A Vow to Love

by Sherryl Woods

  Then, when she'd returned to Sam's room and been the target of his cranky attitude, she had known he was already on the road to recovery. Relief had washed through her even as he'd verbally sparred with her. She'd thought then that she would take endless doses of his foul humor any day over losing him. She'd actually looked forward to the coming days together.

  Twenty-four hours later, after they'd settled into Brandon's, Penny wasn't so sure either of them would survive Sam's slow recovery process. She was beginning to understand why the hospital had been so anxious to get rid of him. Saying that Sam was a bad patient was like saying Attila the Hun had a minor interest in power. His shouts echoed through her grandfather's house.

  "Dammit, get your hands off of me! Penny! Penny!"

  Sitting at the kitchen table having a much-needed cup of tea, Penny glanced at Mrs. Farnsworth, whose expression was filled with tolerant amusement.

  "I guess he doesn't care to be bathed by the visiting nurse's aide," Penny noted drily.

  "He'd probably rather it be you," the housekeeper said, looking innocent as a lamb as Penny choked on her tea.

  Penny doubted it was anything that lascivious. He was just being obstinate and mule-headed. "Is it time for his painkiller yet?" she inquired hopefully. "That usually knocks him out for an hour or so."

  Mrs. Farnsworth grinned. "He just took it. Probably stuck it under his pillow, if I know him."

  "Was he this obnoxious as a teenager?"

  "Worse. And he wasn't even sick when he'd hang around here then."

  Penny shook her head. "Hard to believe Grandfather didn't beat the dickens out of him."

  "Are you kidding? Those two were thick as thieves from the minute they met. Mr. Halloran always did admire a person with spunk. He loved having Sammy drop by."

  "Then Mr. Halloran ought to be back here babysitting him."

  Any further observations about the patient's temperament were cut short by another indignant shout. "Hell, woman, what are you trying to do? Scrub the skin off me? Penny! Get up here!"

  Penny and the housekeeper exchanged a glance.

  "I guess I'd better get upstairs before the woman refuses to set foot inside the house again," Penny said. "Have you got some lemonade? That ought to suit his sour mood."

  "Just made a fresh pitcher. You go on up. I'll bring it."

  Penny reluctantly climbed the stairs. The nurse, an expression of grim satisfaction on her face, met her halfway up.

  "Everything okay?" Penny asked Ruth Dawkins, a handsome African-American woman with twenty years' experience dealing with surly patients. She didn't look any the worse for her encounter with Sam.

  "It is now," she said. "Showed him this great big needle in my bag and told him I'd use it to dose him up with tranquilizers, if he didn't mind his manners."

  Penny didn't even try to contain her grin. "How'd he react?"

  "He's quiet, isn't he? I'll be back tomorrow. Same time. I don't expect I'll be having any more trouble."

  "No, I don't expect you will," Penny said. "Thanks, Ruth."

  "Honey, you decide to marry that man, I'd suggest you have counseling first to talk you out of it. He's a fine-looking man, but he's got the temper of the devil."

  "I don't think marriage is an issue, but if it ever comes up, I'll remember your advice. Maybe I'll even borrow that needle of yours."

  She climbed the remaining stairs quickly. She wanted to see if Ruth had actually tamed the beast. She found him sprawled across clean sheets, his head propped up against freshly fluffed pillows. His blond hair was tousled and he was still unshaven. Apparently he'd refused to allow Mrs. Dawkins near him with a razor or comb.

  The top sheet was draped strategically, leaving his bandaged chest bare and one leg poking out. Penny seriously doubted Ruth had left him covered so provocatively. She'd probably tucked that sheet up to his handsome chin.

  He turned an accusing look on Penny. "You left me alone with a crazy woman."

  "I hear she found a way to bring you in line."

  "She threatened me with a needle the size of one of Dana's knitting needles."

  Sam seemed faintly bemused by that. Penny grinned at him. "I've already asked her to lend it to me."

