Their Discovery (Legally Bound Book 3)

by Rebecca Grace Allen

  That was why she never kept stuff like Lucky Charms in the house anymore. Not only was that sugary stuff not good for Allegra, but Sam was in constant fear of how easily she could literally tip the scale back in the other direction.

  The gym was fairly empty, so Sam did a quick warm-up, then went to the weights floor. Lifting was her jam, the only place where she felt like she had any kind of power. At home she could put in all the effort she wanted and it wouldn’t change anything. Here, effort put in yielded results. Squats. Lunges. Deadlifts. Here she was in control. Here she was surrounded by other adults, even if they were mostly the stay-at-home moms she’d tried to befriend but quickly discovered she had nothing in common with.

  The women she’d met had never seemed to get her, or her children. They’d go on about how wonderful motherhood was, how peaceful and fulfilling, how much Sam should cherish these days when her babies were young. But then there were the side-eyes when Allegra refused to follow directions at mommy-and-me Gymboree. All judgy and self-righteous, they’d whisper when Sam had to corral Allegra back to the routine. And don’t get her started on why Sam had named her Allegra. No, it wasn’t because she liked the allergy medicine. The name meant joyful, thank you very much, not that she’d seemed all that happy during library storytime. Other kids would listen quietly while Allegra tried to rip pages out of books and screamed when Sam stopped her. The moms would glare, and Sam would glare back, too sleep-deprived to care.

  Yeah, she cherished those days. Fuck other moms. That was a meme she should post on her Instagram.

  She finished her routine, racked her weights and went to the locker room. The Momzillas were chattering about the next book they’d become obsessed with, the only thing Sam had mildly bonded with them over.

  “Mommy porn.” That’s what they’d called it. Sam had never read romance before, but she couldn’t help her curiosity when they were all gushing about it. She grew fascinated by the power dynamics—which characters took the lead and which ones didn’t. Who gained satisfaction from the obedience of the other. The intricate world of protocols, safewords, limits and consent.

  It had been a decent escape, for a time. A flimsy substitute for sex, because if she wasn’t having it, she might as well read about it. But those women were almost always bossed around in a way she never got on board with. And they all had amazing jobs and never had cake on their clothes, weren’t exhausted because there hadn’t been a night in ten years when a child wasn’t hollering for them in the middle of it. Plus, every book concluded with over-the-top, wildly perfect scenarios where they got the job and the guy, and saying “I do” automatically meant happy ever after.

  She showered and got dressed. Catching herself in the mirror, she grimaced at the sight of her four-leaf clover charm lit up by a red spot at the base of her throat. It wasn’t the necklace—she’d loved the anniversary gift Brady had given her, wore it all the time. But her skin always got splotchy after a workout. Her fair complexion often got her leaving the gym looking like Hope after she’d caught Fifth Disease, and the heat from the hair dryer was only going to make it worse.

  She flipped her head over and dried the strands in the back. Sam went from pale to lobster in the sun, had none of the trademark freckles redheads so often had, and could never find the right shade of concealer, but her hair was her calling card—her secret weapon and her best feature. It wasn’t flame bright but a classic rich red, vibrant and deep.

  Her hair was also her Achilles heel, her Kryptonite. She loved having it played with, her scalp so sensitive it tingled. Brady used to play with it in college, discovering it was the best relaxer, and foreplay.

  Another thing he’d forgotten.

  Finished drying, she flexed a bicep, took a mirror selfie and uploaded it to Instagram.

  #MondayMotivation #FitGirl #HealthyIsTheNewSkinny

  #IsThisAllIHaveToShowForMyself?

  Yeah, skip the last tag. She hit share and her phone started buzzing with likes, people who followed her weight-loss journey and found her inspirational. She enjoyed the attention, but they were accounts online, clicks on devices scattered across the globe. The one person she wanted to notice never seemed to.

