Rediscovering Love - A Billionaire Romance Novel (Romance, Billionaire Romance, Life After Love Book 5)

by Nancy Adams

  They stayed silent for a while, staring up at the great beyond. With her head upon his chest, Claire began to ponder something. It was something that had always bothered her since their parting nearly six years ago.

  “You know I watched your car crash live on television,” she suddenly told him.

  He had to think about this for a moment, as so much of that time came flooding back to him like the crashing waves of the sea that stood before them on the other side of the fire.

  “I’m sorry,” he answered after a moment.

  “What for?”

  “It was a stupid thing to have done.”

  “It’s completely understandable. You’d just found out that your wife was dead. You were hurting.”

  “It wasn’t just losing her. It was losing you as well. I was so desperate. For the first time since I was fourteen years old, I was all alone in the world. I felt such despair at everything and I had to run. And that’s what I did. I was running from myself more than anything.”

  A tender silence pervaded for a moment as both of them considered that time.

  “I’m the same,” Claire suddenly remarked from his chest. “I run when I’m feeling real low. I ran that night when you crashed. Ran into the rain. I ended up running on and on for almost an hour until I reached a big field near the edge of town.”

  “Before, you once told me about how you would run whenever everything bothered you too much. I guess it’s a reaction of many of us. The flight response.”

  “Yes.”

  Silence once again flowed between them and they each drifted off into their own thoughts.

  “I always wondered what you were thinking while you were driving,” Claire said, breaking their brief pause.

  “I was thinking of you,” he replied solemnly. “I tried to call you when I first got in the car, but you didn’t answer.”

  “Yes. I wasn’t aware of what you were doing then. It was only later when my brother told me about it that I began watching the television. I just sat there on my bed with my hands almost all the way over my face, watching it all through the gaps in my fingers, petrified that you’d come crashing off that road at any minute and those assholes on the news would proudly pronounce you dead live on television.”

  “I’m sorry if I upset you in any way.”

  “You did. I was scared for you. So scared that my whole body went cold and everything around me was numb. You know, I actually closed my eyes and prayed for you at one point.”

  “You did?”

  “Yes. It was as I was praying that you crashed. It was an odd sort of answer to everything, really,” she added softly at the end.

  “Not if you were praying for me to crash it wasn’t!”

  She slapped his chest playfully and frowned at him.

  “Huh! Of course I wasn’t praying for that! I was praying that you’d come to your senses and stop the car. You seemed to be in the midst of some terrible episode and I was really worried.”

  Grinning all over, Sam craned his neck slightly and kissed her on top of the forehead.

  “I guess it was for the best that I came to a stop when I did,” he commented once his head was resting back on the cushion. “I think everything may have turned out much worse had I reached my destination.”

  Claire was about to say something, but paused for a moment. Before saying it anyway.

  “I’ve always wondered where you were going.”

  “Isn’t it obvious?” he retorted in a knowing tone. “I was going to see you.”

  She sat silently for a moment, her eyes searching the cosmos. Not for an answer, but simply to enjoy its vast sight while she held this feeling in her heart.

  “I dared not think it,” she said softly, a moment or so after he’d told her. “I always kidded myself that you were just running to nowhere in particular. Driving away from your pain and into the night with no real destination. The road you crashed on would have taken you to me—I knew that—but it could also have taken you to countless other destinations, so I never gave it much credence.”

  “I was always coming to see you, Claire. I was going to arrive on your doorstep and beg you to be with me. I was mad with despair at the time.”

  Claire smiled gently at the thought, the whole scene playing out in front of her parents’ house.

  “You would have brought with you a whole entourage of cops and newsmen. My mom would have freaked!”

  “I guess I was so overcome that I didn’t care. I was desperate to be with you. If it hadn’t been for my subsequent weeks in hospital, I would have plagued you with calls. But in the hospital everything began to feel like it was all foolishness and my madness slowly dissolved. I began to think that I’d lost you forever and it was no good ruining myself over something that would only ever lead to pain. I’d already had enough of that, so I decided to leave you alone.”

  Claire mused on the thought of Sam turning up on her doorstep back then. She’d been so sensitive at the time that she probably would have hidden in her room under her bed if Sam and the rest had arrived on her street and begun banging on the door.

  “It was probably for the best that you didn’t make it,” she said after a moment. “Not that your crash was a good thing—well, not directly—but I guess it did work out in the long run being for the better.”

  “Would you have turned me away?”

  “I would have hidden from you! I would have had my mother tell you and all the others to go away. Then I would have had to explain things to her. It would have been awful.”

  “That’s exactly my thoughts on it. I think this past five-and-a-half years’ sabbatical has done us good. We can start afresh and leave the past behind having grown stronger for it.”

  When he said this last part, Claire was hit with a pang of guilt. “Leave the past behind,” echoed over and over in her ears, and once again she was reminded that although part of their past had been exorcised, there still remained a major detail which hadn’t. Namely: the child.

