The Other Side of Divine Read online

  Also by Vanessa Davis Griggs

  Forever Soul Ties

  Redeeming Waters

  Ray of Hope

  The Blessed Trinity Series

  The Other Side of Dare

  The Other Side of Goodness

  The Truth Is the Light

  Goodness and Mercy

  Practicing What You Preach

  If Memory Serves

  Strongholds

  Blessed Trinity

  Published by Kensington Publishing Corp.

  THE OTHER SIDE OF DIVINE

  VANESSA DAVIS GRIGGS

  Kensington Publishing Corp.

  http://www.kensingtonbooks.com

  All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

  Table of Contents

  Also by

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Epilogue

  A READING GROUP GUIDE

  Discussion Questions

  The Other Side of Dare

  Copyright Page

  To you

  The readers of my books

  Acknowledgments

  To my Lord and Savior Jesus the Christ, the author and finisher of my faith; my loving mother and father, Josephine and James Davis Jr.; my husband, children, grandchildren, other family members, friends, publishing personnel, and all who have supported me and contributed in any way toward my dream in this magnificent writing journey I embarked upon so many years ago: I love you, thank you, and appreciate you more than words will ever be able to convey. If you’re reading this right now, then my sincere and heartfelt thanks and acknowledgment are to you!

  To those who may be new to my books (this being your first introduction to me and my works), thank you for choosing The Other Side of Divine, a novel that, like all of my others, was written with so much of my heart remaining inside of it.

  As always, I do love hearing from you. You can find me on the Web at: www.VanessaDavisGriggs.com and on Facebook at: www.Facebook.com/vanessadavisgriggs.

  Once again: I truly, truly, love you and pray God’s blessings upon you. If you know me at all, you know what I’m likely going to tell you next. And yes, I still continue to believe that the BEST is YET to come . . .

  Prologue

  And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.

  —Ephesians 6:17

  When I tell you how beautiful, you’re not going to believe just how much so. In fact, beautiful doesn’t even begin to describe it or give it justice.

  I’m sorry. Please forgive me. I’m getting ahead of myself here. I hate when someone starts in the middle of a conversation as though you’ve taken part in what was apparently going on in their heads before they began to speak and you have no earthly idea what they’re jabbering on and on about.

  To those who don’t know me, my name is Esther Crowe. Those who know and love me best call me Esther, Aunt Esther, or Miss Crowe. A few folks even call me Zion from my days when I had a dance group called the Daughters of Zion many forgotten years ago. The miss part of Miss Crowe is actually a miss statement. There I go again: my attempt at a little humor and playing on words. I love words. For anyone who may have missed it, I was playing on the word misstatement.

  I was born Esther Morgan, no middle name. I married into the last name of Crowe. My husband died young (much too young) early into our marriage, from complications of an illness called lupus, to be exact. I don’t like talking much about it. Suffice it to say: I never remarried; I never got around to finding anyone special enough to fill his space.

  Then there was that terrible automobile accident that pretty near claimed my life here on earth. I was spared, although barely. For ten years, it was as if I didn’t really exist. But then my nephew, Dr. Zachary Wayne Morgan, stepped into that Chicago nursing facility, bringing with him someone near and dear to my heart: my dear, sweet Gabrielle Mercedes Booker all the way from Birmingham, Alabama and all grown up now.

  Gabrielle dropped the last name of Booker and goes by Gabrielle Mercedes. That poor child has indeed lived a hard life. That wretched woman who was given charge over the almost four-year-old at the time was actually the cause of Gabrielle (eight years old when I first met her) and I becoming acquainted. I was out in the community on a summer jog and Aunt Cee-Cee (Mrs. Cecelia Murphy) was out there treating that sweet child like she thought her name was Cinderella (before the glass slippers). I laugh sometimes because Gabrielle has told me on more than one occasion that I was like her very own fairy godmother.

  I suppose it’s true what some folks say: What Satan meant for bad, God will use it for good.

  I figured out a way to get that precious little girl some joy into her life while she endured being treated even worse than a redheaded stepchild. At least I’d like to believe I brought some good into that child’s life. But Gabrielle could dance, oh my goodness, she could dance! The first time my eyes fell on her running around picking up after those four other children like she was their hired help, I saw the greatness in her. I often described her movements as like the seeds on the feathers of dandelions being carried in the wind: Graceful with a capital G. I saw the greatness in her future.

  Gabrielle’s aunt Cee-Cee tried to say I believed Gabrielle was the child I never had. She even said jokingly (or so she claimed after she didn’t get the response she’d apparently hoped for) that I could have Gabrielle outright, for the right price, of course. If I could have gotten Gabrielle without the insult of seeming to buy her, I would have taken that child in a heartbeat, in a heartbeat. After I learned how badly Aunt Cee-Cee had done Gabrielle after my automobile accident—taking the money I’d paid for Gabrielle to attend Juilliard, then throwing her out on the streets with nowhere to go . . .

