Excerpt From Valentine to Faith

SANIBEL ISLAND, FLORIDA
SUMMER 1985

From her kitchen, Angel clocked the sound of Max’s wagon heading home. She cleared her supper and went to the porch to wait until six p.m., the time she judged best to arrive on his doorstep. Any later would put her in the way of his class, any earlier gave them too much time alone together.

Pulling on her smoke, she surveyed the artistic display in the skies. God had dipped a paintbrush into buckets of rich red and peony pink and zesty orange, layering them o...