Faith (Rescue Me, A Contemporary Romance) (23 page)

She groaned and looked at the clock with one bleary eye.

2:15 AM.

“Okay,” she said, yawning.

Sitting up, she looked at her husband and smiled. She couldn’t help it. Even at 2:15 in the morning she was so in love with her husband.

“Josh,” she whispered in his ear playfully.

“You’re insatiable,” he laughed batting her away in mock refusal. “The baby’s crying.”

“I know. I’ll go get her in a minute. I just want to wake up properly. It could be dangerous for her if I try feeding her without being one hundred percent awake.”

With a smile and a playful groan he reached up and grabbed his wife, dragging her down to kiss her still swollen lips.

“I can still taste myself on your mouth,” he breathed into her ear.

“I can’t get enough of you,” she said with a smile as she tugged at his pajama bottoms.

“The six weeks we had to wait after you gave birth to Molly was like a punishment,” he said with a groan as she wrapped her hands around his stiff penis. He didn’t even feel himself getting hard around her, he thought in amazement, it was like he just walked around with a hard-on all the time, simply for the sheer joy at being married to his gorgeous, luscious, sexy wife.

“I agree,” she said, taking him into her warm, wet mouth.

His eyes rolled back into his head as he groaned with ecstasy.

The baby crying through the monitor sitting on their nightstand dampened his joy though.

“Honey,” he groaned again – damn, his wife was an amazing lover – “the baby is crying, Faith please honey, I can’t enjoy you knowing our daughter is hungry.”

He reached down and pulled her up so he could kiss her again.

“Fine, party pooper,” she laughed at him.

He nuzzled her breast with his lips and patted her bottom affectionately.

“That is one lucky baby,” he said.

“We’ll pick this back up when I’m done,” she promised him, leaping out of bed and rushing out the door.

He could hear her cooing to their daughter over the monitor.

How did he get so lucky?

He spent every moment of every day feeling grateful and lucky for the amazing turn his life had taken after he and Faith had met.

In the middle
of the darkness they had been drawn to the light in each other. He was constantly amazed at their luck, and the sheer audacity they had to look sorrow in the face and call it love.

A month after Liam’s funeral he had asked Faith to marry him and she had said yes.

At first they’d been concerned that Emily would be upset about how quickly they’d come together, but she’d been overjoyed.

“I’ve been hoping you’d find someone that made you happy dad!” Emily had told him, her eyes bright with happy tears.

Even Myra had been happy, as traditional as she was.

“Liam would be okay with this,” she’d whispered to Faith when she’d heard the news. “I know he would.”

Faith agreed. On that day, the day he’d asked her to marry him, Faith had confessed that she felt like Liam was near to them.

“Is he happy?” Josh had asked a little nervously.

It was a fair question, after all, Liam had definitely not been pleased at the prospect of a future between him and his mother when he’d been alive.

“Yes,” Faith had assured him with a kiss and smile.

They were married in a small civil ceremony a few weeks later.

“Why wait?” Faith had asked him and he didn’t really have a good answer for her.

The truth was that he thought she’d want to plan a big, fancy wedding for the two of them. After all she had all that money—we have all that money, she always corrected him—and he knew that tradition was important to Myra.

“I was married before and so were you,” Faith explained when he asked her if she was sure she only wanted to do something small and private.

“We both thought we’d be married to our soul mates for the rest of our lives and that didn’t happen. Turns out a person can find the love of their life twice. We’re living proof of that.” She said lovingly, “I don’t need a big wedding to show off our love. I just want to start living the life we were meant to have, quietly and immediately.”

He couldn’t argue with that. No one could.

And nine months after their wedding, Molly was born.

“That’s the name Mac had wanted for Liam if he’d been a girl,” Faith told him holding their newborn daughter in her arms.

“Is it okay if we use it for our daughter? It feels like a way to honor him and Liam together. But you’re my husband now and this is your daughter, you’d tell me if that made you uncomfortable right?” She asked him.

He nodded, but the truth was that he couldn’t be happier with his baby girl and she looked like a Molly. The name fit her as if she was born for it, and she was.

“I love it,” he’d said to Faith.

“Molly,” he said, holding his daughter tight to his chest.

Now here they were, he thought leaning his head back into the soft down feathers of the pillow.

His beautiful wife was caring for their new daughter down the hall. Emily, his loving, special oldest girl was sleeping soundly in Liam’s old bedroom – her new bedroom—getting a good nights sleep before she got up to go to school in the morning. She’d be starting college in less than two years, he couldn’t believe it.

And his mother-in-law Myra, was probably on the last chapter of one of the mystery novels she loved.

Their family was perfect, he sighed with happiness. Nothing could change that.

They had carved their happiness out of solid, black rock and that made it even more special he thought.

It made it theirs, and he would kill anyone who tried to visit tragedy on them again.

Faith threw her cap up into the air and watched it fall back toward earth surrounded by hundreds of other black graduation caps.

She could hardly believe she’d actually done it. She had graduated from college with a degree in marketing.

Rory’s suicide, her son’s death, her marriage, the birth of her daughter – none of it had stopped her from realizing her dream of earning her degree. She finally had something that was hers.

