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.
CHAPTER FIVE
HENRI LEANED FORWARD in his seat across the table and lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Now that we are alone, perhaps you should share with me some details about your unsettling morning, eh? Is Dylan well?”
“Damn, I’m sorry.” Guilt took a swipe at Garrett’s insides. He should’ve realized that his friend would jump to the conclusion that the unsettling morning