She had thought maybe it was her turn for happiness. Maybe this baby heralded a new time in her life, one where she did not lose everyone who she loved.
But she could see already that was not true.
She had lost Tino, or was on the verge of doing so.
Her body racked with sobs, she ached with a physical pain no one was there to assuage.
What if Tino’s rejection was merely a harbinger of things to come?
What if she lost this baby, too? She could not stand it.
The first trimester was a risky one, even though her doctor had confirmed her pregnancy was viable and not ectopic. The prospect of miscarriage was a dark, scary shadow over her mind.
Falling apart at the seams like this could not be helping, but she didn’t know if she had the strength to rein the tears in. How was she supposed to buck up under this new loss?
The pain did not diminish, but eventually the tears did and she was able to drive home.
She had not lied when she told Agata she felt the need to create, but the piece she did that night was not one she wanted to share with anyone. Especially not a woman as kind as Tino’s mother.
Faith could not make herself destroy it, though.
Once again it embodied pain she had been unable to share with anyone else.
It was another pregnant figure, but this woman was starving, her skin stretched taut over bones etched in sharp relief in the clay. Her clothes were worn and clung to the tiny bump that indicated her pregnancy in hopeless poverty. Her hair whipped around her face, raindrops mixed with tears on the visage of a mother-to-be almost certain not to make it another month, much less carry her baby to term.
The figure reflected the emotional starvation that had plagued Faith for so long. She’d tried to feed it like a beggar would her empty belly in the streets. Teaching children art, sharing their lives. Her friendship with Agata. Her intimacy with Tino, but all of it was as precarious as the statue woman’s hold on life.
Faith had no one to absolutely call her own and feared that somehow the baby she carried would be lost to her as well.
She could not let that happen.
Valentino called Faith the next day. He’d tried calling the night before several times, after Gio had gone to bed, but she had not answered. He’d hoped to see her, but she had been ignoring the phone.
It was the first time she had done so during their association. He had not liked it one bit and had resolved not to avoid her calls in the future.
This time however, she answered on the third ring, just when he thought it was going to go to voice mail again.
“Hello, Tino.”
“Carina.”
“Do you need something?”
“No ‘How was your trip?’ or anything?”
“If you had wanted to tell me about your trip, you would have called while you were away … or answered my calls to you.”
Ouch. “I apologize for not doing so. I was busy.” Which was the truth, just not the whole truth.
“Too busy for a thirty-second hello? I don’t think so.”
“I should have called,” he admitted.
“It doesn’t matter.”
“If it offended you, it does.” Of course it had offended her.
He would not have cared with any of the other bed partners he had had since Maura’s death, but this was Faith. And he cared.
“I guess you didn’t have time for phone sex and saw no reason to speak to me otherwise,” she said in a loaded tone.
He had already apologized. What more did she want? “Now you are being foolish.” They had never engaged in phone sex, though the thought was somewhat intriguing.
“I seem to make a habit of that with you.”
“Not that I have noticed.”
“Really?” She sighed, the sound coming across the phone line crystal clear. “You must be blind.”
Something was going on here. Something bad. Perhaps he owed her more than a verbal apology for avoiding her as he had done. It was imperative they meet. “Can we get together tonight?”
“For sex only or dinner first?”
What the hell? “Is it your monthly?”
She was usually disconcertingly frank about that particular time of month and did not suffer from a big dose of PMS, but there was a first time for everything. Right?
She gasped. There was a few seconds of dead air between them. Then she said, “No, Tino. I can guarantee you it is not that time of month.”
Rather than apologize for his error yet again, he said, “It sounds like we would benefit from talking, Faith. Let’s meet for dinner.”
“Where?”
He named a restaurant and she agreed without her usual enthusiastic approval.
“Would you rather go somewhere else?” he asked.
“No.”
“All right, then. Montibello’s it is.”
She was early, waiting at the table when he arrived. She looked beautiful as usual, but gave a dim facsimile of her normal smile of welcome.
He leaned down and kissed her cheek. “Did you have a good day?”
Looking away, she shrugged.
This was so not like her he really began to worry. Was she ill? Or returning to the States? His stomach plummeted at the thought. “Anything you want to talk about?”
“Not particularly.”
Right. He was not buying that, but obviously she was hesitant. Maybe they could ease into whatever was making her behave so strangely by talking about other things. “There is something I think we should discuss.”
“Fine.” The word came out clipped and infused with attitude.
Okay, then. Reverse was not a gear he used often in his professional or personal life, so he went forward with the original plan. “We need to come up with a strategy for how we behave around my family.”
“You really think that’s going to become a problem?” she asked in a mocking tone he’d never heard from her. “We’ve been sleeping together for months and have only been around them together twice in all that time. The first instance would not have occurred if you had known I was your son’s teacher, and the second could have been avoided if I had known you were due to return a day earlier than expected.”
“Nevertheless, the occasions did happen and I feel we should develop a strategy for dealing with similar ones when they happen again.”
“I think you handled it already, Tino. Your family is under the impression we are something between bare acquaintances and casual friends.” Her hands clenched tightly in her lap as she spoke.
He wanted to reach out and hold them, but that would be pushing the boundaries of what he considered safe public displays. Both for his sake and hers. He did not hide the fact that they saw each other, but he did not make it easy for others to guess at their relationship, either.
Marsala was a big enough city that he could take her to dinner at restaurants where he was unlikely to run into his business associates. Even less probable was the possibility of being seen by family. However, there were still some small-town ideals in Marsala, and Faith, as