Reverend Feelgood by Lutishia Lovely Page A

shorter than his preacher cousin, Mark lived in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, where along with being an active member of his church, he was a bank president with political aspirations. His wife had died three years ago, just months after being diagnosed with ovarian cancer. The loss had devastated him, especially since they never had the child that both had so desperately wanted. Since then, he’d thrown himself into his work and, after a nasty election, won a seat on the Baton Rouge City Council. He’d immediately established himself as a leader in the group, had gotten several of his proposals passed, and was already eyeing the mayor’s job. It was this immersion in civic service, work, and counseling from his pastor that had finally started the healing from the profound grief of losing his wife.
    “Mark later told me what he’d thought about that first phone call,” Nettie said. “Given my previous stance on him and women, I wasn’t surprised.”
    When his Aunt Nettie had called and said there was “somebody she wanted him to meet,” you could have knocked Mark over with a feather. The Aunt Nettie he knew while growing up was the one who was always trying to keep him and Nate away from girls. And now she was playing matchmaker? Mark had been immediately suspicious.
     
    “C’mon, Aunt Nettie, what aren’t you telling me?” he’d prodded. “There’s got to be more to the story for you of all people to be trying to set me up with a date. Not that I don’t appreciate it. I still miss my wife. Not as much as I used to, but I still miss her.”
    Nettie’s heart had hurt for him when Rhonda died, and now it swelled with hope and happiness, as it often did with anything involving this gentle, soft-spoken nephew of hers.
    “She’s a beautiful, smart, church-going woman,” Nettie assured him, before giving Mark a rundown of Simone’s background.
    “She does sound good, Auntie. But if she is all that you claim, why isn’t she married already?”
    “Maybe God was waiting to give her to you.”
    “Oh, so this was God’s idea, not yours?”
    “That’s right.”
    “Uh-huh.”
    “Look, you can be skeptical and ungrateful if you want to. I just thought you might like to have a five-foot-nine, perfect size six, long hair—her own, almost down to her waist—with a perfect little behind and nice-sized breasts and everything, but I was obviously mistaken, so I’ll just let you go—”
    “Now hold on, Auntie, not so fast.” The physical description had finally awakened Mark’s genuine interest. “Tell me more.”
    And she had. She’d told him almost everything—almost. She left out what she knew about the Noble-Thicke legacy. But there was one very important thing she didn’t leave out.
    “Her daughter’s in trouble,” Nettie had said, after answering every question that Mark had asked. “And honestly, Mark, that’s one of the reasons she may be agreeable to marrying you.”
    “Okay, now we’re getting to it. This is to be a marriage of convenience. I knew this story was too good to be true.”
    “It doesn’t have to be,” Nettie countered. “Sometimes love can grow where friendship flourishes. I never would have considered it before—you and Simone—but now that I do, I believe you two can be friends…and more.”
    “What’s going on with her daughter?”
    “She’s pregnant.”
    “Okay, Aunt Nettie, I think I’ve heard enough. You had me going along with it until you brought up the fact that I’d gain not only a wife and stepdaughter, but also the title of grandpa at the ripe old age of thirty-five.”
    “It’s Nate’s baby.”
    Mark groaned. “How old is this woman? And how old is the daughter?”
    Nettie answered his questions, and relayed to Mark the chain of events that had led to her phone call, including the fact that while Destiny had agreed to let Simone claim the baby initially, she and Nate would eventually raise the child.
    “This is getting crazier by the minute. I’m