Having Faith (24 page)

She didn't fight him very hard, which raised the third possibility.

She wondered if it was simply her own lack of control where Sawyer was concerned that was letting things snowball. Because they were snowballing. The more she was with Sawyer, the more she enjoyed being with him, and the more she had visions--fleeting, granted, but nonetheless vivid--of being with him forever.

She might have felt a semblance of power if Sawyer was running around trying to please her. But he wasn't. He knew what he wanted, which just happened to be what she wanted. He was perfectly at ease, perfectly comfortable, perfectly happy doing things that were satisfying for them both.

He was also attuned to the tiny crease that showed up between her eyes from time to time, and whenever he saw it, he immediately and deliberately filled her mind with different thoughts. Still, the issue of who she was as a woman, whether she was an active or a passive one, whether she had any real power, shadowed her. Long after they returned to her condo, after they'd made sweet, sexy love, she lay awake thinking about it. Each time she came near to an understanding, Sawyer would do something in his sleep--tug her closer, kiss her, whisper her name--and the issues became muddied again.

She knew one thing. He did love her.

She knew another thing. She did love him.

What she didn't know was whether she was the type of woman who could sustain a relationship like that, and whether she could bear it if she wasn't.

Thursday morning came too soon. She'd found no answers to her questions and she'd had far too little sleep. It was an easy matter to keep her eyes closed while Sawyer dressed, but it was harder to ignore him when, as was becoming his habit, he came to sit beside her before he left. "Plans for today?" he asked, smiling at her sleepy look.

"I don't know," she mumbled flatly.

"Uh-oh. You're tired."

"Mmph."

"And cranky. Should I let you get into the office and call you there?"

"Mmm."

Without another word, he bent his head and placed a chaste kiss at the corner of her mouth, then left.

Because he'd read her so well, she was in an even worse mood, and because she was in an even worse mood, she felt even weaker, which made her more angry. She stomped out of bed, went into the bathroom and slammed the door.

Then she found that she'd gotten her period.

* * * "Good morning," came Sawyer's deep voice on the phone shortly after she'd arrived at the office.

"Hi, Sawyer," she said in a no-nonsense, businesslike way.

He got the hint.

"You're busy."

"Very."

"Can I see you later?"

"Uh, I don't know." She flipped through her desk calendar--unnecessarily since the day's appointments faced her on a single page.

"I have one meeting after another."

"Lunch?"

"With the mayor."

"I'm impressed."

"Don't be. It's business."

"Then I'm jealous."

"No need. It's me and six other women."

"Sounds kinky."

She sighed.

"Okay," he conceded.

"I'll call you later."

He tried her at two o'clock, but she hadn't returned from lunch. He tried her again at three, but she'd, returned and left again. When he tried her at five, she was with a client. So he left a message for her to call him when she was free.

She called him at six-thirty, and her tone was anything but encouraging.

"Sorry I've missed you. It's been one of those days."

"You sound tired."

"I am. I think I'll go home and go to bed."

There was no mistaking the lack of an invitation. But then. Sawyer had had a premonition all day. "Is something bothering you?"

"I just said it. I'm tired."

"Beside that."

"What could be wrong?"

You could be uptight about us. You could be feeling crowded. You could be missing your freedom.

"I don't know. You tell me."

"I'm tired. Sawyer."

"But if I said that I'd go home with you and work while you sleep, you'd say no, wouldn't you?"

It was only a minute before she said, "Yes."

"You want to be alone. Why?"

"Because I want to sleep."

"You wouldn't sleep better if I was there?"

She heard his gentle teasing, but she was determined to resist its lure.

"That's an egotistical question if ever there was one."

"I sleep better with you than I do alone."

"Sure. Sex is a powerful sleeping pill."

He abandoned gentle teasing.

"Even when we don't make love, I sleep better when you're with me. What's wrong. Faith? What's eating you?"

"I'm tired."

"Talk to me. Tell me what it is."

"I'm tired."

"Tired of me?"

"Tired, period. I need sleep. Alone."

He listened to what she was saying and tried to read between the lines, and though he could imagine what the problem was, if she wouldn't talk, they couldn't work it out.

He debated pushing her, but the idea that she might be legitimately tired kept him from it. He figured he could give her a little time.

"Okay," he said.

"You go on home and get your sleep. I'll call you in the morning."

"I'll be in court in the morning."

"Then I'll call you before court."

"No. I'll be with my client before court."

"Then I'll call you after court."

"I don't know when I'll be back."

"I'll keep trying," he said, less indulgently now.

"You're being crabby. Faith, and I don't think it has anything to do with being tired. It has to do with us, but unless you tell me what it is, I can't do anything about it." He was pushing her, just as he'd told himself he wouldn't do moments before, but he was helpless to stop.

"There may be times when you'd like to turn back the clock and make things between us the way that they used to be, but you can't do that.

I can't do it. I don't want to do it. So we'll talk. If not now, later. " He meant every word he was saying, and then some.

"You're running. Faith. But I run faster. I'll always catch up. Remember that."

He hung up the phone before Faith could tell him how dumb what he'd said was. And it was just as well. The more she thought about it, the more she realized that it hadn't been such a dumb thing to say at all.

