Having Faith (16 page)

As far as Faith was concerned, that was dangerous. Each time he grinned, she felt tiny prickles of awareness march through her belly.

She tried to think back to the days when he grinned and she enjoyed it in an innocent way, but those days seemed an eon ago. She wasn't sure she was ever again going to be able to see Sawyer's grin without melting a little inside.

The water tower, she supposed, was in apt counterpoint to what she was feeling.

"Very solid," she confirmed.

His grin relaxed when he took a large bite of his sandwich, but all that did was to shift her awareness from his mouth to his other features. Though he'd washed up before they left the house, he still had the rugged look of a workman. Part of it was due, she was sure, to the gray athletic T-shirt he wore under a faded flannel shirt, jeans that were old, worn and thin, and work boots. The other part was due to the muss of his dark hair, the ruddy color on his cheeks, the size and sine wed strength of his hands, and the power of his features, which seemed, here in the country, more exposed than usual.

Faith needed a diversion.

"How did you find the tower? Had you been looking for land down here?"

"Not exactly," he said, but he, too, was distracted. The look in her eyes just then had been full of the kind of appreciation that men dreamed of receiving from lovely women. She fought it; he could see how she deliberately brought herself back, but for several minutes she'd been swept up by something over which she had little control.

That was a good sign, he decided. Faith had a thing about control. She was a harsh taskmaster when it came to ruling herself. It would do her good to lose control once in a while.

As long as he didn't. He'd promised her.

Clearing his throat, he finished his burger off in a bite. When it had gone the way of both its predecessor and a large order of fries, he said, "I got lost, actually. I was visiting friends who were renting a place down here, and I got the directions screwed up. I wound up at the water tower, and it intrigued me."

"Did you know it was for sale?"

"Not then. I finally managed to get where I was supposed to go, and I went back to Boston at the end of the day, but I kept thinking about the tower. It looked abandoned. So I made a few calls, found out that the whole parcel of land was for sale and came down the next weekend to look again."

Faith remembered some of the discussions she'd had with Sawyer way back when.

"You always wanted a vacation place. You used to talk about finding something in northern Maine." "Mmm. Joanna hated that idea. She may have been as maternal as they came, but Earth Mother she wasn't. The thought of being too far from civilization frightened her."

"She'd have liked it down here. You're isolated, but you're not."

"Her loss."

"Your gain. It's really a super place, Sawyer."

He raised two fingers to the waitress and called for coffee.

"It'll be even more super when it's done. It won't ever be big, but the way the architect has it planned, there'll be room for everything I want.

It'll be a year-round escape. " Putting his weight on his elbows, he met her gaze with a look that was frank and unguarded.

"I've wanted something like this for years. I wanted it when I was a kid, only my parents couldn't afford their own house, let alone a vacation place. I wanted it when Joanna and I first married, only I didn't have the money then, either. Joanna was the one who bought the house in Cambridge. I was getting benefits from Uncle Sam, and that helped a lot when I was in school, but even when I finally graduated, it was a while before I hit the upper brackets."

The waitress came with their coffee. Sawyer handed Faith a packet of sugar, took two for himself and two thimbles of cream, and focused on the mocha-colored brew as he stirred it.

"By the time I had enough in the bank to think about a second home, Joanna and I were on the skids. I felt badly about that. She deserved more of the fruits of her labor than she got. I didn't take care of her very well, at least not during our marriage."

Faith had to smile, but it was a smile made soft by understanding and admiration. Sawyer was, indeed, a throwback to the days where men took care of women. She didn't find it offensive just then, though. As he talked so quietly and honestly, she saw him for the protective and caring man that he was. Joanna, with her need to protect rather than be protected, to care for rather than be cared for, couldn't appreciate him.

Faith could. The thought surprised her, because she saw herself as a thoroughly independent woman, but at that moment, away from the city and her thoroughly independent world, she found the idea of being protected and cared for strangely appealing.

"Does Joanna know what she gave up?" she heard herself ask.

If there was a compliment inherent in the question, Sawyer missed it.

He was shifting his coffee cup in its saucer, studying each turn.

"She didn't give up so much. When I was in school, I studied most of the time. When I got a job, I worked most of the time. I wasn't much of a companion for her. I think she was as relieved as I was when we finally called it quits."

"Who handled the divorce?"

' The. It was an easy thing. We agreed on the property settlement. I gave most everything and then some. She'd earned it. "

"You are a good man."

He looked up at her.

"I like to think I'm a fair one. The marriage wasn't going anywhere, but Joanna had invested a great deal of time and effort in me. Largely thanks to her, I was healthy and productive.

She deserved a good settlement. I wasn't about to rob her of it just because I knew I could get away with it in court. " He paused, frowned.

"Why is it we always end up talking about the past?"

"Because it's part of us. You went through a lot with Joanna. Just because the marriage is over doesn't mean you forget her." "Is it the same with you and Jack?"

"I don't know," Faith said. She shifted her gaze to the counter, but she was oblivious to the people perched on leather-covered stools at the bar.

"Jack and I didn't go through anything like you and Joanna did. He was just there. I went about my life, he went about his. It was an increasingly uninteresting relationship."

"Was it interesting when you first met him?"

Sitting back in the booth, she looked down at her hands.

"I'm not sure."

"Did you love him?"

"I guess so."

"You weren't sure?"

Faith raised her head and spoke in her own defense.

