Never Without Hope (Sacred Vows Book 1) Page 2

  Surely his question was innocent enough. I really should talk about my faith. So why haven’t you so far, eh?

  I shook off the thought. “Uh, lunch would be okay, I guess. But I’d rather meet at your house…like maybe on a Sunday after church.” Sucking in a deep breath, I released it with a whoosh. “I think it would be nice to meet your wife. I think you’d get along great with my husband, too. Maybe you could even go to church with us.”

  He hesitated; his voice sounded less confident. “Is not good idea. My wife, she is very…how you say…possessive? She would not understand.”

  That should’ve tipped me off right there. But I can be pretty naïve sometimes. “Okay, well, then I guess you can send me an e-mail. If you think your wife might change her mind, let me know.”

  “Sounds good. I send you e-mail.”

  “Sure.” I paused. I really didn’t want to meet him in person again. It would be too…awkward. I’d feel like we were doing something behind our spouses’ backs—at least on his end it would be sneaking around—and that wouldn’t be okay. Sure was a nerve-wracking conversation, and I wanted it to end, but was not sure how to do that tactfully, since I really did need his input on Italian culture for my book series.

  “Hey! Where you live?” he asked with a smile in his voice, like he was on the verge of laughing.

  “Why?” I glanced in my rearview mirror. His large black truck tailed me. What if he was a pervert? My chest tightened.

  “Because I drive behind you. I live near Colorado Drive and Miller Road.”

  I peered closer. Yep, that was definitely him in the truck behind me. Thankful that Miller Road was over twenty miles long, I considered answering his question, but decided against it.

  His signal clicked on and he took a left turn.

  “See you later, Bella Speranza.”

  Bella Speranza? What in the world?

  “That means beautiful hope.”

  “Okay, uh, bye, Tony.” I winced. Why didn’t I say something about his comment?

  He turned off the road and within seconds was out of sight.

  Again, I wondered what had I gotten myself into. He lived less than five miles from my house. Out in the country, yes, but off the same main road. That couldn’t be good, or could it? I decided it wasn’t good. Told myself that, anyway. Even if I didn’t have enough courage to confront him on calling me beautiful Hope in Italian.

  I snapped my cell phone shut.

  Later that evening I logged onto the computer and checked my e-mail.

  I saw an address I didn’t recognize, but I knew it wasn’t spam because the subject line read WE MET ON PLANE. I clicked on it. Thanks for getting to know you in airport. This made my day nice. Tony. He attached an adorable smiley to his signature.

  So his grammar was a bit off, but I figured if my first language was Italian I wouldn’t do much better. I knew he was a nice guy. Sometimes I am just too paranoid. I decided since his comment was innocent enough, I’d write him back. Same here. Hope.

  His reply came quickly. You still plan to mail chapters for me?

  Sure, I replied and attached the completed chapter of my most recent work. Maybe he’d learn something about my faith from my story. After all, that was the only reason I’d keep in any kind of contact with him. At least that’s what I’d told myself.

  I’d gotten the impression over lunch that he wasn’t a man with a strong belief system. While I hate to judge anyone, the hints I dropped that would normally draw out that type of conversation had fallen on deaf ears. So I was pretty sure I was right. With a sigh, I logged off the computer and got ready for bed.

  After four months of e-mailing back and forth, the contact trickled off. I suppose that was okay, because he’d given me the necessary details about Italy that I needed to enrich the book. Plus, I got a bit nervous after reading some of his comments. Several times he’d reply with a you are beautiful woman comment, or that scene was pretty hot.

  Now don’t get concerned. I don’t write trash. I think he was referring to the first kiss in my book. I suppose it was pretty unique, and of course, well written. Honestly, I was thrilled that he liked my story for any reason. Yet he never mentioned the faith thread in my novel, and I had much more to say about that than kissing. Other than those comments, not much communication occurred. After all, we were just friends.

