Preacher's Daughter - Flora Ferrari Page 0,33

Hell-”

He shrugs at me, passing the phone back as I sink into my seat.

“Not great reception out here, I’m afraid. I’ll call him later, have a pow-wow, man to man,” Noah says absently to himself.

Nervously, I power down my phone, not wanting any sort of trace or whatever they call it.

From what I just heard Noah tell my Dad, and knowing my Dad… plus the recent news stories, I can only guess that Dad and Sheriff Brodie have assumed I’ve been kidnapped by the third and still at large bandit.

The bandit they think is Noah Templeton.

I shiver in my seat, feeling like I’m about to be sick.

“You alright?” Noah asks innocently, clapping my leg with his huge hand, and squeezing it.

“It’ll be fine, Faith. Your Dad will come around, you’ll see.”

It all clicks in my mind.

Noah’s no bandit, it’s all just a simple but now extremely complicated misunderstanding.

I left home with Noah and because of what else has happened, plus Sheriff Brodie, my Dad assumes Noah is bandit number three, kidnapping his daughter and promising to call him later with the demands.

My head starts to spin with the concept, and then starts to pivot again as I look behind us every thirty seconds, eyeing every car that passes us.

“I think it’s best if I just come straight out with it, Faith. With your Dad, I mean. No point beating around the bush. I mean, him being a man of God and all, I figure he’d appreciate the straight-up truth, what do you say?” he asks.

But I can only squirm in my seat some more, feeling the blood drain from my face as I look out the window.

“It’ll be just fine, Honey. You’ll see,” he comforts me again.

For the next few miles I sit silently until Noah actually starts to whistle, he’s that pleased with how he thinks things are going.

I can’t stand it a minute longer.

I have to tell him.

After asking Noah just now if there’s anything else he wants to tell me, it would look pretty stupid of me to even begin to try and explain what I think’s actually happening on my Dad’s end.

In the outside world, which I feel like could implode on us at any minute, driving around in Noah’s truck after staying at a hotel he’s just used his real name at too.

“Now, sweetie, you were asking me?” he says, feeling my mind with his.

I shift in my seat uneasily, only asking once Noah prompts me with his eyes before focusing on the road again.

“Is Noah Templeton your real name?” I ask, feeling silly but figuring it’s a question that’s a lot easier to answer than the million others I have right now.

Noah looks serious for a moment, creasing his mouth, and then studies me carefully in the rearview.

“Well, you may as well know it isn’t,” he says, sending a shockwave of surprise through me.

I thought a simple question might get me off the hook, not make things worse between us.

“I mean, it is, but it isn’t,” he adds cryptically.

I gulp loudly, wanting all this to be over so we can just go back to what we had at the hotel.

Noah and me, nothing and nobody else’s business.

Not meaning to I groan quietly.

“My middle name is Noah. I made it my first when I was a kid,” he says sheepishly, embarrassed. “Templeton was the name on my birth certificate, so I stuck with that too.”

I feel a sly grin of relief spread across my face.

“What’s your first name then, your real first name?” I ask, feeling better already.

“Not telling,” he says firmly, clamping his lips shut and shaking his head roughly.

I feel my fingers creeping over to him, walking up his side and then tickling under his ribs, amazed again at just how muscular the man is all over.

Every single inch is pure muscle.

He flinches, but only for a second and we both burst out laughing.

Real laughter, the kind I’ve never had with anyone else. I don’t need to know his first name, Noah is who he’ll always be to me anyhow.

“You really wanna know?” he asks, baiting me with his grin now, his eyes wide and wild.

I can’t help but laugh louder.

“No! No don’t tell me,” I squeal. “I don’t want to know, it must be terrible if you’re acting so crazy over it.”

“It’s… It’s…” he teases me, threatening to blurt it out.

“No, don’t!” I shout, gripping his arm. “Save it until we getting married!”

We both go quiet and I stop laughing, feeling my