They’d been young. Stupid. Ignorant. And a lot of other things. But Oliver had never been petty or cruel. She’d wanted him to be, because then she’d feel better about hating him. The man her family loved. The man she still loved.
“I’m sorry, Sam,” Oliver said softly.
She turned toward him, her whole world tilting back into focus.
It was as though she’d been walking around life with one shoe off—no balance—and a mess. And here he was, putting her to rights again.
In that moment, the only thing she wanted was him.
They stared at each other in the darkness, the sounds of the party a few steps away, and yet they were separate. In their own little bubble.
Oliver held out his hand, slowly, as though she might spook.
She took a step toward him and he wrapped his arm around her, bringing her in for a tight squeeze. Her head didn’t quite fit under his chin like it used to, but everything else was just right.
He smelled the same. And different.
She was at a loss. More than a bit wobbly. Everything she’d known about their dynamic was wrong.
The things she’d said to him over the years…
Oh, God. She’d been so mean.
She leaned back and jabbed a finger at his chest. His still very hard…muscular chest…
“How could you let me be such a bitch to you?” she demanded.
“Because I didn’t do right by you.”
She put her hands on her hips. “Oliver Falcón—”
“Sam, I felt awful, and maybe… I don’t know… Maybe I felt like I deserved it.”
“Do you have a therapist? Because you need one.”
He chuckled and flashed his smile at her. He’d always been a charmer, so easy on the eyes, even if he was an ass when it came to winning what he wanted.
“We’re good.” She didn’t know what good meant, but sooner or later she’d figure it out.
“I’m glad.”
They stared at each other for a few moments.
She’d never stopped feeling the zing around him, though he’d never seemed to acknowledge it. Had she been wrong about that, too? Because the way he was staring at her…
Sam shivered.
“Cold?” Oliver took her hand.
There were very good reasons the girls in high school had swooned over his dark eyes and generous mouth, that strong jaw…
“No, must have been a breeze.” She was in some sort of trance.
He leaned closer.
She licked her lips.
Her palms were probably sweating.
When had he gotten so close?
Her back was to the railing now, and he leaned in, their bodies brushing.
Oh, God… Oliver was going to…
“Sam? Sam!” The voice from her pocket was jarring and unexpected.
Oliver straightened, glancing from her to her hip.
“The blue team just took out the dojo. Sam, where are you?”
Shit.
“Guess what I just heard.” Sophia settled into the car next to the French Ambassador. She was technically an assistant or something, but in reality Sophia’s role was more of…an information gatherer.
“I don’t care.” Hugues Durand shoved his hand through his thinning hair. He had a lot riding on changing the minds in Washington and no real bargaining power.
Sophia knew Hugues was destined for failure. It was why such hefty demands were being made of him. If he couldn’t succeed, and chances were that he couldn’t, then the mayor of Paris would be appointed Ambassador by the end of the year. Still, it was Sophia’s job to make sure the current Ambassador had all the information he needed to do his job.
“Tonight didn’t go as planned?” Sophia turned to face the older man. It would appear that he needed to vent before he’d open his ears.
For the next fifteen minutes, Hugues complained loudly about the inactivity of the American Secretary of State and how he’d been ignored. That was the problem. Hugues thought very highly of himself. And no one else did.
“I heard something interesting tonight,” Sophia said after a pause that stretched on for a few moments too long.
“What?” Hugues stared out of the window.
“Someone out there has compromising pictures of Oliver Falcón and Samantha Grant.”
Hugues’ head turned slowly.
They stared at each other.
It wasn’t widely known that Hugues had blackmailed his way into being Ambassador, but Sophia knew. It was her job to know these things. Which meant this information was precisely the sort of thing Hugues would want to know about. And possibly act on.
“Find them.”
He bobbed his knee and hummed a tune, something Hugues only did when he had ideas.
Sophia almost pitied the poor woman, but not enough to care. She hadn’t been hired to have a heart, only knowledge.
3.
Oliver had to circle the block twice before he found an available parking spot near Samantha’s house.
This was a terrible idea.
He should have done what a normal thirty-something would have and Facebook messaged her. Or maybe called her. A text message would be a better idea than just dropping by. But here he was.
From where he’d parked outside a coffee shop a little ways down the road, he could see her front door.
A cluster of people stood at one end of the street, staring at their phones. The overabundance of Monster-Go shirts and paraphernalia were enough to tell him that there was probably more than one waystation near her place.
Maybe he should ring the doorbell, leave the flowers and scram.
It wasn’t like they’d spoken since before their near kiss last night.
What a bad time for his team to pull a rabbit out of a hat and take down the dojo.
Oliver leaned forward and thunked his head on the steering wheel.
What was he doing?
Sam was his boss’ daughter. As if it hadn’t been bad enough in college when she’d been his friend’s little sister. Careers ended because men fucked around with the boss’ family. And Oliver would be lying to himself if he said he didn’t want Sam back the way things had been in college. For a month and a half…he’d had it all. Six glorious weeks. And then it’d been over.
