Finding Faith (22 page)

By the time I got out of the shower and stuck my head out of the bathroom door John was nowhere to be found. Thank God. Maybe he gave up and went out for something.

I was in such a hurry to hide from his inquisition I had gone into the bathroom without anything to put on. Do I put my dress back on, or do I take some of his hulk-sized clothes and borrow them? Brad was the last thing that I was concerned about at the moment. I had a bigger fish to fry named John. I fanned my face at the memory of what we’d just done, getting horny again. Pull your shit together, Faith.

Not wanting to risk getting jumped while looking for my dress, I chose to rummage through his drawers hoping to find something that might come close to fitting.

It didn’t take long for me to find a small stack of shirts and sweats in the back of his closet that fit.

How stylish will I be in sweats and blood-red spiked heels. All I can pray is that a cab is waiting downstairs so no one has time to notice.

When I came out of the bedroom in forest green sweats with our alma mater running down the side and a navy shirt, I scanned the open floor plan and saw no sign of the sex maniac. Relief poured out of me. My feet were still sore from the night before and I was in no immediate danger of getting boned so I took my time walking.

My hand was on the door to leave when I heard his deep voice behind me. “Hell, I don’t know which is hotter. Your ass practically hanging out of one of my T-shirts or your perfect little body showing off our old St. Mary’s gym sweats. I would have to see the heels with you in my shirt to make a fair judgment. Do you have time?” John asked with a wag of his eyebrows before taking a vicious bite of a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

His doors must be solid because my head made a dull thud when it collapsed onto the dark wood. Too bad I hadn’t done it harder to knock myself out. I’d rather be unconscious than deal with this horn dog now.

“I thought you were gone.” I kept my head against the door with my eyes closed. Maybe if I pretended to be irritated he’d leave me alone. Who was I kidding, I wasn’t pretending.

“Nope. Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me. I was just hungry.”

He put a hand on my shoulders to pull me away from the door.

Resting his chin on my shoulder and his hip against my ass so I could feel his hard-on he whispered close into my ear, “You will never fool me again, Faith.”

When he stood back up he took another bite out of his sandwich as he opened the door saying, “Shall we?” extending his arm out in front with that hand I wanted all over me again.

As I walked past he spanked my ass, making me jump. “Get a move on, sweet cheeks,” he said with a devilish smirk, pulling my coat from the hook before closing the door.

I gave him the best glare I could muster because I really wanted to fuck him right there.

“Since when are you so horny?” I asked.

“Since I found you again,” he said with lust-filled eyes roaming me from head to toe. “Nothing’s better than finding you, handshakes and PB and J.”

I didn’t have a comeback for those words, so we headed down to his truck in silence. Why did he have to say things like that?

While in the elevator he rested my wool coat over my shoulders like a cape. “Can’t have my little sex kitten catching pneumonia can we?” he said, doing a bad job at holding back a smile.

I rolled my eyes at him but kept my lips shut, not wanting to encourage him. It was clear he didn’t need much help.

Once we were tucked safely away in John’s truck from the brutal winds of the city, he tossed his coat in the back of the cab and turned to look at me. His eyes were back to the heavenly green I loved.

He said, “Now that I have you confined to a small space and you can’t run away, what the hell do you mean we’re friends?” He did weak air quotes when he said friends.

“I don’t want to talk about it.” I really didn’t. I thought I had gotten away from talking about this. Add the idea of finding Brad seething at my place on top of this friend conversation and it completely overrode the glorious morning I’d just had with John. I yanked my coat off my shoulders throwing it on top of John’s to have a distraction.

Brad already texted three times wanting to know what was taking me so long. I tried to tell him I ran into some trouble and that we could meet up after my meeting but he refused to hear it.

The leg closest to John was bouncing like a spring at the same time as the butterflies in my stomach were eating me from the inside out. I was anxious, to say the least. I couldn’t get the feeling to stop no matter how much I shifted around and changed the positions of my legs. I wanted this entire confrontation over.

It didn’t make things any better that John was here with me. If Brad sees John what will he do? Surely he’ll recognize John from work. Then when he sees how I’m dressed it’s going to make everything so much worse. My hands went over my face at the thought. I wished I had magic hands like John’s tongue that could make me invisible. A pained groan, only meant for my head, came out.

John pulled me closer to him, his arm flexing, showing off the dip between muscles and bulging veins in his forearm. When we bumped thighs he rested his hand on top of my bouncing knee, caressing it until it stopped.

“There, that should be better,” he said with a satisfied smile.

Sure, if better is making me soak your seat. The bulge I saw in his pants made me cream even more. How could he have a constant hard-on?

I shifted again onto a butt cheek to get rid of the tingles down below, putting me at an angle facing him. He really was beautiful, inside and out.

I hadn’t noticed that I was staring at him until he said, “Do I have some jelly on my face?” scrubbing around his mouth with the back of his hand to make sure.

“No,” I mumbled, turning to look out the front window, wondering if my face was as red as it felt.

My knee got a pinch on either side, getting my attention. “Talk to me.” John’s face was sullen, his words quiet.