  Back on the road, Sam stopped at the pharmacy to pick up Allegra’s pills. It didn’t seem like they’d found the right mix, but despite the outbursts of the last two days, they were in a better place than they’d been.

  First there was the can’t-sit-still and on-a-whim behaviors that started when she was three, then the out-of-control hyperactivity and academic underachievement in kindergarten. Sam had been the one to fill out the paperwork to get Allegra diagnosed. She’d wanted Brady’s input, and to suggest they do the same for him, but he’d of course made jokes about it, and Sam hadn’t had the energy to push it. He didn’t come to the appointments Sam was always shuttling Allegra to, either: the pediatrician for the meds, individual counseling for Allegra and family therapy to map out the behavior plan. They’d started Allegra on a low dose of a stimulant, but the first medication had amped her up so much she couldn’t fall asleep, while another threw her into a zombie-like trance. Now she was on a short-lasting, four-hour drug, but when it wore off she got hangry, so she always needed nutritional snacks on hand in between the morning dose and the second one she took in the nurse’s office before lunch.

  The bad days were when Allegra ditched those snacks for something full of food dyes at school, or when it was a schoolmate’s birthday. Sam steered Allegra clear of those foods at home, and they’d already had to discuss what kind of food she could expect at her own party in a few months, but Sam couldn’t control what happened when she wasn’t there. Even the school support team wasn’t much of a help. Allegra qualified for Section 504, which got her assistance with writing assignments into her planner, a seat far from distractions and a quiet area for test-taking, but even that wasn’t helping. And as Allegra spun in more circles, Hope stood so still it was like she was trying to disappear.

  It was almost comical, what a bad job Sam was doing raising them.

  Prescription filled, she headed toward her parents’ place. Fifteen minutes east on Beacon Street, it was prime real estate, with a brick-and-stone exterior and steps from the T. They were going to make a killing from it, whenever they ended up selling.

  She used her key to open the door. “It’s me,” she said, then nearly tripped over a giant box. “What’s this?”

  “Oh, I signed up for one of those meal delivery services,” Sam’s mom said, one hand on a kitchen chair as she tried to reach for a screaming tea kettle. “Thought we’d see if we liked it.”

  Sam stepped quickly over to her mother. “I’ve got that, Mom. Sit.”

  Once her mother was safely in a chair, Sam removed the kettle from the stovetop. “So my cooking isn’t good enough for you now, huh?” she asked with a smile, gesturing toward the box.

  “You won’t be cooking for us in Arizona,” her mother said.

  Sam paused as she poured two cups of tea. Her parents had bought a condo in Sedona months ago on a whim after visiting friends out there, but they hadn’t made any decisions about moving.

  She brought the tea to the table. “How are you feeling?”

  Her mother waved a hand. “The cold always makes it harder.”

  “That’s why I’m here.”

  Sam returned to the counter and began straightening up. The rheumatoid arthritis her mom had developed when Sam was in high school made housework difficult. They’d downsized into this apartment after Sam went to college—a second-floor building with an old elevator. They weren’t helpless, certainly not now that Dad had retired, but cleaning, helping with meals and keeping everything organized was what Sam had done when she lived here, so she’d kept on doing it.

  “Where’s Dad?” she asked.

  “He’s peering through his bookshelf, trying to pick out which books to give away.” Her mother huffed out a sigh. “Leave the counter be, will you? Sit here and talk.”

&nbs
p; Sam held out a block of cheese with mold on it. “You know this is bad, right?”

  Her mother took it from her hand and put it on the table. “It’s fine. How was the wedding?”

  They’d been invited—Jack had known them for ages—but they’d said no because Sam’s mom didn’t want to “overdo it.” She was in much better shape now, but the paranoia of having more problems had settled in long ago.

  “It was nice.” Sam scavenged through a cabinet for more expired products. “Allegra had a few meltdowns.”

  “Poor girl. I don’t get why she has it so rough.”

  Neither did she.

  “Was it a fun night, though?” her mom asked. “Did you and Brady dance?”

