скачать книгу бесплатно
The rush of heat she’d felt dissipated with the chill that seeped through the glass. “Hi. Are you here about the room to rent? I thought we weren’t meeting until after dinner.”
“Master Sergeant Harry Lockhart, ma’am,” he announced in a deep, clipped voice. “Are you Daisy Gunderson?”
Recognition and relief chased away her trepidation and she smiled. “Master Serg...? Harry? Pen pal Harry?” She plopped Muffy down between the other dogs, then unlatched the storm door and pushed it wide open. “Harry Lockhart! I’m so excited to finally meet you.” The dogs followed her out onto the brick porch and danced around their legs. Daisy threw her arms around Harry’s neck, pressed her body against his rock-hard chest and hugged him tight. “Welcome home!”
Chapter Two (#u24867251-8052-5487-9e00-c5bcbc2bafa4)
Welcome home?
Harry’s vision blurred as something gray and furry darted between his legs. A mix of squeals and barks blended with the deafening boom and shouting voices inside his head, and his nose was suddenly filled with the stench of burnt earth and raw skin.
One moment, the memories were there, but in the next, he blanked them out and focused on the here and now. His body was hyper-aware of the softness wrapped around him like a blanket, and the creamy chill of the woman’s cheek pressed against the side of his neck.
Daisy Gunderson was on her tiptoes hugging him. Bear-hugging him. Giving him a squeeze-the-stuffing-out-of-him kind of hug. What happened to polite introductions and handshakes? This wasn’t the greeting he’d expected. She wasn’t the woman he’d expected.
But when a woman hugged a man like that, it was his natural instinct to wrap his arms around her and...pat her back. He could hear his men ribbing him now, giving him grief over his lousy moves with the ladies the same way he gave them grief about staying sharp and keeping their heads down. He’d been short on this kind of contact for a long time. Months. Years, maybe. The instinctive part of him wanted to tighten his grip around her. A baser part of him wanted to reach down and see if the curves on the bottom half matched the ones flattened against him up top—or whether all that luscious body he felt was just the pillows of her coat squished between them. A different part of him, the part that was still fractured and healing, wanted to bury his nose in the sugar-cookies-and-vanilla scents radiating off her clothes and hair and skin, and let it fill up his head and drive out the nightmares.
Harry did none of those things. Although her scent was as sweet as he’d imagined, nothing else about this meeting was going according to plan. Dogs were barking. She was plastered against him. He patted her back again because he wasn’t sure how he was supposed to react to this welcome. After all, he’d never met Daisy in person before.
She started talking before pulling away. “This feels like a reunion between old friends. I just got home myself. A few minutes earlier and you would have missed me. What are you doing here?” She shooed the dogs into the house and grabbed his wrist, pulling him in, as well. “Sorry. I’ll stop talking. Come in out of the cold.”
He watched the little gray-and-white fuzz mop dart back and forth across the area rug in the foyer while the white terrier jumped over him with a yip of excitement when he got too close. Those dogs were wired. They needed a good bit of exercise to take some of that energy out of them.
After locking the thick mahogany door behind her, Daisy pointed to the little one. “Muffy, down.” Muffy? The long-haired one was clearly a dude, but he had to give the little guy credit for flopping down on his belly to pant until he got permission to go nuts again. “I can put them in their kennels if you want, but they’ll mind if you tell them to stay down. Make sure Patch is making eye contact with you and use your hand. He’s deaf. But smart as a whip. Jack Russells usually are. He knows several commands. Patch?”
She demonstrated a universal hand signal. The terrier sat, all right, but so did the Belgian Malinois. Who looked a lot like... That muscle ticked beneath Harry’s right eye as he slammed the door on that memory and focused on the dog with the graying muzzle. Poor old guy had lost a leg. But those deep brown eyes were sharp and focused squarely on him, as if awaiting a command. Maybe the dog recognized another wounded warrior. “Is he a working dog?”
“KCPD-retired,” she answered. “That’s Caliban. He lost his leg to cancer. I inherited him when his handler couldn’t keep him. Sorry about the mess. I’m in the middle of decorating for the holidays.” Daisy was moving down the hallway beside the stairs, which were draped with fake greenery and red bows tied along the railing. She swerved around a couple of plastic tubs and kicked aside little bits of melting snow with her low-heeled boots. “Stick to the runner and it won’t be slippery,” she advised. “Could I get you something hot to drink? Coffee? Cocoa? Are you hungry? I baked a ton of cookies last weekend.”