  He scowled at her. "Don't even think about it." He struggled into an upright position and swung his leg off the bed. "Help me up."

  She regarded him with astonishment. "Where do you think you're going?"

  "Outside. I do not intend to stay cooped up in this room. The sun's shining. I want to be outdoors."

  "The doctor doesn't want you climbing stairs."

  "Then you shouldn't have stuck me up here, should you? Get my pants."

  Penny folded her arms across her chest defiantly. "No."

  His gaze narrowed. Finally he shrugged. "Suit yourself."

  He stood and the sheet fell away. For the second time in recent weeks Penny was treated to an eyeful. The man was... She searched for a suitable word. Gorgeous didn't seem remotely adequate. Her pulse raced, in spite of her efforts to pretend indifference.

  "Sam," she protested.

  His eyes glittered with amusement. "Told you to get my pants."

  "Hasn't anyone ever introduced you to the concept of underwear?"

  "Sure. I've got a whole drawer filled with it."

  "You're supposed to wear it."

  "In bed? What for?"

  Penny groaned. She grabbed his pants off the back of a chair and handed them to him. "If you can get them on by yourself, then we'll talk about going downstairs."

  He glowered at her. "I can see why you decided to spend your life with books and germs. You don't know the first thing about getting along with flesh and blood people," he accused as he struggled to stay upright.

  "Talk about the pot calling the kettle black," she muttered. It took every ounce of willpower she possessed not to go to his aid as his complexion turned ashen. He finally uttered a sigh of disgust and collapsed back on the bed.

  She smiled at him as she gently tugged the sheet back into place. "Maybe tomorrow."

  "What am I supposed to do now?"

  "Rest."

  An oddly wistful expression came over his face. "Sorry. Don't know how."

  She realized in a heartbeat that it was probably true. He'd had a tough adolescence and turned into a compulsive overachiever from the day he'd joined the police force.

  "When was the last time you took a vacation?"

  "I was at the Cape a couple of weeks ago."

  "For the weekend," she reminded him.

  He shrugged. "That's it."

  "You took two consecutive days off and considered it a vacation?"

  "Three. I had Friday off, too."

  Penny shook her head. "It's going to be a very long recovery, isn't it?"

  "For both of us. Is that what you're saying?" He kept his gaze fastened on her when he spoke. "Are you already regretting the fact that you agreed to do this?"

  Sam sounded as if it were no more than he had expected, as if he'd known from the outset that she'd run out on him at the first hint of discord. There was a bleak, accepting expression in his eyes that made her want to weep.

  Impulsively, she reached out and squeezed his hand. "You're not getting rid of me that easily, Roberts."

  She thought she detected a vague hint of relief in his eyes before his eyelids fluttered closed and he drifted off to sleep, still clinging to her hand.

  Penny thought perhaps they'd reached an understanding. She'd actually hoped that her reassurances that she wasn't bailing out no matter how difficult he was might actually be a turning point. However, the next day brought absolutely no improvement in Sam's mood.

  The arrival of Ryan O'Casey and Jake Washington served as only a minor distraction. Even their announcement that Sam's attackers had been caught and jailed, thanks to an informant in the gang, didn't cheer him up. He seemed to think they should have waited until he could personally capture Tank and his accomplices. Testosterone run amok, Penny thought i
n disgust.

  How could anyone possibly live with a man who dealt with people and danger like that day in and day out, who actually seemed to thrive on it? She was beginning to wonder if she could.

  Add in his lousy temper and it was doubtful anyone else would ever be able to pull it off, either. To her surprise, she found herself worrying about him going through life all alone, even though that was what he claimed to want.

  Of course, under the circumstances, it could be a very short life. That worried her most of all. Since his attack, she was awakened again and again by nightmares in which he'd been lying in a pool of his own blood, only this time there was no one around to save him. For a long time afterward she'd lain there, bathed in sweat, her heart thudding as she fought off panic.