  I don’t even like thinking about that. Why couldn’t I have been here? I wanted so much to see the look on her face when she received the information about Juilliard. But to think: That wretched woman took that money, stole it is what she did. . . . Well, needless to say, Cecelia Murphy’s day of reckoning is coming. And you can believe that. Those that live by the sword shall die by the sword.

  I didn’t think of Gabrielle as the child I never had. What folks have to understand is none of us truly own anything or anybody here on earth. Everything belongs to God. Psalm 24:1 pr
ovides the title and the deed. “The earth is the Lord’s, and the fullness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein.” My father used to say, “If folks think they own it, then let them die and see just what they really own. You brought nothing into this world and for certain, you’ll take nothing when you leave, not even these earth suits we fondly call our bodies.”

  I miss my father. Our parents taught us that if we saw someone in need, especially a child, we should try to do what we could to help. That’s how things were back in my day. Yeah, I’m close to sixty years old, short by almost two years. Nowadays, if you say something to a child, not only might the child cuss you out, but nine times out of ten, when the parents find out, one or both of them will hunt you down and cuss you out.

  Yes, I meant cuss and not curse. Having been a schoolteacher, I know the difference between the two words. Cussing is a whole other word and a whole other level than cursing. High-society folks, who make their subjects and verbs agree, curse. Folks who want to get you good and told cuss.

  But back to what I was saying. I don’t want to get off on that because that’s a whole story in itself. I was in this horrific automobile accident. Everybody, including me, believed my life as I’d known it was over. Then Gabrielle stepped into my room and danced me back on my journey to recovery. There was such an anointing in my room that day, oh my goodness! I felt the glory of the Lord sitting . . . the weight of His glory on me. There’s nothing like the glory of God to lift you up.

  Yes, God raised me right up off of that sick bed. I heard Him speak to me just as clear as you hear me speaking now. “There is more that I require of thee. Get up, Esther! There’s too much still left for you to do.”

  So I girded myself up. I began putting on the whole armor of God. I held up my sword, I’m talking about the Word of God, and I was ready to get back on the battlefield.

  If God has ever told you to do anything, please know that God equips those He calls. He raised me up off that deathbed, and in a little less than a year’s time, my speech has become ninety-five percent clear again. My dance returned, not so much in my legs and feet as in my heart. There’s something glorious to be said about dancing from the heart.

  People come up and say, “Esther, how are you doing?” And I say, “I’m still kicking, just not as high.”

  After God got me back on my feet, He told me I had to go help Gabrielle one more time. That there was a huge battle coming, and I needed to be there to assist. All I needed was one Word from the Lord. Over the objections of my family (mostly from my sister-in-law Leslie Morgan, also Zachary’s mother), I packed my bags and told Zachary what time to pick me up from the airport. These new flying rules are horrible. I feel like Rip Van Winkle with everything that changed while I was out. What’s all this taking off your shoes and folks with purple plastic gloves patting all over you? I’m almost an old woman. What exactly do they think I’m going to do?

  There I go again: another subject for another time.

  In mid-November 2010, I left Chicago and arrived in what had been my hometown for a few years. When you obey God, things fall into place even if to us it doesn’t appear that’s what it’s doing. God knows what He’s doing. I thought I was coming to Birmingham, Alabama, to help Gabrielle plan a wedding she and Zachary were taking much too long to move on. There was also that little unfinished legal matter between me and Mrs. Cecelia aka Cee-Cee Murphy, better known now as “the defendant.”

  So after a beautiful Christmas with Zachary and Gabrielle (not to leave out my biggest surprise of all, little Jasmine Noble, who can dance just as wonderfully as her mother Gabrielle), who would have guessed that at the beginning of 2011, all Hell would break loose. No, I did not cuss here. When I say Hell, I mean Hell in every biblical sense of the word with the devil, his imps, and the fire and brimstone. Well, all of Hell broke loose. It’s definitely what you would call the other side of divine.

  God knows in advance of spiritual warfare when prayer warriors are needed to be called to arms and in place. God sent me to Birmingham (the home of U.S. Steel that helped give Birmingham its nickname The Magic City because of how fast the city grew, although some say it was because of the smog that caused the city to seemingly disappear then “magically” appear again), for such a time as this and . . .

  You know what? Instead of me telling you everything, why don’t I just let you see for yourself?

  Chapter 1

  The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.

  —Matthew 6:22

  “All right, Jasmine, spell, energetic,” fifty-eight-year-old Esther Crowe said as she and soon-to-be-ten-year-old Jasmine Noble sat on the couch in the den wearing their matching red Minnie Mouse shirts.

