“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” Leah said to Shay. “Connor has told us so much about you.”
“He has?” Shay asked with surprise.
“He has,” Ben answered. “Any friend of Connor’s is a friend of ours.”
“Very true,” Leah said.
“As long as I’ve known Shay,” Connor said, “and that’s a long time because we met in middle school, she’s been a fan of the Miracle Five.”
“I’ve read the books,” Shay said to Ben, “and countless articles. I’ve seen the movie a dozen times. Your story inspires me. It reminds me that miracles still happen, and that God is still as active as He ever was.”
“Amen.” Lines of kindness lightly marked the skin beside his eyes. “We spend too much of our time trying to control things that aren’t ours to control. The rescue taught me that God can be trusted. You’d think, seeing as how I lived through it, that I wouldn’t have to remind myself of that lesson so often.” He shrugged. “But I still do.”
Several teen girls passed, shooting Connor and Ben dazzled looks.
Shay asked Ben a few questions about his work and his family.
Ben was known as the optimistic one of the five and she saw evidence of that in spades.
The only off-key note? A faintly stilted vibe between Ben and Leah, despite their friendliness. Connor had told Shay that he’d worked with Ben and Leah for the past few years. They all knew each other well and liked each other a lot. So, why the undercurrent of stiffness?
When she and Connor parted from Leah and Ben, two young female teachers immediately waylaid Connor. The women made googly eyes at him and agreed with everything he said.
Just as she’d expected, Connor had a large fan club here. She couldn’t decide whether to feel smug or sad.
When the women moved off, they began walking toward their cars. “Is Leah Molly?” she asked outright.
His gait stuttered. “No.”
“Would you tell me if she was?”
“Yes. Leah loves Sebastian Grant.”
“What?” Sebastian was another of the Miracle Five.
“Yeah, Leah and Sebastian. They’re a couple.”
Leah wasn’t Molly, Lord be praised. “I could be wrong, but I noticed something strange between Leah and Ben just now. An underlying... hesitation.”
“Ben fell for Leah as soon as she came to work here. He and Leah are close, but her feelings for him have always been platonic. Then she met Sebastian and her feelings for him weren’t platonic.” He shot her a look, one eyebrow raised. “It got complicated.”
“Oh no.” It was widely known that Ben and Sebastian were best friends. “So Sebastian started dating Leah even though Ben found her first?”
“Only after Ben gave him full permission to do so. By that point, Ben knew that it wasn’t going to happen for him and Leah.”
“Has Ben and Sebastian’s relationship fractured? If so, I’m not going to be okay.”
“Their relationship’s intact. They all behaved honorably. They all care about each other. It’s just that this only went down less than two months ago so it’s still a little sensitive.”
“Has it been strange for you, to be in a friend group with Leah and Ben? Since they’re in a weird place?”
“At times, yes. I’ll be glad when Ben finds someone. He’s great.”
“Connor!” Yet another female teacher around their age flagged him down.
Shay hid a groan. It seemed Connor was already out of her league. Men did not stop her every thirty feet when she tried to walk from her job to her car.
Had Connor ever been in her league? He lived in Misty River because he was helping his mom through ALS. She was a skilled stationery designer, but he was a phenomenal painter. He was kind, a good listener, a man who worked with teens, a man who was seeking the advice of a dating consultant in order to win Molly’s heart.
