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Redeeming-Love-By-Francine-Rivers

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R E D E E M I N G L O V E

Contemplating that, she was afraid. At night, when he turned to her in his

sleep, his strong body brushing hers, she would remember the way he used

to make love to her—with joyous abandon, exploring her body as he did

the land he owned. She had felt nothing then. Now, the lightest touch made

her senses spin. His dreams were becoming her dreams.

Michael opened his hand more each day, but she was frozen in fear. Why

couldn’t they leave things as they were? Let her stay this way. Let her still be

inside herself. Let things be as they had been. Still, Michael kept pushing,

gently relentless, and she held back in fear because all she could see ahead

was a great unknown.

I can’t love him. Oh, please, I can’t!

She couldn’t be more than her mother, and Mae hadn’t been able to hold

on to Alex Stafford. All her love hadn’t been enough to keep him from riding

out of her life like the wind. Angel could still see his dark figure, cape flying,

as he galloped down the road and out of her mother’s life. Had he even

come in person to tell Mama to pack and get out? Or had he left it to that

young lackey to do it for him? She didn’t know. Mama never said, and she

never asked. Alex Stafford was sacred ground Angel had never dared walk

over. Only Mama spoke his name, and only when she was drunk and

despondent, and it had always grated like salt on a raw wound. “Why did

Alex leave me?” Mama had wept. “Why? I don’t understand. Why?”

Mama’s grief had been so great, but her guilt had been even greater. She

had never gotten over what she had given up to have love. She had never

gotten over him.

But I paid him back in spades, Mama. Can you hear wherever you are? I

smashed him into tiny pieces the way he smashed you. Oh, the look on his face.

Angel covered hers.

Oh, Mama, you were so beautiful and perfect. You were so devout. Did your

rosary beads ever help you, Mama? Did hope? Love never did anything but bring

you pain. And it’s doing the same to me.

Angel had sworn she would never love anyone, and now it was happening

in spite of her. It stirred and grew against her will, pushing its way

through the darkness of her mind to the surface. Like a seedling seeking the

light of the spring sun, it came on. Miriam, little Ruth, Elizabeth. And now

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