  *****

  All through the summer I had suffered with headaches. I finally went to see the doctor a week after Labor Day because it was interfering with my work. As I waited, I sat next to a guy who looked a lot like Tony. What are the odds? Especially in Rochester.

  The man teasingly poked me in the arm. “Hey, Hope. How are you? Is me, Tony. From the plane.”

  Startled, I frowned and clutched my head. “Not so great, you know?”

  “Me either. I have trouble sleeping, so I come see specialist.”

  Bags were under his eyes and he had stubble on his chin. He didn’t look nearly as good to me this time around. Then again, I didn’t look so hot either. I don’t think I even wore any makeup. Not that it mattered.

  The doctor called me in first. I groaned. I hated going to the doctor, but I had to get rid of these headaches. Apparently Tony saw someone else because he and I both ended up in the waiting area again at the same time. How strange is that?

  Now what to do?

  “Are you going back to work?” I asked.

  “I work 3 to 11 shift at rehab in town. I never work in morning.”

  “Maybe working the late shift has something to do with your trouble sleeping.” I suggested.

  He shrugged. “Maybe. But my baby is also not sleeping so good now. He have colic. I bring him to sitters every day for some hours so I can rest.”

  “You have a baby? Yeah, now I remember. Your wife was pregnant when we met, right? So how old is he now?” My head still hurt like someone squeezed it in a vise grip, but I tried to be pleasant anyway.

  “He be five months, almost six.”

  Had that much time passed since March?

  “My son came a month early.” He hesitated and licked his lips. “You have job today?” Tilting his head toward me, his face showed concern. I have no idea why, but I thought it was a nice gesture anyway.

  “No, I haven’t been able to work for over a week. My headaches have gotten bad. When I’m not feeling like this, I work at home transcribing doctor’s notes as an independent contractor. In my spare time I write books, but you already knew that. What do you do at the clinic?”

  “I work in drunk tank. Is interesting job.”

  “Drunk tank? You mean the alcohol treatment center?” Man, my head hurt.

  “Yeah, but we call drunk tank, and so do cops.” He grinned. “You have plans?”

  “Right now? I’m waiting for the order from the doc. They want me to go pick up my CT scan from the hospital next door and bring it back here so they can see it. I have to come back today so the doctor can examine the results and confirm my diagnosis.”

  Just then, the medical assistant brought the paper out to me.

  “Want to walk over there with me?” I asked, not expecting him to say yes.

  “Sure. I have nothing today. My baby is at sitters and I not on schedule for work tonight.” He smiled and opened the door for me. Sigh. What a gentleman.

  Then I had that funny feeling again, but I rationalized that we were just friends, and not even very good ones at that. He hadn’t written back to me in months, so I’d quit sending him chapters. I darted a sideways glance at him. Maybe he’d tell me why he stopped e-mailing.

  Before I could ask, he answered my unspoken question.

  “I am so sorry I have not written in months. I have classes in Rochester, and between my work, my classes and my baby, I have no time to get on computer and check messages.”

  “That’s okay. No big deal.” I smiled. At least he still liked my stories. Just too busy to read them. At first I’d thought maybe I’d offended him when I sent a new chapte
r from the sequel I’d begun. It was a spin off from the same series I had presented to the editor in L.A. The character in the new book had Tony’s first name and his eyes.

  Up until the headaches, I’d had a productive past few months, so I started a new book. I couldn’t help wondering if that had something to do with my headaches.

  My dilemma was that I’d wanted to come up with an exotic hero. Making him Latino would be too cliché. I needed his to be a different language, so I picked Italian since I decided to bring the brother of the Italian man from the first book to the states, where he meets the woman of his dreams.

  While there are plenty of Italians in New York State, few speak primarily Italian. And the language did sound sexy, which was my goal for a romance.

  The bummer was I didn’t know the cultural stuff that well. My friend, Maria, who had given me some insight into European culture for book one, was too busy with her new job to help me much these days. Since the meat of the romance pertained to the hero’s culture, I really needed someone familiar with Italian traditions to help me with the details.

