. “Maybe you’re exactly what the world needs. You’re putting limits on yourself that God is not. Want to know how I see you? A woman who makes the whole world her backyard barbecue. You make people feel warm, welcome, invited. You’re also a truth speaker. In all the good ways. As you move into the role of Nathaniel’s wife, you’re going to make royalty more accessible and therefore, in my humble opinion, make God more accessible.”

  She laughed, a bursting, scoffing sound. “Please, Reverend.”

  “Do you think you just stumbled into this relationship without any divine intervention? That the Lord was out to lunch when you met and fell in love with Nathaniel? You both overcame great odds to be together. Can you allow yourself to consider the idea that God is promoting you to royalty, like Esther, for such a time as this?”

  “But I’m not worthy.” She hung her head, letting her hair curtain her face.

  “Ah, there’s the rub.” He bent to see her eyes. “You’re making this about your worthiness instead of God’s. None of us are worthy. Do you think I’m worthy to be a reverend? To pastor His flock?”

  She raised her head, combing back her hair with her fingers. “You’re a good man.”