"I had to do something. I was fresh out of college, just starting law school, and it seemed that everywhere I turned, someone was telling me that if I didn't marry soon, I never would. They said that once I became a career woman I wouldn't have time for anything else.

They said that if I was successful, I'd become so threatening to men that none of them would come close. " Her words stopped. She shrugged.

The ghost of a smile touched her lips and was gone.

"I guess I bought it all."

"Who was doing the selling?"

She didn't answer at first. Disloyalty wasn't something she took pride in, and this dme there was no wine to blunt the effect. But Sawyer was waiting for an honest answer--Sawyer, whom she trusted.

"My family."

Studying her face, he saw a vulnerability that was entirely new.

Gently he said, "I've never heard you talk about your family before."

"I try not to."

"You don't get along?"

"Oh, we get along just fine, as long as we don't discuss anything more weighty than the price of eggs."

"They don't live nearby, do they?" He was sure he'd have known if they did, principally because Faith would have been more involved with them.

"They're in Oregon."

"And you're on the opposite coast. By design?"

She pursed her lips, thought for a minute, gave a single slow nod.

"Safer that way?"

"You got it. My parents are very conventional people, and I'm not criticizing that. But I'm not conventional by their standards, and they do criticize me. I go back to visit once a year. That's enough."

"They must be proud of your work."

"They know nothing about it, other than that I'm a lawyer. For all of their interest in that, I could be a toll collector on the turnpike.

I've tried to tell them about what I do. I've described some of the more interesting cases I've handled, but as soon as I stop for a breath, they're asking me whether or not I'm dating. "

"Did they like Jack?"

"Jack was a husband. That pleased them. But then the questions started coming about babies, and when I told them I wasn't ready to have kids, that set them off. They always found something cutting to say. I've never fit into the mold of what they think a woman should be." Faith chewed on the inside of her lip for a minute. Slowly she released it and in a small voice said, "It hurts sometimes, y'know?"

Sawyer could see that hurt clear as day on her face. It was all he could do not to take her in his arms and soothe her, but he wasn't sure she'd want that. She took pride in being independent and strong.

Then again, he wondered whether it was all pride or whether there wasn't a little defensiveness involved. Was she independent and strong because she wanted to be or because that was the only way she could manage on her own? And she was alone. He saw it now as he'd never seen it before. He wanted to soothe her for that, too, but he wasn't sure she'd want that, either.

Before he had a chance to do anything, she sighed.

"So, anyway, Jack wasn't the most significant part of my life. He was just a physical presence while I went ahead and did what I would have done if I'd never married him. Sad, isn't it? It was a wasted relationship. I'm glad for his sake that he got out of it. He deserves more."

Sawyer wasn't so sure about that. In his book. Jack had had a gem in his hand and had dropped it. For his lack of care, he'd gotten what he deserved.

"What about you? Don't you deserve more? I knew Jack. He was a nice guy, but he wasn't right for you. You were way ahead of him in most every way. He didn't satisfy you. He didn't challenge you. He didn't do anything for you that you couldn't do for yourself. So don't you deserve more?"

"I have my career."

"And what else?"

"Maybe that's enough."

"Is it?"

"More coffee, folks?" the waitress asked.

They swung their heads in her direction, startled by the interruption.

Sawyer was the first to recover. "Uh, no. I'm fine. Faith?"

She shook her head.

"Just the check," Sawyer quietly told the waitress. When she tore it from the pad and put it on the table, he took it up in his hand. But he didn't look at it. His thoughts were elsewhere.

"You sell yourself short, Faith. Maybe we both do. I say that Joanna is better off without me. You say that Jack is better off without you. Well, what about us? Don't we deserve excitement and happiness and fulfillment?" He opened his free hand to ward off an argument.

"Yes, I know we get satisfaction from our work.

But is it enough? "

Faith let the peripheral conversation, the occasional laugh or cough, the clatter of china on china fill in where she had no words. At last, she murmured, "I don't know."

He let out a breath.

"It's ironic, when you think of it." Not that he had. He usually took life pretty much as it came, without deep thought to the future. "The satisfaction we get from our work was probably what did in our marriages. So now that our marriages are done in, is work enough?" He paused, held her sober- eyed gaze, shrugged.

"I

don't know the answer, either. "

"That's a relief. It makes me feel a little less inadequate." She reached for the check.

"Don't you dare," he growled.

Carefully she retrieved her hand and tucked it in her lap. She heard the voice of command, and while there were times when she felt compelled to exert herself, this wasn't one of them. Paying for lunch at a diner wasn't going to bankrupt either one of them. Somehow it seemed foolish to argue over the bill.

Walking back to the car, he dropped an arm around her shoulder. It was a deliberately casual gesture.

"You're a good girl, Faith."

She tipped her head up against his arm and gave him a pert smile, which seemed the least a good girl could do. It also told him that she wasn't grappling with heavy questions such as the one he'd posed.

There was a time and a place for everything. Being away for the weekend with Sawyer had its own challenges without the pressure of intense philosophical thought. Time enough to brood about her future in the future.

They made several stops on the way back to the house--one to pick up a sleeping bag for Faith to match the one Sawyer already had, another to pick up a cooler and juice, milk and cheese for snacks, a third to pick up nails, scrapers and sandpaper. But rather than going right back to work, they took a walk. Sawyer wanted to show Faith the lay of the land, and she didn't argue. She loved the outdoors. Well beyond being a break from the city, walking through Sawyer's sun-speckled acres was a treat.