Christmas Diamond, a Novella

Chapter 3

FAITH sat on the dry sand and looked out at the ocean. A full moon bathed the beach in a silvery light. It allowed her to see beyond the darkness of the night, but the empty waters and the vacant beach also helped her feel alone and isolated.

At nearly one in the morning, no sound but the gentle surf lapping over and over onto the shore broke the silence of the night. Which is why, when someone sat down next to her, a startled cry escaped from her lips and she nearly jumped out of her skin.

"Sorry," TJ apologized, loosening the bow tie at his neck and unbuttoning the top button. "I thought for sure you saw or heard me coming."

Faith put a hand to her chest. "Quite all right. Must have been wool gathering."

So that she would not have to consider just how handsome this man looked in the starlight, she looked back out at the water. The silvery moonlight reflecting on the crystal clear waters shimmered like a diamond mine. She thought about how nice it was to not feel so alone at the moment, surrounded as she was by the raw beauty all around them.

"I'm really looking forward to the show next week." TJ confided.

Faith nodded. "Elizabeth does a beautiful job with coordination and choreography. I've flown in a few shows, and hers is by far the best one." She brought her legs up so she could rest her cheek on her knees. She had her face turned to look at him. "If I could only sleep."

"Jet lag?"

"Mmm hmm," she said, closing her eyes. "I get it so badly."

"My father has spent his entire career bouncing from one time zone to another and has never even yawned. It drives me nuts. I get jet lag when the time changes in the fall."

Faith smiled and opened her eyes again. "What's your father really like? What does he do?"

TJ shrugged. "Whatever he wants. If a business looks interesting to him, he acquires it." He picked up a piece of driftwood the size of a stick of gum and started breaking it into smaller pieces. "To me, it's overwhelming, thinking about the thousands of little details he has to keep up with every day."

"So you hide in your books."

TJ snorted a laugh. "Not too much. But that's what my baby sister says. She's always been there, in his office every chance she could get. She has his mind for it. Me, not so much."

An only child herself, Faith asked, "What is the age difference between you and your sister?"

He met her eyes and she could tell he was pleased that she had asked a somewhat personal question. "I'm a little more than two years older than she."

"Ah," Faith said, nodding. "And how old is she?"

TJ grinned at her roundabout question. "I think I know what you're asking. I'm just two months older than you, Faith."

Shocked, she demanded, "How do you know how old I am?"

He waggled his eyebrows. "I have my ways."

She could feel the heat on her cheeks and decided to change the subject back to safer territory. "So what are you going to do with your Ph.D.?"

"Write. Teach. Publish. Teach. I have dozens of ideas. If I didn't have to write so many papers for school, I'd be able to get some books written. This coming semester is my last one. Then I'll start writing for me."

Faith slipped the shawl off her shoulders and spread it behind her. Then she leaned back, letting the shawl serve as a barrier between her elbows and the sand. "Sitting still and writing. I couldn't sit long enough to write a check, much less an entire book."

"But you can sit long enough to fly from London to New York."

With a dismissive gesture of her hand, Faith said, "That's entirely different."

"Not so much." TJ stretched out on his side, facing her, his head propped up with his hand. He reached over and ran a finger over the bare skin of her forearm. "I really enjoyed you sitting with us tonight at dinner."

Faith thought back to the dinner and the tables of the Viscolli family. In what seemed like a whirl, she met aunts, uncles, young and old cousins, and lifelong friends. She didn't think she'd ever met a happier, closer group of people in her life. "It was rather amazing. I'm afraid my family is just me and Grandmum. Well, and some cousins."

"No brothers or sisters?" TJ asked.

Faith felt a little bit like a school girl with a crush all of a sudden. "Just me. Grew up rather spoiled, I should think. Not like your family."

TJ gave her a one sided grin. "I have a remarkable family. And they liked you very much. Spoiled or not."

She felt a flush tinge her cheeks and hoped the night served to disguise it. What she wanted to say was that she liked him very much, but she was afraid to say it. Instead, she just smiled. "I enjoyed talking to Peter O'Farrell. I have a friend who is from the same county as he."

"You'll rarely meet anyone more faithful to God than that man. You should hear his testimony."

"I would probably enjoy that very much."

"He's getting old but he's still in great health. He blames corned beef and cabbage."

Faith smiled a smile that bared her teeth. She really liked this attractive man. "My grandmum's health is starting to fail, I'm afraid."

TJ met and held her gaze. "It is incredible that she's still living. What a blessing that must be for you to have had your whole life to get to know her. I would love to meet her and talk with her. She's the last one. I checked."

Faith nodded, feeling her smile fade. Every year as Remembrance Day or the anniversary of the Normandy invasion neared, Faith had to beat back an army of reporters looking for some human interest quote from the war hero. They hounded her grandmother in recent years with a ferocity that fully equaled the anonymity and obscurity that surrounded her for decades after the actual war ended. "The last living Virtue. There's a book, there, I suspect."

Apparently out of the blue, TJ changed the subject. "Faith, will you join me for dinner tomorrow night? Just the two of us?"

She turned her body toward him and rested her weight on one elbow. "That depends, I suppose," she answered.

He reached out and took her free hand, running a thumb over her knuckles. "Depends? On what?"

Faith raised an eyebrow. "On whether you want to take me to dinner because you're attracted to me. Or perhaps because I saved your life the other day. Or is it because I'm Faith Green, the granddaughter of Helen Green the famous Virtue?"

TJ said, "There's only one possible answer to those questions."

Faith raised her eyebrow. "And that is?"

He smiled his most charming smile. "Yes."

Faith sat up, her tone very flat. "That's rather what I thought. Pity."

TJ's eyebrows came together in a sharp frown. "I don't understand."

"As the son of the very rich and very powerful Tony Viscolli, I should think you actually do understand." Faith pushed herself to her feet and bent down to pick up her shoes and shawl. "Once you have it sorted, you know how to contact me."