  “It would’ve been nice if we had.”

  “So why didn’t you?”

  Because only couples who talked and touched danced at weddings. “We’re not getting along right now.”

  “That makes me sad.”

  Sam shut the cabinet and turned around. “Well, you taught me to be honest.”

  Her parents had been college professors, and both at UMass Amherst. They valued education, and had raised Sam to be moral, ethical and straightforward.

  Maybe she’d become a bit too much of the last one.

  Her father came in with a smile, dressed in the same sweater, shirt and tie he’d worn when he was teaching, a pile of books in his hand. “There’s my scholar.”

  He kissed Sam on the cheek. Sam rolled her eyes with a smile. “I haven’t been a scholar for a while now.”

  “You’ll always be one to me.” He put the books he was holding on the table, a tattered old hardcover of the complete works of Franz Kafka on top of it. “These are going.”

  “You’re giving away Kafka?” she asked in surprise.

  “I thought we always agreed he was incredibly overrated.”

  “We did.” She’d found the grotesqueness and utter hopelessness of his work to be more like neurosis than art, but one of these stories had a special place in her heart. She wasn’t letting this one get donated away.

  “I’ll take care of it,” she said, and slipped the volume in her purse.

  “It makes me sad,” her mother said, emphasizing the word like Sam needed the reminder, “because you two have so much history. Seventeen years is a long time.”

  Funny, how everyone glossed over when Sam and Brady weren’t together. They’d met seventeen years ago, but the time she’d spent in DC was forgotten like it was something negligible, easily written off.

  The unfairness of it made her want to scream like Allegra having one of her temper tantrums. After dominating her high school model congress and spending her summers volunteering for local politicians, Sam had charged headfirst into B.U.’s Political Science program, tacking on a double minor in French Studies and English Lit. By her junior year she was running a four-oh, was a member of student government and a peer tutor, making her a shoo-in for the DC Internship Program.

  It had taken her away from Brady for a semester, but they’d only been casually dating at the time. She wasn’t serious about him, not the way she’d been about her studies. And Washington had been a dream come true: the culture, the pace, the politically charged atmosphere of a town that ran on power and favors. She fell in love with life on The Hill, and with being assigned to Representative Arnold Dawes, a Democrat from California who was a ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Reform.

  Brady had probably figured she wouldn’t be sticking around when she returned to school the following semester, even before she’d received the call from Dawes saying there was a position waiting for her after graduation.

  “He’s a good man,” her father added, taking a sip of his tea. “Takes good care of you and the kids. That’s not something you throw away.”

  “Yes, he’s a good man,” Sam said. It didn’t mean things were working though. Didn’t mean she was happy. “And no one is throwing out anything.” She retrieved the block of moldy gouda from the table. “Except for this cheese.”

  She threw it into a large black garbage bag, then went into the other rooms to begin gathering up what was in the trash.

  “Did you tell your doctors about your decision yet?” she hollered from the living room.

  “Oh yes, they’re supportive,” her mother yelled back. “My physical therapist said I can exercise more regularly in a warm environment.”

  “Did he say changing locations would make a long-term difference?”

  “No, but I’m not willing to risk my health anymore before this hip replacement wears out.”

  Sam kept her eyes on her tasks. That had always been a fear, for all of them. Her mother’s condition had progressed when Sam was in DC, requiring total joint replacement. Sam came home without a second thought—Mom was having surgery, so she was on a plane, no questions asked. But then one of her implants dislocated, her body rejecting the hip, requiring a second surgery. A one-week trip home turned into two, then a month, and then having to call the congressman and say she couldn’t come back for a while because her family needed her.

  Turned out rock bottom was sitting in a PT waiting room watching C-SPAN.

  Sam became the one to take Mom to her appointments, sleeping on her parents’ couch because there was no bedroom for her, and she wasn’t planning on staying long. Now they were trading the Massachusetts chill for the warmer, arid climate of the Southwest and a summer-camp-style retirement community, leaving Sam without their support and wondering what she’d come home for in the first place.

