Faith (Rescue Me, A Contemporary Romance) (13 page)

Except now he was back. And standing in front of her like no time had passed since the first time they’d spoken. How did he keep sneaking in like that, Faith wondered with a glance at the front door. The man moved like a cat.

“Well, you weren’t ‘supposed’ to or anything, but I kinda hoped you’d want to…Faith,” Rory said, grinning at her like the Cheshire cat, hoping she’d notice that he’d found out her name.

“Who told you my name?” Faith asked. She wasn’t sure if she wanted to flirt or run, but since she was at work and Rory was a visitor—and the son of the big boss—she didn’t have too much choice in the matter. She wasn’t going anywhere.

“A little birdie,” Rory teased her.

“I see…” Faith actually did not see. Who would talk to a celebrity about her? She was well liked, but she wasn’t really friendly with anyone she worked with in the way that meant they went to happy hours or dinners at each other’s homes or anything. She couldn’t picture any of the people that worked there taking the time to speak to Rory about her, and then keeping that conversation from her. It made no sense.

Rory looked down at her, obviously enjoying her confusion. It wasn’t often that he met a girl who was so refreshing real. Faith was different, no doubt about it, and he was intent on learning more about her.

“How about dinner tonight?”

“Oh, thanks but I don’t think I can. My son’s expecting me home tonight and my mom said she was making something special for dinner because we’ve been here for almost three months, so it’s sort of our anniversary as a family…”

She trailed off, realizing how absolutely insane she probably sounded. And, by his expression, she sounded bat shit crazy. It was clear that women didn’t turn down dinner with Rory Reynolds. Especially not so they could keep dinner plans with a son or a mother. He looked stunned.

“Tomorrow night?” He persisted.

She paused. She could come up with an excuse and try not to sound like a crazy person offering it, or she could go to dinner. Of course there was Liam to think about, but he’d apologized profusely when she’d spoken to him after his shocking dinner comments that night, and she’d believed him. He was allowed to act out, and she was allowed to act up…as the case may be.

“Um…sure. Yes. Okay.”

“Wow! Don’t sound too enthusiastic or anything,” Rory was teasing, but he was also kind of embarrassed that she didn’t seem to eager to actually go out with him.

“Sorry!” Faith apologized. “I’m looking forward to it, really!”

Later, when they’d exchanged numbers and he’d promised to arrange a “very special evening” she found herself feeling more nervous and excited than she had in a long time. Maybe even since she had met Mac. At the thought of her late husband she instantly felt guilty and sad, and regretted agreeing to the date.

Still…it had been awhile since any man had acted so interested in her. She ran a hand through her thick dark brown hair and wondered what she was supposed to wear to go to dinner with a celebrity?

“This looks amazing grandma!”

Liam looked at the table in wonder. He’d never seen so much food, not even during Thanksgiving.

“Mom, you really out did yourself,” Faith agreed with a quick hug.

Myra beamed at the praise. She’d told them she wanted to do something special to celebrate their three-month anniversary as a family, but she’d also told her church prayer group and those ladies had gone into overdrive cooking up a storm for her and Faith and Liam. They now had so much Southern cooking in her kitchen, that they wouldn’t be able to eat it in a week. It was exactly the kind of affectionate outpouring that she wanted to show her daughter and grandson, especially since that was the opposite of the type of mother she’d been to Faith when she was growing up, and she was wracked with guilt over the kind of mother she’d been then.

“Thank you, thank you!” Myra said, “Now let’s grab some plates and dig in!”

At her comment, they all moved to grab a plate when the doorbell rang.

Just as
on the night of the attack, they all stopped talking and moving. Faith felt her stomach seize up and one glance at Liam told her he felt the same way. Myra stared at them both curiously.

“Should I get the door?” She asked.

Faith fought her instinct to get Liam into his room with the door blocked. What were the chances of another attack here? It wasn’t healthy to be so paranoid, but it also wasn’t healthy to undergo a vicious home invasion for the second time.

“Okay, get the door.” Faith said, motioning Liam behind her.

From where she was standing in the kitchen she couldn’t see who was at the door when Myra opened it, but she did hear her mother’s surprised yelp of recognition and excited cries of “come in, come right in!”

Before she could react, Rory stuck his head around the corner of the kitchen and grinned at her.

“I was in the neighborhood,” he said with a grin and a shrug, “I just thought I’d pop in and surprise you since it’s your anniversary and all.”

She was stunned and not a little displeased to see him. No doubt he meant well, but she wasn’t ready for a man to be having dinner with her mother and son, and she definitely wasn’t ready for any surprise visits, not even if it was a gorgeous celebrity making them.

“Hi Rory,” she said, “thanks for stopping by but we were just about to eat. Maybe we could just get together tomorrow night like we planned?”

“Faith don’t be ridiculous!” Myra objected, “Of course he can stay and eat with us! Look at all the food we have!”

Faith gave her mother a ‘stay out of this’ look, but it was too late. Rory was already grabbing a plate and asking a stunned Liam about his new school.

“Okay, well I guess…thanks for coming then,” Faith said trying to remain gracious, even though she was starting to fume at Rory’s obvious arrogance.

After dinner – an embarrassing, awkward meal that was punctuated by Myra’s excited questions about celebrity gossip and Liam’s sullen teenage glares at her and Rory – Faith walked Rory outside to his car.

As soon as they closed the door behind them and they were alone on the porch Rory moved to Faith and leaned down to kiss her.

“I’m not sure I’m ready for that,” Faith told him, stepping back so he couldn’t kiss her.

“
What?” Rory asked, confused.

“In fact, I didn’t appreciate you just showing up here and basically barging in. I told you I couldn’t see you tonight because I was having a family dinner.”

