Lovers and Strangers (17 page)

"You're late," the Flynn's short-order cook said, looking up as Faith rushed in the back door.

"I know. I know. I'm sorry. Time just got away from me today," she mumbled, hoping she wasn't blushing.

The swinging doors into the bar burst open. "Two orders of potato skins. A plate of nachos, hold the sour cream. Chicken wings, extra spicy. And an onion flower." Sammie-Jo ripped four sheets off of her order pad and reached up to clip them to the cook's order wheel, then quickly loaded her tray with the order already sitting under the heat lamps on the metal counter. "You're late," she said, catching sight of Faith.

"I know," Faith said again. "I'm sorry."

"We'll talk about it later," Sammie-Jo warned, already heading back out to the bar with a heavily laden tray balanced against her shoulder. "After the Happy Hour crowd thins out some." She gave Faith a quick once-over. "Fix your blouse before you show yourself out front, honey," she advised drily. "You've got it buttoned up wrong."

Faith gasped and looked down, turning her back on the cook as she rebuttoned and retucked her white tuxedo blouse. She'd run from Jack's apartment in a pelter, rushed through a quick shower, jumped into her uniform and then raced over to Flynn's. She'd been in such a hurry, fumble-fingered and clumsy, it was a wonder she'd managed to get her clothes on right side out. She checked her reflection in the mirror next to the employee washroom, just to make sure nothing else was wrong. Everything looked okay. She was a bit flushed and her hair wasn't as neat as it could have been but, all in all, it wasn't too bad. She didn't think anyone would guess she'd spent the afternoon making love.

She tugged on the hem of her black satin vest, straightening it, then did the same for her red bow tie. With as much dignity as she could muster, she turned and picked up her tray and order pad, pretending not to see the knowing smirk the cook aimed her way. She paused in front of the swinging doors, going up on tiptoe for a quick peek out at the crowd before she entered the fray.

The bar was busy, unusually so for a midweek Happy Hour. Businesspeople in tailored suits, clerical workers in less formal clothing, more creatively attired sales clerks from some of the local boutiques, plus the occasional tourist were lined up at the polished wooden bar or gathered around the tiny tables set out on the shiny black-tiled floor. Taking a deep breath to fortify herself, Faith pushed the doors open and began threading her way through the crowd, heading straight to where she least wanted to be. Penance—or so she'd been told all her life—was supposed to be good for the soul.

"Good evening, Mr. Brown," she said, tacking on a smile as she reached the booth. "What can I get for you this evening?"

"You can bring me my usual Chardonnay, sweetheart."

"One Chardonnay." She looked at his companion. "And you, sir?"

"Scotch and soda."

"Scotch and soda," she repeated. "Can I get you gentlemen something to munch on with those drinks?"

"You might offer that delectable neck of yours," Freddie Bowen said with a smile, reaching up as if to pull her down to him.

Faith avoided his touch by the simple expedient of stepping back and shifting her tray. "I'm afraid my neck's not on the menu," she said, trying for levity, "but I'd be happy to bring you an order of chicken wings to gnaw on."

Freddie Bowen laughed, accepting defeat with good grace.

And Faith was amazed at how easy it was.
You've been making mountains out of molehills,
she thought, pleased with the way she'd handled the situation. Nobody had been humiliated and nobody's ego had been hurt. It was a good feeling. Empowering, she thought, using a word she'd heard a lot since she'd moved to California.

"Good going," Sammie-Jo congratulated her as they simultaneously approached the cocktail waitress's station at the bar. "Two Miller Lites, two frozen Margaritas, a club soda and a Tequila Sunrise," she said to Tim before turning to smile at Faith. "You handled that really well. And without resorting to Miz Griffen's disapproving stare."

Faith smiled back. "Thanks. I guess I'm getting the hang of it." She gave her order to Tim. "And you were right, Freddie Bowen is harmless."

Sammie-Jo raised an eyebrow. "Oh, really?" she said, busy placing slim plastic straws and wedges of lime in the drinks Tim set in front of her. "In comparison to who, I wonder?"

"Whom," Tim said as he added the two light beers to her order. "In comparison to whom."

Sammie-Jo rolled her eyes at him and picked up her tray. "Writers." She turned and disappeared into the crowd.

Tim switched his attention to his other waitress. "You were late," he said as he assembled the drinks she'd ordered. "Is everything okay?"

"Everything's fine," Faith said, and wondered why it felt as if she were telling a lie.

* * *

Two and a half hours later, the crowd at Flynn's had thinned considerably, leaving only a handful of customers at the bar and a couple at the back booth who appeared to be more interested in exploring each other's tonsils than finishing their drinks.

"How about pouring me a cup of coffee, Tim?" Sammie-Jo said as she hoisted herself onto the corner stool at the bar. "I could use a good stiff shot of caffeine."

"One coffee, comin' up," Tim said obligingly. "Faith?"

"Yes, please," Faith decided. "Heavy on the milk."

"So, okay, give," Sammie-Jo ordered when they both had their cups on the bar in front of them.

Faith glanced at Tim out of the corner of her eye. "Excuse me?" she said to her friend and roommate, with just exactly the same inflection she might have used to put down a too forward customer.

Sammie-Jo wasn't impressed. "That good, huh?" she said wryly. She picked up both cups. "We're taking this discussion over to one of the booths," she said to the bartender. "Girl talk."

Faith had no choice but to follow her.

"Okay, give," Sammie-Jo said again when they were settled into a booth. "Where were you all afternoon? Or need I ask?"

