Читать книгу Moonlight in Paris - Pamela Hearon - Страница 12

CHAPTER FOUR

PEOPLE STAYING AT bed-and-breakfasts do this all the time, Tara told herself as she passed the plate of croissants to the little boy who’d insisted on sitting beside her. Of course, it would probably have been easier to convince herself there was nothing weird about eating breakfast in a new country with total strangers if she hadn’t seen one of them naked a few minutes earlier.

She tried to focus on the inch-long scar that cut diagonally through the left side of Garrett’s upper lip—the one that disappeared almost completely when he smiled—rather than let her mind wander to the foot-long one on his thigh that pointed like an arrow to his masculine assets.

“I finally decided it was time to see Paris.” She answered Dylan’s last question just shy of the complete truth. “How long have you lived here?”

Dylan piped up before his dad could answer. “Three years. We moved here when I was three, but I’ll be seven soon, so I guess then I’ll have to start saying we’ve been here four years.”

Garrett used his spoon to point at his son. “Quit talking so much, sport, and eat your breakfast.”

With a grin that could charm the sweet spot from a Louisville Slugger, Dylan opened his mouth wide and shoveled in a spoonful of Greek yogurt and fresh berries.

The boy’s grin was a replica of his dad’s, as was the sandy color of his hair. But the jade-green hue of his eyes was a far cry from the walnut-brown of his elder’s.

No mention had been made of a wife or mother. And something about Garrett Hughes’s manner seemed standoffish, despite the fact he’d invited her to stay for breakfast. If he’d kidnapped his son and moved to a foreign country, Josh Essex would’ve let her in on that, wouldn’t he?

“So you’re originally from St. Louis?” Tara probed, trying to get Garrett to continue where he’d left off before Dylan had started in with questions again.

Garrett held up the carafe as a question, and Tara offered her cup in response. “I grew up in St. Louis,” he said, “and moved back there after college. Not too long after my wife died—”

Ah, a widower. “I’m so sorry.” She took another sip of the incredibly strong brew and settled a hand on her chest to check for any hair it might cause to sprout through the T-shirt.

“Thanks.” Garrett acknowledged her condolences with a curt nod. “The brewery I worked for was bought out by a Belgian company that was expanding. Dylan and I moved here with that expansion.”

“How exciting that must’ve been.”

Garrett shrugged one of his broad shoulders, and even though a sport coat now covered it, Tara’s mind flashed back to how it had looked unclothed and damp from the shower. “It came at the right time,” he answered.

The concoction Garrett called coffee had chased away any effects of jet lag and set her mouth to chatty mode. “And what do you do at the brewery?”

“I’m head of the marketing department.”

The formality of the country she was visiting struck her as she wiped away the last remains of the buttery croissant from her lips with the linen napkin that had been part of her place setting. “Were you already fluent in French before you moved here?”

Her question brought a low chuckle from Garrett that tickled at the bottom of her spine. “Whether I’m fluent now is still debatable.” He jutted his chin in his son’s direction. “Dylan’s the language wizard. He speaks it like a native.”

Dylan paused, the spoon halfway to his mouth. “C’est vrai, Tara. Je parle le français très bien. La langue n’est pas difficile.” He cocked his head and grinned, looking like the cat that ate the berry-and-yogurt-covered canary.

Garrett shook his head as his mouth rose at one end. “And he’s obviously quite modest about it.”

Tara smiled, her heart touched by the endearing relationship between these two. Would she and Jacques Martin ever have anything that approached this? The thought caused her hand to tremble as she set her cup back on its saucer. “How did you get so good, Dylan?”

“Only French at school. Only English at home.”

“And speaking of school, we need to be on our way.” Garrett stood and started clearing the table. “Go brush your teeth and get your stuff, bud. We’ll walk Tara down to the front entrance.”

Hearing her name from Garrett’s lips sent an unexpected, pleasant zing through Tara. She gathered her and Dylan’s dishes as the child hurried to the bathroom.

“With our key, we can get in the courtyard below and take the shortcut through the building.” Garrett loaded the dishwasher while he talked, and Tara stored the items that needed to be refrigerated. “Madame LeClerc is quite taken by Dylan. If she balks about giving up the extra key, he’ll be able to talk it out of her.”

Tara glanced around, noting that everything was done. “I’ll change back into my dress as soon as Dylan gets out of the bathroom.”

