Free Games of the Heart (Crimson Romance) by Eva Shaw Page B

Gramps’ Mustang. I stood on the porch, waving until the car turned out of the neighborhood, feeling empty and lonely and, okay, weird. I wanted to go with them, like a family, and have fun. “Get outta here, girl,” I said to myself, and the grown up took charge because in ten minutes I was on my way to church.
    A church on Saturday is bliss, quiet and people-less. There was a boatload of work to be done for Vacation Bible School, and like it or not, it’d barrel into the station marked “Jane’s Responsibility” on Monday. Moving into the left lane to enter the church, what I saw nearly made me swerve, make a U-turn, and run away.
    Pastor Bob’s spanking new Lexus was hogging two handicapped parking spots near the entrance. Odd? Not the hogging, but that he was there on a Saturday. Why did I have such an aversion to him? Paranoia? Always over-caffeinated?
    I slowed the SUV to five miles an hour, but eventually, even at that speed, I’d have to park among the BMWs, Hummers, classic Corvettes, and five Mercedes so new they still with temporary plates. Through the huge, glass front doors I spied a crowd with Pastor Bob in the middle. I swear they were doing a cheer, like, well, cheerleaders.
    My first, second, and third choices would have been to totally avoid the perky pastor and his precocious surprises. Gosh, I hate being a adult at times, I thought as I headed into the foyer where Pastor Bob was holding court, encircled by adoring fans, huddled with their arms circling each other.
    They yelled, slapped each other, and the laughter rang in the cavernous foyer. I inched around the crowd, but I’m rather tough to miss because of my pleasing plumpness.
    “Look who’s here, everybody. Pastor Jane, perfect timing. As usual. These are my personal prayer partner, Ms. Delta Cheney. Yes, my goodness, it’s our new youth minister. We are getting really huge things done around here with Pastor Jane on board.” Pastor Bob’s face shined, moist with sweat. He started patting me on the shoulder. “You should hear this woman talk to those teenagers. And now the news. God has great plans for our VBS, especially with Jane in charge. Real PR move getting neighborhood kids here, lots of new faces, to um, bring to the Lord, and to help beef up the coffers so we can launch new programs. Right, Jane?”
    They clapped and cheered, like a high school pep rally, jumping for joy at whatever Pastor Bob said. It was spooky. There I stood in my Saturday “ensemble” of baggy jeans, hot-pink scoop-neck T-shirt, down to my flip flops, pumping hands with the movers and shakers of Las Vegas.
    The weirdest thing happened after that. Maybe not as spine-chilling stuff as from the last forty-eight hours, including nearly having Carl Lipca in a position where in some states we’d have to marry, but with these bashful baby-brown eyes, it looked a heckava lot like Ms. Cheney and the good pastor were in cahoots, cookin’ and plannin’. They were chummy. Like that Supreme Court judge said about pornography, you know it when you see it.
    My niggling whisper preceptor was on red alert because something weird and creepy was going on, which was perceptible in a body-language, Patrick Jane on the Mentalist sort of thing. It was disturbing and perturbing. I tried to smile like I didn’t have a care in the world but the thought occurred to me that I could be slightly psychotic. Or is that like being slightly pregnant? Hopefully it was just the heat. Or perhaps it was from being in close proximity to the ever-surprising, always-something-up-the-sleeve Pastor Bob Normal.
    Ms. Cheney was, as Jerry Seinfeld says, “a close talker,” in breathing distance and in my face although I knew she was ignoring me. She smelled of cigarette breath, which spilled on me like a douse of Taboo perfume. She was tall, muscular, and athletic as if she’d been in sports, like a forward for the Chicago Bulls.
    I started a string of small talk, weather, my move, the price