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"Oh, yeah. How about tomorrow?"
"Sorry, Pete. I'll be busy-though I will see your mom tomorrow night. I'm taking her out for the evening."
"No," Faith said again, with an edge of hysteria in her voice. Neither the man nor the boy looked at her. "Just you an' her?" Peter said.
"Just the two of us, yeah. Grown-up stuff, champ." Cole put the boy back down on the stool. "Nothing you'd enjoy but I promise, you and I-
"Don't do that," Faith snapped. "Don't lead him on when you know none of this is..." She caught her breath. Her son was staring at her and she forced herself to calm down, to smile and speak gently. "Peter, darling, go upstairs now. I'll come tuck you in in a few minutes."
"But I want to stay here with Cole."
"Hey, champ. Do as your mother says, okay?"
"I don't need you to intercede on my behalf," Faith said stiffly.
"Go on," Cole said, as if she hadn't spoken. "It's late." Peter sighed. "Okay."
Cole plucked the boy from the stool and swung him in an arc before putting him on his feet. "Good night, Petey."
"Cole?" Peter smiled shyly. "You can give me a hug, if you want."
"Peter," Faith said, but it was too late. Cole bent down and caught the boy in his arms. His eyes met hers over the top of the child's head. "You don't want to be shut out of this," he said softly. "Do you?"
"Shut out of what, Mom?"
"Hush." Her voice trembled but there was nothing she could do to stop it. She reached out, caught Peter as he started past her and hugged him hard. Too hard, probably, but she couldn't help it. He gave her a questioning look and she flashed a quick smile. "Go on," she said. "Back to bed."
Her son trudged up the stairs. She waited until he disappeared down the hall and she heard the faint sound of his bedroom door closing. Then she looked at Cole, knowing she mustn't beg, knowing she could do nothing less.
"Please," she said. "Don't do this. You can't do this."
"Of course I can." He walked slowly towards her, put a finger under her chin and tilted her face up. "I can do anything I want. You'd better accept that." He bent his head, brushed his mouth over hers. "I'll see you tomorrow night. Eight o'clock, at the inn by the lake."
"If you think I'm going to be there tomorrow or any other time.
Your choice, baby. If you'd rather discuss our wedding plans here, that's fine with me."
Faith clamped her hands into fists. "I hate you. I just hope you-"
Cole kissed her again. When he finally lifted his head, his eyes glittered. "Eight o'clock, at the lake. You do remember the lake, don't you, Faith?"
Before she could think of an answer, he was gone.
At ten minutes before noon the next day, Faith drove into a parking lot just off a busy Atlanta thoroughfare. She pulled into an empty space, shut off the engine, flipped down the sun visor and looked at herself in the mirror.
It wasn't a reassuring sight.
She rarely wore makeup, nothing but a little mascara and lip gloss, but today she'd done her best to live up to the headlines that trumpeted Make Yourself Into A New You in the slick women's magazines. After a sleepless night, "a new you" sounded like a pretty good idea. She'd applied foundation, blusher and lipstick...
So much for the wonders of makeup.
The blusher and lipstick only made her pallor more pronounced, the violet smudges of exhaustion under her eyes more visible. It was a look that might have gone over well on a high-fashion model but it only made her look sick.
She grimaced, plucked a tissue from the center console and wiped off as much of the stuff as she could. That was better. Now she just looked like something the cat had dragged in. With a sigh, she opened the door and stepped from the car.
What did it matter, how she looked? What she said, how she said it, would be what counted.
She had an appointment with one of Georgia's best-known family law attorneys. Her job would be to convince Elmore Bookman to represent her. He had the expertise and he wouldn't be intimidated by the kind of legal talent she suspected was at Cole's fingertips.
Bookman's name had popped into her head in the middle of the night. He'd been all over the papers a couple of years back when he'd won a seemingly impossible custody battle between a wealthy grandfather and the child's far-from-perfect mother. The mother's saving grace had been her love for the child but the evidence of her promiscuity had been overwhelming. The pundits had been sure the girl would lose the case. Bookman had laughed at the skeptics. The mother would win, he'd said, and she had-thanks to her attorney.
If anyone could see to it that she kept Peter, Elmore Bookman could.
