Seagulls shrieked overhead, and with the muted thunder of the ocean, he hardly heard the knock on the hotel room door. Probably would have missed it entirely, but for the excited, familiar squeal that immediately followed.
“I’ll get it!”
Turning, Jeff headed inside in time to see his own personal little hurricane racing to the door.
“Hey,” he called, “what did I tell you about opening doors—”
Too late.
Like every other female in his life, this one had a mind of her own. Laughing, the little girl yanked the door open before Jeff could stop her. And then Sam was there, standing in the doorway, shock glazing her eyes.
Sam’s heart stopped.
She actually felt it jolt hard, stop, then start up again with a thudding roar that pounded in her ears and rattled her soul.
Staring down into a small, smiling face with pale blue eyes just like her own, Sam knew. Knew without the slightest doubt that this was her daughter. Her child. The one she’d given up nearly eight years before. The one she’d come to tell Jeff about.
Jeff.
Still reeling, she forced herself to tear her gaze from the child who was a mini-Marconi and look at the man stepping into the room from the balcony. The scent of fresh flowers and the sea filled the room and a sharp, cold wind entered with him. Sam thought he looked . . . annoyed.
Her world had just been rocked and he was pissed?
“Hi, who’re you?”
A small voice, confident, happy. Sam looked back at the little girl and wondered how she ever could have stopped looking at her. She was perfect. Her dark reddish-brown hair was pulled into pigtails high at the sides of her head and the ends of her thick, wavy hair hung past her shoulders. She had bangs cut just a little crookedly over big blue Marconi eyes and her mouth was curved in a wide smile, displaying a missing front tooth.
Oh God.
Who am I? she thought desperately. I’m your mother.
Pain knifed through Sam, leaving her breathless in its wake. Throat tight, lungs labored, Sam couldn’t stop watching the child—as if half-afraid the little girl might vanish. She drank in the sight of her daughter and thought she might drown in the joy of it. Dismissing Jeff as though he weren’t even there, Sam committed this first sight of her child to memory, etching it into her brain so that not even time would be able to erase it.
Sam struggled for air. Fought for it as a dying man battles to stay alive just one more minute. Her heartbeat raced, thundering in her chest. Her stomach spun wildly as though she were on one of those weird carnival rides that turned you every which way but loose. She slapped one hand to the doorjamb to keep herself steady even while trying to find her voice.
“I’m Sam,” she finally said, ignoring the child’s father as he moved into an openly protective stance just behind the girl. “Who’re you?”
“I’m Emma Hendricks and—” She stopped and looked back at Jeff for one more heart-stopping moment. “This is my daddy and Sam’s a funny name for a girl.”
“I guess it is,” she said, and silently congratulated herself on managing to get another sentence past the horrible, tight knot in her throat. Emma. Her daughter’s name was Emma. A pretty name. One she might have chosen herself if she’d had the chance. Sam’s eyes filled for missed chances and empty years and she blinked frantically to keep them at bay. Not that she worried about crying in front of Jeff, but she didn’t want her vision to be blurred. Not now. Not when she finally had the opportunity to actually see the child she’d once held briefly in the crook of her arm.
Oh God, the child she’d wondered about and prayed for, for eight long years, was standing in front of her, smiling at her—and seeing a stranger.
Emma wore pink shorts, a white short-sleeved T-shirt with pink ribbon around the neck, and bright blue Barbie sneakers with white ankle socks. She had a Band-Aid on her right knee, and freckles across her nose.
And Sam thought she’d never seen anything more beautiful.
“Are you here to see my daddy?”
Daddy.
Strange how much power one little word contained. The joy within receded under a tide of anger that slowly rose inside her. “Yes,” Sam said, aiming one more brief look at Jeff. He was stonefaced—no expression of apology or shame to be seen. And dammit, he should be ashamed. He hadn’t wanted Emma. Hadn’t wanted Sam. He’d thrown away what they’d had and then, like a rat-bastard-lying-weasel-dog, he’d slipped under Sam’s radar and stolen their child without bothering to tell her. He’d been able to love their daughter freely. He hadn’t been haunted by decisions made by a scared eighteen-year-old. He hadn’t spent every birthday, every Christmas, every Easter, wondering where she was and if she was safe. No, Jeff had been there, with their daughter, watching her grow and change.