Sure, she had millions from Rory’s settlement, but she wanted to have the education and understanding of what to do with it, she explained to Josh when he questioned why she was killing herself studying when she’d earned a chance to just relax and be happy.

He’d just smiled and hugged her, and told her he was proud of her. She loved her husband dearly, even more so for the fire they’d had to walk through to find each other, but this achievement was hers alone.

“Congratulations Mrs. Woodrow,” Professor Silvan said as she passed by on her way to her family. “Of all my students, I think this achievement has been hardest earned by you.”

“Thank you ma’am,” Faith said.

She agreed wholeheartedly.

Finally, reaching Josh, Myra, Emily, and baby Molly she squealed with excitement.

“Congratulations honey!” Josh told her with a hug and a smile, “we’re all so proud of you!”

“Thanks baby!” she agreed.

There were so many well wishers she didn’t know who to thank first.

“Let’s go home and party!” Myra said, making everybody laugh.

She’d spent the weekend preparing the food for a big graduation party. Faith had invited everyone in her program to come over and judging from the RSVP’s, it didn’t look like anyone was going to miss a chance to be a bigger part of the elusive Faith’s inner circle.

She wasn’t completely blind to the fact that the public and her classmates were curious about her. The press attention of the last year alone guaranteed that she would probably always be infamous in some way, but Josh had been encouraging her to open up more to other people and start to let people in.

It was part of the reason she’d returned to the classroom instead of trying to finish her program with online and correspondence courses.

As they moved through the crush of people towards their car, Faith tried not to be overwhelmed by the chorus of people calling out to her.

“See you this afternoon Faith!” “Thanks for the invite Faith, can’t wait to stop by!” “Can you believe we finally graduated? See you later Faith!”

One voice suddenly stood out from the rest and her head jerked around in surprise and shock. Was that…? No, it was impossible. It couldn’t have been him.

“Are you okay honey?” Josh said curiously.

“I’m fine,” she said, still craning her neck, struggling to look at each face in the crowd.

“Let’s go,” Emily nudged them.

Faith let herself be carried along with her family, but the memory of that long forgotten voice stuck in her head and made her skin crawl.

Could she really have heard the voice of the man that killed Mac?

“So what are your plans?” Professor Silvan asked Faith.

They were standing with cocktails in her living room and the party was in full swing. Almost one hundred people had shown up, and the house was almost groaning with the weight of supporting so many unexpected people at one time.

Poor house, Faith thought with a laugh, it was used to having only a few people living here at a time. It never thought it would have to host a huge party.

“Well,” she answered her professor with a serious, determined look in her eye. “I’m thinking of starting a recording label here in town.”

“Really?”

Her usually mild mannered professor was clearly surprised at her answer. Faith was a little surprised herself. Starting a recording label was something that she and Josh had discussed over the last few months, but they’d never really talked about it with any degree of seriousness. But, when she’d heard the question, she suddenly knew it was what she wanted to do.

“Well, I’ve always wanted to do something in the music industry,” she explained, “and my dad was a musician, so it’s sort of in my blood. Plus, my son was very artistic. I think he would have liked the idea.”

“Well Faith, I think you’ll be an outstanding success at whatever you decide to do.”

Faith thanked her and watched her step away to mingle with some of her other students. She still felt surprised at the pride she felt when someone complimented her. She had never thought of herself as anything remotely special, but her mettle had been honed she reminded herself. First with Mac and then with Rory and finally with the loss of her son…both of them.

The thought of Mac sent her mind racing back to the graduation ceremony that morning.

Why would she suddenly hear that monster’s voice after all this time? And why here?

“Josh,” she said, tugging at her husband’s arm. “I need to tell you something.”

He looked at her in concern. He hadn’t seen her like this in months.

“This morning at the ceremony I could have sworn I heard the man who killed Mac.”

He was in shock. He could feel his heart rate speeding up in response to her words.

“Do you remember I told you that he was talking to me during the attack? There was only a door between us, I could hear him clearly. I’ve never heard his voice again until today. Should we call the police?”

Josh took a deep breath.

“I’m sure it was your imagination, probably a result of all the excitement. You almost subconsciously can’t allow yourself to feel happy and satisfied. It’s like what Dr. Novick says all the time, you have to give yourself permission to be happy again. We have to stop imagining boogie men behind every locked door.”

She nodded, she knew he was right, but still she had that eerie feeling that something was waiting for her. A feeling she hadn’t had since the attack in Alaska. Surely she was wrong, all of that was behind them now. They’d had their share of horror.

“Let’s just enjoy the party,” she said, grabbing his hand and dragging him over to the bar for a refill.

“We should hire a clean-up crew next time we throw a party,” Myra said as she stacked dishes in the washer.

“I second that!” Emily shouted from the living room where she was collecting glasses, dirty dishes, and napkins.

“Stop complaining,” Josh teased, taking a break from sweeping up. “It was our first party and it was a huge success. A great sign for the future!”

“Here, here!” Faith agreed, holding up an empty champagne glass to toast his words.

She was tired, but happy. Josh was right, it was important for them to start opening up to the world more.

She’d been in the dark for so long, but there was a big world full of sunshine waiting to receive them – her loving husband and new daughters—plural—were the perfect examples of the truth behind that statement.

“To many more parties in the future,” she said and toasted her smiling family.

“And clean up crews!” she added with a laugh.