Angel Falling Softly Read Free

all. It was David. He’d powered Jennifer through the chemo with prayer and raw emotional muscle. But then came the GVHD and the coma, and he was out to sea. He did things with the kids or did things for them. Faced with a child who did nothing, he had nothing to give. It was easier to work and tend to his flock. Easier to deal with other people’s problems.
    But hadn’t she wanted to be a bishop’s wife? Come to believe she’d earned it? Deserved it? No, not growing up. Not when they were first married. And not even when David was briefly elevated to the stake high council. Nevertheless, there was little subtlety in the politics of picking a Mormon bishop. When David was called as first counselor four years into Bishop Ackerlind’s term, everybody knew David was going to be the ward’s next bishop.
    She found herself looking forward to that which she’d once scoffed at. It would be like being first lady, enjoying no de jure authority but having all she said taken with extra seriousness.
    Though by now it was beginning to wear. All things being equal, it was the hours of David not being home that truly gnawed at her. Not being out in the garage, or at the computer, or mowing the lawn. Just not being around.
    Worse was the pedestal. How did her brother Carl put it? “Sooner or later they stop admiring you and start looking up your skirt.” She dreaded the day that Laura hit puberty full on. David would be done as bishop in two years, and then the pressure would be off. With luck they could escape all those idiotic arguments between parents and their teenagers that David was always being called on to mediate.
    Such as another piercing, two in each ear like Kathy Reid. Laura had brought up the subject twice already. But she couldn’t. Not while David was bishop. Not while any other kid in the ward could turn to the bishop’s child, her child, and make her the example.
    Once he was released as bishop, Laura could turn her lobes into sieves—that’d be fine with Rachel.
    She pulled out of the parking garage and drove down from the University of Utah campus. The mountains rose up behind the hills in the east. To the west, the bright city slowly hid itself behind a green curtain of trees.

Chapter 6
    Look before you leap
    T he secretary returned to the conference room promptly at twelve-thirty. As they rode the elevator to the penthouse suite, Milada said, “I take it the invitation was Edward’s idea?” While Karen stammered for an answer, Milada continued, “No matter. I appreciate the thought.”
    The city looked deceptively cool through the tinted windows, but Milada asked the waiter to seat them away from the wall of plate glass.
    Milada said, “What do you recommend, Karen?”
    “I usually get—” She didn’t seem too sure about what she usually got. “I usually get the chef’s salad.”
    Milada said to the waiter, “Two chef’s salads.”
    The waiter retrieved the menus and left. Karen said under her breath, “To be honest, I don’t eat here that often.” She quickly added, “But the chef’s salad really is good.”
    Milada smiled. She appreciated that the girl was not good at lying and knew it. “Tell me, Karen, are you married?”
    Karen shook her head. “Engaged. Well, almost.”
    Milada took a sip of water. “An employee at the firm?”
    “Tom Wilkins.” She brightened saying his name. “He’s an accountant with Smith Barney. We met at the Salt Lake AICPA conference last fall.”
    “Where do you live?”
    “I share an apartment with Cindy—at the front desk. Tom’s building a house in Draper up on the bench. It’s got a great view of the valley, but it’s a little far from things, you know? At least it’s not as bad as commuting from Lehi or American Fork. Draper’s the only place on the east side that’s affordable these days.”
    “Where would you prefer to live?”
    “Sandy would be nice, or Granite. But you’ve got to be totally rich to live there.” Karen reflected