  Jasmine smiled as she correctly spelled the word without even the slightest hesitation. Her brownish/black hair was pulled up into a cute little ponytail, her hair having grown tremendously in the thirteen months since her successful bone marrow transplant. Jasmine giggled. “Okay, Miss C,” Jasmine said, calling her by the special name she’d given Miss Crowe as she’d done with Zachary, in calling him Dr. Z, and Gabrielle, whom she’d once called Miss G before calling her Mama. “Now it’s your turn.”

  Miss Crowe placed her hand on her chest. “My turn? How did I end up getting a turn? I’m not the one who has a spelling test tomorrow.”

  “Are you ready? Because this is going to be a long and tricky one that always seems to mess me up.”

  Miss Crowe nodded. She’d been a middle school teacher many years ago and there was nothing that put a smile on her face more than watching a child with an uncontained hunger for learning. “Hit me with your best shot, Miss Jazz.”

  Jasmine giggled again. “Okay, your word is Mississippi.”

  “Mississippi?”

  Jasmine grinned and tilted her head to the side. “Yep. Mississippi.”

  A big smile spread across Miss Crowe’s face. She repeated the word again, and then began. “Mississippi. M-i-crooked letter-crooked letter-i-crooked letter-crooked letter-i-humpback-humpback-i.”

  Jasmine was cracking up with laughter as she tossed her head back, falling back onto the sofa. “What?”

  “You said Mississippi so I spelled Mississippi,” Miss Crowe said. “Have you never heard it spelled that way before?”

  Jasmine rolled onto the floor, kneeling as she giggled madly. “I most certainly have not. Crooked letter crooked letter, humpback humpback-i?”

  Miss Crowe was laughing now as well. “Yes. Crooked letter-crooked letter”—she drew the letter S in the air with her index finger twice—“humpback-humpback”—she then drew two letter P’s—“i,” she said while cocking her head to one side and folding her arms like a rapper who’d just successfully delivered a rap.

  Jasmine got up and sat back on the couch next to Miss Crowe. “That was too funny.”

  “Well, that’s some of the things we did in the old days to help people learn to spell difficult words. The next time you have a need to spell Mississippi, you can sing that song in your mind, and you’ll get it right every time, no problem.”

  Gabrielle Mercedes walked into the den. “Hey, you two. How are you feeling, Jasmine?”

  Jasmine ran to Gabrielle’s opened arms and hugged her. “Mama!”

  Gabrielle smiled. There was nothing like hearing those words, especially after all they’d been through in the span of just a little over a year.

  There was Jasmine’s lifesaving bone marrow transplant at the end of December 2009. Then Jasmine’s adoptive mother, Jessica Noble, died of cancer on March 30, 2010, which of all days was also Jasmine’s birthday.

  Jessica had desperately wanted to tell Jasmine that she was adopted. Sadly, she ended up taking her last breath before getting a chance. And as if that wasn’t enough, in May of that same year, Gabrielle finally told Jasmine she’d been adopted by the Nobles before Jasmine learned in July, in the most horrific way, that Gabrielle was not merely a frien
d of the family as she’d been led to believe, but instead, her birth mother. “The mother who didn’t want her and had given her away,” as she overheard it carelessly blurted out from the mouth of the beautiful Paris Simmons-Holyfield.

  Yes, it had been a journey all right, all coming to a climax November 2010 with the court’s final approval of Gabrielle’s adoption of Jasmine just as Gabrielle’s beloved Miss Esther Crowe waltzed back into her life, vowing not to leave until she’d physically witnessed wedding vows exchanged between her very own nephew and the one some liked to call “the daughter she never had.”

  And now, it was a new year, 2011—a new season in every sense of the word. Engaged and come June 11, 2011, Gabrielle was set to wed the most amazing man: Dr. Zachary Wayne Morgan. For once, things were finally coming together . . . finally starting to look up.

  Gabrielle strolled over to the couch and gave Miss Crowe a hug. “How did things go with the two of you today?”

  “I told you that Jasmine and I would be fine. This baby is never a problem.”

  “I keep telling you I’m not a baby!” Jasmine said vehemently but with total respect toward an adult in her tone.

  Miss Crowe pulled Jasmine over to her and hugged her. “I know, baby. I know. You’re not a baby. Got it!”

  “You just did it again!” Jasmine laughed and hugged Miss Crowe back.

  “Sorry, baby. I know you’re growing up into a big girl.” Miss Crowe rocked her several times before letting her go. “But you’ll always be my baby. Just like Gabrielle will always be my baby.” Miss Crowe slowly shook her head. “It’s amazing. I first met Gabrielle when she was around eight years old. And the first time I met you was when you were just a little past eight. That’s something, isn’t it?”