CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Faith
The sound of the bell makes me open my eyes, even though I’ve been half awake and listening for a while. It sounds like a bath is running somewhere, and I hear Noah whistling to himself quietly, moving around the suite.
There’s a smell of roses and his natural fresh, woodsy smell too so I decide to keep my eyes shut tight.
Not wanting to ruin the surprise, I know he’s been busy while I’ve slept.
I certainly don’t look like a princess, seeing my reflection in the ceiling to floor mirrors opposite the bed, but I do feel like one once I see all those rose petals.
I find a robe in the bathroom adjoining the bedroom, and slipping it on, I step out wide-eyed into the lounge area, following the trail I know he’s laid out for me.
I can hear voices before I get there, smell the fresh scent of croissants and bacon too.
Breakfast and a bath?
Noah really is a mind reader. I don’t think my first time could have been managed more perfectly.
What I don’t expect to see is a maid in a very short dress she’s spilling out of, huge hair, and a chest that makes mine look like an A cup.
I make my appearance just as Noah opens the door. Blonde bombshell-maid Barbie looks up at me first, then with a cocked brow eyes Noah up and down as she wheels a large trolley covered with silver domes into the room.
“Faith!” Noah exclaims, coming over to me, kissing my cheek only because I turn my face from his. “I thought you were asleep still,” he murmurs, gripping both my hands.
“Honey, what is it?” he asks, totally oblivious to the eyes that woman’s making at him.
She wheels the cart into the center of the room, and checking her face in one of the domes, she clears her throat.
Noah shoots her a quick and very annoyed look.
“Will there be anything else, Mr. Templeton? I could make up your bed while your daughter has her four hourly feed,” she drawls languidly, moving her eyes up and down my thickly robed frame, making me clutch it at my throat.
“Excuse me?” Noah says, dropping my hands and turning on the woman, looming up with that shape he makes when his whole body tenses.
His ‘I’m about to kill somebody’ pose.
“I mean, I thought you might like your room made up while your daughter has breakfast is all. You could come show me just how you want it,” she adds, sounding sluttier than I could ever even try to.
Sluttier then anyone could, even if they were really trying.
Noah makes for the phone, holding his hand up to me in a silent and solid gesture to stay put.
Slutty Barbie holds her hands up in resignation, backing out of the room once she hears Noah asking for the manager, wanting to lodge a complaint about the atrocious level of so-called service he’s getting for eight hundred dollars a night.
Eight hundred?
I hear myself gulp loudly.
She makes a face at me before finally pulling the door shut loudly, leaving me feeling very unsure of myself and Noah absolutely livid that his attempt at romance has been foiled by cheap help with an itch he has no interest in scratching.
I don’t blame him, but I can’t help feel a wave of hurt from all those taunts and jeers I got from cheerleader types just like her at college.
The same sort of looks and remarks I’ve had my whole life just because I’m not a size four and actually eat.
It brings it all back, except Noah is the jock type who should be laughing at me too.
But this time he’s rooting for me. He’s on my side and on a warpath because someone disrespected me in front of him.
Disrespected me in the first place.
He’s launching into the whole episode on the phone when I touch his arm, shaking my head gently. Pleading with my eyes for him to just let it go.
Thinking maybe we should just go, but he won’t have any of it.
Noah Templeton promises to come downstairs and deal with things personally before slamming the phone down.
“Noah, don’t,” I tell him. “Is it really worth it?” I glance at the rose petals on the carpet, at the trays of food and finally I look him up and down with a look I know tells him more than that stupid maid ever could.
He groans and rolls his eyes, gripping me by the elbows and kissing me hard.
“I can hear a bath running,” I confess, cocking my head and making my way to that trolley while he jumps to stop the faucet.
“I had it cooling a little,” he admits as I trundle our food right outside the bathroom door.
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” I ask him, hoping like hell he is, because I’ve always wanted to eat in a bath that was big enough to swim in, and this one looks perfect.
“I’m sorry, Faith, I wanted to surprise you,” he admits.
“But you did,” I tell him honestly. “You really did. The bath with rose petals no less… and all this food!” I exclaim.
“Let’s start this morning over,” he suggests, and meeting me in the doorway, he leads me back to the bedroom and makes me close my eyes so I can tiptoe across the rose petals to the bathroom, gasping with surprise as I see what he’s laid out just for me.
For both of us, I hope.
“You’re getting in there with me,” I instruct him. Smiling once he takes my hand and kisses it.
“That’s kind of what I had in mind,” he says. “I’m sorry baby. I didn’t mean for that.”
I shake my head, dismissing it and her like I know he just did.
Once I look into his eyes, I can tell it’s like we’re picking up right where we left off earlier.
Just the two of us, each having eyes for only the other. No matter what else happens.
“I want you in that bath and I’ll serve you breakfast,” he tells me. But I shake my head again.
“No?” he asks.
“No. I want you to serve me in that bath but...I don’t want to see a stitch on you either, Noah Templeton. I want my breakfast raw. Naked.”
