Free Tempting Faith (Indigo Love Spectrum) by Crystal Hubbard Page A

stubbornly. “He still talks about you, you know. Every time I go home for Christmas or Thanksgiving, the two of us sit in the diner and talk about you. My old dance teacher Miss Lorraine still talks about you, and so does Art Brody.”
    “I was his best grease jockey,” Zander said. “And I worked cheap.”
    “I’m not the only one you left, Alex,” Faith said. “I’m not the only one who missed you.”
    Zander grimaced. He had no right to expect her to make this meeting easy, but he had hoped that she wouldn’t make it so hard, either.
    “You hated Booger Hollow as much as I did, so don’t—”
    “Back then, yes!” Faith said. “I was a kid itching to get out into the world I saw on MTV! But guess what, Alex? I’m not a kid now. And every time I go to Booger Hollow, I’m going home. My parents are there. The dance studio I loved is there. The guidance counselor at Lincoln High invited me to speak on careers for writers two years ago, when I was still at the L.A. Times .” Unshed tears strained her voice as she quietly added, “All my memories of you are there, and that makes Booger Hollow very special to me.”
    Zander plucked a napkin from the container resting against the leather-covered wall, and he mopped his damp brow.
    Faith watched his every move. She had noticed the subtle changes in his appearance at the press conference. His lower teeth were no longer slightly crowded. His nose had been broken twice in Dorothy, but it appeared to have been rebroken and properly set to remove the tiny bump he’d once had. His hair was much lighter, brightening his face and softening the intensity of his gaze. The old scar near his right eye was virtually undetectable.
    The one thing he hadn’t been able to alter, the one thing that had given him away, remained achingly the same. His eyes, as vivid and captivating as the last time she’d looked into them, had been left unchanged, a blessing for which she offered a silent prayer of thanks.
    “Look,” she began, refocusing her attention, “I know who you are, and—”
    “That makes one of us then,” he interrupted.
    “Please. Drop that phony accent. It’s not you.”
    “My accent isn’t fake.” He leaned across the table. Lowering his voice, he seamlessly reverted to his native West Virginia dialect. “Zander Baron was born in Australia. He was left an orphan when his parents were killed in a motorcar accident. Young Zander was taken and raised by an American uncle in Wyoming, where he learned to ride horses and rope cattle and—”
    Her hands clenched into fists, Faith cut him off. “I’ve read your biography. I don’t need that fiction recited to me.”
    “What do you want from me, Faith? Money?”
    “Are you dumb?” she asked, incredulous at the suggestion.
    “Then what are we here for?”
    “A damn explanation!”
    “For what?” he hissed.
    She slammed her palms on the tabletop. “For everything! For leaving, to start with! For letting everyone believe that you were dead!”
    “Making a scene here will hurt your career far more than mine, Faith, so calm down,” he warned. “Lower your voice and I’ll answer your questions, if I can.”
    Her appearance had changed, but she was still the straightforward, stand-up Faith he had known in another life.
    “Did you ever think of me?” she blurted, frustrated with herself for losing her cool and exposing a wound that had never quite healed.
    “Yes,” he answered immediately.
    She dropped her eyes and blinked back tears of relief that threatened to give away how much of her heart she had invested in his response. She lightly cleared her throat. “Zander Baron is a puzzle wrapped around a secret, but I’ve pieced most of it together,” she said. “I know enough about Olivia Baxter to recognize her fingerprints all over your transformation. The cosmetic work must have been easy, but it’s a lot harder to weave the facts of your life into the fabric of your fictional one. She didn’t