Season of Dreams Read Online Free Page B

Ryan’s girlfriend. Ryan blamed himself, but he resented Sin’s absence. He’d had to face Sara’s folks alone.
    After lunch, Eva grabbed the long pruning loppers to tackle another row of trees. Within hours, the snowflakes grew fatter and more insistent. They stuck to her eyelashes and blurred her vision. She brushed them away.
    She glanced at Adam on his milk crate. He’d slowed down considerably from this morning and kept blowing into his gloves. “Are you cold?”
    â€œJust my hands.”
    She searched the wagon. Pulling out another pair of heavy-duty work gloves, she walked toward him. “Try these.”
    Adam tucked his expensive-looking ski gloves into his coat pockets. The tips of his fingers were white with a purple hue.
    Eva grabbed his hands. “Let me see.”
    Adam tried to pull back. “They’re fine.”
    â€œNo, they’re not.” Eva took off her gloves and touched his frozen skin. “We have to get you back to the house.”
    â€œGive me those and I’ll be fine.”
    â€œNope. You’ve got frostbite starting on your fingertips. Time to call it a day. I’ll let Ryan know.” Eva looked at Adam’s face. The tip of his nose had turned white, too. The most important thing was to get Adam back home where it was warm.
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    Adam sat in Eva’s cheerfully decorated kitchen once again. Antiques mixed with brightly colored modern-looking fabrics but it blended well. The place had life. Vibrance. This time his hands were plunged into bowls ofwarm water while Eva built a fire in the woodstove. The snap and crackle of igniting wood cut the silence. And Adam felt like an idiot. Obviously he needed better gloves, and he’d have to pick up a fleece balaclava to protect his face if he planned to work an eight-hour day alongside the formidable Eva Marsh.
    â€œSo, I take it your family are churchgoers, to have a brother in ministry.” Adam couldn’t take the quiet. It was too much like when he was in grade school and sent to the principal’s office.
    â€œYup.”
    â€œI went to church when I was a kid.” His mother used to take him to Sunday school and church every week. A few years after she’d died, when he’d hit his teens, Adam took a detour away from everything he’d been taught about honoring God. He stayed on that road too long, making choices he wasn’t proud of now that he’d given his heart back to the Lord.
    Eva shut the woodstove doors. “Do you attend now?”
    â€œWhen I can.” He wanted to settle in somewhere and go regularly. He needed a home church to call his own. A place to grow.
    After attending a Christian concert with his sister over the holidays, Adam hadn’t anticipated God grabbing hold of him, but he was grateful for the second chance. Another puzzle piece of his life found its place. Adam might not have all the pieces locked in yet, but he was on his way.
    He looked her square in the eye and wanted her to know he’d changed. “I recently came back to my faith.”
    Her eyes widened with surprise. “Looks like you’ll have to change your lifestyle.”
    She couldn’t know what his life had been before—the parties filled with women and friends looking for what they could glean from him. Not that he cared to enlightenher. He was over it. Finished. Still, he smiled at her sharp tongue, and then laughed when the shock on her face registered as if she’d accidentally spoken her thoughts out loud.
    Adam knew he had a lot to live down. “I thought Christians were supposed be nice. Love thy neighbor and pray for your enemies.”
    Her eyes glazed with remorse, and then she laughed, but her amusement sounded forced. “Yeah, well, I’m working on that.”
    â€œSo, have you decided if I’m your neighbor or your enemy?”
    She glanced at the clock on the wall, obviously uncomfortable with his probing.