Did the woman never stop talking? He couldn’t even say hello, much less ask a question or explain the reason he was here. “That’s not necessary.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. It’s cold. I’m cold. I’d be fixing it, anyway.”
Clearly, she expected him to follow her through the house, so Harry pulled the watch cap off his head and stepped out. A parade of curious dogs followed him into a cozy kitchen that opened up to a dining room that appeared to be a storage area for unwanted furniture, more plastic tubs and paint cans.
“Ignore that room. My goal is to clear that out this weekend and finish decorating. I’m hosting my school’s staff Christmas party next weekend.” She shed her coat and scarf and tossed them over a ladder-back chair at an antique cherrywood table. “Have a seat.”
“I wanted to talk about the letters.”
“Sit.” She pulled out a stool at the peninsula counter and patted the seat. “I’d love to talk about the letters you sent. Wish you’d kept writing after the school year ended.” He’d stopped in June because that’s when he... He hadn’t written any letters from the hospital. “You’re the first one of our pen pals I’ve met in person.”
“That was nice of you to keep writing, even after I dropped the ball.” Harry put his leather gloves on the counter, unzipped his coat and settled onto the stool. He didn’t have the heart to tell her that some of those pen pals were never coming home. “I want you to know how much my unit appreciated all the letters you and your class sent them. Even if we, if I, didn’t always respond.”
She was running water now, measuring coffee. “That was one of my more inspired projects. I started it with last year’s composition class. Anything to get them to write. Plus, at Central Prep—the school where I teach—we encourage our students to be involved in the community, to be citizens of the world and aware of others. It seemed like a win-win for both of us, supporting the troops while improving their communication skills. When your sister mentioned your Marine Corps unit at church, looking for Christmas cards to send them last year, I jumped right on it.” She tugged at the hem of her long purple tweed sweater after reaching into the refrigerator for some flavored creamer. As she moved about, Harry noticed that her glasses were purple, too, and so were the streaks of color in her chocolate brown hair. “I always model what I ask my students to do, so I adopted you. I don’t mean adopt you like that—no one would adopt...you’re a grown man. We drew names out of a hat. You were the one that was left, so you lucked out and became my pen pal. It’s nice—no, amazing—to finally meet you in person.” She stopped to take a breath and push a plate of sugar cookies decorated like Christmas trees and reindeer in front of him. “And now I’m rambling. Thank you for your service.”
Now she was rambling? Harry was still replaying all the dialogue in his head to catch everything she’d said. “You’re welcome. I was just doing my job. Thank you for your letters. They meant a lot to me.”
“You’re welcome. And I was just doing my job.” She pulled two turquoise mugs from an upper cabinet while the earthy smell of coffee brewing filled the room. “You’re home on leave for the holidays, I imagine. Are you visiting Hope?”
“I’m staying with my sister and her husband for a few days.”
“How’s their little boy? He’s about two, right?”
“Gideon is...” A little afraid of the growly uncle who was rooming with him for the time being. Or maybe the fact that Harry was a little afraid of holding his energetic nephew without breaking him was what created the awkward tension between them. Who was he kidding? Pretty much every relationship was awkward for him right now. “Yeah, he’s two in a couple of months.”
“And Hope is pregnant with baby number two? That’s good news. Although that apartment over her bridal shop only has two bedrooms, doesn’t it? She and Pike will have to be looking for a bigger place soon.” Daisy filled two mugs and carried them to the counter across from him. Although that bulky knit sweater covered the interesting bits between her neck and thighs, her leggings and boots hinted at earth-mother curves. He was busy filling in with his imagination the shape he couldn’t see, enjoying the mental exercise a little more than he should when she set a fragrant, steaming mug in front of him, and cradled the other between her hands, warming her fingers. “What can I do for you, Master Sergeant?”
Harry dutifully pulled his gaze up to the blue eyes behind her glasses. “Top. You don’t have to call me Master Sergeant every time. Top is the nickname for an NCO of my rank.”
“All right, Top. What can I do for you?”
“I wanted to meet you in person and thank you for your letters.”
“You said that already.” She picked up a red-nosed reindeer cookie and dipped it into her coffee before taking a bite, waiting for him to continue.