“Don’t bother.” Garrett’s eyes met hers, and then darted away as he waved at the outfit she had on. “You can return those...whenever.”

Tara’s stomach did a quick flip. She’d just been given an invitation to come back. A little offhanded, maybe. But, nonetheless, an invitation.

* * *

“EARTH TO FAITH. Can you hear me?”

Sue Marsden’s annoyed tone broke through the deep fog of Faith O’Malley’s thoughts. She glanced around the small circle of women who made up the Ladies’ Prayer Group, noting all twelve eyes were on her.

Being the preacher’s wife, she was used to that, but she still hated it...had always hated it. Living in the glass house had taught her to never throw rocks, but that wouldn’t stop the community from verbally stoning her if word got out of what she’d done.

Sue Marsden would be the first to start flinging.

“I’m...I’m sorry. What did you say?” Even that comment was an admission that she hadn’t been listening and would give Sue something to gossip about later.

Sue gave that laugh of hers, which wasn’t really a laugh at all but more of a tsk-tsk. “I asked if you had any prayer requests. We are a prayer group. Remember?”

We don’t have enough time for my list, lady.

Prayer requests from the group too often gave Sue her weekly start on new items of gossip.

Time and again, Faith had seen it happen, had warned the group that what was shared within the group should stay within the group.

But Sue’s pious contention was that the more prayers rallied on a person’s behalf, the better the chance of God’s listening. She’d back her ideas with much Bible-thumping and scripture quoting. And, yes, the prayer chain she’d formed after Tara’s accident had been much appreciated.

But to have the matters of Faith’s heart bandied about Taylor’s Grove like an item in a tabloid was unthinkable, and even the slightest hint of turmoil in the O’Malley household would start the rumor mill turning.

On the other hand, if she didn’t share something, the ladies would think she was being either secretive or uppity. She’d walked this tightrope for years and knew well how to perform on it without losing her balance.

“Tara called this morning,” she said, at last. “She got to Paris last night around midnight our time. I’d like y’all to remember her in your prayers...her safety.”

Nell Bradley spoke up. “I’ve worried so about her ever since I heard she was gallivanting off to a foreign country. And in such a hurry about it. I’ll never understand why kids these days have to have everything right now.”

“Well, I’m not at all surprised.” Sue waved her hand dismissively. “Ever since she and Louis broke up, Tara’s been a different person. She has a capricious nature that none of us had ever seen. She needed someone like Louis to keep her reined in.”

The comment jarred Faith’s composure, causing it to slip. “Tara’s twenty-eight. She doesn’t need anyone to rein her in. Certainly not a man.”

“You can’t be okay with all her shenanigans, Faith. Motorcycles and tattoos.” Sue rolled her eyes. “Last Sunday, she came to church with her hair tipped in blue, for heaven’s sake.”

That brought out the lioness in Faith. No one was allowed to attack her cubs...her pride. “Sue, I am very proud of my daughter,” Faith said quietly before she gave a swipe, claws extended. “And, yes, her hair might be tipped in blue, but, at least, she was in church last Sunday.”

The astonished looks of amusement told her that everyone picked up on the thinly veiled reference to Sue’s daughter Quinn, who made it a habit of sleeping in on Sunday.

Faith’s cheeks burned with shame that she’d stooped to Sue’s level and had given everyone a story to repeat this week.

Well, at least the talk would focus on her and not Tara.

A muscle twitched in Sue’s jaw, proof that she’d felt the stinging blow. “Let’s pray,” she snapped.

Faith bowed her head and took deep breaths to slow her racing heart.

Another week had passed and her secrets were still secure by all indications.

No one had mentioned the increase in Trenton’s visits home as opposed to the decrease in Thea’s.

No one had brought up the haunted look in Sawyer’s eyes, or the despair that Faith felt was surely reflected in her own.

No one knew that they hadn’t touched each other for going on four weeks now. That the happy faces they put on in public dissolved once they stepped through their door at home. That Sawyer pulled away every time she tried to reach out to him. That their conversations were cordial, but lacked any kind of intimacy, as if they were acquaintances meeting on the street.

That he’d moved into Trenton’s room.

That her family was fractured just like she was on the inside.

That she was searching desperately for something to hold them together. To hold her together before she fell apart completely.

No one knew what she was going through.

No one could ever know

Amen.