Faith (Rescue Me, A Contemporary Romance) (12 page)

“One second mom,” Faith heard Rory say and then before she knew what was happening, he was standing in front of her clutching a few flowers he’d taken out of the bouquet.

“Take these please,” he said offering them to Faith. “I couldn’t live with myself if I offered a beautiful woman flowers and then didn’t follow through and actually give them to her.”

How could she say no to his movie star charm. He was exactly the way he was in the movies!

“Thank you,” she said primly as she took the flowers he was holding out to her.

But, before she could take them from him he jerked them away from her teasingly.

“It’s only good manners to tell me your name. After all, you know who I am.”

She laughed out loud. She couldn’t help it, he was irresistible with those wide spaced green eyes and that beautiful face.

Faith opened her mouth to tell him her name, but before she could say anything she heard the unmistakable icy tones of Penny in her office.

“Rory? What are you doing out there? Can you please leave that receptionist alone?”

‘That receptionist,’ Faith thought with a grimace. Great, I guess that’s my name as far as she was concerned, and what was she doing anyway. She’d only been a widow for a month and she was already flirting with another man?

“Sounds like Mrs. Meyers is waiting for you,” she said to him without a smile as she reached to answer the phone.

Puzzled, Rory looked at her for a moment. It wasn’t normal for women to resist his charms when he decided to let his personality loose on them.

“Yeah, okay. Sorry to bother you. Have a good first day,” he said and left.

Faith studiously avoided looking up while she successfully transferred the caller – yay!—and by the time she’d hung up the receiver the door to Penny’s office was firmly shut.

But, sitting on the counter in front of her was the mini-bouquet and a business card with a cell number scrawled on it and the words “call me.”

Faith sat on one of the wide concrete steps on the riverfront and flipped Rory’s business card back and forth in her hands.

It was time for her to go home, but she wanted to get a breath of fresh air before she got in the car and sat through rush hour traffic all the way home. She’d had a crazy day and she almost didn’t trust herself behind the wheel while her thoughts were going a million miles an hour.

On the one hand, it was absolutely amazingly wonderful that a celebrity—and a gorgeous one at that—had flirted with her and then left his business card and flowers for her with instructions to call. No one she knew could say anything like that had ever happened to them!

On the other hand, Mac had only been gone for a little more than a month. She woke up with him on her mind and didn’t close her eyes without fantasizing that he was in the bed beside her. She felt like crying all the time, although she had to admit that sometimes an entire hour would go by and she hadn’t thought of him or the attack at all, and that thought almost made her cry harder. She didn’t want to forget him. She felt guilty for even thinking Rory was good looking, although you’d have to be blind not to notice his beautiful green eyes and the way his chin dimpled a little when he smiled.

Faith! She mentally slapped herself. What is the matter with you?

Still, she thought, Mac had wanted her to live. It was the last thing he’d ever said to her. He’d want her to smile and laugh and flirt, and if it had been her that had died, she would have wanted the same for him, she knew.

But, this whole situation was making her feel guilty she thought. She had Liam and a new relationship with her mom begging for her attention. What was she going to do? Jump in bed with a strange man just to make herself feel better?

Of course not. And with that, Faith got up and headed for her car.

***

Liam had had an eventful first day as well, although he hadn’t met a celebrity, not that anyone had asked him he thought as his mom shared her day with him and Myra over a dinner of mashed potatoes and fried chicken.

“I just cannot believe you met Rory Reynolds on your first day at work?” Myra said, not for the first time, as she added another scoop of potatoes to Liam’s plate.

“I know! It was amazing. I didn’t even hear him come in and when I looked up, there he was asking to speak to his mother. Did you know she’s the Executive Director?”

Of course we knew, Liam thought with a roll of his eyes. We knew because you’ve repeated this story three times in the last thirty minutes.

For some reason he was jealous as he watched his mom sparkle and laugh. It had been a long time since she looked happy and he couldn’t deny it, she looked very happy sitting there eating chicken and talking about movie stars. What kind of a monster son denied his mother some happiness, he wondered. The same kind of monster who would get his father and unborn baby brother killed, he reminded himself.

Stop it, stop it! He squeezed his eyes shut hard and pinched his leg so the sting would jolt his brain out of the track it had gotten stuck on since the attack.

“Liam? What’s the matter with you?” His mom asked, her once happy face now drawn and worried.

Great, now he was responsible for her return to the family drama. Just add it to the pile, he thought.

“Nothing mom. So listen, are you in love with this guy or something?”

He didn’t know why he’d said that. He didn’t really care if his mom did have a crush on some movie star, did he?

“I mean, dad’s only been dead a little while you know. Maybe let the poor guy rest in peace for a few months before you replace him?”

“Liam!” Myra’s shocked voice broke the stillness that had frozen everyone into place with his words.

“Go to your room right now,” Faith said. “I can’t even look at you.”

Liam got up and left the table feeling wretched about the pain he’d just caused her. It was typical teenage stuff, straight out of an afterschool special. He knew better than this. He wasn’t some adorable five-year-old that couldn’t stand to see his dad replaced. For gods sake, he knew how the world worked so why was he cock blocking his mom? Damn, he was so twisted.

Faith and Myra sat at the table in silence, the food and laughter forgotten now in the wake of Liam’s comment.

“Do you think I’m disrespecting Mac by letting Rory flirt with me?”

Faith was almost afraid to hear what Myra had to say. She knew her mom could be tough and she didn’t react well to most matters of the heart, thanks to her own cheating, lying, heart breaking ex-husband.