Exactly how did a guy broach a subject like I need the woman from those letters to help me regain my sanity? The golden, ethereal one with the soft voice, gentle touch and quiet mien I imagined in my dreams? I need that angel’s healing touch. He definitely didn’t need a woman who talked nonstop, owned a pack of dogs and triggered a lustful curiosity he hadn’t acknowledged for longer than he cared to admit. Harry picked up his mug by the handle, then turned it in his hands, staring down into the dark brew that reminded him of one of the colors of her hair. “Writing your students gave my unit something to do during the slow times. Getting those letters could really... You know, some days were harder than others, and, um...” This wasn’t right. She wasn’t right. Time to abort this crazy ass mission and call one of the shrinks Lt. Col. Biro had recommended for him. Harry set his mug down on the counter with enough force to slosh the coffee over the edge. “Sorry.” He shook the hot liquid off his skin and shot abruptly to his feet. “Now’s not a good time, is it?” While she retrieved a dish cloth to clean up his mess, he grabbed his gloves and headed toward the front door. “Sorry to show up on your doorstep unannounced.”
“You haven’t even touched your coffee.” Harry strode past the trio of dogs who hopped to their feet to follow him. He heard Daisy’s boots on the floor boards behind him. “You must have stopped by for some reason. We have lots to talk about, don’t we? Your dog, Tango? Your friends who were wounded in that IED explosion? Are they okay? Were you hurt? I mean, I can see the scars, so clearly you were, but—”
“That was a different skirmish.”
“You were hurt more than once?” Harry had his cap on, his coat zipped and the front door open when Daisy grabbed his arm with both hands and tugged him to a halt. “Wait.”
Her fingers curled into the sleeve of his coat, tightening their hold on him. Harry glanced down at her white-knuckled grip, frowning at the unexpected urgency in her touch before angling around to face her.
“Please don’t leave.” Her face was tipped up, her eyes searching his as if she was struggling to come up with the right words to say. Odd. Words didn’t seem to be a problem for her. “If you really have to go, I understand. And if you don’t want to talk, that’s okay. But...” She looked back over her shoulder, past the dogs and holiday decorations before she finally let go of his sleeve and shrugged. “Totally unrelated thing, but, before you go, would you do me a favor? I’m not saying you owe me anything. I mean, you barely know me—”
“I know you better than most people.” Correction. He knew the person who’d been his lifeline to normalcy and home and hope. This chatterbox with the wild hair and effusive personality felt like someone different. “After reading your letters, that is. You shared a lot. About your ex, your parents, this house...” He glanced around at the refinished wood and fresh paint of the drafty old Colonial that was far too big for one person—even if she did live with a pack of dogs. “Some of your school stories made me laugh or made me want to wring someone’s neck.”
She took half a step back. “You remember all that?”
He’d memorized nearly every sentence. Laughter. Concerns. Wisdom. Compassion. The Daisy Gunderson he knew had shared her heart.
“I know the men and women I work with,” he clarified. “My sister and her husband... I mean, you’re not the only person I know.”
He couldn’t tell if the pinch at the corners of her mouth and eyes meant she was touched by his confession, or if she felt a little sad to learn how few connections he had outside the Marine Corps. “Thank you. I feel like I know you better than someone I just met a few minutes ago, too. You wrote some touching things that, well, some of them made me cry.”
He made her cry? Harry shifted uncomfortably inside his coat. “Sorry about that.”
“Don’t be. You shared the truth about what was on your mind, what you were feeling. I was honored.” She hugged her arms around her middle. “You made me smile sometimes, too.”
So why wasn’t he seeing that smile? The Daisy in his dreams always smiled. This was not going well. Daisy Gunderson was supposed to have a serene smile and a calm demeanor that made all the crap he had to deal with go away. But just because the real Daisy didn’t fit the ethereal angel he’d imagined, it didn’t mean he should blow her off. “You were going to ask me something?”
“Right.” She shrugged one shoulder. Then she pointed at him, at herself, then back at him. “I’m here by myself and I wondered... Would you...?”
Now she couldn’t come up with words? “Ma’am, I really should be going.”