God, she wanted to scream. She wanted to kick something. Break something.
But mostly, she wanted some answers.
Now.
“Yes, I’m here to see your daddy,” Sam said tightly, wondering if he could hear the ice in her voice. If he could see the fury in her eyes. If he cared.
“Go to your room, honey,” Jeff said.
Emma’s little face screwed up in a tiny mask of disappointment/pouting/temper. “Daddy, you said we could get ice cream.”
“We will,” he said, stroking one hand over the back of her head. “Later. First, Sam and I have a few things to talk about.”
A vise clamped around Sam’s heart and squeezed as she watched father and daughter together. Their easiness with each other was touching and, oh, so hard to look at. If things had been different . . .
Oh yeah, they had to talk, she thought. That’s for damn sure. They had plenty to talk about and it would be much better for everyone if Emma were nowhere around when they did.
“Good-bye, Sam,” Emma said, and turned toward the door on the right. As she walked, she managed to drag her feet as if they were both chained to anchors. Clearly, she didn’t want her father to miss the fact that she was disappointed. And just as clearly, Emma had inherited the Marconi flair for drama.
As soon as Emma was gone, Sam could breathe again. However, her whole body ached, as if she’d been tackled by a three-hundred-pound linebacker. She’d had her feet knocked out from under her and her breath slapped from her chest. Shaken, she kept a firm grip on the doorjamb, just in case her knees suddenly decided to give out.
“I wasn’t expecting to see you,” he said. His voice rumbled through the room, sounding like far-off thunder.
“I guess not,” she said quietly, watching him walk across the elegantly appointed room. As she’d expected, he’d taken a suite. The wood gleamed, crystal vases were filled with fragrant flowers, and warm colors and overstuffed furniture made for a soft, cozy space.
And for as much as Sam gave a damn, it could have been a concrete cell painted beige.
He closed the door on Emma, shutting the girl out of whatever they might have to say. Then he turned and walked back toward Sam. His expression carefully neutral, he kept his gaze on hers and waited for her to speak first.
“She doesn’t know me,” Sam whispered, her gaze shifting now to the closed door standing between her and her child.
“Why should she?”
Sam snapped him a look and hissed at him. “I’m her mother.”
He was unimpressed. “You were.”
New pain, fresh and sharp as a well-honed blade, sliced through what was left of her heart. Her fingers dug into the doorjamb until she wouldn’t have been surprised to see half-moon indents from her nails pressed into the wood. “I gave her up so that she could have a family.”
“Spare me.” He laughed shortly and stepped nearer, closing the space separating them until he could whisper harshly and be sure she heard. “You gave her to my mother.”
“What?” Sam finally understood that old cliché about “seeing red.” A crimson haze surrounded her vision, clouding everything in a shimmering wave of pulsing fury that poun
ded and rippled in time to the beating of her own heart. When she thought she could speak without blowing the top of her head off, she whispered, “Are you out of your mind?”
He sneered at her. No other word for it. The expression was one tyrants and despots reserved for the peon who made the mistake of crossing them. And he had it down cold. Must be in the genes, she thought wildly. Grow up rich and learn that sneer from the cradle up.
“Drop the act, Sam. No point in it now, is there?”
There went the top of her head.
She punched him. Hard. Her fist hit his chest and bounced off like a bullet ricocheting off a brick wall and it didn’t help a bit. “You are crazy.”