“Well, let me ask you this. Do you think Mac is upset right now?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, he’s looking down on this whole scene from heaven, so do you think Mac’s upset?”

Faith thought about it for a long moment.

“No. No I don’t think he’d be upset.”

“Well, I do.” Myra said.

Faith looked at her, ashamed and angry.

“I think Mac would be very upset to witness Liam talking that way to you. I think he would be ashamed of his son’s behavior, but I think he would be thrilled to see you happy. Even if it meant you were happy because a good looking man had taken notice of you. I don’t think he would mind that part a bit.”

Faith smiled, relieved.

“Thanks mom. I think I need to talk to Liam.”

Myra nodded and got up to start clearing the table. She was disappointed in her grandson, but she wasn’t surprised. It would be a hard transition to start seeing his mother dating again. Not every woman would have the opportunity to date again so soon, but her daughter was breathtakingly gorgeous and she would have suitors lined up to take Mac’s place if she let them.

The interesting thing about Faith was that she didn’t seem to notice how many men looked at her when she passed by or the whispers when she entered a room.

She’d always been beautiful, she got that from her father, Myra knew her own shortcomings in the looks department without feeling sorry for herself, but Faith’s father had been a looker of the first order. It was what had attracted her and every other woman to him. She had the same effortless charisma,
hazel eyes, and thick dark brown hair that waved naturally no matter what time of year it was.

That alone would be enough to earn the admiration and rage of most women, but Faith’s heart-shaped face and curvy, petite frame gave her the look of an innocent doll, and even when you wanted to envy her, you couldn’t help but like her.

Myra had seen it happen her whole life. She supposed it was her fault, or to her credit, depending on how you looked at it, when you considered that Faith had never really known how lovely she was. She always assumed that Faith knew her own good looks, but these past few weeks she had seen that her daughter genuinely didn’t know her own power over men. She rarely used makeup or took extra care with her clothes or her hair. Of course, she had one of those enviable figures that meant everything looked good on her, but beyond what nature had given her, she did nothing to enhance her looks.

No, Myra thought as she scraped plates into the garbage underneath the sink so she could wash them, Liam was not going to have the luxury of having his mother all to himself for too much longer. If it wasn’t this movie star then it would be another man. A man with money, she hoped thinking in practical terms. She’d never met Mac in person, but she’d seen photos of him on Christmas cards over the years and she’d gleaned enough from those cards to see that Mac had been a handsome, charming man who had ultimately left her daughter and grandson completely bereft. Not too much of a catch in her mind, Myra considered, not for the first time.

He was gone now and it wasn’t done to speak ill of the dead, but every tragedy had a silver lining and Mac’s death could be a new beginning as well as a tragic ending. She just hoped Faith would realize that she had an entire life to live stretching out in front of her, and she needed to do whatever she could to live it to the fullest.

On that point, Myra agreed with Mac wholeheartedly.

“Still lost?”

Liam swiveled in his seat to see who was talking to him. American History was his favorite class so far, and it looked like he wasn’t alone. The class was packed and last week even more students had transferred into it when it had been moved to the auditorium to accommodate even more people.

“Over here.”

He felt a dull tap on his shoulder and he turned to look who was trying to get his attention. The girl that had helped him on his first day was sitting there and grinning at him. He’d nicknamed her ‘map girl’ so he’d have something to call her when he thought about her, and just looking at her made him smile. She wasn’t yelling pervert and pointing at h
im, so he guessed that she must not have noticed the hard-on she’d given him when they first met. Today would be different, he swore to his penis.

“Hi!” He smiled at her eagerly. Oh god, did he look like he was too eager? Was he resembling a puppy right now?

“Hey, I never got a chance to introduce myself,” she said with a smile, “I’m Emily.”

Immediately his smile died and he felt a wave of revulsion welling up in his throat. She must have noticed his expression, because she frowned and sat back in her seat.

“Are you okay?” She asked.

“Yeah, sorry,” he said. He couldn’t do it. He could not say that name. “I just know someone else named Emily, it surprised me to hear you say it, that’s all.”

“Someone you don’t like,” she surmised.

“Yeah, it’s a long story. Sorry. I’m really sorry.”

He couldn’t even look at her without seeing the face of the other evil Emily in place of this hot girl’s. He turned around and sunk down in his seat to listen as the teacher started the lecture. Behind him he could feel her gaze piercing his shoulder, but he didn’t turn around. When the class ended he bolted out of his seat and rushed for the exit so he wouldn’t be caught in the aisle with her. He was acting crazy, he knew it, but he couldn’t look at this girl, and speak to her, and say that name without making everything front and center in his mind again. What if he was never able to act normally again?

***

“You never called me!” Rory said accusingly.

Faith looked up from her computer where she had been reviewing online marketing classes. Lately she’d been thinking she should do something to better herself. It wasn’t going to be okay forever to live with Liam and Myra. She needed to do something to get a better job, make more money, give Liam a college education.

“I didn’t know I was supposed to,” Faith lied, flustered at the sight of him calling her out.

She honestly didn’t think she was ever going to see him again. It had been at least five weeks since the first day when he’d stopped in to the office. She’d assumed he’d gone home to Los Angeles, but she’d never asked Penny for sure. Not that she’d had much of a choice. The older woman always looked at Faith like a stray cat had wandered into the front lobby.

No matter that everyone else seemed to be very happy with her work there, Penny would probably never forget the sight of her much-loved son trying to give her flowers away to the receptionist. Yet, another reason for Faith to forget all about her brief flirtation with Rory Reynolds.