Total pages in book: 49
Estimated words: 44860 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 224(@200wpm)___ 179(@250wpm)___ 150(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 44860 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 224(@200wpm)___ 179(@250wpm)___ 150(@300wpm)
"Over twenty-one thousand!"
Olivio raised a brow at the way his wife had blurted out a figure in the midst of the contemplative silence between them.
"There are over twenty-one thousand documents that speak of Jesus' existence and the New Testament in general," Chelsea said in a rush, "and some of them were written by individuals who weren't even Christians."
While speaking, his wife retrieved something from the storage rack under their breakfast table: a slightly worn copy of Lee Strobel's The Case for Christ, with more than a handful of colorful page tabs poking from its sides. The book had the look of something that had been read more than once and argued with in the margins, and he found his gaze lingering on the faded spine, the dog-eared corners, the way her fingers held it, not casually, the way one held a book one was lending, but close to her body, the way one held something that mattered.
"You asked me last night about what I wanted for a wedding gift—-" Chelsea was suddenly shy, her voice dropping to something just above a mumble, and her gaze skittered away from his to land somewhere around the blue ceramic plate. "And I was hoping you'd find time to read this."
Her heart pounded as her husband leaned forward, and then he was cupping her chin to tip her head up—-
Their gazes met, and this time, the darkness of his eyes yielded nothing. He was looking at her the way he looked at contracts: with absolute attention and no readable intent.
"Why do you want me to read this, Chelsea?"
Because I love you, she thought.
She didn't know when it started. Why it came to be or how it was even possible in so short a time. All she knew was that she loved him, would always love him, and since loving someone also meant seeking the highest good for the other person—-
"I want you to go to Heaven."
The words simply tumbled out, and she found herself holding her breath, not knowing what to expect—-
"Alright."
Her eyes went wide.
She searched his face for any trace of mockery, of the polite deflection she knew he'd perfected over years of turning down his family's gentle overtures. She searched for the careful distance he maintained whenever faith came up in conversation, the way he'd redirect with a question or a dry observation, never dismissive, never unkind, but never letting it in either.
There was none of that.
Just his dark eyes, intent on hers, and a gravity in his expression that told her he understood exactly what she was asking and exactly what it meant to her, and he was saying yes anyway.
Olivio hadn't yet finished speaking when his wife was already on his lap, beaming at him with so much joy that the sight of it did something to his breathing he refused to acknowledge.
"You promise?"
"Yes."
A soft, shaken laugh, and then for the first time in their marriage, she was the one to kiss him first. Her mouth found his with a certainty that surprised them both, no hesitation, no waiting for permission, just Chelsea rising up on his lap and pressing her lips to his with the urgency of a woman who had just been given something she'd been too afraid to ask for and needed him to know, needed him to feel, what it meant to her.
And as her body melted against his, it was in this kiss that he knew he had not imagined what he heard.
I want you to go to Heaven.
Those were the words she said with her lips.
Because I love you.
And those were the words whispered by her heart.
His arms tightened around her. Not the way they tightened when his body covered hers, fierce, consuming, a man trying to bury himself so deep in someone that there was no room for anything else. This was different. This was his arms closing around her the way they might close around something that had just fallen into his hands from a great height, and he was holding it, and it was whole, and he could not understand how it had survived the fall.
Chelsea pulled back just enough to look at him, and whatever was in his face made her eyes shine.
"Thank you," she whispered. "Thank you, thank you, thank you."
Each one punctuated with a kiss, forehead, cheek, the corner of his mouth, and each one so gentle and so grateful that Olivio's hands, resting at her waist, went still in a way that had nothing to do with control and everything to do with the fact that he did not know what to do with this.
He did not know what to do with a woman who asked for nothing, not jewelry, not trips, not the things every other woman he had ever been with had eventually, inevitably, requested, and instead asked him to read a book because she wanted him in Heaven.