A muscle in his jaw twitched and a flash of memory blasted through Sam’s brain. Jeff had always been one of the most . . . controlled human beings she’d ever met. That had been part of his fascination for her when they first met. Since she’d grown up in a houseful of people who shouted more often than they spoke, meeting a man whose aplomb was rarely shaken had been . . . intriguing. The one sign he’d shown of temper was that jaw twitch. And with enough of a push, she knew she could make him surrender to the anger and give it free rein.
That would suit her just fine. The way she was feeling at the moment, there was nothing she’d like better than a good old-fashioned screaming match.
But even admitting that to herself, she couldn’t give in to the urge. Not with Emma . . . Emma . . . right there, in the next room. She had to find a way to fight in his style. Cold. Controlled. Reasonable.
It wouldn’t be easy. What she was feeling went beyond pain. Beyond fury. Beyond anything she’d ever known before.
Reaching out, she grabbed a fistful of his crisply starched shirt and dragged him out into the hall. He came willingly enough, then pulled the door to quietly behind them. When they were alone, she released her grip on his shirt and gave a furtive look down the short hall to make sure no one else was within earshot. They were alone. Sunlight streamed through the leaded-glass window at the end of the hall and laid intricate patterns on the deep burgundy floor runner. More flowers, in a vase atop a table just below that window, sent the almost cloying scent of roses into the still air and Sam’s stomach churned.
Ignoring the sensation, she focused on him. On the man she’d once loved more than anything else in the world. The man who’d walked away from her without a backward glance.
Old pain simmered deep inside, blending with the fury that still bubbled in her blood, and together they formed a mixture that nearly choked her. “Don’t screw with me, Jeff. If I murdered you now, I’d find a way to get away with it.”
“Nice,” he said, nodding. “Good to know you’re still making idle threats.”
“Who says they’re idle?”
“Jesus, Sam.”
She shook her head and lifted one hand for silence. When she had it, she sputtered, “Just what did you mean in there? I never gave my baby to your mother. I thought I’d arranged for her to have a family.”
His eyes narrowed. Dark slits of pure fury. The muscle in his jaw twitched again. “Don’t screw with me, either, Sweet Cheeks. If you didn’t give Emma to her, just how did I get her?”
She swallowed hard and tried to breathe at the same time. Not easy. “That’s the million-dollar question, isn’t it? I specified to the adoption attorney that I wanted her to go to a good home.”
“She did.”
“With two parents.”
“She didn’t need two,” he said and shifted his long legs until they were braced apart, like a man standing on the deck of a wildly bucking ship at sea. “She had me.”
God, how could the pain keep coming? Wasn’t there a saturation point? One at which her body would simply say, Sorry, no more pain here. We’re full up. No more room? Apparently not. Her nerves danced, her brain raced, and her stomach did a quick somersault that made her wish she carried barf bags in her purse.
“How did she get you is what I want to know.”
“You know damn well how.”
His eyes. Anger splintered in those dark centers and flashed like a warning beacon. But she couldn’t pay attention. There was too much she had to know. Too much she had to say. And if he wanted to fight, then she’d be happy to oblige him. Sam couldn’t remember any other time in her life when she’d been balanced quite so neatly on a razor’s edge. She felt as though if she tipped too far one way or the other, she’d fall into some slimy black hole and just sink to the bottom.
How did this day manage to keep getting crappier?
Taking a deep breath, she told herself to fight for calm. She remembered her mother’s voice always telling her daughters, “Think before you speak.” Unfortunately, Mama had been disappointed on that one. The Marconi girls tended to jump feet first into the fire and only then worry about how to stomp out the flames. “I know that I gave her up for adoption after you sent me divorce papers.”
He stared at her for a long minute, then shook his head and laughed shortly. “Nice try. You sent the papers, babe. I was in London. Remember?”
She swayed, as if his words had had a physical as well as an emotional impact. Oh, she remembered everything. In vivid, digitally enhanced color. She remembered meeting him, falling desperately in love in a few short weeks, and knowing, absolutely knowing, that she would never be happy unless they were together.
Their families had argued against it.
