Erasing Faith(5)
Having a totally egocentric mark always made things easier. No questions, no feelings, no strings.
It doesn’t have to be her.
The voice was back, nagging, as if I didn’t already know I could target someone else. Any of the girls who worked at the courier service would do. The agency didn’t care who I chose, so long as I got the intel. Which I would, without question.
No — it didn’t have to be her.
But it was.
As soon as I’d locked eyes on Faith Morrissey, I knew she was my mark.
The only option for me.
I didn’t allow myself to question why as I followed her home, keeping to the shadows and ignoring the fact that my eyes were a little too intent as they memorized the way her hair fell in a lush reddish wave over her shoulders and midway down her back.
Chapter Four: FAITH
SIXTY STRANGE SECONDS
Wes Adams and I didn’t meet. We collided.
Hard.
On the day I turned twenty-one, amidst the throngs of Hungarian locals and fellow tourists crowding Heroes’ Square in hopes of snapping a few photos of Budapest’s most popular statues, my flimsy sandal caught on a loose cobblestone and I landed in the strong, waiting arms of a man who, unbeknownst to me, was about to flip my world on its head.
It wasn’t a graceful collision. This was no corny, cliché, out-of-a-movie encounter between star-crossed strangers. No iconic, elegant, swept-off-your-feet embrace, like that famous photo of the V-J Day Kiss in Times Square.
We hit like opposing air fronts. Clashed like hot and cold. Two total contradictions — a high-pressure system and its low-pressure polar opposite — converged and created a massive atmospheric disturbance.
A lightning strike.
My head bonked ungracefully against his, setting off an explosion of sharp pain inside my temple. Stars swam in my eyes and I surely would’ve collapsed to the ground if not for the muscular, well-tanned forearms that banded around my midsection and hauled me upright.
Without even realizing it, that one, tiny, insignificant action — tripping over my own feet, crashing into a stranger — set off a chain of events that forever altered the course of my life. One freak accident changed everything.
Well, at least at the time, I believed it was an accident. Months later, when I finally learned the truth, I’d realize that our meeting had been carefully planned, that each word he spoke and gesture he made had been orchestrated with meticulous precision.
But, in that moment — face to face with a beautiful stranger, his calloused hands gently gripping my forearms and steadying me in the sea of camera-toting globetrotters — the only thought in my head was that the archangel Gabriel’s handsome sculpted profile, captured for eternity in the statue I’d come to photograph at the square that afternoon, was a dull visage of beauty compared to the man before me. He was so appealing, it was almost aggressive. A visual assault that stopped my breath and made my heart skip a beat.
Not classically handsome — something more than that. Handsome was too refined a word for him. He held a more primitive, more savage beauty — all sharp edges and angles. High, prominent cheekbones and a chiseled jawline framed a nose that looked like it had been broken at least once. Stark raven eyebrows slashed across a broad forehead, over a set of deep, dusky eyes. Rimmed with a fan of long, inky lashes, his irises were so dark they seemed entirely black at first glance. A second look revealed a thin ring of brown around ebony pupils — darker than the super-expensive, bittersweet chocolate the vendors sold at the upscale candy shops on Váci Street.
Unusual eyes. Unconventional eyes.
They seemed to pierce my skin with the sheer intensity of their gaze, lingering on my features like a physical weight. Memorizing my every feature. Taking the measure of my soul.
His gaze was personal… Intimate even. Five tiny seconds under his gaze and I felt stripped bare, reduced to my most basic elements.
I shivered, despite the intense summer heat.
“I’m sorry,” I mumbled like an idiot, feeling the blush rise to my cheeks. “I tripped.”
Thank you, Captain Obvious.
As soon as the words escaped my lips, I wanted to smack an open palm against my forehead.
The stranger’s mouth lifted at one corner in the sexiest, crookedest half-grin I’d ever seen in my life. Despite my best intentions, I found myself watching his lips, mesmerized by their movement like some lovesick preteen meeting her celebrity crush.
People moved around us in a constant stream, their cameras held aloft. Ceaseless chatter in many different languages filled the air. Seconds ticked by on the small silver watch cuffing my wrist. High overhead, a cloud meandered across the sky and drifted in front of the bright summer sun. Generally speaking, the rest of the world carried on.
But we didn’t move.
The stranger still held me in the circle of his arms and, for some reason I could never fathom when I looked back on it later, I let him. We didn’t shift or breathe or speak. We just stood face to face, the only point of stillness in an ocean of moving chaos, taking each other in with an intensity typically reserved for longtime friends and lovers.
Finally, after nearly a minute, belated clangs of warning began to sound in my head and I took a hasty step back. I’d seen all the PSAs and read all the pamphlets cautioning naive young tourists against all manner of less-than-law-abiding citizens before I set off on my study abroad trip. This guy could be anyone — a pickpocket, a con artist, a serial killer.