  “So what you write now? You sell any books yet?” He stuffed his hands in his coat pockets. Today he wore the same bomber jacket he wore on the plane, and smelled like a Wilson’s Leather store. Sometimes I shopped there just to inhale that unique scent.

  “Actually, I got a call from my agent the other day. She said the publisher I met with in L.A. wants to offer me a contract. She’s negotiating with them, so I don’t know what will happen yet. But she’s a great agent. I even started another book. In fact, I’m almost halfway done with it.” I grinned. “The hero is an Italian guy named Tony.”

  He stopped walking and turned toward me. His expression grew thoughtful. “You serious, not joking me?”

  “Yep. I told you I’d use your eyes. Why are you surprised?”

  His grin widened. “Not surprised. Is very nice. Thank you for making special story. I would like to read your new book.”

  “It’s called, ‘A Slice of the Good Life’. The hero is a pastry chef and is very good at making pies. They’re world famous. Get it, a slice? For a pie slice?”

  Nodding briefly, he started walking again. We entered the sliding doors of the hospital. “You will send me story to read?”

  “Yeah, in fact, why don’t you just delete the chapter I already sent and read the new one. Okay?”

  “Sure. You need more help with Italian words and phrases?”

  “I hadn’t thought about that. I was thinking more about food Italians eat, but I guess it would make the story better, huh?”

  “Yes, always much better. Italian is language of lovers.” His voice deepened and he gave me the cutest smile as he peered at me from the corner of his eye.

  “Hmmm…I’ve heard that, but I always thought it was French… You know, I don’t think I’ve ever asked you how old you were.” I hesitated. Did I really need that info?

  “My birthday last month. I turn twenty-eight. How many years old are you?”

  We arrived at the door to the radiology office where they had my films and I paused before going inside.

  “Me? I’m thirty-six.” I smiled inwardly.

  He stopped before opening the door and touched my arm. “You thirty-six?”

  “Yeah, I’m often told that I look like I’m still in my twenties.”

  “Amazing. I can’t believe you eight years older than my age.”

  I slapped his bicep. “Don’t rub it in. I’m not excited about being over the thirty-five mark as it is.”

  “You look very much younger. Very beautiful. I not believe you older than me.”

  My cheeks warmed. I never blush. Never. “Uh, thanks, I guess.”

  He opened the door for me and didn’t say anything while I waited for them to find my CT scan records.

  As we left, he held the door open and repeated, “You look young for age. Very young is good.”

  I didn’t reply. While used to being complimented often, his voice held a tinge of awe in it and it made me a tad nervous. But I liked it.

  After all, what woman wouldn’t want to be told that she looked younger than she really was?

  “My wife, she is my age and looks more old than you.” He scanned the length of me briefly. “She gained much weight after baby. You look so great. Perfect.”

  I couldn’t help but smile. I knew what he meant. What woman wouldn’t love a compliment like that?

  We crossed the street and arrived at the door to the doctor’s office. I needed to meet with the doc again and was pretty much done with chatting. My head hadn’t stopped hurting, and the bright sunshine hadn’t helped at all. Tony stood by the door and stuffed his hands in his pockets. He acted like a nervous teenager.

  “I gotta go back inside. It was nice seeing you again. I’ll send some more chapters.” I waved and started to turn when I saw him move.

  He removed his hands from his coat pockets and held them out in a friendly gesture, inviting a hug. On impulse I gave him one, but he refused to release me at first.

  Hey, I hugged all my friends at church. No big deal, right? Still, I pulled away, uncomfortable with my body’s response to his spontaneous affection.

  My friends never squeezed me with such enthusiasm, not like Tony had. My stomach tingled as he released me, then gazed with intensity, a questioning expression in his eyes.

  I couldn’t help inhaling the faint trace of his spicy cologne when he’d held me. He smelled wonderful, of course. “Talk to you later?”