“I’m getting in right behind you,” he laughs, helping me into the tub, which is the perfect temperature, and wheeling in the food before setting it out on a board that fits across the bath like a table.
Finally, he drops his robe and I sink deeper into the bubbles, feeling like food is the last thing I want after what else is on the menu.
“I’m gonna have you tubbed, scrubbed, and loved before your morning’s through Miss Holding,” he tells me, mimicking the sucky concierge and the even suckier staff in this place, but with an edge, I like the sound of that.
A lot.
Nestling in behind me, and cutting some food before he feeds me before himself, I notice a remote on the solid wooden table and a huge plasma screen opposite the bath.
Reading my thoughts, Noah flicks on the TV while we eat, and I lean back, glad to feel a certain hardness pressing into me that hints of what’s to come after we’re done here.
‘…In breaking news. The Fugitive trio who held up a bank truck has been traced across two states with two of the offenders being captured in a non-lethal shootout with police. Local sheriff’s say that the crime spree isn’t over, with a hostage being believed to have been taken by the third bandit who remains at large…’
There’s some aerial footage of the same armored car from the night before, but my heart stops when I see Sheriff Brodie’s cruiser, plus a dozen others surrounding an old plantation house.
It’s only for a second before Noah flicks the channel over to an old movie, but I recognize the place.
I also recognize another car in the long gravel driveway before Noah changes the channel.
It’s my Dad’s car. The one who took him to the airport.
“What’s the matter, Faith?” Noah asks, feeling me tense up under the water. “Don’t like old movies?”
I try and say something, but only manage a dry croak, pretending to fill my mouth with food instead and then taking a sip of a glass of juice in fron
t of us.
“Honey? What is it?” he asks me again, but I can’t speak, I feel like I’m in shock.
“Faith?” he asks again, switching off the TV and leaning over me, asking if I’m alright.
“We should go,” I tell him quickly. “I don’t think you should spend any more money on places like this Noah, it doesn’t feel right,” I confess.
I don’t believe everything I’m hearing on the news, and I don’t distrust Noah either.
But I do know he checked in with his real name and everybody saw me.
It’s only a matter of time before all that’s all over the news and Noah and I are in more trouble than just trying to explain to my Dad why I left without a proper reason for a few days with a stranger.
The most handsome, lovable stranger I’ve ever met, and the one I plan on sticking by no matter what.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Noah
I don’t know what I’ve done wrong. Maybe it was all that business with that stupid maid that set Faith off. Who knows?
But like it or not, our romantic breakfast, along with the day in bed I had planned for us both is interrupted by her insistence that we leave.
Immediately.
I guess it hurt her more than she let on, and I do try and explain once more that I have no interest in the maid, that I was only just trying to surprise her with a taste of things to come.
What I thought was our new life together.
Sort of how I’d like to surprise her most mornings or evenings, whenever she gets home, or just because, whenever I feel like spoiling my girl.
That’s all.
Stupid god damned Barbie-slut maid.
I’ve got a good mind to-
“Please, don’t make a scene, Noah. Let’s just go, okay?” she says, reading my face as we’re about to go.
“Uh, okay, sure thing,” I tell her. I don’t want to make a scene either, not if it’s gonna upset her.
The front desk is all apologies, even offering to refund some of our stay, but I wave them off, more worried that my Faith isn’t happy anymore.
What just happened back there?
Everything was fine, even after that stupid maid… right up until-
The TV, those news reports. Something’s got her spooked.
The thought flashes across my mind that maybe her old man isn’t the local preacher after all.
Maybe she’s mixed up in some business she doesn’t know how to get out of.
Maybe I’m up against something bigger than just a preacher?
Cheesing a grin at the valet as he brings my truck around, I forget that idea.
Faith’s been totally upfront with me so far, and I think I’ve been the same with her.
Haven’t I?
Once we’re out of the city and heading back on the turnpike to the highway, I ask her.
“Faith, if I’ve done anything to upset you…?”
“It’s not you, Noah,” she says, reaching over to grip my knee.
I notice she’s not sitting right next to me though and it hurts.
I look for a place to pull over, stopping before we even start again, but I just have to know what’s wrong.
Arterial roads and freeways, highways aren’t meant for pulling over on so I just ask her.
“I thought you said you loved me, Faith. And I sure as hell know I love you, so what the hell happened just now?” I ask her, nearly shouting, confused, and angry to see her so upset.
I see her chewing her lip again, and wanting to do the same I stop myself.
“Please, Faith?” I implore her. “What happened to make you this way? We were doing great. Right up until-”
“I trust you, Noah. I really do, but…” she starts to say.
And I get it, a flood of memories and emotions grips me. Maybe she knows, somehow.
I don’t know how though.
I’ve spent a lifetime trying to forget. I paid for what I did.
Spotting a rest stop, I pull over.
If Faith Holding is gonna have Noah Templeton and all his demons, she may as well be introduced.
I should’ve told her, but how? And why on earth would I bring up the past. It’s not the kind of conversation that excites romance.