  Since they’d traveled away, Claire had done her best to let herself be free of this nagging doubt in everything and just enjoy his company after so many years of absence. But each time he talked of being free from the past, she realized that although he may well be, she certainly wasn’t. She had to tell him—she knew that. But how? And when? At the moment there was so much trouble already orbiting them that it made it all so much harder to tell him. What with Jenna finding out the way she had and the media storm that was surely on its way, there appeared to be too much already upon their horizon to want to further cripple their blooming relationship by revealing this remaining detail. She felt that it could be a burden too far for them at this delicate stage of everything.

  But then, on the other hand, she had to tell him right away. It was imperative that she didn’t hold off any longer. The later she left it, the harder it would be on him. He was sure to accuse her of betrayal for not telling him the moment she knew she was pregnant, let alone all this time later. This single secret felt like a stone in her heart and filled her with utter terror. A part of her had even suggested that she should never tell Sam and keep it a secret for sure. But what type of person would she be then?

  “You’ve gone quiet,” Sam commented, interrupting her troubling thoughts.

  “I was just thinking was all.”

  “It’s not all this dredging up of the past is it?”

  “A little. But it’s good that we’re able to talk about it.”

  “You’re right. We should feel able to talk to each other about anything, be completely open with one another.”

  Once again the stone in her heart felt ready to drop and she froze inside, a tremor running through her.

  “You’re shivering,” Sam remarked, feeling her tremble against his side. “Are you cold?”

  “A little.”

  “Shall we go back inside?”

  “We can stay here a little longer.”

  They resumed their former position of gazing at
the stars, the trail of smoke from the fire blowing across their view, the waves crashing against the shore and the crackling flames resounding in their ears. As they lay there, Sam felt a wave of euphoric rapture permeate his body. He had his love once again by his side and nothing could diminish the joy of that.

  Claire, however, felt the impending dread of something awful coming. She felt that until she told him about the child, she could never truly enjoy him, never feel free of doubt. But at the same time, the thought of telling him, as already explained, filled her with equal dread.

  She was caught in a terrible catch, one that, up until a month ago, she’d thought would never happen, as she’d never dared to dream that she and Sam would ever be together again. Now they were, and if she didn’t tell him she would always have it hanging over her. It would sour the taste of everything, turn wood to ash, fruit to mold.

  Nevertheless, telling him would lead to recriminations, the possibility of the media getting ahold of it all, the possibility—which she was sure of—that Sam would search out the boy, and the whole thing would spill out for all to see, her lies to her mother being viciously exposed. Her life would be massively altered.

  But it had to happen if she wished to stay with Sam. Claire had to accept that, for love, she would have to pay a price.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Sam awoke the next morning with the warm body of Claire snuggled into his flank. It instantly made him smile to feel her there and to smell her sweet scent radiating from her. The moment he was awake, he craned his head down and kissed her upon the crown of the head, taking in the smell of her hair as he did. With her warm, snoozing body beside him, Sam gazed around the place. The large bay window at the far end of the room was open a fraction and the breeze that came in from outside blew the white cotton curtains about, allowing the sunbeams to race in through the gaps, cutting through the shadow that otherwise ruled the room.

  Needing to go to the bathroom, he pulled himself away from her, and as he did, she roused slightly, complaining in a gruff tone that it was too early to get up. He explained that he needed the bathroom and she told him to come back quick, she hadn’t finished cuddling with him yet.

  In the bathroom, Sam looked at himself in the mirror and smiled. He hadn’t felt this happy for so long. Not this completely content anyway. With Jenna there had always existed somewhere deep inside of him an echo of doubt that threatened to ruin everything; and eventually it did. But with Claire there was no doubt at all. On waking up beside her, he’d instantly felt that he was exactly where he should be: with her. There was absolutely no doubt in his mind that this was what he wanted, and ultimately what he needed. Everything about smelling her scent first thing in the morning was right. Everything about it told him that this was who he was and where he should be. For the first time in over five years, Sam Burgess had not one bead of doubt sowed into his heart.

  When he came back into the room, Claire had roused and was sat up in bed.

  “I thought you wanted more cuddles?” he asked her.

  “I do, but I felt like getting up when you left me. Do you fancy spending the morning in bed watching a film or something?”

  “I thought we were going to go off to Gardiners Island this morning?”

  “We could. But we could also be really lazy and spend a whole morning cuddled up in bed eating food and watching movies.”

  Sam made a face that told her that he was at least contemplating it.

  “A day on an historical island,” he mused out loud, rubbing his chin playfully, “or the morning cuddled up in bed with you. Mmm…”

  “We could make it a day and not just the morning.”

  “Ah! Then in that case, I say day in bed!”

  “Yay!” Claire exclaimed raising her hands up and beckoning him to rejoice with her.

  He went to the bed and placed himself in her arms, taking her in his own and kissing her on the lips. When they parted after the kiss, she was smiling like a Cheshire cat at him, her expression full of glee.

  “How do you like the sound of me cooking us breakfast in bed?” he asked her. “I can make us pancakes, bacon, sausage and eggs, and we can eat it here in bed watching television. Then later on, I’ll order us pizza and we can live like pigs. How does that sound? Do you like the idea of living like a pig with me?”

