Chapter Seven
Delilah
This is fine. This is totally fine.
I swallow thickly as the truck rumbles along the country road out of the east end of Canaan. Mama’s dinner leftovers are wrapped up in cling wrap and tupperware on the bench seat next to me, but not even the smell of still-warm pecan pie is yanking me from my own head. Not even the smell of honeysuckle coming in through the rolled-down window.
I can’t believe I’m doing this—walking right into the lions freaking den, like an offering. I’m alone, I’m still shamefully buzzing and tingling from what almost happened not fifteen minutes ago in my bedroom, and I’m about to walk right up to the front door of the man who’s slowly turning my entire world upside down and dragging me into sinful damnation.
Yeah, no, there is nothing “fine” about this.
The woods peter out, and suddenly, there’s the big expanse of grassy field. On the other side of it, I see the low lights of his Winnebago, and the big circus tent set up next to it. I pull the truck off the road into a little clearing in the grass, and I kill the engine. I shiver in the darkness, even though it’s muggy and hot outside. I swallow, and my skin tingles.
Okay, in and out. I’m just going to go over there, give him the stupid food, and then turn and run, not walk, back here to drive away. Easy, right?
I swallow again and step out of the truck cab, tupperware in hand. Step by step, I make my way across the field to his setup, my heart beating faster and faster the closer I get. Finally, I step into the soft glow of light from a small outdoor light on the Winnebago. I shiver and step up to the door, and before I can chicken out and run away, I knock.
There’s only silence in return.
I frown and knock again.
“Mr. Marsden?”
The door behind the screen door is open, and I peer in. It’s clean enough inside, but it’s not all that big, either. And he’s definitely not in there. I can even see that the bathroom door is open. I frown and step back off the single step to the door and glance around.
“Preacher Gabriel?” I say softly. “Mr. Marsden?”
Again, nothing but silence. I swallow thickly, and I start to walk towards the tent. At the door, where the flaps are pulled back, I glance inside, but it too is empty. I frown, and I’m about to call the whole thing off, when I notice a glow from behind the wall at the back of the small stage that holds the pulpit. The tent extends back behind it a little ways, and I see a flicker in the soft glowing light.
Movement.
“Mr. Marsden?”
I frown and start to walk quietly down the grassy aisle between the rows of folding chairs. I get closer to the pulpit and the small stage, and I can hear a soft…I guess it’s a bubbling sound, from behind the back wall. The light flickers again with movement, and I take a shaky breath as I walk to the right of the stage and start to creep around the edge of it to the backstage area.
“Mr. Mars—ohmygod!” I scream, because I’m almost positive I’m looking at a dead man slumped over the edge of the baptism tub, his head lolled back. But the very second I scream, the dead man jumps about two feet out of the water and whirls to face me.
…My jaw drops, and my heart skips probably two or three beats. Yeah, no, not a dead man. Just a naked one.
I scream again and whirl, dropping the food to the ground and quickly covering my eyes. But there’s no unseeing what I just saw, which was every single inch of Gabriel Marsden’s grooved, sculpted, muscled, tattooed body, from the top of his head to basically his knees.
Allof him.
“I’m so sorry!” I scream. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m—”
That’s when I realize he’s laughing. Loudly. I swallow, and I start to turn before I realize he hasn’t moved at all, nor has he somehow magically become clothed. So I whirl back, keeping my eyes squeezed shut with my hands over them.
“You… what are—” I gasp a shaky breath. “What are you doing!”
Behind me, Gabriel chuckles. “What am I doing? I’m not trespassing, for one.”
I blush heavily. “I’m so—I’m sorry!” I fumble. “I wasn’t trying to break in or spy on you! I was—”
I stop because he’s laughing again.
“Delilah,” he finally growls lowly in that voice that sends heat and shivers to place it very much shouldn’t. “It’s fine. I’m teasing you. You can turn around.”
I swallow. “Are you decent?”