Beautifully Knight (Jordan Knight Fanfic, Liadan #5)

Churches and Cities

-JORDAN-

"I'm not going to lie—the land needs work. We used to have a landscaping crew who had a bunch of fancy equipment that made it really easy to keep the grass cut and the weeds plucked right along with the main church property, but when the board did the budget a few years back they determined that we needed to cut down on non-essential spending. Understandably, landscaping empty acreage was deemed as non-essential, but now a bunch of weeds and unruly plants have popped up everywhere."

I stifled a yawn as I followed my father's long-time secretary through the halls of the church that I'd wandered a million times as a child. Vivid memories of my mother ushering me and my siblings along and whispering for us to "look alive" before our choir performances played in my head, but much like those early Sunday mornings of long-ago, I could feel exhaustion closing in on me and I was certain I looked like a dead man walking.

"Why didn't you guys call me? I told Dad if he ever needed it I'd be happy to get together some equipment and come over here," Jon chimed as I tried to discreetly cover my mouth while I trudged on forward at his and Logan's heels.

"You already do so much with all of your farm-to-fork donations. The food pantry really thrives off of the fresh fruits and veggies and Alex is such a doll. He always arranges the cutest baskets," Ms. Nora Miller smiled brightly. "He didn't tag along today, did he?"

"No," Jon smiled. "Not today. He had an emergency at his brewery. That's why we weren't at the service today."

"Ah, well tell him he was missed," Nora nodded before focusing on me. "The same goes for Lia. I was glad to hear your father say you guys thought of us for her fundraiser. The whole church has been praying for her and wondering when we'd get to see you all again. It's been quite a while, hasn't it? Your dad misses you every Sunday."

Nora was a sweet woman. I had fond memories of her as my Sunday School teacher in primary school, but it never failed—every time I saw her she mentioned my family's relative absence from my father's church and every time it drove me just a little bit crazy.

It was no secret that Lia and I weren't every-Sunday church people. During our earlier years, our careers had kept us busy working irregular schedules that were far different from the traditional routines we'd both been raised with. Thus, we'd decided early on to make it a point to always go to church for the important things—baby baptisms, weddings, Christmas, and Easter—and beyond that to handle our attendance on a week-by-week, moment-by-moment basis. We had our personal beliefs and we felt that was more than enough to guide us as decent, moral people who'd raised decent, moral kids, even if we didn't have assigned pew spots. I liked to think that had worked out okay, but Nora never failed to nudge at the issue in a motherly way.

Once upon a time, there had been rumors of her becoming my stepmother. As far as I knew, she and my father had never officially dated—they just considered themselves to be really good friends—but more than once my older brothers had intervened in fights between me and some mouthy kid who thought it was okay to taunt me that Widow Miller was going to be my new mommy. As a teenager, I'd been furious at the mere notion of my parents spending their lives with anyone else besides each other, but as an adult, I sometimes wondered if those kids and their nosy parents really had seen something.

Even all these years later, there were times I caught a glimpse or smile that made me wonder whether there was more there than a friendship. After all, a thirty-year-long weekly bowling night sounded like a standing date to me, but Dad never said and I never asked. Most of his time was spent with his congregation and all of the many ongoings that were constant in my home and my siblings' homes. We were a big family that had grown exponentially bigger and we kept him busy. Thus, he largely kept the little bit of a private life that he had leftover to himself and that was fine by me.