But before he could finish his thought, a knot of sadness twisted in his stomach that his father wouldn’t be the one officiating his and Cora’s wedding ceremony. He should be here, and sometimes Roy felt like it wasn’t fair that illness had taken his father when he still had so much life to live. But he couldn’t dwell on that. God’s plan was perfect, and he could only focus on the future.
“What would you think of officiating mine and Cora’s wedding?”
Philip’s eyes grew wide in surprise and excitement. “It would be an honor. When is the big day?”
Roy sighed sadly. “That’s kind of up in the air right now. We definitely want it to happen as soon as possible, but it all depends on her father’s recovery. He’s the priority right now. But I know that we both want it to be here in Lakewood. And if it can’t be my father, I would love for you to be the one who will be stepping into his shoes.”
“You can count on me, Roy,” Philip said, and the two men shared a smile of gratitude that all of the chaotic and tragic events of the past few weeks had forged a friendship between them. Roy had once thought that coming back to Wheats Ridge would make him a pariah, that he would instantly be rejected by everyone in the community, but that had been far from the case. Perhaps he had judged the people of Lakewood just as harshly as he assumed they had judged him. It was certainly a lesson in humility for Roy, one that he was glad to have learned.
“Roy!” Cora’s shout suddenly sounded from the porch, disrupting the quiet of the morning and causing birds on nearby trees to take flight. “Come quick, hurry!”
Roy felt the blood drain from his face, and he could imagine that from Philip’s perspective, his face had turned ashen. He froze, every muscle in his body tightening in fear of what that frantic cry could mean for their family. He imagined Sheriff Williams body aflame with a fever, overcome by an infection they wouldn’t be able to control—or worse, his body ice cold, having fully succumbed to the trauma of the gunshot wound.
“Go,” Philip said softly. “Go be with her. I’ll be praying for both of you.”
Roy nodded and pushed his fear aside, running into the house to be by Cora’s side, for better or for worse.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Cora was empty inside. She had shed so many tears over the past few days that her body had neither the energy nor substance to physically produce anymore. As the third day since her father’s shooting dawned, Cora’s wordy prayers had devolved to brief, repetitive pleas of merely one or two words in length: “Please God” or simply “Jesus…”. She took comfort in knowing what the Scriptures said about situations just like this one:“the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God.”
“God knows your heart,” Roy had said to her that morning, standing behind her and squeezing her shoulder as she kneeled over her father’s bed, unable to formulate a prayer. “He will fill in the gaps.”
Cora was infinitely grateful for Roy’s constant presence and support, proving himself in such a short time someone who would be the godly helpmate she had always prayed for. And then Roy had told her that her father would be okay. He said it with such confidence, and Cora wanted to believe him. But doubt had permeated her heart, and it deepened the longer her father went unconscious.
Roy had gone outside to meet with a visitor. Cora wasn’t sure who it was, and she didn’t have the energy to care. She had started to doze off in the chair when she heard her name spoken in a faint, almost distant voice.
“Pa?” Cora sat up abruptly as her father’s eyes flickered open. He looked confused for a second, as if he were trying to place himself in his surroundings. Then his eyes landed on Cora, and it was as if he had a sudden moment of clarity. He reached for her hand, missing at first, his coordination not quite there, before grasping it and giving her a small, feeble squeeze.
“How long… how long have I been out?” he asked weakly.
“A few days. Oh, Pa, we’ve been so worried!” Cora said, resisting the urge to throw herself over him in an embrace and disrupt his wound. “Let me go get Roy!”
In an instant she was out the door and on the porch, where she found Roy talking to Philip Hawthorne. She yelled at him to come quickly, and then she raced back inside, as if she thought that if she spent more than a few seconds away, her father would slip back into unconsciousness.
Sheriff Williams tried to lift himself into a sitting position, but upon putting weight on his injured shoulder, he winced in pain. Cora quickly adjusted his pillow and helped him get into a comfortable position, so he was slightly reclined but supported. Roy appeared in the doorway, and the fear on his face dissolved into joy as he saw Sheriff Williams alert and propped up.
“I’m going to catch Philip and tell him to send for Dr. Davenport,” he said. He left for only a moment, and Cora could hear him calling down the road for Philip. Then Roy came back inside and joined Cora at the sheriff’s bedside.
“Philip is going to alert him that he’s woken up. He should be here soon.”
“How much do you remember, Pa?” Cora asked.
“I’d just come home from the station,” Sheriff Williams started carefully, furrowing his brow as if trying to sort out the images in his head. “I came home, and the house was quiet. I wasn’t worried, I knew you were still helping Roy pack up the house.”
His gaze wandered off into the distance, and for a moment Cora thought that he had reached a dead end, and that was the last thing that he remembered, but then he continued.
“I had left the kitchen and went into the living room to sit down and relax. But before I could sit, I heard the back door through the kitchen open. I thought it was you, Cora. But there he was, Alfred, pointing a gun at me.”
He swallowed hard and winced, and Cora worried that the stress of the memory would cause too much of a strain on his vulnerable state.
“You don’t have to try to remember anything else, Pa,” Cora hushed him, fixing the blankets up near his shoulders. “Don’t strain yourself.”
“No… no, I need to say this,” Sheriff Williams insisted, putting his hand up to stop her, so Cora let him continue.
“I reached for the gun in my holster, but I didn’t pull it out right at first. I wanted to talk, try to talk him down. I guess part of me thought that he was still able to be reasoned with. I think that was my guilt, realizing that I almost forced you into marriage to someone so morally depraved.”
“You had no way of knowing, Pa,” Cora assured him. “Even though we knew he wasn’t a good person, we had no indication that he was willing to commit murder.”