  “How soon is this happening?” she asked. “Today? Tomorrow? Next year?”

  “We don’t have a definite date yet,” her mother said.

  “It would be nice to know, so I could prepare myself.” The ambiguousness of it made the need for a sitter more urgent.

  Her father must’ve heard the sadness in her voice, because he was suddenly in the living room next to her. “We’ll miss you, too,” he said. “But think of it this way: without us around and the girls in school, you can start working again.”

  Sam forced a smile. “I’m not sure it’ll be that easy. But I’m happy for you guys.”

  She didn’t begrudge her parents the right to enjoy their retirement. And without them here, there’d be less caretaking in her already chaotic and exhausting life. It was a good thing.

  Sam bagged up the trash, dumped it by the door, then gave them both a kiss on the cheek. “Gotta go. Lots of errands to do.”

  “Give the girls a hug for us,” her father said.

  “And Brady!” her mother added.

  “I will,” she said, and headed out the door.

  4

  By the time Sam did the rest of her errands, which included purchasing a new pair of hip-hop dance shoes for Allegra—hot pink with sequins, of course—there were only a few hours left before the bus came back and the afternoon bedlam began. Sam started the dishwasher, then walked through the house, collecting toys and clothes and video game boxes as she went. This place was pure anarchy by the end of the weekend. She’d clean up on Mondays, but before she knew it, it was a disaster again, overrun with her children’s and husband’s stuff. Barely any space in this house felt like hers, which she supposed made sense. It wasn’t hers.

  The down payment had been a wedding gift from Brady’s parents. Extravagant, but Brady’s business was taking off at the time, and she was temping around Mom’s appointments. No steady income meant Sam couldn’t be on the mortgage, just on the deed. It was a beautiful house, but as she heaved a bin full of dry clothes up from the basement and dumped the contents on the couch, she couldn’t help but feel defeated.

  This was what her life had amounted to—separating piles of fabric in an empty house.

  She’d planned to be more, to use the education and skills she’d worked so hard to get. But she’d gotten pregnant quickly after she and Brady got married, and since she was still Mom’s Appointment Taxi it made more sense for her to stay home. She’d lo
oked at jobs again when Allegra was in pre-k, but then she’d discovered Hope was on the way and was back in the same boat again.

  The positive pregnancy test had been a shock. It was during the small window of time when she’d taken off some of the pounds she’d packed on with Allegra, and she and Brady were having sex again. Somehow she’d managed to forget to take her pill for a few nights. Usually so regimented, she’d gotten out of her routine, exhausted from dealing with a badly behaving three-year-old while shuttling Mom to appointments. And then, boom—she was doing all that, plus morning sickness.

  It was why she’d sworn never to have sex without two forms of protection again.

  She was more nauseous with Hope than she’d been with Allegra, and put on twice the weight. Add to that a more difficult birth, resulting in a longer recovery and two children under the age of five while Brady zipped back to work after two weeks of paternity leave.

  That was the US healthcare system for you.

  She balled up a pair of Hope’s socks and tossed them in the basket. She wasn’t blaming anyone for this. Lots of women made the choice to stay home. She supported Brady’s career—he was a genius with all things tech, and even when his work took over their lives, it was what put food on the table. But eventually, never being around adults had become suffocating. Daycare cost a small fortune, and for as much as her parents were good sitters, Mom could only take the girls for a few hours on her own. She’d sit for longer when Dad was home but steering clear of a flare-up meant avoiding exposure to infections, so she’d only babysit when the girls didn’t have any signs of a sniffle.

  How often were school-aged children germ-free?

  At least they were both in school now. She wanted to go back to work but it was another thing she felt powerless over. Who was going to hire her? She’d been out of the workforce for so long she felt paralyzed to get back into it. The one phone interview she’d had in December had been through luck and connections alone, but two months had gone by and she hadn’t heard diddly-squat.