Sawyer had an advantage over her that had nothing to do with physical size or strength. It had to do with determination. He knew what he wanted, and he wasn't letting it get away.

She was nattered. More than that, she was gratified. More than that, she was touched and touched deeply--so much so that at times during Thursday night, she felt herself on the verge of tears. She was frightened. She wanted Sawyer, but didn't want to want him, and she was terrified of losing him. She was alternately confused and frustrated and angry.

By Friday morning, she was feeling totally washed out. At some point during the night, her mind had pulled a temporary blank and allowed her to sleep, but it hadn't been enough. The light of day illuminated all the things she preferred to have left hidden in the dark.

Grateful to have something to fully occupy her mind, she met with her client at eight, then went to court. By eleven-thirty she was back at her desk, and though she hadn't come up with an answer to the Sawyer dilemma, she found herself willing the phone to ring. He said he'd call. When he didn't, she felt angry--not so much at him, but at herself for being disappointed.

Being disappointed was her lot in life, she decided in a fit of self-pity as she threw papers and files into her briefcase and headed for the law library to work. If she wasn't in the office, she reasoned, she wouldn't be there to hear the phone not ring, which was some improvement on the disillusionment of waiting and wishing.

Sawyer found her at the library. It was nearly four,

and neither the dimming light of day nor the heavily shaded lamp on the table could hide his irritation. Slipping into the wooden armchair beside her, one of eight at the long mahogany table, he leaned close and whispered, "Where in the hell have you been? I've been looking all over for you."

"I've been here," she whispered back. She didn't know whether to be pleased that he'd found her or not. Her heart didn't wait for her to decide; it was beating faster than it had moments before.

"Why wouldn't Loni tell me?"

"Because she didn't know. I said I was going out. I didn't want to be disturbed."

Sheltered by knitted brows, Sawyer's eyes skipped toward the two other men at the table. Though they seemed engrossed in their own work, he carefully kept his whisper low.

"Well, you're going to be disturbed.

We have to talk, and we have to talk now. "

"I'm working now."

But he was already closing the books she'd been using.

"We'll go to Timothy's. It's right around the corner. We can take a quiet booth at the back."

"Timothy's is a bar."

"So a drink might do you good."

"I don't drink."

"It might loosen up your tongue."

"I don't need a drink to loosen my tongue. I don't want to talk."

"Come on. Faith. You're pulling a Laura Lein- decker, and what was it you told her? That she had to share her feelings with Bruce?"

"They're married. We're not."

"Through no fault of mine. I'd have asked you last weekend and seen the deed over and done by now if it had been up to me."

"Well, it's not." Her whisper took on a panicky edge.

"Sawyer, what are you doing?"

He was gathering her papers together and stuffing them none too neatly into her briefcase.

"We're getting out of here."

"I'm not leaving."

"If you don't," he said, pausing in his work to lean extra close, "I'll give you a slow... wet... deep ... kiss."

Faith could hardly breathe. Sawyer's nearness was bad enough, but when his breath fanned her ear and his words heated her insides, her resolve was more fragile than ever. Still she clung to it.

Grabbing her papers from Sawyer's hands, she put them into the briefcase herself.

"You'll give me no such thing. I'm going back to the office." Snapping her briefcase shut, she stood.

He was right beside her when she left the table. Before she could go far, he closed a hand around her arm.

"You're coming with me."

"No way." Her voice remained a forced whisper.

"It's over, Sawyer.

I've made up my mind. I apologize for having led you along, but this relationship isn't for me. It's too time-consuming. Too distracting.

Too demanding. I can't possibly be what you want, and I'm exhausted trying. " With the carpeted room left behind, her heels beat a rapid tattoo on the floor.

"It's the fighting that's exhausting you," Sawyer declared. Though they no longer had to whisper, he kept his voice low. That didn't blunt its urgency.

"Give in. Let it happen. Say you love me."

They trotted down the broad marble stairs, nodding to a judge coming up, but not pausing. When they burst through the large double doors and hit the street, Faith tried to turn in the direction of her office. Sawyer firmly propelled her the opposite way.

"Sawyer, I can't," she cried.

"I have work to do."

"Work will wait. This won't."

"What's the big rush?"

He strode on holding her arm, his dark eyes straight ahead.

"Yesterday was unbearable. Last night was even worse. I won't let things go on like this. I spent years watching my marriage fizzle, and I didn't fight because I didn't care, but I care about this. You say it's over.

I don't believe that. If you want to convince me, you'll have to do it now. "

"I just did," she argued.

"This relationship is too much for me to handle."

"Bullshit."

"Say what you want, but it's true." "You were handling it just fine at the start of the week," he argued, generating anger to cover up the unsettled feeling in the pit of his stomach.

"Nothing's changed since then, except that you started getting scared that you couldn't handle it. So you decided not to try.

That is cowardly. Faith, cowardly }" " So I'm a coward. That's as good a reason as any why it won't work. "

They reached Timothy's. Sawyer kept his hand in firm possession of her arm while he drew her through the door.

"Two of whatever's on tap," he called to the bartender as he swept down the long bar to a booth near the back. It was the only free one. The bar was filling up with happy-hour patrons. The noise of their chatter didn't bother him, any more than the dimness of the place did. Both provided a certain privacy.