Courting Hope. Jenna Mindel

she’d grown up and still called home at the ripe age of twenty-seven, Hope wondered how she’d break the news of their new minister to her folks.

      With a sigh, she got out and trudged toward the house. Her mother met her at the side door, letting out their black-and-white shepherd mix named Gypsy. “Judy called.”

      Hope cringed. Did they already know? “What did she want?”

      “Why didn’t you tell us the church hired Sinclair Marsh?”

      “Because I just found out today.”

      “Why didn’t they bring you in on the decision?”

      Hope let her head fall back. “I don’t know, Mom. I was on vacation. Besides, the board found interim pastors without my input, so I guess they didn’t need it. Can we talk about this later? I’m beat.”

      “Your father’s not happy.”

      Hope didn’t expect that he would be.

      “I think you should talk to him.” Her mom gave her a ghost of a smile.

      She didn’t feel encouraged. “Now?”

      “He’s in the barn.”

      Hope left her purse on the bench against the wall in the kitchen before she plodded back down the porch steps. They had a small farm with a whole lot of cattle for beef. An oddity, considering the surrounding fruit growers. Entering the barn, she spotted her father in his workshop with a blowtorch and soldering wire.

      She slipped into a nearby chair and waited. It didn’t take long for one of the barn cats to find its way onto her lap.

      When her dad finished mending the metal, he flipped up his safety glasses and looked at her. His eyes were red. Could be from the work, or something else?

      “Hi, Daddy.”

      “You gonna quit?”

      “No.” She stroked the calico cat’s fur. How could she?

      “Don’t expect us to go there.” Her father slipped his glasses back in place. Conversation over.

      Hope watched her father finish fixing whatever it was for one of the tractor engines. He had kept the tractor that had crushed Sara. Her father’s rationale had been that it wasn’t the tractor’s fault it flipped.

      True. It was Sinclair’s. And Hope’s for not being there to stop her sister from doing something so stupid.

      Hope often wondered if it would have been easier on her dad if she had been the one under that tractor. Sara had been his kindred spirit—the one who wanted to take over the farm someday. Sara had been the one who knew how to help. Her little sister didn’t need to be told what needed to be done or shown how to do it. Sara just knew.

      Hope didn’t know. She’d tried, but she couldn’t fill the empty void Sara left behind.

      “Put those in the box over there, would you?” Her father handed her his safety glasses.

      Hope gently shooed the cat down and brushed off her skirt. She laid the glasses alongside a few other pairs and closed the lid, careful to keep the edge of her skirt from brushing the greasy side of the workbench.

      “You should have changed your clothes before coming out here.”

      Hope shrugged. “It’s okay.”

      “Your mother sent you, didn’t she?”

      Hope nodded.

      “We were finally getting some distance.” Her father’s face looked worn.

      “I know.” Her heart tore in two. They may have accepted Sara’s death, but Sinclair’s return reopened the wound and made it feel fresh and sore, like a torn scab.

      “Let’s see what your mother has cooked up, huh?”

      Hope followed her father out of his workshop. The dog flew past them, barking the whole way, toward a candy-apple-red Camaro that pulled into the driveway.

      Sinclair.

      “What’s he want?” her father growled.

      “I’ll send him on his way.” She glanced into her father’s metal-gray eyes, which looked hard as steel.

      Her father slowed her down with a touch of his hand. “Wait. I want to hear what he’s come to say.”

      Hope focused on Sinclair as he made his way toward them up the long gravel drive. What did he think he was doing here? The dog trotted alongside him with her tail wagging. Gypsy had always loved Sinclair. Everyone had loved Sinclair.

      Once upon a time, Hope had, too.

      “Gypsy, come!” She grabbed the dog’s collar and put her in the house.

      “Who’s here?” Her mother stepped onto the porch, wiping her hands on a dish towel.

      “Sinclair Marsh,” Hope answered, then watched her mother’s expression change to tense concern.

      When Sinclair stopped near the porch, the air turned thick and heavy with emotion. There were things that had never been said. Forgiveness that was never granted.

      Hope would never forget that day she’d returned from shopping to the horrible scene enfolding in the living room. The police had asked Ryan questions while her father had tried to console her mother. Sinclair had stood alone, looking pale and guilty.

      This wasn’t going to go well.

      “Mr. and Mrs. Petersen. I didn’t call first, because I figured I should say this in person.” Sinclair looked directly at her father.

      “Say what?” her father asked with impatience.

      Her mother stepped down to stand next to her husband in the driveway. They’d always thought Sinclair irresponsible. They used to tell her he was a young man they couldn’t trust. Seeing them standing so stiff, the two reminded Hope of a stone wall. Like a permanent fixture of the landscape, her parents were bound to be hard to move.

      Hope stayed on the porch and watched and waited.

      “I wanted to let you know that I’m the new pastor at Three Corner Community Church.”

      “We heard.”

      “And...I’m sorry.” Sinclair didn’t waver in his stance. He met her parents’ stone-cold stares without flinching.

      “Three years and you’re sorry.” Her father’s voice was low with sarcasm and hurt.

      Hope noticed the skin on Sinclair’s neck flush red. This wasn’t easy for him, either.

      “I can’t change what happened or my part in it. But I wanted you both to know—” he glanced at her “—the three of you to know, that I’m done running from it.”

      Hope watched her father. He looked like a tractor that had been worked too hard and might blow a gasket. And yet Sinclair hadn’t looked away. He faced them with an honest humility she’d never seen in him before. There was no sense of challenge in him, no cockiness.

      “That’s what you’ve come to say?”

      Sinclair gave a quick nod. “That’s it.”

      “Okay then, you’ve said it.” Her father stuffed his hands in his pockets. Conversation over.

      Only Sinclair didn’t take the cue right away. He looked like he might say something else but thought better of it. With a tight upper lip, he gave her mother another stiff nod. “Good night, then.”

      The three of them watched in silence as Sinclair walked down the drive, got back into his car and pulled out.

      Hope released the breath she’d been holding. Not nearly as bad as she’d thought.

      “Hope, if you were smart, you’d rethink working there.” Her father stomped up the