"I don't know." Faith carefully stirred two spoonfuls of sugar into her coffee. "Need you?"

Sammie-Jo grinned. "Don't try that look on me, Faith McCray. I taught it to you, remember? So cut it out and tell me what's going on."

Faith met her friend's gaze across the table. "I spent the afternoon with Jack."

Sammie-Jo nodded. "And?"

"And we, ah..." She looked down into her cup and then up again, determined to face it without guilt. It had been a beautiful experience and there was nothing to feel guilty about.
Nothing.
"We slept together."

"Oh, boy."

"Well, we didn't actually sleep, we, ah..."

"No need to go into the details, honey, I get the picture." Sammie-Jo cut her off with a wave. "Are you all right?"

"Of course, I'm all right," Faith said, indignant on Jack's behalf. "He's not a wild animal, you know." Why did everyone—including Jack—seem to think she was some kind of delicate flower who needed to be handled with kid gloves? "He was very..." a soft glow came into her eyes "...gentle."

"Oh, I'm sure he was great and it was a wonderful experience. If you were anybody else I'd probably be pea green with envy. But that's not what I meant. I meant, how are you feeling
now.
Are you all right with it?"

Faith stared back at her friend for a long second, wondering what she was getting at. "I'm fine. Really."

Sammie-Jo picked up her coffee cup and took a sip, obviously giving herself time to gather her thoughts. She put the cup down with a sigh. "Can I give you some advice?"

Faith smiled at that. "Can I stop you?"

Sammie-Jo smiled back. "No," she admitted.

"All right, then," Faith invited. "I could use some advice. Shoot."

"Well, first off, did he use a condom?"

"Sammie-Jo!" Faith blushed beet red. "I thought you didn't want any details."

"Just that one. Did he?"

"For heaven's sake," Faith said, flustered. "I hardly think that's any of your business."

Sammie-Jo just stared at her, waiting.

"Oh, all right, yes. He used a condom. Satisfied?"

"Every time?"

"Bobbie—" She gave a resigned sigh. "Yes, every time. Do you want to know how many that was?"

Sammie-Jo ignored the attempt at sarcasm. "Okay, then, we don't have to worry about your health. Only your heart. And, Faith, honey—" she reached across the table to touch her friend's hand "—men like Jack Shannon were put on this earth to break women's hearts. Mostly, it's our own damn fault that they get away with it," she admitted. "We're suckers for the bad boys of this world, especially when they're as gorgeous as Jack. Normally, my advice to you would be to stay as far away from him as possible but I know it's too late for that. You're already hooked. All you can do now is batten down the hatches and hold on tight to your heart until it's over."

"I think it's too late for that, too," Faith said. "I think I'm already in love with him."

"Oh, boy." Sammie-Jo stared at her for a moment, worrying at her bottom lip with her teeth. "I don't want to sound patronizing or anything but..." She shrugged uneasily, then plunged ahead. "You've just had what I'm sure was a premiere sexual experience with a sexy, gorgeous guy who probably knows his way around a woman's body the way most men know their way around the block. And I understand. I really do. We should all be so lucky at least once in our lives. But sex—even really great sex—doesn't necessarily equal love."

"And you don't think I can tell the difference?" Faith said, hurt—and insulted—by the assumption.

"No, frankly, I don't," Sammie-Jo said kindly. "Not when you're still glowing like a candle from the experience. And I don't mean that as a bad reflection on you, because few women could, especially not one who'd been raised in a sheltered environment, the way you were. That's why I think you need to back off a little. Give yourself some room to think about what happened and sort out your feelings before you make any declarations to anyone about them." She squeezed Faith's hand. "You might also give some thought to the well-known fact that the sex doesn't equal love equation goes double for most men. There are some guys, when they're in bed with a woman, who can make her think she's
the
woman, the only one in the whole world for them. Some of them even halfway believe it themselves, while it's happening. But the next night, or week, or month, they're making love to another woman the same way."

"Do you think Jack's that kind of man?"

"Honey, I don't know what kind of man he is. And the point is, you don't know, either. So, just be careful. Okay?"

* * *

DAMMIT,
I
think
I'm
falling in love with her!

Jack swore and kicked at one of the crumpled balls of paper that once again littered his dining room floor. He didn't want to be in love. Love hurt too damned bad. Everyone he had ever loved had died.

His parents had been killed in a car accident when he and Eric were six and eleven. Frightened and alone except for each other, they'd been sent to live with their Uncle Mick, a ham-fisted binge drinker who wasn't above knocking his nephews around a little when he was in the midst of—as their timid Aunt Barbara so delicately put it—one of his "spells."

It was Eric who'd created the secret refuge in the basement where they'd hidden when Mick drank. It was Eric who'd tried to protect his younger brother when they hadn't been fast enough to escape their uncle's wrath. It was Eric who'd gotten Jack out of an increasingly untenable situation as soon as he could, bringing his fourteen-year-old brother to live with him in his first apartment, despite the hardship it caused.

And then Eric had died, too.

And Jack had gone to 'Nam and watched his best buddy get blown away by a sniper's bullet in the middle of downtown Saigon. He'd stopped having best buddies after that. And then even friends, because not caring was easier when people were dying all around you. He got so good at not caring that, pretty soon, all he had were acquaintances and professional colleagues, and the focus of his existence, his whole attention, narrowed down to whatever story he was working on. He'd convinced himself it was better that way. Safer.