by Louise Clark
“My deepest apologies,” Andrew said. He didn’t look apologetic, though. He looked energized. He looked like he was having fun.
Faith eased to a stop again as they reached another light. “Listen, Andrew, you’ve got to be careful. Ask me before you act. For instance, the window is run by the electrical system. It opens by flicking that switch on the side of your door.”
Andrew looked a little dubious, but he cautiously put his finger on the tiny lever and pushed. The window slid open with a mechanical hiss. Andrew’s expression slipped into delight.
After that the window went up and down with monotonous regularity until Faith could stand it no more. “Okay. You’ve done the window thing. Now, listen. We’re about fifteen minutes from NIT. When we get there I’ll show you around, figure out where I’m going to put you, introduce you to people. Then I’ll have to get to work and you’ll have to look busy. Understand?”
Andrew raised the window. He nodded. “What have you done with all of the trees? And the fields.”
“We cut the trees down and built houses and shops and office buildings on the fields. Andrew, are you listening to me?” The light changed. Traffic moved slowly forward.
He nodded. “I must appear busy.” He turned in his seat so he could look directly at her and leaned against the passenger door.
“Good,” Faith said, maneuvering through the intersection. On the other side was a long stretch without lights. Traffic began to move more quickly. “Now, about the computers. I know you’re supposed to be an expert, but—” She glanced over at him. And almost had a heart attack. “Andrew! You can’t do that!”
“Now what have I done?” he demanded indignantly, sitting up.
“You can’t lean against the door. It might fly open. You could get hurt.”
“It is latched quite securely.”
“You’re not supposed to lean against car doors. It isn’t safe. Any kid knows that.”
“I am not a child,” Andrew said, on his dignity.
“I know,” Faith said, but she was coming to think that when it came to the twenty-first century, a five-year-old was better equipped to handle everyday life than Andrew was.
Andrew was a big hit in the bullpen. Not surprising, Faith reflected. Though not tall, his stocky body was roped with lean muscle toned not at the gym, but in everyday activity. He walked or rode a horse to reach a destination; he milked cows, chased chickens and did God knows what else to his animals; though he had hired-help to manage his acreage, he walked behind a plow pulled by oxen to turn the earth in his fields and he weeded a garden that was as large as the lot on which the average house was built. As long as Faith had known him, Andrew had been a man with a very fine physical presence. Dressed in the formal clothes of his own times, dripping with velvet, lace, and fine linen, he was imposing. Clad in the casual, form-fitting knits and tight denims of the twenty-first century he was second-look sexy and enough to make any sane woman salivate.
Which Angela and June, and all the others in the bullpen certainly did.
Andrew loved it, of course. He turned his old-fashioned charm on each of the women in turn and before long he had them laughing and giddy.
On Monday morning. At nine o’clock.
Faith towed him off to her office over the protests of her staff on the excuse that she had to go over his responsibilities with him.
The light was blinking on her phone, indicating she had one or more voicemail messages waiting. She unlocked her bottom drawer and dropped her purse inside. Andrew observed this with considerable interest.
“I have to work,” she said, relocking the drawer. “So I need you to make yourself appear busy for the next little while. Think you can do that?”
“Why,” he said, pointing to the desk, “do you feel a need to secure your belongings when you are in the privacy of your own study?”
“I always do,” Faith said, sitting down and not really paying attention to him. She picked up the phone and punched in the voicemail code.
Andrew ambled over to a filing cabinet. He tugged at one closed drawer. It was locked. “Do you not trust those who work for you? Even on matters that relate to the organization?”
Faith tucked the phone against her shoulder, made a note, deleted one voicemail, went on to the next. “What was that?”
Andrew shrugged and sent her a dismissive wave. Faith accepted it with a nod, deleted another voicemail and logged on to her computer while she listened to the next voicemail. Andrew wandered around the room, checking things out. He flipped through file folders, lifted hanging racks to see what was behind them, opened drawers where he could, pricked his finger on a message nail. The contents of Faith’s desk organizer—paper clips, elastics, ballpoint pens, highlighters, and tacks for her cork board—kept his attention all through Faith’s voicemails and even into a few of the e-mails that had accumulated since Friday.
