An Imperfect Process Read Free

Rainey's quick, perceptive words had made her recognize how much she had come to seek her security in money. Blindly she gazed from the window and wondered where she had gone wrong. Not by choosing law school, though her reasons had been a spaghetti tangle of good and bad.
    Yes, she'd wanted to impress her father, but she had also loved the challenges and discipline required by the law, and her talents suited the work well. She enjoyed analyzing cases, researching precedents, devising ingenious strategies, and performing in the courtroom. Her law firm was a decent employer, and every day was different.
    Yet somewhere along the line, she'd lost her course. A fat portfolio is not the cure for what ails you. Her instinctive desire to save the movie money was odd considering that financially she was in fine shape, with a good job, a nice home, and a healthy amount of savings. But she had clutched at that million dollars—less massive taxes—as if saving the money was vital to keep her from destitution.
    Her mind skipped to an emotionally needy boyfriend who had lived on the edge of financial disaster because he tried to fill the holes in his spirit with extravagant spending. It never worked. The satisfaction that came with buying was gone in hours while the bills stayed around forever.
    Val had broken up with him regretfully, unable to deal with his chronic money problems, yet she hadn't recognized the similarities between them. They both put too much faith in material things—he by spending, she by saving. Somewhere along the line she had turned into Ebenezer Scrooge without noticing it.
    Had Val ever known inner peace? Yes, as a girl there had been times when she had felt centered and content. But now she was restless and unhappy, running so hard there was never time to stop and think about her life. She needed to slow down and find a way to heal her tattered spirit before it became frayed beyond repair.
    The question was—how?

 
     
     
    Chapter 2

     
    Val turned south on Old Harford Road from Northern Parkway. Unlike nearby Harford Road, a busy through street, this older route was a quiet residential road. The address Kate had given her was a couple of blocks down. Turning on to a cross street, she parked her car and studied the stone structure on the corner.
    Petite and well-proportioned, the church was dangerously charming. Leave it to Kate, an architect by training, to know about such an interesting possibility.
    That didn't mean the building would work for Val even if she did decide to set up her own office—a very big if. Though small for a church, the structure would be large for a sole practitioner law firm. Probably built in the early twentieth century, it had Gothic arched windows containing roundels of stained glass at the top. The clear lower panels allowed lots of light in. From here, the interior looked white and empty.
    She climbed from her car and went to explore. A For Rent sign in the front window looked weathered, and she wondered how long Rob Smith had been trying to find a tenant. This was a big project for a carpenter. If he had all his money tied up in the church, he might be hurting.
    Reminding herself that she shouldn't rent an office simply to make a stranger's life easier, she circled around behind the building. Neat shrubs lined the foundations, and well-grown trees shaded the corner lot. This close, she could see that the back of the structure had a second floor. Still more space that she wouldn't need.
    Behind the church was a parking lot that might hold eight or ten cars. A wheelchair ramp, which was good—the carpenter knew the law. There was street parking, too, which was much nicer than the claustrophobic parking garage Val used downtown.
    She was touching a glossy magnolia leaf when a voice asked, "Can I help you?"
    Almost jumping from her skin, she spun around to see a powerfully built man in jeans and a worn blue work shirt standing an arm's length away. His shaggy light brown hair