I was more nervous about the fact that Finn watched me like a hawk from the darkness of his side of the car while I drove than I was about driving. I tried to remember how to get to Finn’s house, but I’d only been there once and I had to keep asking him which way.
Nothing looked familiar to me and I kept waiting for his neighborhood to come up, but there was nothing but woods. I was starting to worry that Finn was drunker than I thought. I continued to drive as thoughts kept coming to me. Like, how was I going to get home? I thought about all the trouble I was going to be in when I finally did get home and how badly I was going to get it.
“Take a left here,” Finn said from the darkness.
I took a left onto a dark road and continued to drive until finally I came to a clearing. There were woods behind me and in front of me was the ocean. The smell of saltwater engulfed the car as the waves rushed toward the shore that was practically in front of us. A long dock stretched out over the water and in the distance, I could see boats with lights on them. The Cooper River Bridge was the backdrop. It was lit up with light-blue lights as cars drove across it and into the black star-filled sky.
“It’s beautiful,” I said in awe.
I’d never seen a place more beautiful in my life. Not that I’d been many places.
I turned when I felt Finn’s fingers in my hair. He was sitting beside me and pulling softly at my fingers on the steering wheel.
“Then it’s perfect for you,” he whispered in my ear.
My body went up in flames. I was burning and it felt so wonderful.
He captured my face in his hands and turned me to face him. Even in the darkness, I could see his light eyes as they skimmed my face and then landed on my lips.
“Can I please kiss you again?” He ran his thumb across my bottom lip as he asked.
I nodded my answer and closed my eyes. His soft lips landed on mine and I absorbed everything I could. The feel of his breath, the taste of him, and the way his tongue moved softly over my lip. I didn’t want to miss a single second. Tiny noises traveled from his lips and rushed down my body, landing in the bottom of my spine.
When he broke the kiss, he pressed his forehead against mine and we both took a much needed breath.
“I have a tiny problem,” he said as his lips brushed mine.
“What?”
I sounded like a different person. My voice was deeper, like that of an experienced woman. One kiss—that’s all it took—and I was blooming under his heat like a ripened flower.
“I never thought I’d say this, but I think I might be falling in love with you.”
He opened his eyes and looked deep into mine as he waited for my reaction. He was drunk. Only a drunk man could think he was in love with me. Me? The boring pastor’s daughter who never went anywhere or did anything exciting, but then again, wasn’t I here alone with him in the middle of nowhere? Hadn’t I run out on a date without telling anyone?
“That’s the alcohol talking,” I stated.
He blinked at me and then shook his head. “No. That’s my heart talking. I’ve never felt this way about anyone before. I’m sorry if that freaks you out.”
In that moment, everything changed. I was his and I didn’t care who said I couldn’t be. I didn’t care about anything else. I just wanted to be with him and soak up every moment that was offered to us.
I slid my arms around his neck and he smiled down at me.
“I’m not freaked out, but I guess I have a problem, too,” I said.
He leaned down and pressed his smiling lips against mine. “And what’s that? Anything I can help with?”
“Maybe. It seems my heart wants to talk, too.”
“Oh really? And what does your heart have to say?”
I sat quietly and tilted my head as if I were listening to something. “I’m falling for you, too.”
The moment the words left my lips, his face lit up. The car no longer felt like a dark and scary place. It was light and peaceful. As if someone had just lifted tons off of our shoulders.
He leaned in and kissed me again. This time pushing a little farther and drawing noises from me. My body rebelled against everything my father had ever taught me, and I didn’t care. If God didn’t want me to have that moment, then I wouldn’t have been there. My heart wouldn’t have been so full of love for Finn.
“We need to slow down,” he said against my lips.
“Why? Did I do something wrong?”
“God, no. You’re doing everything just right.”
I went back in and kissed him harder. I wasn’t sure what was happening to me, but I couldn’t get enough of him. I pressed my body against his in ways that didn’t make any sense to me and silently cursed my restrictive skirt for not allowing me to move my legs they way they begged to move. I didn’t understand any of it. I just knew it felt nice and I wanted to keep doing it. He chuckled against my lips and pulled away.
“I don’t want to push you into anything. When you’re ready, and if you decide you want me that way, I’ll be here. I’ll wait.” He grinned.
I paused at the look in his eyes. I’d only known Finn for a few weeks, yet somehow he had wrapped himself around me so tightly—metaphorically and literally.
“You’d wait for me?”
The concept seemed foreign. I was nothing—a pastel blob on the face of the earth. Meanwhile, he was bright—a star that illuminated my existence. I was drawn to him and I didn’t know if I’d ever want to pull myself away.
His thumb caressed my cheek and lips. He looked down at them as if he wanted to kiss me again and then licked his.
“I’d wait forever for you.”
And just like that, we were together. I was his and he was mine. I didn’t think twice about Stephen or my dad, and when Finn asked me to spend the night with him in his mom’s Jeep, I did just that. I fell asleep in his arms with the sounds of the waves as our background noise and his fingers in my hair.
Ten
Finn
When I woke up, my arms were wrapped around Faith and her face was buried in my chest. I was blanketed in her warmth and covered in her long, flowing hair. I ran my hand up her back and a tiny noise sounded from her moist lips.