He was going over there. He just needed to man up, accept it and get this done with. If Sam wanted to talk or anything, it was up to her.
Oliver grabbed the flowers and his phone, pausing only to activate his app.
Man, the coffee stop was in proximity to two waystations, both with active lures.
No wonder Sam had leveled up so stinking fast since the game’s debut.
He kept his thumb on the screen. Might as well, in case something interesting spawned nearby.
Sam lived in a brownstone that had once been the Grant family’s DC home. Otherwise, the family had lived in Georgia. Now it was hers. He hadn’t visited since he was in high school. On more than one occasion, he’d partnered with Rashae for a project and wound up at the Grant house for dinner or lunch on the weekends. He’d always liked them. Their kindness. How normal they’d seemed.
Oliver paused at the foot of the stairs, staring at the slate gray door.
This was a terrible idea, but he couldn’t turn back now. Not when he’d seen the ghost of a chance in her eyes last night.
He took the stairs two at a time and knocked on the front door.
What if Sam wasn’t even home?
He hadn’t considered that one.
Shit.
He could always leave the flowers.
And let some stranger pick them up?
Oliver had found peonies in Sam’s favorite shade of pale pink. He couldn’t just leave them. They were for her.
The front door swung inward and he stared.
Sam stood there, barefoot, her toes painted pale purple, long legs on display in track shorts and a slouchy sweatshirt. Her eyes were wide, lips parted.
Yea
h. This was a bad idea, but here he was anyway.
“Hi, Sam.”
“Oliver.”
“I…um…brought you flowers.”
“I can see that.”
“Here.” He thrust them toward her.
Sam reached out and gently took the bunch of blossoms, cradling them in her arm.
They stood there for a moment, neither speaking.
“Would…you…like to come in?” Sam stepped back.
“Do you want me to?” Oliver rocked forward onto the balls of his feet.
Sam studied him for a moment. Her hair was down, framing her face. It looked so silky and soft. He wanted to touch it. Touch her. But right now he’d settle with just being permitted around her.
“I don’t know what I want,” Sam said finally.
It wasn’t the warmest reception he could have hoped for, but it was honest.
He stepped over the threshold, taking in the changes she’d made to the place. The color palette was soft grays, whites and pops of color. Modern and bright. Very Sam.
“The place looks good.” He peered into the dining room on one side, the sitting room on the other. He paused to stare at a framed, four-feet-tall painting of a…blue police box?
“Thanks.” Sam went to the right of the stairs, past the dining room and into the kitchen.
He followed, because where Sam went, he went as well.
She pulled a vase from under the sink and he slid into a stool. He’d sat here before, across from Helen and next to Rashae, tugging on Sam’s pigtails when she tried to dart by.
“What are you smiling about?” Sam arched a brow at him while she arranged the flowers so they were perfect.
“You.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” For the first time in ages, she said the words without sarcasm or bite. There was feeling there. Emotion. Angst. Much of what he was experiencing as well.
“I think about you all the time. How you’ve always been part of my better life. How much I miss you. How much I screwed up.” Saying those words was…liberating. And terrifying.
Sam stared at him, eyes wide, lips moving, but nothing coming out.
They just looked at each other for several moments.
She was the best of everything in one package. A very sexy package, but then his type had always been Sam.
Her lashes lowered and she closed her eyes for a moment. Pulling herself together. Unlike Rashae, Sam was calm, composed, level headed. Sam had an honesty that Lily lacked. There was something about Sam that made people like and trust her, which was why she was so good at her job.
“Why wouldn’t you tell me sooner? Why wait this long?” she asked finally.
He shrugged.
“Oliver.”
Ah, there was the pointed, dagger sharp glare.
“By the time everything was…fixed…you were happy. We’d moved on, in a way, and it didn’t seem like it would have made a difference.”
“You mean…I was engaged to Trevor.”
Busted.
“Yeah. You were.”
She folded her arms across her chest and they stared at each other. There were so many years he wanted to take back, do over, but every time he’d opened his mouth or thought it was time to clear the air…something came up. Sam’s engagement. A family member’s death. The campaigns. It was never the right time. It still wasn’t, and it hadn’t stopped him.
“I wish you would have told me. I’ve been a bitch to you.”
“I guess…I always thought I deserved it.” He shrugged and spread his hands. “You can’t deny that I was an ass at times.”
“You were.”
“The truth?”
In for a penny…
“Always.”
In for a pound…
Oliver stared deep into Sam’s eyes. Ever since he’d broken her heart, she refused to look directly at him for long. He’d missed this. Just looking at her. Knowing she saw him.
“I liked fighting with you,” he sat back on the stool, hands spread over the pale marble counters, “because then I knew when you went home you were thinking about me when I was thinking about you.”
The truth was out there. Now, what was Sam going to do with it?
Sophia flipped through a magazine as she sipped her coffee.
A brown envelope was lodged between the glossy pages halfway through.
She glanced around, but didn’t spy the seller. The source didn’t matter, only the merchandise, though Sophia would have preferred to know the person she was doing business with.