  If she was this terrified now, knowing that he was safe in the bedroom down the hall, what would happen to her when he went back on duty? Her gut-wrenching fear was totally unexpected. In her entire secure existence, she'd never experienced anything like it. She knew it was something she was going to have to confront and confront soon, if she really hoped that one day she and Sam might have a future together.

  He regarded her worriedly when she walked into his room the next morning after one of the worst nightmares she'd had. "You okay?" he asked.

  "Of course. Why wouldn't I be?"

  "I thought I heard you pacing last night."

  "Just a bad dream. I couldn't get back to sleep."

  "What kind of bad dream?"

  She wanted to tell him, wanted him to know how fearful she was, but something in his expression told her he'd already guessed. "It was nothing," she said.

  He regarded her bleakly. "If you say so," he said. He rolled onto his side, his back to her, effectively shutting her out.

  Penny sighed. Someday soon she would have to be honest with him. For now, though, her only goal was to survive his rotten mood swings, to get him well again.

  The next morning before Penny got up, Sam managed to haul himself out of bed and down the stairs. She found him collapsed into a chair on the terrace, his breakfast tray beside him. He stayed where he was, silent and morose, for most of the morning. She could tell when he began getting restless.

  He stood and paced back and forth in front of her, until she was ready to scream.

  "Sit down and read a book before you tear your stitches open," she advised finally.

  He looked as if the concept were alien. She handed him something by Ernest Hemingway that she'd brought out in the distant hope of reading it herself. Maybe he'd buy into all that macho stuff that drove Hemingway's male protagonists.

  Fifteen minutes later he'd tossed it aside. "The guy's a jerk," he declared.

  "The author or the character?"

  "The character," he said at once. Then paused. "Maybe the author. He created the guy, right? Hell, both of them."

  To Penny's astonishment, they wound up having an actual conversation about books. It didn't last long, but it was heartening just the same.

  When he tired of it, though, he regarded her speculatively. "Want to play poker?"

  She caught the unmistakable gleam in his eye. "I don't think so."

  He took the refusal in stride. "There are some computer games upstairs. I used to hang out here and play them. Drove Granddad Brandon crazy because he could never beat me. Mrs. Farnsworth told me he used to practice when I wasn't around, cursing a blue streak the whole time."

  "That is not an incentive to get me to take you on," Penny told him. "You're already driving me crazy."

  "I'll go easy on you," he promised.

  Anything was better than watching him mope around, Penny decided. Besides, it was time to get him back up those stairs and closer to the bed he belonged in.

  Fifteen minutes later, she realized to her astonishment that she had a fierce competitive streak. Apparently it had lain dormant all those years when she'd excelled at everything without even trying. Because she also had more patience than Sam, she watched carefully, analyzed the timing of those little characters on the screen and slowly began to get the hang of the game. Once she did that, it was only a little while before she started gaining on him.

  "You've played before," he accused when she beat him by several hundred points. "You hustled me."

  "Nope. First time I ever played. It's all a matter of mathematics, timing, maybe some innate coordination."

  She stood. He snagged her hand and pulled her onto his lap. Startled, she stayed where she landed.

  "Now let's see if I have this," he said.

  His gaze was intent in a way that should have made her nervous, but only filled her with an odd little thrill of anticipation.

  "One, that's you," he said. "Plus one, that's me, equals two. And if I were to kiss you, say right now, that would be a matter of timing."

  Penny seemed to have lost the ability to speak. How had she missed the fact that he was far enough along in his recovery to start thinking about seduction? The man still had a bandage from his collarbone to his belly. Maybe most of his wounds were superficial, but even they weren't fully healed.

  His lips curved slightly. "And maybe a little innate coordination, right?"

  She swallowed hard. "Right."

  "Is there anything I'm missing?"

  She shook her head. His gaze softened as his hand curved around the back of her neck.

  "This is a really bad idea," he murmured.

  Or was that her own conscience screaming? At any rate, it didn't stop the kiss. Nothing short of an air raid siren going off in the next room could have stopped that kiss. It was as inevitable as sunrise.