“What do you want me to say?” I shrugged biting my lip. Now I understand why Grace does it so much.

“That you feel like I do. That we’re more than friends.”

“I can’t say that.” I shook my head as I kept staring out the front window.

“You can’t say because you don’t want to be more, or because you’re afraid?”

“Do we really have to talk about this now?” I rolled my eyes as I faced him, hoping that I was convincing him with my annoyed act.

“Yes, we do.” He mouth was set into a serious pout telling me he wasn’t playing around.

I just wanted to kiss those lips without answering anything.

“Then I don’t want to be more.” I crossed my arms and put a gap between us so our thighs didn’t touch, but I couldn’t move any further away. “There, happy?”

We were magnets. He was the North Pole to my South, and no matter how hard I tried to get further from him I couldn’t pull away, our attraction was that great.

“I don’t believe you. The way your body responds is the complete opposite of what you say. Would it be so horrible to give us another chance?”

Shit! He caught my love you slip up. That was because of the sex, I didn’t mean it.

My building came into view. I had never been so happy and terrified all at once.

“Let me out,” I blurted as I dove for the passenger door. John ignored me, finding a spot a little ways down.

“You are not coming with me,” I said.

“Yes, I am, and you don’t have time to argue with me. Not to mention you need me to walk next to you so people don’t think you are coming back from a one-stand stand, Miss High Heels and Sweat Pants,” he said as he leaned into the back seat to grab our jackets.

He was trying to make light of the situation but if he had an inkling of what we were about to walk into he wouldn’t be joking.

We managed to get inside with only one obnoxious honk. John responded by giving a huge thumbs up to the guy and waving like he was a movie star while pulling me in close to drape his arm around my caped shoulder. I was completely embarrassed.

“I think that guy knows you’re doing the walk of shame,” he said as he tucked me under his arm some more.

Shaking my head I said, “You’re such an ass.”

“Yeah, but at least I’m your ass.” His grin made me giggle on the inside. Crap, I shouldn’t be laughing at that. He’s not mine. My scowl grew but it was aimed at myself this time.

We stepped into the drab beige lobby and my heart stopped. I was steeling myself for the confrontation with Brad, fully expecting him to be pacing back and forth waiting to attack. He would surely start calling me names if he saw me with John.

John felt me tense up and tightened his grip around me while rubbing my arm. “Geez, I was only joking.”

Stan, my front desk man as I liked to call him, had his back to us and the rest of the small lobby was deserted. I let out a breath relieved, settling myself a little better under John’s arm.

“I know. I was worrying for nothing,” I said.

Brad must have gotten sick of waiting and took my advice to come back after my meeting.

For the first time since we left John’s place I was feeling young again. Maybe we could try it. It sure did feel pretty damn good to be with him. I took his hand from my shoulder and laced our fingers together. I looked at our hands folded into each other. His hand was so much bigger than mine, reminding me of how strong of a person he was.

It was hard for me to think that there was a time that he was lost and it was in part because of me. He still wanted me. How could I not want to be with him? When I glanced up to his handsome face I saw he had been watching me intently. Our eyes met and he showed me the most unguarded love in his smile I’d ever seen, causing my heart to ache. What was holding me back?

Just as I was about to tell John I was willing to give our relationship a chance one of the two elevators rang out its arrival. We stepped into the elevator linked and I pressed the button for my floor as the second set of elevator doors slid open.

As our doors were closing, it looked like Stan was trying to say something to me. Through the sliver that was left open I could see a tall man cross his path. Stan’s eyes shifted between the man and our elevator and before he could say something to me our doors shut. If it was important he’d call.

Why did the elevator have to come at the exact moment I thought Faith was about to tell me she wanted us to be together? That’s all right, I made progress. I was not about to nag her. If she let me hold her hand I would not complain about not hearing the words.

“What time is your meeting?” I asked, trying to focus on something else other than her hand in mine. That connection alone was making me hard. Fuck man, pull your shit together.

“Two o’clock. I don’t have much time to change before I have to leave again,” Faith said as she slipped the key into the lock. “It wouldn’t be good if I were late for this. It could really cost me.”

She went in, and after taking off her killer heels at the door and throwing her coat over the back of the couch, she stood there awkwardly shifting between feet not sure what to do.

“I’ll wait here for you go change. Then I’ll drive you so you’re not late,” I said. I could see her breathe, glad for me to have given her an out.

As I got comfortable on her couch I wondered about when she planned to tell me she was supposed to meet Brad here, if she was even going to tell me at all?

I do have thick doors but not so thick I couldn’t figure out it wasn’t Grace, especially when she called him by name.

I decided for now it was better for me to play dumb and not push the issue. Grace told me she would be the one to tell me, so I would sit back and wait. I’ve made so much progress I didn’t want to scare her away now that I was so close.

The prick had obviously decided to blow her off anyway. From what I heard, it was his usual deal when they were together so I wasn’t going to make a big fuss about it.

If he had showed that would have made for an interesting talk. I could only imagine how that would have gone considering how Faith was dressed and how she glowed around me. Part of me was grateful it had turned out the way it had because I didn’t want to see her anymore stressed and uncomfortable than she already was.