The store’s patrons were engrossed in their own activities. No one paid her any mind.
She plucked the envelope from the magazine, slipped it into her purse and rose, coffee in hand. The best she could tell, the seller was either the former mistress, an assistant of hers, or the mistress’ sister. Sophia’s money was on the sister, but without setting eyes on her, there was no way to tell.
The walk to her car was short. She slipped into the back seat and lost no time opening the envelope.
The quality was good. Close-up. In focus. She flipped through the two dozen images and smiled. There was no doubt who the subjects were. None whatsoever.
Her phone vibrated from the depths of her purse.
She was tempted to let it go to voicemail and finish her coffee, but there were things to do.
“What?” she said.
“He’s at her house.”
“Really?”
“Which one do you want me to follow?”
“If they split, follow her. I want to know what she’s doing. And if they stay together, I want evidence.”
Sophia didn’t need to elaborate on what evidence meant.
Samantha tried to swallow, but the lump in her throat was too tight.
How many nights had she lain awake, muttering curses because of Oliver and…deep down…all they’d really wanted was each other? What kind of screwed up game were they playing here?
She leaned against the edge of the apron sink and blew out a breath.
That was a metric fuck-ton to process. The implications…
Sam swallowed, and her poor heart limped along, trying to keep up. She’d felt wounded and hurt by him so many times, unable to free herself because…she didn’t want to. Her gaze slid to the flowers.
Oliver slipped off the stool. She tracked the soft thump, thump, thump of his footsteps around the island. Gooseflesh crawled up her shins and down her arms. Her body reacted to his nearness. It was always like this, but she’d stopped allowing herself to feel it, blocking out her natural response to him because she couldn’t act on it. Couldn’t feel for him like she wanted to.
He’d been the enemy.
And now…what was he?
He stopped less than a foot away from her and braced one hand on the island, the other on the sink. He was so…big. He took up space that wasn’t his to take. Like in her heart.
She tipped her head back, looking up at him.
Oliver used to pull her ponytail and call her a smarty pants. She still didn’t know when that’d changed, if it was the dare or something that’d always been there, waiting for them to grow into what they could have. They’d gone down that road once, and though she should have learned her lesson about falling for a jock like Oliver, here she was.
They were such different people. He lived and breathed competition. It was why he gelled so well with politics. She did it for the people. To make a better tomorrow. Living and breathing ideals.
On any given day, he’d watch sports and she’d turn on Firefly. They shouldn’t work. And yet…he was everything she wanted.
“Sam?” Oliver bent his head forward. His arm brushed hers. He was so close. Was he still a hundred-billion degrees warm?
“Oliver?”
“Do you still think about me?”
She opened her mouth to say no, to protect herself, and no words came out.
Yes, she still thought about him.
Yes, she still
wanted him.
Yes, God, yes, Oliver was the addiction she couldn’t shake.
Sam curled her hand around the back of his neck and pivoted toward him. He didn’t move, but his eyes ate her up.
She lifted up, just a bit, and kissed him. She had to.
At the first brush of his lips to hers, Oliver’s arms wrapped around her, hauling her up against his chest. It was as though by touching him she’d broken his restraint. His hands tangled in her hair. He pressed her back against the counter. His tongue thrust into her mouth and she groaned.
She wrapped her arm around his waist and pulled him closer, until she could feel the flex of every muscle where they were plastered together.
He pushed his knee between her legs and she sucked in a breath.
They’d been fumbling kids before. This? Oliver was a man, plundering her mouth. She had no doubt the thoughtful, playful lover she’d enjoyed years ago, had a number of new tricks up his sleeve.
It was too soon to have thoughts like that, wasn’t it?
He rocked into her.
Clearly it was not too soon.
“Oliver.” Was that needy, wanton voice hers?
He muttered words too soft for her to understand. She’d always known when he was truly turned on because he forgot what language he was speaking and jumbled his words up. Right now it wasn’t what he said that mattered, it was how he said it. The need in his voice.
This whole time…he’d wanted her as much as she’d wanted him.
“Sam? Sam, you left the front door unlocked.”
No.
No, no, no!
What was Lily doing here?
“Fucking—Christ.” Oliver let go of her and braced one hand on the kitchen counter.
“Lily.” Sam scrambled around the island smoothing her hair, pulling her sweater back down. She turned and waved at Oliver, whispering, “Bathroom.”
There was no hiding the tent he was pitching. She’d have to distract Lily and come up with a plausible reason for Oliver to be here. Something besides sucking face.
4.
Samantha was ready to rip her hair out. Or Lily’s. Would she just stop talking?
Sam didn’t care about the latest latte blend the coffee shop was peddling, but Lily wouldn’t shut up about it. She’d lately begun this weird habit of dropping in randomly just to chat. Ever since Sam had gotten fired, Lily seemed to have taken it on herself to get Sam out of her so-called-funk. Except Sam was funk-free. She hadn’t had time to get into a rut or be depressed.
The Jock and the Geek (Gone Geek Book 3) Page 3
