Jacob was a different story. The eternal optimist, an enthusiastic youngster who could elicit a smile from a slab of marble. Great at amusing himself. Right now he was busy watching an ant hill, eyes glued to the nonstop action.

Decker enjoyed both of the boys, but knew if he walked out of their lives tomorrow, Jake would recover quickly. Sammy was the vulnerable one. And that worried him because his relationship with their mother was so ambiguous. He and Rina were in love but not yet lovers. Her religious values forbade intimacy outside of marriage, and marriage right now was impossible. They were in limbo until Decker officially converted.

There was an easy way out. He could reveal to Rina that he was adopted and that his biological parents were Jewish, so there was no legal reason for him to convert. But he didn’t consider that a viable option. Too dishonest. He was a product of his real parents—the man and woman who’d nurtured him. And they had raised him a Baptist. Besides, Rina deserved a genuinely committed Jew for a husband, not a Jew by accident of birth. Anything less would make her miserable. He knew he’d have to come to Orthodoxy on his own.

He inhaled deeply, filling his lungs with the pungent, crisp air.

He was making progress. His weekly sessions with Rabbi Schulman had shown him to be a quick learner. So far, he had no trouble grasping the intellectual and legal aspects of Judaism. But Hebrew remained a roadblock. The boys loved to play teacher with him, drilling him on the alef beis from their first grade primers, correcting his pronunciation and handwriting. They giggled when he made a mistake and flooded him with compliments when he came up with a correct answer. It was a game with them, an ego boost to instruct a grown-up, and though he went along with their lessons good-naturedly, inside, in spite of himself, he was humiliated. Afterwards, he’d return home and take out his feeling of frustration on his horses, running them around his acreage, working up a sweat until he smelled like a man and no longer felt like a child.

He lay back down and groaned. You’re on vacation, he admonished himself. Take it easy and forget your obligations. He had no trouble blanking out work, but as always, his cloudy status with Rina—and Judaism—continued to gnaw at him. Seeing life through the skewed eye of a cop, Decker found faith hard to come by.