Chapter Three
Once, when Faith wasyoung, she and Celia and some of the other girls who lived near their family farm, had run races up and down the dirt road for hours in the dead of August with no water. She’d thought she’d been thirsty then.
But that was no match for how dry Faith’s throat went now.
“I’m sorry. You’re . . .” That was all she could manage to say.
“Beau Landry.” The devilishly handsome man spun his fine hat in his hands before continuing in a lightly accented voice. “Your . . . correspondent, I suppose?”
“Correspondent,” Faith repeated, simply because she didn’t know what else to say. And she was not one to ever find herself at a loss for words. She gripped the edge of the counter.
He was here.
How was he here?
Whywas he here?
Her memory charged through every letter she’d received from him, searching for mention of his actually coming to Last Chance, but the memories were jumbled and hazy and she couldn’t force her mind to slow and think properly.
His brow creased now, and he transferred the hat to his left hand and reached out to her with his right. “Would you care to sit? You look faint,cher.”
She dropped her incredulous eyes from his face to his broad shoulders to the assured outstretched hand. “I am not faint.” And what was it he’d called her?
His mouth twitched as if she perplexed him somehow. Another moment went by and he withdrew his hand, but he kept those golden brown eyes on her as if he were trying to figure her out.
It was too much. Too unexpected.
The walls of the building were suddenly much too close, and Faith could not draw a deep breath. She had to get out.
Pushing herself away from the counter, she mumbled her excuses to this man who claimed to be Beau Landry, and propelled herself from behind the counter.
And then straight out the door.
*****
Outside, Faith drewin deep breaths of the warm summer air as she strode headlong down the road. Past the stagecoach depot next door, she made an abrupt turn onto the road that led down to the river and the ferry. Someone called to her. Whether it was the ferryman, a friend, or that dark-haired man who’d just turned her entire world upside down, Faith didn’t know. She didn’t answer and she didn’t look back.