She hadn’t quite finished her e-mails when her telephone rang. The call was from a client who wanted to discuss their latest billing so she took it. Out of the corner of her eye she noticed Andrew was at the window, searching the edges of the glass the way he had in the car. She spared a moment to reflect with relief that he couldn’t open the door this time and almost fall out, then she focused on the problem at hand.
Faith’s window consisted of two six-foot square panes, framed by black metal. These didn’t open, but between them and the four-foot walls that rose from the floor were two narrow rectangular windows that did. These were hinged to open outward with a gentle push and, like the non-functioning windows, they were framed in thin black aluminum.
A modern design, these windows were not the old-fashioned sash construction that Andrew was used to. Instead of moving up and down, the hinge opened the pane outward, rather than upward. By the time Faith finished her conversation Andrew had found the handle that worked the window and thrust it open. As she put down the phone she took a good look at what he was doing.
He had his head stuck out the window and was in the process of pushing his shoulders out along with it.
“Andrew.”
Focused on the task at hand, he didn’t respond. Or that was what Faith told herself. Maybe he just didn’t want to hear another lecture on what he could not do.
The open window provided a narrow opening between the sill, the frame and the angled windowpane. There wasn’t a lot of room for a body to exit, particularly a muscular, big-boned one like Andrew’s. “Andrew. What are you doing? You’re going to get stuck.”
The door to Faith’s office opened.
For one panicked moment Faith thought Ava Taylor was about to come in. Her heart skipped a beat, then started again at a gallop. She wasn’t ready to face Ava. Andrew needed more coaching. Ava was never going to believe Andrew was an intern.
It wasn’t Ava who entered, though, it was Cody. He smiled when he saw her, that sexy half-smile that made her think of his lips on hers, his hands stroking her body, the press and promise of his hips against hers.
Andrew said cheerfully, “The window opens outward, not up the way it should.”
Cody ripped his gaze away from Faith’s. One look at Andrew hanging half-in, half-out of the window, doing his best to wriggle into a better position to view the workings of the hinges, had Cody closing the door behind him. He pointed to Andrew as he said to Faith, “What’s he doing?”
Faith looked over at Andrew. “He’s trying to figure out how the window works. I think.”
“Is he really?” Cody said, sounding approving. He went over to the window where he crouched down so he could look out at Andrew’s level. “What’s up?”
There wasn’t room for both of them to stick their head and shoulders out, particularly now as Andrew had managed to wriggle an arm out. “Do you see this?” Andrew said, reaching up to rub his finger along the top of the frame. “There is a hinge up here. It allows the window to open outward. Once the windowpane has been opened fully the hinge locks to become a brace to keep the pane from falling back against
the frame.” He grunted. “I do believe for this mechanism to work properly it would have to be very strong.”
“I guess,” Cody said. “I’ve never thought about it.”
Andrew wriggled a bit more. “I certainly hope they are.”
There was an ominous sound to that statement. “Why?” Faith demanded.
Andrew hesitated, then he said, “Because I do believe I am stuck.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake!” Faith said.
Cody rocked back on his heals. There was a suspicious twitch to his lips that suggested he was fighting the urge to laugh. He managed to keep a straight face as he stood up to assess the situation. “Andrew, you need to arch your back and roll your shoulders. Make yourself as small as possible, then inch back and forth. That should work. I’d hate to have to cut your t-shirt off you so we could grease you up to let you slide out.”
Andrew grunted. “I’m damned well not about to be disrobed by you, my friend!”
At that very moment the door opened again.
This time Faith’s worst expectation was fulfilled. Ava the Tyrant Lizard walked in.
And heard Andrew’s half-amused comment.
“Nor by anyone else, I should hope,” she said tartly.
Cody sighed. Horrified, Faith said, “Oh…ummm…ah…Hi Ava.”