I looked down at her flushed cheeks and smiled. Her mouth was open and she snored softly when she breathed in. It was best moment of my life. I’d slept better lying on the bench seat in the back of my mom’s Jeep than I had anywhere else in my life, and I’d slept in a lot of places.
I watched her sleep until the sun was fully shining into the windows. The seagulls outside seemed to get louder the brighter the sun grew. My leg was falling asleep, but I didn’t move. I didn’t want to wake her. The moment was too sweet to ruin.
When she finally woke, she leaned back and looked up at me with a sleepy smile. Her long hair lay across my arm. The soft scent of roses and fresh powder filled my senses as I bent my head down and gave her a tiny kiss.
“Good morning, beautiful,” I said as I let my thumb explore her creamy cheek.
I couldn’t stop touching her. It was as if I needed reassurance that she was really there with me. It wasn’t that I wasn’t used to girls being with me; it was that I wasn’t used to girls like Faith. She was perfection, far too perfect for a screw-up like me, and I knew in my heart that I didn’t deserve her, but I couldn’t help myself.
I couldn’t even think about the fact that my head was pounding. I had a tiny hangover and I felt a little embarrassed about my behavior the night before, but screw it. A drunk man tells no tales, and I’d been up front and honest with Faith, which was exactly what she deserved. At least I got it off my chest and at least she didn’t turn me away like she probably should have.
Her cheeks flushed sweetly. “Good morning. You’re the first person to ever call me beautiful. It feels weird when you say it.”
“Then I guess I’ll say it over and over again until it’s not weird anymore,” I said as I fingered a strand of her soft waves. “You’re beautifu
l, Faith.”
She smiled sweetly and then leaned up and kissed me. I kissed her back with all that I was and tried to stay in control of myself. Not only was it morning and my morning wood hurt like a bitch against my jeans, but she was pressing against me in ways that she couldn’t know were making me crazy. I wanted her, more than I’d ever wanted a girl, but I also wanted to make sure she was ready.
She brought out a side of me that I hadn’t known existed before. I wasn’t usually a patient man, but she made me patient. She was slowly transforming me into a better person, a person worthy of her.
I gasped when I felt cool fingertips against my stomach. She fingered the creases of my abs slowly, as if she were memorizing me. Even though it was killing me, I restrained myself and allowed her the freedom to roam my body.
“You’re so hard,” she said as she pressed her palms to my chest.
I couldn’t help myself. “In more ways than one.” I grinned down at her.
Before she could figure out what I was saying, I kissed her again and chuckled against her mouth. Time slipped away as we made out in the back of my mom’s Jeep like normal teenagers. The waves crashed against the shore outside and the birds flew above us in the warming breeze.
I felt something cold against my chest. I stopped kissing her and leaned back to find her necklace had escaped her shirt and was lying against me. She’d always worn the silver cross around her neck as far as I knew, and there had been many times when I’d see her pull it out of her shirt and hold it in her palm as if it soothed her.
I picked it up to inspect it. “Where did you get this?” I asked.
She looked down and pulled the small cross from my fingers. It disappeared in her tiny fist as she wrapped her hand around it. “My grandmother gave it to me when I was little.”
“Do you ever take it off?”
“Never.” She shook her head. “It saved me when I was little, so I never take it off.”
She looked up at me. Her deep-brown eyes swirled with some profound emotion I wanted to know more about.
“What do you mean it saved you? Did something happen to you?”
I knew I was pressing her, but I was worried there was something going on in her life that she wasn’t telling me about. I wanted to know everything when it came to Faith.
“When I was little, my dad used to tell me that if I was bad, the devil would come and steal my soul. For years, I worried that my soul was never safe. So whenever I felt like I’d done something bad, or when bad things would go on around me, I used to pretend that I could hide my soul inside my cross and keep it safe. I panic when I even think about taking it off. It’s engraved in my head that I have to keep my soul safe.”
When she looked up, a tiny tear clung to her cheek. I kissed it away before kissing her. When I pulled back, she smiled down at me.
“I’d never let anyone take your soul. It’s too precious… You’re too precious.”
This time, she kissed me and I let her, but just when my body relaxed into her, she suddenly pulled away from me, leaving my lips burning and my breath stuck. She stared up at me in confusion and then as if released from a spell, she jumped up, her eyes wide with fear and her breathing deep and fast, as if she were in a panic.
“Oh my God, my dad’s going to kill me.” She gripped her cross with one hand and pawed at the door to open it with the other.
A salty breeze wafted into the car when she finally pushed it open. I followed behind her and my shoes sank into the thick sand beneath our feet.
“Don’t freak out. This is my fault. I’ll tell him it’s my fault.” I tried to calm her.
“No, this is my fault. I knew better than to leave the movies, but I did it anyway. Please, Finn, just take me home. I might as well face the firing squad. It might be a while before we get to see each other again, though.”