  He grinned shyly and said, “I would still like to eat lunch sometime with you.”

  “I really don’t know when I can do that. I’m always working. But I’ll see.”

  “Is great you see. I call you later.” He turned and walked to his car, his head tipped down, his hands fisted inside his pockets.

  I exhaled, wondering what he was thinking about me now. Hoping he’d hear my request before he shut the door, I hollered, “Just e-mail me, okay?”

  Tony never looked back at me so I don’t know if he heard my request.

  What to do? Shaking my head to eradicate my wayward thoughts, I opened the door. If I’d only discouraged him at that point. I honestly never thought anything would happen.

  But something did.

  Chapter 2

  Tony called me for the second time in one week. He was excited about my new book! Heck, I was excited about him being excited about it! The only one who didn’t share our enthusiasm was my husband. He didn’t get excited about much of anything these days.

  In fact, within the last six months I could count on one hand the number of times he kissed me, I mean really kissed me. Not to mention sex. If it was a good month he might even try to make love to me, but that hadn’t happened in nearly five months. I’d actually counted them.

  Sure, we’d do other things once in awhile, but not much. The whole thing was depressing, actually. I’d talked to my husband about seeing a doctor. I was sure something was wrong for him to have so much trouble in that area of our marriage, but I also kept reassuring him that it was okay. None of that mattered.

  I don’t think James believed me because even with my reassurance, he kept pulling away from me. Sometimes he even slept in the other room, then blamed me for being on the computer so much. Well at least my online friends give me some attention! I wanted to yell at him, but instead I just burned with anger.

  And my hormones had started raging. Ridiculously so. Maybe from lack of contact. I don’t know the reason, but it was really starting to bother me.

  I called my girlfriend Jenna, one of my few friends who didn’t know my family, figuring anonymity was better. We had never met in person, but just knew each other online. She was ten years older, so I thought she could help me understand what was going on with my body and in my marriage.

  To summarize, she’d said it was pretty normal for men to have trouble that way as they got older. My husband had just turned forty-nine. That didn’t seem all that old to me.
Our age difference didn’t seem to matter when we’d married. I found it very strange and unexpected that his interest in me sexually had taken such a sharp nosedive since my trip to L.A. I knew plenty of women whose husbands were older than mine was and they didn’t have any trouble in bed.

  Know what Jenna said about my problem? She said when she was my age all she could think about was sleeping with her husband. In fact, it got so bad when he was out of town and working late that she’d gotten lonely and as a result became emotionally involved with a man online. Things deteriorated quickly and they started talking about having sex. Thankfully it ended before anything actually happened, and her husband had forgiven her for it.

  And I’d thought I’d messed up just by thinking about it! Whew. What a relief to know the raging hormone thing was biological. But it was still scaring me. I honestly thought about sex all the time. Whenever anything touched my body, my breasts, any part of me, I got excited. Maybe the fact that I never got any touches at home had something to do with my preoccupation with sex.

  I didn’t know much except that I was frustrated. Big time.

  I liked the intense feelings and hated them at the same time.

  Could be from mood swings, or some weird peri-menopausal thing, according to what I’d read on the Internet. I always get very funky this time of year even though I take medication for seasonal affective disorder, or SAD. The blues just made me more emotionally needy. I hated that, but it was true. I probably needed a med adjustment, but I didn’t like taking medication, so I left things alone, hoping they would just go away. Stupid, I know.

  The bottom line was my husband wasn’t getting excited about me in the marital way. That hurt my feelings. I mean, really hurt them. I even bared my soul a few times and told him how I felt. He just got angry.

  Sure, I understood how humiliating it could be for a guy, so while I felt bad for him, I started to resent the fact that he wasn’t willing to fix it. I even told him a few times that every man in town was starting to look really hot to me. I was serious! And you know what he did? He just blew off my comments and stormed off to bed.