“Who is this?” Ava demanded, joining Cody by the window.
“This is my—” Faith began.
Cody said, “This is Andrew. He’s a computer grad, here as my intern. He’s trying to make the decision to go for his masters or look for a full-time job. Andrew, this is Ava Taylor, the COO of NIT.”
“A pleasure dear lady,” said Andrew from the window. “If you will be patient for a few minutes I will introduce myself properly.”
Ava didn’t acknowledge this. She said curiously, “What are you doing?”
There was an ominous silence. Faith said, “There was a bird.”
“A bird?” Ava raised her brows in a disbelieving way. Not surprising, since Faith’s windows displayed a panorama of concrete sidewalk and asphalt street with nothing green in sight. She looked pointedly at Cody.
Faith said in a rush, “Yes, a bird. It…ummm…flew into the window and got…stuck. Andrew was helping it escape.”
“I see,” said Ava, who looked as if she saw entirely too much. “What was your intern’s name again, Cody?”
The intern, still stuck in the window, was wiggling in a determined way and had begun to make some progress, but he wasn’t free yet.
“Andrew.”
Ava waited a heartbeat, and then another. Her brows rose. “And does Andrew have a last name by any chance?”
“Of course,” said Cody.
Faith realized Cody had no idea what Andrew’s last name was because she’d never used it. Why would she? Andrew was Andrew. Cody was covering his ignorance by staring at Ava as if she’d just asked the dumbest question in the world. Ava was glaring back, resisting the silent intimidation. In a second or two she’d probe deeper and in doing so make it obvious Cody didn’t really know Andrew well. That would blow Andrew’s cover and make Cody look like an idiot. Faith had to do something.
She kicked Andrew on the ankle, hoping Ava wouldn’t notice.
Andrew said loudly, “Ouch!” which tore Ava’s attention away from Cody for the moment.
“Are you okay?” Faith said. She leaned close to Andrew to say more quietly, “Tell Ava your last name. Quick!”
“When I am able too free myself of this insidious device,” Andrew said, his tone indignant, “I will introduce myself properly. However, until that time I will tell you, dear lady, that my surname is Byrne.”
Ava absorbed the somewhat flowery language. She observed Andrew with considerable interest. “And what is Andrew Byrne doing down here in Faith’s office supposedly rescuing birds in distress instead of being up in your office, Cody, working with you?”
Almost out of the window, Andrew stilled.
Cody leaned against the edge of Faith’s desk. He looked relaxed, but the muscles in his jaw had tightened and his mouth was a hard line. “He was here because I sent him down here. What is your point, Ava?”
Ava raised her brows. “Nothing. Except that I’m having difficulty accepting that a young man who gets himself stuck in an office window would be of any benefit to NIT.”
“Are you questioning my judgment, Ava?” Cody demanded. He sounded cool. His raised brows suggested that this was a mild disagreement between colleagues. The flash of fire in his eyes said otherwise.
Ava must have read the anger in his eyes as clearly as Faith had, but she wasn’t backing down. “Had you taken the time to clear this through me—as you were supposed to!—you wouldn’t have placed yourself in this position, Cody.”
He crossed his arms over his t-shirt covered chest. “And what position is that, Ava?”
“You’ve exposed your very poor management skills,” Ava said, with surprising heat.
“No!” Faith said. “It’s not—”
“Hell and Devil confound it!” Andrew said, popping out of the window like a cork out of a champagne bottle.
“You see,” Ava said dryly, to no one in particular.
Andrew brushed himself off, then sauntered over to Ava, his mouth curved in a disarmingly rueful smile. “I fear I have not created the best impression.”
Ava shot him a glance that said he’d got that right.
Andrew replied with a direct look, his eyelids slightly lowered. The faint smile slowly widened as he took Ava’s hand, held it for a moment, then raised it at the same time as he bowed over it.
Ava blushed and looked away, clearly rattled.