Panic seized me. I hadn’t thought about the consequences of my actions the night before. I never really thought about consequences ever, but not thinking was biting me in the ass. Because I’d practically forced her to the leave the movies the night before, I’d made it ten times more difficult to be able to see her. Of course once her dad knew she was with me, he was going to forbid her to see me again. I had to remember that I wasn’t dealing with the girls from around my way, whose parents didn’t give a shit about them.
I wouldn’t let it happen. For the last few weeks of my life, I’d been able to see Faith, and if it were up to me, that would continue.
“Nah. If I want to see you bad enough, I’ll just come to you. I’m kind of a pro at sneaking in windows.” I grinned.
She gave me an adorable eye roll and threw her hands in the air in frustration. “That doesn’t make me feel better, Finn.”
I couldn’t help myself. I laughed and pulled her to me. She melted in my arms.
“Don’t worry about this, okay? I’ll make it better.”
And I would somehow. No matter what I had to do, I’d make it better. At least that’s what I thought, but thirty minutes later, when we pulled on to her street, I knew things were about to get worse. Two police cruisers were in her driveway waiting for us. Her hand tightened in mine and I felt the moisture of her nervous palms. She was afraid and I hated it. I wanted to take away her fear.
“Just follow my lead,” I said as I pulled in behind a cop car and put the Jeep in park.
She nodded her agreement, popped open the passenger’s side door, and then climbed out. The front door to her house snapped open loudly, and her mother and father came barreling out of the house, followed by two police officers. The screened door was practically ripped from its hinges.
“You!” The preacher pointed his finger at me. “You kidnapped my daughter!”
I stood my ground, but suddenly Faith was standing between me and her father as he growled at me.
“Daddy, this wasn’t Finn’s fault. It was mine.”
“I didn’t kidnap her. She drove me home. I was drinking, sir, and…”
“I don’t want to hear your excuses. You stay away from my daughter, do you understand me?”
“Daddy, please just calm down for a—”
She was quieted with the back of his hand. The sound of his hand landing against her cheek echoed all around me. Long brown hair shifted in front of me as she skidded to the side, landing hard against the Jeep before falling to the ground.
I didn’t even realize I was moving until I felt my shoulder connect with his stomach. I slammed him on the ground as hard as I could and punched him in the face twice. He put his arms up to block, and I lifted my fist to hit him again. I would’ve kept punching except I felt tiny fingers dig into my arms as Faith pulled me away.
“Stop, Finn, please stop!” she was yelling.
Her mother was screaming nonsense, drawing attention to our little drama in their front yard. Strong fingers replaced Faith’s as a cop pulled me from the pastor. I was thrown against the side of my Jeep and handcuffed immediately. I stopped fighting once the cop shifted my body and threw me into the back of his car. Faith stood there staring back at me with dirty tears running down her cheeks.
Neighbors had started coming out of their houses and were openly staring. I looked down at the pastor, who was still lying on the ground. His silvery hair shined in the sunlight as he turned his head to the side and spit a mouthful of blood onto the dirt at his side.
His wife helped him up from the ground and then he sat and talked to the police. I couldn’t hear anything they were saying, and I couldn’t keep my eyes from Faith. She still hadn’t stopped crying, and I felt like shit for not being fast enough to stop her dad from hitting her and then for being so crazy with rage that I’d kicked her dad’s ass.
There was no doubt in my mind that I was going to jail and my poor mom was going to have a hell of a day. I felt like shit. We’d only been together for a few hours, and already I’d made Faith cry and ruined my mom’s day. I was a selfish asshole. I’d put what I wanted ahead of others and what they des
erved.
I was shocked when one of the officers came over, opened the door, and pulled me out. Spinning me around to face the car, he unlocked my handcuffs.
“Well, son, it looks like it’s your lucky day. Pastor Warren here has decided to not press charges.”
I turned to face the pastor. His cheek was turning purple and there was a trickle of blood on his lip. He walked up to me and the officer and placed his hand on the officer’s shoulder.
“Thank you, Ronald. We look forward to seeing you and the wife at church soon.” He smiled.
When he turned to face me, his smile wasn’t real. He was putting on a show for the police, and it only made me despise him more.
“James, I’d appreciate it if you stayed away from Faith. Your community service is done, so that means my family and I shouldn’t be seeing much of you anymore. All is welcomed in the house of the Lord, so if you decide you’d like to come to church on Sunday’s, then please, by all means, come, but make sure you’re nowhere near Faith when you do.”
My eyes collided with Faith’s as his words sank in, but honestly, I’d known all along it was going to be difficult to see her.
He couldn’t have known it at the time, but he’d issued a challenge and I’d accepted wholeheartedly. He wasn’t going to keep me from what I wanted, and I wanted Faith. End of subject.
I nodded and turned to go back to my Jeep. I had to keep in control if I didn’t want my mom having to spend money we didn’t have to bail my stupid ass out of jail. I shut the door behind me, cranked up the Jeep, and then sat there and stared at Faith through the dusty windshield.
She held up her hand as if to say good-bye, with sadness in her eyes. I could see it in her face that she thought I was done. She thought I was just going to walk away from her so easily—let them win. Well, she had a lot of things to learn about me. I wasn’t going to give up. When it came to her, I was just getting started.
Finding Faith Page 9