And You Will Find Love

No Face had come out of nowhere, wresting the cane away from Chet and hitting him with it.

"Back up and go!" No Face told her.

Barbara did not think she had room enough to back up, but managed to and sped away. When she looked in her rear-view mirror she did not see No Face, just Chet using his cane to try and get up from the sidewalk.

When Barbara arrived at Glenview Academy later that morning, still shaken from her latest encounter with Chet Armstrong, she asked where she might find Tim Riordan and learned he was in the gym. What she saw when she got there angered and unnerved her even more than Chet had.

To one side of the gym, she saw Stephen Collier in a boxing ring, coaching two boys in boxing trunks who were swinging at each other with boxing gloves. The taller boy was her godson.

Barbara started for the ring in a fury, but then stopped, realizing that Tim would be very upset with her if she interfered. With every once of self restraint she could muster, she turned and walked back out of the gym and found a cadet.

"Please tell Captain Collier right now that Barbara Markey wants him to stop his class and see her out here in the hall, immediately!"

Puzzled, the cadet did as he was asked while Barbara watched from out in the hall and through a window into the gym. She saw the cadet give Stephen her message, then he told the boys to break and stop their boxing match. Moments later, he came out into the hall outside the gym to see her.

Wearing a sleeveless white silk undershirt and white coach's trousers with a wide black leg stripe, his silver hair mussed from refereeing the boxing match, she was momentarily distracted by how handsome he looked. She could not help but notice he had a finely toned upper body; flat stomach, almost no hips, and pectorals to die for, beautifully pronounced under the thin silk. She thought he was, in fact, gorgeous.

She almost gasped or cried, discovering his physical beauty, which before then had been limited just to his face and hair. Now she thought he must be beautiful all over.

But then she remembered why she asked to see him. He then became -- had to become -- just a man to her; a man to be reckoned with.

"I will not have Tim boxing!" Barbara exploded. "I loathe and detest boxing. It's barbaric! Because of boxing, one of the finest men I've ever known is today a vegetable! If I had known Tim was taking boxing lessons, from you or anyone, I would have had him taken out of the school!"