his elders, he’d at least have to consider it. Or talk to him about it first. Maybe a good, strong talk would bring him back in line. He’d remind Kenneth of Proverbs 23:26: “My son, give me your heart, and let your eyes observe my ways.”
And then he thought of Ephesians 6:4, if only because he considered himself something of a father figure to Kenneth: “Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up to the discipline and instruction of the Lord.”
So depending on how their talk went, discipline, at the very least, is what it might take.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
When they reached the truck, daylight had waned. But they made it through the woods. They came upon no other hunters, no other animals. They were safe now. They were in the clear.
The road was quiet. The truck looked as if it hadn’t been tampered with. Everything appeared good and right. God was with them.
God also was the reason they chose this place that was so far away from anywhere, it was barely there at all. Monson, Maine. A place where you could drag a whore into the woods and let her fend for her life until the decision was made to end it.
But the woods weren’t all that Ted Carpenter imagined them to be. The moose, for instance―he never saw that coming. And Lord knows, he never thought he’d have to run from one, only to get lost. Getting lost surprised him because they had studied the woods so carefully. And then there was the hunter, bursting through the trees, only to be killed by Kenneth and sent to hell by him.
They were being challenged as a team, and he personally was being challenged by Kenneth, who now was opening up the large plastic storage box that was at the front of the truck bed and removing from it the tactical night vision goggles they’d wear when it got dark. He watched the young man before him and wished that, in his youth, he had been as similarly focused when it came to doing God’s work. He respected him on that level. He just needed to bring him around and let him know that, as God saw it, it was he who was in charge.
“Kenneth,” he said, “can we have a word?”
“We don’t have time for a word, Ted. We need―”
“We have time, Kenneth. I need to have a word with you now.”
The direct tone of his voice made Kenneth look up at him. He met his eyes―those ice blue eyes framed by the thick dark lashes that caused every woman to melt when he approached them at bars like The Grind―and held his gaze with an unflinching authority Kenneth hadn’t seen in them before.
Generally, Ted’s eyes were without emotion―at least that’s what his mother used to say about him when she was alive (“They look dead to me. You look dead to me. What’s wrong with you?”).
It’s also what some of his teachers used to say to her. They’d tell her that they were worried about him. No friends. No social activities. Just him and his worn-out Bible, the reading of which took precedent over school work. Since his mother was a God-fearing woman, she protected him when it came to his Bible studies, but she also told him that learning math and English and history also were important.
“You’ve got to make time for all of it, Teddy,” she said to him one day, when another concern arrived from one of his teachers.
“Yes, Mama.”
“Just do enough to get some average grades―nothing spectacular because the good Lord knows you don’t have anything spectacular in you―then you can get out of there and become the holy-rolling preacher we all know you want to be. You can gather your flock then. You might even be happy then. Happy enough that it will show in your eyes.”
“Yes, Mama.”
And that’s what he did. He graduated with a 2.1 GPA, which was enough to get him out of high school with a solid D average and start thinking about his future.
In front of him, Kenneth shifted. “What do you need to say, Ted?”
“That you’ve been sinning.”
“That I’ve been what?”
“Sinning. You’ve been sinning. I don’t think you realize it because things are tense again, but you’ve been sinning. You need that brought to your attention and you need to correct it before it’s too late.”
“Too late for what?”
Ted pointed a finger toward heaven. “Too late for Him.”
Kenneth screwed up his face at him. “What