Her manic energy returned in a burst that faded into breathless hesitation. “One. Don’t call me ma’am. My students call me ma’am, and it’s after hours and I’m off duty. Besides, it makes me feel like I’m old enough to be your mother. And two... I could use a man right now.” Now wasn’t that a suggestive request. The parts of him south of his belt buckle stirred with interest, even as his chest squeezed with anxiety at the possibility she wanted something more than a pen pal, too. “But I don’t have a big brother or a boyfriend or a dad to call and...” She gestured down the hallway toward the back of the house. “Would you check something out for me?”
His disappointment surprised him more than the relief he felt. “You’ve got a problem?”
“Maybe. I don’t know.” She tucked a stray lock of hair back into the purple and brown waves behind her ear. “I hope not, but...”
He could change a flat tire for her, or do some heavy lifting or pull something down off a high shelf. He owed the fantasy Daisy from his letters at least that much. But as Harry waited for the details, he read something more troubling than the awkwardness of this conversation in the blue eyes behind her glasses. She was scared.
Seventeen years of military training put him on instant alert.
“Show me.”
Stopping only to put on her coat and order the dogs to stay inside the mudroom, Daisy walked out onto the back deck, and Harry followed. She went to the railing and pointed down into the snow. “Those footprints. Something seems off to me.”
This was about something more than tracks through her backyard. Her cheeks should be turning pink with the dampness chilling the air. Unless the colored lights were playing tricks on him, her skin had gone pale. The buoyant energy that had overwhelmed him earlier had all but disappeared. Seemed he wasn’t the only one keeping secrets.
With a nod, he accepted the simple mission she charged him with and went down into the yard. Stepping farther out into the snow so as not to disturb the suspicious tracks, Harry switched his phone into flashlight mode and made a quick reconnaissance. This was an awful lot of traffic through the yard of a woman who lived alone. And all of these tracks were too big to be Daisy’s. His boots were digging into snow instead of sand, but the hackles at the back of Harry’s neck went up just as they had overseas when he sensed an enemy lurking somewhere beyond his line of sight.
Trusting suspicions he wasn’t sure he was equipped to deal with yet, he retraced his own path a second time, kneeling to inspect some of the deeper tracks. They’d frozen up inside after a bit of melting, meaning they’d been there long before the afternoon sun had reached them. He pushed to his feet and moved closer to the house to confirm that the deepest boot prints were facing the house, a good five feet beyond the gas and water meters. Harry looked up to a window with a shade drawn halfway down and curtains parted a slit to reveal the blackness of the room inside.
Harry glanced up at Daisy, who was watching his every move from the edge of the deck. She was hugging her arms around herself again. Something definitely had her spooked. “That’s not just a case of a new meter reader guy thinking he could get out on that side of the yard, is it?”
“I don’t think so. He’d only have to see that part of the fence once to know there’s no gate over there.” And yet her visitor had walked back and forth multiple times, then stopped here to look inside that window. “What room is this?”
She paused long enough that he looked up at her again. “My bedroom.”
Harry walked straight to the deck, braced one foot on the bottom planks and vaulted over the railing. The snow flinging off his boots hadn’t settled before he’d turned her toward the door to walk her back inside. “You need to call the police. You’ve got a Peeping Tom.”
Chapter Three (#u24867251-8052-5487-9e00-c5bcbc2bafa4)
Harry sat in the darkness of his truck watching Daisy’s light blue Colonial with the dark blue shutters and dozens of Christmas lights, wondering if she was going to give the balding guy at her front door the same kind of hug she’d given him when he’d left a half hour earlier. He already wasn’t a fan of the older gentleman who’d insisted she leave the barking dogs on the other side of the glass storm door and finish their conversation on the brick porch where Daisy was shivering without her coat. If she hugged the guy, then Baldy was definitely going on Harry’s do-not-like list.
Not that he’d handled either her enthusiastic greeting or grateful goodbye terribly well. But something simmered low inside him at the idea that Daisy’s stuffing-squishing hugs were available to anyone who came to her front door.
Finally. The would-be renter handed Daisy a business card and shuffled down the steps. Harry exhaled a deep breath that fogged his window, relieved to see the thoughtless twit depart without a hug. He approved when Daisy crumpled the card in her fist, clearly dismissing the inconsiderate anti-dog man. She huddled against one of the big white pillars at either corner of her porch to watch the rejected tenant drive away.
“Go back inside,” Harry whispered, urging the woman to show a little common sense and get out of the cold night air. But she was scanning up and down the street, searching for something or someone. Was she still worried about those snowy footprints in her backyard?