The Marconis, concerned that their eighteen-year-old daughter was far too young to get married, tried reasoning with Sam. It hadn’t worked. Jeff’s mother had tried a different tactic. She’d threatened to disinherit him. But he hadn’t been bowed and his mother eventually caved in as he’d been so sure she would.
Memories rushed through Sam’s mind, staggering her with the onslaught of lost passion and buried pain. But she couldn’t stop it. She felt it all again. Saw it all again. Saw herself as a young bride, living in a tiny apartment, and for the first couple of weeks everything was great. But then reality crashed and took them down with it.
Didn’t matter, she thought. Nothing mattered now. Nothing but Emma.
“I sent you a letter, Jeff. Telling you about the baby. You sent it back to me. Unopened.”
“Bullshit.”
“And,” she added, as if he hadn’t spoken at all, “you sent along a set of divorce papers.”
He shook his head, but something in his eyes shifted, changed, softened from anger to suspicion. “No I didn’t.”
“Somebody did,” she snapped, leaning toward him. “And I’ve still got my returned letter to prove it.”
He scraped one hand across the back of his neck. “Assuming that such a letter exists,” he said tightly, “why the hell would you keep it?”
“As a reminder.”
“Of what?”
She looked up into his eyes. “It reminds me of the mistake I made in trusting the wrong person.”
He winced.
She didn’t care.
“Show me,” he said.
Chapter Four
“I don’t believe this,” Jeff said, clutching the unopened, nine-year-old envelope. But he did. Dammit, he did. Standing in Sam’s old bedroom in the Marconi family house, he half-expected one of her sisters to charge into the room swinging a chain saw. And right this minute, he couldn’t even say he’d blame them.
They’d left Emma back at the inn. The owner’s sixteen-year-old daughter had been happy to earn another twenty bucks babysitting. And this was definitely something he and Sam had to do alone. Just the two of them.
For years, he’d told himself that he and Emma had been lucky to escape Sam. She’d divorced him and given their child away. She hadn’t wanted either of them in her life. And he’d made peace with that long ago. Now he was forced to face the idea that all of it had been a lie. That his own mother had orchestrated everything from behind the scenes. “Damn her.”
“Huh? Damn who?” Sam’s voice, insistent, cracking, as if she were about to snap in two.
All that was holding her together were the tight bands of anger he could practically see.
His hand tightened on the still-sealed envelope and his gaze fixed on the too-familiar scrawl across the front of it. “My mother.”
God, how it cost him to admit this. To acknowledge that Eleanor Hendricks would go to such amazing lengths to get her son away from a woman she’d always considered unsuitable. Rage swept him like a brush fire consuming a hillside. It kept climbing, burning hotter and hotter, and there was no way of stopping it.
“Your—” She stared at him for a long count of ten and then stomped past him toward the window that overlooked the wide expanse of front lawn. An ancient oak stood in the center of the yard, sending gnarled, twisted branches out into a canopy of papery leaves that danced in the ever-present wind. From below came the muted music of a wind chime moving lazily in the breeze.
While she stared blankly out the window, Jeff stared at her. Nine years and she looked even better than he remembered. And God knew, he remembered way too well—on those rare occasions when a memory of her flitted through his mind. He tried to not remember. What was the point, after all? But with Emma growing into a miniature version of her mother, was it so surprising that thoughts of Sam kept cropping up?
Those few, amazing weeks of their marriage had been the one and only time in his life that he’d let go. That Jeff hadn’t allowed himself to be ruled by the Hendricks dogma, “What will people say?” At nineteen, he’d discovered passion and the freedom of being himself—or at least being the man he’d become when he was with Samantha.
She had staggered him.
Literally.
The first time he saw her, she’d run him down in her successful attempt to catch a wildly thrown football. When she helped him up, he’d looked into her pale blue eyes and fallen all over again.
Unfortunately, they hadn’t been able to see past their own passion far enough to know that the only thing waiting for them was pain.
And now the past had come back to bite him on the ass.
And Then Came You Page 4
