. “I mean, I think my life is more like an older person’s. I mean, I think it is about to—to take a different turn.”
The reverend glanced at him, surprised, and, to Asher, it seemed, his eyes narrowed in the first glimmer of suspicion. He said slowly, “So what brought you to Atlanta, Asher?”
“Your daughter. I want to marry her.”
Reverend Wilkes shifted in his chair. “Marry?”
“Yes, sir. I’m in love with your daughter and I this is the best way I can think of to show her.” To Asher’s mind, this sounded completely logical. In fact, he had spent the entire flight trying to figure out how to express his feelings to Faith’s father and had agonizingly put that sentence together. But it took hearing himself out loud to realize he sounded like a deranged stalker.
Shit.
“Asher, I’m afraid I need you to back up a little. Because, in my experience, marriage is a commitment once love is established. Exactly what is your relationship with my daughter. Because I’ve never heard your name before.” There was a bite to his final words.
Asher blushed and ducked his head. “I love your daughter. We met in an abstinenance club meeting.” If anything could please an angry father, that sentence was it.
But the reverend just stared at him impassively.
“I was seeing this other girl a few months ago. Vivianne. That’s what send me to the club meeting. I thought Vivianne was abstinent and I wanted to respect that.”
The reverend interjected, “She wanted to wait until marriage?”
Asher made a face. “Nah, turns out she’s gay. She wanted to have sex, just not with a guy.”
Reverend Wilkes’s face went rigid. Like someone hand hit pause on this scene.
Asher said, “So, anyway, I didn’t know Vivianne was a lesbian then. I only knew she wouldn’t sleep with me. I really liked her, though. Like, I was obsessed with her. So I needed to figure out how to be patient and wait. I saw that Faith had restarted the Abstinence Club.” With a look at the Reverend, Asher said, “You know, it means a lot to Faith to live up to your expectations. So, please don’t be too pi—angry at her.”
“Why would I be mad at my daughter?”
No doubt about it, Reverend Wilkes’s demeanor was not quite as inviting as it had been ten minutes ago. He sat up straighter in his chair. His face turned steadily graver. Asher’s gaze flicked to the door of the study as he wondered if the good reverend would thrash his ass for what he was about to reveal.
Tensing his muscles, ready to run if he had to, Asher said in very rapid sentences, “I sorta-got-Faith-pregnant-it-wasn’t-planned-neither-of-us-meant-it-to-happen-but-we-just-had-this-strong-bond-between-us.”
Reverend Wilkes closed his eyes, looking very much like a man who was fighting a losing battle with his temper. “How dare you,” he said.
“Excuse me?”
“How dare you come into my home and tell me you got my daughter pregnant.” He opened his eyes, giving Asher a very un-Christian look. “I know my daughter. She would never have broken one of the ten commandments unless someone had led her astray.”
“Wait a second, that’s not fair!” Asher cried, thinking back to the way Faith came on to him with all her talk about fantasies. But, probably, that wasn’t anything she would want her father to know.
“It isn’t?”Reverend Wilkes prompted him.
Asher kept his mouth shut this time, trying to craft a perfect answer.
“Why don’t we call her and see what she has to say,” Reverend Wilkes said.
That was definitely not want Asher wanted to do. He had wanted to wait to talk to Faith until after he’d gotten her father’s blessing. Which, judging by the way it was going, would never happen in a million years.
“Wh—what are you doing?” he asked as Faith’s father reached for the telephone.
“I think it’s time I call my daughter.”
Asher leaned forward, waving his hands. “No, wait. I don’t think we should do that.”
Reverend Wilkes raised his eyebrows as he dialed and pressed the button for the speaker phone.
After two rings, Faith picked up. “Hey, Daddy,” she said, and with those three syllables, Asher could tell she wasn’t her usual sunny self. She sounded defeated and stopped up, like she’d been crying.
“Faith. Do you have a few minutes to talk?”
“Sure. Did you get the paperwork for the new school?” Faith asked.
Asher’s heart contracted. Was that what he had driven her to…a new school, far away from him?
He sat silently, sweating through his boxers, while Reverend Wilkes said, “There is a surprise visitor sitting my study with some very disappointing news.”
Faith was silent on the other end of the line.
Reverend Wilkes said, “Honey, you know how I feel about surprises. And disappointments.”
“Who’s there?” Faith asked quietly.
“Asher Van Der Bos.”
Asher thought he heard a sniffle before Faith said, “And what did he tell you?” She sounded miserable and Asher felt like the biggest scum to ever walk the earth.
“He said that you had broken one of the Almighty’s commandments. He said you were pregnant.”
Reverend Wilkes had barely gotten the words out before Faith shrieked into the phone, “How could you!!!! Are you