Harry hunkered down behind the wheel as her gaze swept past his truck. The brief glimpse of fear stamped in the big blue eyes behind those purple glasses when she’d asked for his help had been imprinted on his brain. And since the gray matter upstairs was already a bit of a jigsaw puzzle, he wasn’t quite ready to have any worries about her safety lingering on his conscience. So he’d decided to hang out at least until Baldy left. But Daisy already had one pervert who thought looking through her bedroom window was a fun idea. She probably wouldn’t be assured to know that he was still out here in the darkness, spying on her, too.
After one more scan, she went back into the house, petting the dogs and talking to them before closing the door. The colored Christmas lights winding around the pillars went out, followed by the bright light of the foyer. She must be moving toward the back of the house because a few seconds later, the lights decorating the garage went out, too. From this vantage point, Harry wouldn’t know if she was fixing dinner or changing her clothes or making a path through the mess of projects in her dining room.
Not that it was any of his business how she spent her evenings. Baldy had left her house and it was time for him to go.
Harry started his truck and cranked up the heat, obliquely wondering why he’d felt compelled to sit there in silence, putting up with the cold in lieu of drawing any attention to his presence there. Probably a throwback to night patrols overseas, where stealth often meant the difference between avoiding detection and engaging in a fire fight with the enemy.
But he shouldn’t be thinking like that. Not here in Kansas City. He watched Daisy’s neighbor to the north open his garage and stroll out with a broom to sweep away the snow that had blown onto his front sidewalk. That was a little obsessive, considering the wind would probably blow the dusting of snow back across the walkways by morning. The neighbor waited for a moment at the end of his driveway, turning toward the same revving engine noise that drew Harry’s attention. They both watched from their different vantage points as a car pulled away from the curb and made a skidding U-turn before zipping down the street. Probably a teenager with driving like that. The neighbor shook his head and started back to the garage, but paused as a couple walking in front of his house waved and they all stopped to chat. Yeah, Christmastime in suburbia was a real hotbed for terrorists.
Muttering a curse at his inability to acclimatize to civilian life, Harry pulled out, following the probable teen driver to the stop sign at the corner before they turned in opposite directions. Although this was an older neighborhood, the homes had been well maintained. The sidewalks and driveways had been cleared. Traffic and pedestrians were the norm, not suspicious activity he needed to guard against.
Bouncing over the compacted ruts of snow in the side streets, Harry made his way toward his sister’s loft apartment in downtown Kansas City, avoiding the dregs of rush hour traffic as much as possible. This evening’s visit to Daisy’s house needed to go on his list of dumb ideas he should have reconsidered before taking action. What had he thought was going to happen when he showed up on her doorstep? That the woman who’d sent him all those letters while he’d been overseas and in the hospital, would recognize him? They’d never exchanged pictures. He’d thought that trading news and revealing souls and making him laugh meant that they knew each other. That the same feeling he got when he saw her name at mail call would happen to him again when they met in person. If he was brutally honest, he’d half expected a golden halo to be glowing around her head.
Golden-halo Daisy was supposed to be his link to reality. Seeing her was supposed to ground him. The plan had been to let go of the nightmares he held in check, and suddenly all the scars inside him would heal. He could report back to Lt. Col. Biro and never look back after a dose of Daisy.
So much for foolish miracles.
Daisy Gunderson wasn’t fragile. She wasn’t golden-haired. And she certainly hadn’t been glowing. She was a brunette—a curvy one, if his body’s humming reaction to those impromptu bear hugs were any indication. A brunette with purple streaks in her hair and matching glasses on her nose and a need to chatter that just wouldn’t quit.
And the dogs. He hadn’t expected the dogs. Or the mess. Everything was loud and chaotic, not at all the peaceful sort of mecca he’d envisioned.
The fact that some pervert had been peeking in her bedroom window bothered him, too. He’d foolishly gone to a woman he only knew on paper—a stranger, despite the letters they’d shared—for help. Instead, it looked as if she was the hot mess who needed help.
Harry needed the woman in the letters to help him clear his head and lose the darkness that haunted him.
He didn’t need Daisy Gunderson and her troubles.
He’d done his good deed for her. He’d assuaged his conscience. It was time to move on.
To what? What was a jarhead like him supposed to do for six weeks away from the Corps?