I notice Faith looking behind us still as I pull off the highway, sure she has her own secrets too.
Everybody does.
“Faith, ever since the hotel you’ve been looking over our shoulder like you expect something or someone to be following us,” I observe.
“I don’t want any secrets between us, but I don’t see either how something that happened before you were even born could make you so jumpy, without me even telling you either,” I continue, noticing her confused look as she tries hard not to look around behind the truck again.
“I don’t know what you mean...” she starts to say, but my look says it all.
“You first then” I demand. “What’s gone and got you so spooked? Tell me, Faith and I’ll tell you about the ghosts that follow me,” I tell her, calmer, almost relieved I’m halfway to telling her already.
“You first,” she blurts out, looking more worried than ever suddenly.
I’ve never been one to beat around the bush so much, but with Faith, I really do want things to be just perfect, like her. And it pains me to see her worried about something I’m sure is in her imagination.
“Not a lot to tell,” I begin. “Like I said, I never had a real family. The earliest memory I have is being in state care.”
I notice Faith’s look soften. The look.
I always get it as soon as I mention my childhood to anyone, which is why I rarely do anymore.
“Anyways, I grew up like most other kids just without the regular parents, until I was eventually put into foster care. A nice couple, or so everybody thought.”
I stop for a second, not sure I want to go there again, but Faith needs to know and I need to stop being so protective of my own past. I need to leave it where it is, in the past.
“I was a big kid, early bloomer too. Turns out foster my Dad liked to use my foster mom as a punching bag when I wasn’t around, until one day I came home early from school.”
It’s still fresh in my mind. Raw. I feel my hands knotting into fists as I realize too that Faith’s the only person I’ve ever even told this to.
“What happened?” she whispers, putting her hands over mine, relaxing them in an instant.
“I suggested he pick on someone his own size, maybe bigger. I damn near beat him to death. The temper I had back then… I really let him have it.”
We sit quietly for a minute, and Faith figures that’s the story, she starts to explain that she doesn’t feel frightened around me. She knows I’m not that kind of a man.
“That’s not all of it,” I tell her. “It was gonna be Juvie for me, but the sisters at Saint Theresa’s, the ones who looked out for me when I was real young, they offered to take me in so I wouldn’t end up in the system.
“So, you were raised in a convent?” Faith asks, looking super confused and making me chuckle.
“No. Not exactly,” I tell her, smiling and noticing her relief.
“But the oldest Sister, their superior, she retired not long after that, and I ended up staying with her until I was old enough to be out in the world on my own. She was like a Grandmother to me, I guess. The only family I never really had.”
Faith’s brow creases.
“She was a hard lady, Faith. Helped me a lot, but she didn’t dote on me. Far from it. I had to earn my keep and I learned a lot about the meaning of hard work and keeping my mouth shut.”
“What happened to the foster parents?” she asks, and I take a breath before answering.
“Oh, he was alright in the end, physically I mean. But things changed for them both once it hit the papers, he lost his job and his business contacts through it. Blamed me for it and always tried to threaten me. She got away though. I think she remarried, happily too.”
Faith�
�s distant look comes back into focus and I can tell she’s itching to turn around again.
“So,” I start over. “I don’t see what my past… what that has to do with us, today. What happened, or what did I do to make you so edgy, Faith? I’m only asking because I don’t want to screw this thing up between us. Because I love you so much, I really do,” I tell her earnestly, taking her hands in mine, feeling them tremble slightly.
“It’s not you, Noah… well. It is, kind of,” she starts to say, sounding undecided.
“I mean, it’s nothing to do with what you just told me. It’s something else.”
I look at her, waiting.
“Is there anything else you want to tell me?” she asks, searching my eyes, making me feel like I should have more guilt than I already do.
Thinking for a moment, I can answer her with a clear conscience.
“The only other crazy thing I ever did was climb up this tree once, to spy on the girl I knew I was in love with the moment I saw her,” I admit. Because it’s the truth.
Faith gives a smile and sighs, leaning over to kiss me, but she still has that damned worried look in her eyes.
I’m at a loss until she tells me anything more.
Her cell that she’s had on charge since we left chimes, making her gasp when she picks it up.
“It’s my Dad,” she says, turning pale.
“Then answer it!” I exclaim, wanting her to let him know I have her, and she’ll be back, safe and sound once I’m through with her.
Maybe in the next life.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Faith
I have to answer, it’s my Dad and Noah’s insisting on it.
He’s home now, been trying to call me all night on the way back, and only just found my note.
“I just came in through the back when I got home, ooh! Honey, just tell me you’re alright!” he says, trying to sound calm but I know his panicked voice when I hear it.
“I’m fine Daddy,” I tell him, trying to sound casual but hearing my own voice crack.
Noah didn’t read my note to my Dad and I haven’t mentioned to him that I didn’t say I was going anywhere with him.
“Well, for heaven’s sake, darlin’ where are you? Do you need me to come pick you up?”
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