“I trust,” Andrew said in a low voice that was as smooth forty-year-old scotch and just about as lethal, “that I will have the opportunity to redeem myself in your eyes.”
Ava collected herself. She drew her hand from Andrew’s slowly, as if she really didn’t want to, but knew she had to. “I am sure you are a very fine young man. But NIT has no need of another computer programmer—”
“I’ve asked him to work with Faith, to make sure that the software problems we’ve had over the last few weeks don’t reoccur,” Cody said, interjecting quickly.
“How nice for you, Faith. Your own computer jock.” Ava shot Cody a frigid look. “I still do not think that an intern is necessary and I would have said so if I had been asked.” She smiled sweetly at Andrew. “It has been interesting meeting you, Andrew. Please remember. Redemption is not an easy thing to do.”
She walked out of the office, annoyance in every tense muscle in her body. Andrew followed her, poked his head out the opening to make sure she was out of range, then quietly shut the door. “That one,” he said, “is dangerous to know.”
“Do you not long for daylight and the open when you are trapped in this building all day?” Andrew said as he followed Faith into the NIT suite. It was Wednesday morning and office life had begun an inevitable slide from fascination into routine.
Faith tilted her head to one side, considering the question as they walked through the bullpen to her office. As she dumped her purse into her bottom drawer, she said, “No.”
Andrew wandered over to the window where he’d presented himself to Ava Taylor so spectacularly two days before and gazed out, longingly. The sun was shining. The temperature was a balmy seventy-two degrees and there was a freshness about the day that always seemed to come first thing in the morning. “I should be tending my fields to ensure my plantings are healthy and free of pests and weeds.”
Faith heard the wistfulness in Andrew’s voice and rejoiced. Though they’d agreed he would stay in her time only until the weekend, she knew Andrew. If he wanted to stay longer he’d work on her until she agreed it would be okay. On Monday and most of yesterday he’d been intrigued by the gadgets and comforts of her time. She had begun to fear that she would have to work very hard to convince him that he had to go back to his own.
What she needed to do
now was push the wistfulness into frustration and that into determination and action. As she locked her desk drawer, she said, “Fields take care of themselves, don’t they? All you have to do is throw in a few seeds and poof! You have plants that grow and grow until they’re big enough to harvest.”
“Ha!” Andrew turned away from the window. His eyes were sparkling with the enthusiasm of the expert. “I fear you would make a poor farmer with an attitude such as that, Faith. The earth needs sustenance, just as you and I need it. I practice crop rotation to enrich the soil, though many of my neighbors do not. It is a process that requires thought and study, but I believe my acres yield far more than those of other farmers. That is why I am able to sell my excess to the merchants in Boston town and to employ hired men to assist me in my endeavors.”
Faith settled down in her chair and logged-on to her computer. “Sounds like you work smart, Uncle Andrew. That’s the hallmark of a good manager.” While the machine was powering through its start-up rotation, she added, “A pity you couldn’t be as effective in this time period.”
He frowned. Propping his jean-clad hip on the edge of her desk, he crossed his arms over the black t-shirt he wore. “I would appreciate an explanation of that comment, if you please.”
Faith opened her e-mail program. “Umm? What was that, Andrew?” she said, pretending to be focused on work and not their conversation. As he opened his mouth to explain, she said brightly, “Oh, right, not effective.” He nodded. His frown had deepened to a thundercloud. Faith almost laughed. “Well, I guess what I was trying to say was that in the past you are an expert and successful. You understand your business and you make excellent decisions. Here you have just begun to learn and you would have to work through a long process just to achieve the success you have in your own time.”
She opened e-mails and dashed out replies while Andrew considered that.
Finally he said, “Here I am not likely to be set upon by the henchmen of Mary Elizabeth’s father because my politics do not match his and he resents me courting his daughter.”
Faith abandoned her e-mail. She swiveled her chair so she could face Andrew. “If you were not forced to stay close to me, you would probably find that there are plenty of men like Mary Elizabeth’s father around. Behaviors don’t change just because the year has.”