If he was overseas, he’d be doing a perimeter walk of the camp at this time of the evening, making sure his buddies were secure. Even if he was back at Camp Pendleton in Southern California, he’d be doing PT or reading up on the latest equipment regs or putting together a training exercise for the enlisted men he intended to work with again. He was used to having a routine. A sense of purpose. What was he supposed to do here in Kansas City besides twiddle his thumbs, visit a shrink and reassure his sister that she didn’t need to walk on eggshells around him?
He supposed he could find the nearest mall and do some Christmas shopping for Hope, his brother-in-law, Pike, and nephew, Gideon. But even in the late evening there’d be crowds there. Too many people. Too much noise. Too many corners where the imagined enemy inside his head could hide.
Pausing at a stop light, Harry opened the glove compartment where he’d put the list of local therapists Lt. Col. Biro had recommended and read the names and phone numbers. Even before he’d finished reading, he was folding the paper back up and stuffing it inside beside the M9 Beretta service weapon he stored there. He closed the glove compartment with a resolute click and moved on with the flow of traffic.
He’d already made an appointment for tomorrow afternoon. He wasn’t ready for an emergency call to one of them yet. Maybe he should ask his brother-in-law where he could find a local gym that wouldn’t require a long-term commitment. He could lift some weights, run a few miles on a treadmill. That was all he needed, a physical outlet of some kind. A way to burn himself out until he was too tired to have any more thoughts inside his head.
It was almost eight o’clock when Harry pulled into the driveway beside Fairy Tale Bridal, the wedding planner business his sister owned. He pressed the buzzer and announced himself over the intercom before Hope released the lock and he jogged up the stairs to the apartment over the shop where she and Pike lived. He heard her warning Pike’s K-9 partner, Hans, to stay before opening the condominium door. His sister had a quiet beauty that seemed to have blossomed with the confidence she’d found in marriage and motherhood. He was happy to see her soft smile when she welcomed him home.
But that smile disappeared beneath a frown of concern before she shooed the German shepherd into the living area of the open layout and locked the door behind her. “That coat is too small for you. You need to get a new one that fits.”
“Guess I’ve filled out a bit since the last time I needed my winter coat. There’s not much call for them in Southern California or the Middle East.”
Although he’d fully intended to put his own things away, Hope took his coat from him as soon as he’d unzipped it. “You’re later than I thought. Did you get any dinner? I can heat up some meatloaf and potatoes in the microwave.” Seven months pregnant and wearing fuzzy house slippers with the dress she’d worn to work, she shuffled into the kitchen, hanging his coat over the back of one of the kitchen chairs. “Would you rather have a sandwich?”
Harry followed her, feeling guilty that, even after all these years, she felt so compelled to take care of him. “I’m good.”
“Did you eat?” she stopped in front of the open refrigerator and turned to face him.
Hope was only a year older than Harry, and he topped her in height, and had outweighed and outmuscled her for years. But she could still peer up at him over the rims of her glasses with those dove-gray eyes and see right into the heart of him, as though the tragic childhood they’d shared had linked them in some all-knowing, twin-like bond. Lying to Hope wasn’t an option.
“No.”
“I wish you’d take better care of yourself. It wasn’t that long ago you were in a hospital fighting for your life. Besides getting winter clothes that fit, you need sleep and good food inside you.” She nudged him into a chair, kissed his cheek and went to work putting together a meatloaf sandwich for him. “You found Daisy’s house okay? What did you think of her?”
Harry pictured a set of deep blue eyes staring up at him above purple glasses, in an expression similar to the pointed look Hope had just given him. Only, he’d had a very different reaction to Daisy’s silent request. Yes, he’d reacted to the fear he’d seen there and taken action like the Marine he was trained to be, but there was something else, equally disconcerting, about the way Daisy had studied him in her near-sighted squint that he couldn’t quite shake.
“She’s a hugger.” Surprised that those were the first words that came out of his mouth, Harry scrubbed his palm across the stubble itching the undamaged skin of his jaw.
But the faint air of dismay in his tone didn’t faze Hope. In fact, something about his comment seemed to amuse her. “I told you she was friendly and outgoing. She approached me that first morning in our adult Sunday School class. I’d still be sitting in the corner, just listening to the discussion if she hadn’t sat down beside me and started a conversation.”