“Look,” she continued, interrupting him when he started to speak, “you don’t really know what happened where I used to live. I was married for almost 20 years and my husband was recently killed. That’s why we moved here. It didn’t happen that long ago and I’m still getting over it. I’m definitely not ready for a relationship or anything like that, okay.”

“Yeah, okay,” he said sullenly.

“I don’t want to hurt your feelings or anything,” she tried to explain, “But it’s very complicated right now. You coming over here is really confusing my son, and he doesn’t need any additional stress right now. This is all way too much, too fast. I agreed to go to dinner with you, I didn’t agree to introduce you to my family and host a dinner. Do you understand?”

“For someone who doesn’t want to hurt my feelings, you’re sure doing a pretty good job of it,” he answered.

He was behaving like a spoiled kid who wasn’t getting his own way, she thought as she looked at him in frustrated silence.

“Do you still want to go to dinner tomorrow night? I’d like to make it up to you if you’ll give me a chance.” He said.

She paused, thinking it over. The street lights cast a romantic glow over the scene and he was staring at her with those big eyes and looking apologetic and anxious. She could feel her icy resolve melting and reluctantly she agreed to go out with him the next night as planned.

“Thank you!” He said giving her a boisterous hug. “Oh, sorry! Was that okay? I don’t want you to feel like I’m pressuring you into anything.”

She laughed, she couldn’t help it, he was just so sweet and charming.

“A hug is fine,” she told him, “let’s just take this one step at a time okay. And no more surprise visits!”

“Fine, fine, fine,” he agreed in a playful singsong.

Watching him drive away down the street, Faith felt a little sad. What was wrong with her, getting mad at a gorgeous man for visiting her unannounced. Mac’s death and the shock and trauma of the attack had definitely changed her. But, she meant what she’d said to him, she wasn’
t ready for anything serious. And she knew Liam wasn’t ready to see her with anyone else yet, maybe he never would be.

“Did Rory leave? I wanted to ask him some more questions about Jodi Foster!” Myra said, opening the front door.

“Mom, geez,” Faith sighed, “Yes, he left. I wasn’t too thrilled with him being here tonight, or did you not sense that with Liam’s silence and my urging him to leave?”

“Liam will have to get used to seeing you with another man. You deserve someone special.” Myra answered pragmatically.

“I don’t know that he can get used to it actually; but, he’s going to college in a few years, maybe a romantic relationship will have to wait until then. Maybe that’s the best thing.” Faith said.

“I think that’s the farthest thing from the ‘best’ thing that you could do for yourself. But it’s your life…” her mother answered her, and walked back into the house.

Rory hadn’t felt this nervous for a date since his freshmen year in high school when he’d asked Wendy Rogers to go to the homecoming dance with him. Of course, that had gone pretty well—that was the night he’d lost his virginity—so he hoped this night would have a similar outcome.

There was something about this girl that made him feel like a kid again. She was so genuine and real, not fake and phony like the girls in the movie business in LA. He felt like he couldn’t get enough of her, couldn’t see her enough. It was almost sick the way he felt like being around her all the time. Like stopping by her mom’s house yesterday – that had been strange and not something he wanted to let anyone know about necessarily. Especially not Dr. Rothstein, his therapist.

No one knew this—the press would have a field day if they found out – but there had been an incident with a girl when he was in college. Her name was Anne and Faith sort of reminded him of her, although not in a bad or dangerous way, he was quick to justify to himself. Mostly it had been a schoolboy crush that had gotten out of control. The whole thing had been cleared up quickly, but his mother would never let him forget it.

He was a drama student—naturally prone to passionate behavior—as he’d told people when they asked him why he was stalking Anne. Stalking was such an ugly word, and a complete exaggeration of what had gone on between them. The truth was she’d been his girlfriend and he’d fallen head over heels in love with her, but she’d decided she didn’t want to see him again. It had been so out of the blue he’d been shocked and surprised and it was hard to deal with. He still didn’t think that was such a strange thing to understand why he’d gone a little nuts, was it?

He’d had a hard time letting her go, that was all. Sure, he may have followed her a couple of times and he remembered several screaming fights about why she had left him so suddenly, but “stalking” made it sound like she was in some kind of danger from him. He’d never have hurt her, he just didn’t want to let her go without some kind of explanation.

Anyway, she’d called it stalking and had gone to his mom about it instead of the police. It was the one thing he was grateful to her about. Of course his mom gave her some money for her troubles and put h
im on lockdown for the next few months in a mental health facility out in California. It all turned out okay, after all he was a big star now and nothing like that had ever happened again. The silver lining was that he’d met a couple of casting directors in the same treatment facility and when he got out they cast him in the films that jumpstarted his career. He could credit Anne’s break-up for his career, so everything had worked out better than anyone could have dreamed.

Faith was nothing like Anne, he reminded himself. And anyway, it wasn’t a relationship, he and Faith were just going to be dating or friends. Don’t get yourself all worked up Rory, he cautioned himself sternly. It’s just a date, not a promise to stay with him for the rest of her life. Dr. Rothstein would be so proud of his ability to stay grounded.

Yep, just a date, he told himself again as he picked out his clothes for tonight. A date she would remember for the rest of her life.

He smiled to himself. He could hardly wait to see the look on Faith’s face.

“That’s a plane,” Faith pointed out as she stood next to Rory on the tarmac of Nashville’s private airport.

“Yep,” he laughed loudly, obviously delighted at her surprise.

“And we’re going where in it?”

“New York.”

“Why?”

“For dinner.”

“You’re flying me to New York City for dinner?”

Faith couldn’t believe what she was seeing or hearing. This was the kind of thing they made movies about, not the sort of life she lived. And she was definitely not dressed to jet off to New York for a fancy dinner.