  “That would be amazing! The breakfast and the living like pigs! We could live forever in this bed, in this room. It would be our own sty! We’d order food and have it delivered to our nest here, only leaving it use the bathroom. We could hire a cleaner to clean up every morning and then just go on eating and making mess, living in our own filth.”

  He grinned at her and said, “I’d live in your filth any day, Claire Prior!”

  “That’s so romantic, that you’d live in my mess! Almost brings a tear to my eye!”

  “Almost!?”

  “Yes, only almost!”

  They kissed again, smiling and giggling within it. Feeling playful, Sam poked a finger in her ribs and she squirmed, poking her own fingers into him. She pulled him onto the bed and they tickled each other for a moment, playing about within the covers, rolling from one side to the other, taking it in turns to pin each other down, tiring themselves out, until they flopped into each other’s arms in the middle.

  Panting, Claire inquired, “What happened to you making breakfast?”

  He frowned at her and replied, “You don’t want to help?”

  “No! I want to lay in this nice warm bed and wait for you to bring it to me. Like a queen!”

  His frown melted into a smile and they lay on their sides facing one another for a moment, gazing into each others eyes, their hands stroking each other’s bodies, fingers running through hair. Having held gazes for long enough, they both instinctively moved their faces forward and kissed for several minutes, lost in each other.

  When they parted, Sam got up off the bed, left the room to go to the kitchen and made breakfast.

  Twenty minutes later, he was returning with everything on a large silver tray and they ate it all upon the bed, feeding each other pancakes and bacon, maple syrup draped over everything. While they ate, on a large-screen television at the foot of the bed, they watched a soppy movie, and once the food was finished, the tray, plates and cutlery all sat on the floor at the side of the bed as they cuddled up together and watched. Once that one was finished, they started another and enjoyed the laziest of lazy days in their little bed of solitude, floating away with each other, the world disintegrating into mist around them.

  It was as they lay together that Claire began to once again think about the child, her mood darkening with the thought. Lying there, she was slowly gearing herself up to telling him. She’d decided the night before when they’d returned from the beach that she would tell him today. Part of the reason she’d decided that she didn’t want to go to Gardiners Island was so she could tell him at the house. She felt safer and more comfortable telling him there.

  “There’s something I need to tell you,” she said, breaking through the silence that they’d been in for some time, the movie going on in the background.

  Turning away from the film, he replied with a smile, “Oh, and what could that be?”

  “It’s something serious, Sam. It’s something that I should have…”

  Her voice broke and the weight of what she was about to say pulled heavily on her heart. The sanctuary that they had enjoyed thus far was about to be blown apart. All the joy and glowing warmth she’d felt in the last two days would explode instantly the moment she told him.

  “What’s the matter?” he asked, his smile melting slightly, a new, unknown worry breaking out in his heart.

  “All those years ago, I—”

  But she was interrupted. Beside the bed, Sam’s phone went off.

  “Sorry,” he said, “but I gotta catch this. It could be Calloway.”

  Claire smiled.

  “You get it,” she said.

  Sam pulled himself away
from her and leaned over to grab his phone. When he looked at the screen, he frowned slightly.

  Turning back to Claire, he said, “It’s Maud. Jess’s au pair. I better get this.”

  “Go ahead.”

  Sam answered the phone and Claire watched him with a growing sense of dread opening up in her, feeling that she’d lost yet another chance.

  “Hey, Maud,” Sam said when he answered.

  “Sam,” Maud replied, “I’m really sorry to call you, but it’s urgent.”

  “What is it?” Sam asked, the room going instantly dark as his heart sank with the sound of Maud’s worried voice.

  “It’s Jess. She’s run away.”

  Sam instantly sat up like a bolt in bed, pulling himself entirely away from Claire.

  “How can you be sure?”

  “We were supposed to go horse riding this morning. She’s been in the dumps these past few days, but she was much happier last night and asked to go horse riding. But when I was out at the stables this morning getting the horse ready, she never showed up, and when I went to her room, she was gone. She left a note addressed to you. I didn’t open it as I wasn’t sure you’d want me too.”

  “Open it.”

  The sound of ruffled paper was heard on the other end of the phone.

  During this pause in the conversation, Claire took the opportunity to ask Sam what was up.

  “Jess has run away,” he told her.

  Her face instantly suffused with a mixture of sadness and guilt.

  “I’ve opened it,” Maud said.

  “Read it to me.”

  “Dear Sam,” the old au pair began, a slight pause as she weighed up Jess’s use of her father’s first name, “what you’ve done to both Mommy and Jenna is wrong. I don’t want to live with you anymore. I always looked up to you as my hero and never did I think that you could be so cruel. Mommy once told me when I was little that one day I would have to learn to see the darkness as well as the light. I didn’t know what she meant then. But now I do. Seeing how hurt you made Jenna and how much you could lie and how much you don’t care that your actions hurt me too, that was the darkness. I feel I can’t live with you anymore. Don’t try and find me.”