  And, she thought when he left her sitting alone and dazed in front of the computer, it was one damned fine kiss, the kind that could make a less wise woman forget that the man delivering it was flat-out determined to avoid making a commitment.

  Chapter 13

  Five days of proximity. Five days of Penny's shy, gentle touches and those occasional, dizzying, stolen kisses. Five days of a yearning so powerful that his body felt as if it might ache forever. Sam knew he had misjudged her passion, just as he'd misjudged so much else about her...and about himself.

  Determined not to let these discoveries affect him, he actually tried to tell himself that his desire was purely physical, the result of remaining celibate too damn long. He hadn't looked at another woman since Penny had arrived on the scene in Boston. He tried to tell himself that that was sheer coincidence. He tried to tell himself that under those circumstances any woman would have aroused the same desperate hunger.

  He wondered when he'd turned into such a liar.

  It was Penny who exasperated and enchanted him. It was Penny who filled his dreams. It was Penny whose most casual caress made his pulse race. It was Penny who was going to drive him out of his head with longing if he didn't do something about it.

  The quickest, surest way to solve the immediate problem would be to get her into his bed. Given the fact that she was still worriedly hovering over it half a dozen times a day, even though the doctor had said he was virtually back to normal, it shouldn't be that difficult to tumble her into it.

  Sam considered the matter with detached, calculating, masculine logic. One quick roll in the hay and he'd be over her. The intrigue would be over. That was the way it usually worked for him. There was no connection whatsoever between his brain and his libido.

  As for a heart, everyone knew he didn't have one. He saw no reason for this time to be any different. It was just the noble, hands-off policy he'd adopted that was making her so blasted tempting. A person always wanted most what he couldn't have, what he wouldn't allow himself to have.

  He tried to convince himself that seducing her wouldn't be such a lousy thing to do. After all, this hunger wasn't entirely one-sided. There was an undeniable mutual attraction between them. There had been from the start.

  Sam had seen the flare of unmistakable excitement in Penny's eyes each time they'd kissed. He'd felt the way she responded in his arms. Mor
e important, they were both smart enough to recognize that they were too different to ever have a lasting relationship. They'd both be better off if they just had sex and got it over with.

  Sam was still in the midst of the greatest internal moral debate of his entire life, when Penny sashayed into his bedroom looking like a ray of sunshine and humming some cheerful little tune. She was wildly off-key and clearly couldn't have cared less.

  She wore seductive white shorts and a clingy, yellow T-shirt. She'd scooped her hair into a ponytail with some sort of bright yellow scarf thing. He gazed down and saw that she was barefoot and sometime since he'd last seen her she had painted her toenails an enticing, feminine shade of pink. He suddenly felt an overwhelming urge to kiss each and every one of them. Dear heaven, he was losing his mind, he thought with dismay.

  Hands on hips, she stood over him. "Are you okay?" she inquired worriedly. "You look funny."

  He shifted in the bed, turning onto his side. "Funny how?" he asked cautiously, hoping she hadn't seen the erection that she'd aroused just by walking into the room.

  "All flushed and feverish. I'd better take your temperature."

  She whipped a thermometer out of her pocket and removed the cap. He shoved it away. He was overheated, all right, but he doubted it would register on the instrument. "Forget it. I'm fine."

  "But you could have an infection. I'll call the doctor to stop by and check your bandages."

  "Take it from me, sweetheart. It's not an infection."

  Something in his tone must have alerted her. She might not be an experienced lover, but she'd certainly taken enough science courses to understand basic anatomy and human chemistry. Her gaze shot to the telltale bulge beneath the sheet. The expression of fascination on her face, combined with the flood of color into her cheeks, was almost his undoing. His entire body throbbed with sexual awareness.

  Eventually her gaze returned to meet his. To his amazement and vague alarm, he detected a faint hint of amusement. It was the last reaction he'd anticipated.