As a child, Samantha had been incredibly close with her grandmother. They’d done everything together – cooked, baked, gone swimming and hiking in the woods nearby. When her grandmother died, Samantha thought that she’d never get over it. The hurt had been sharp, like a wound, but eventually it had started to dull with the passing of time.
Losing Eric and Trevor hadn’t been like that. Samantha mourned the loss of her son every day. On the bad day, the emotional ones, she couldn’t even look at a mother and child together in the grocery store.
I have to keep trying to get on with my life, Samantha thought dully as she slipped into a parking space and hit the brakes. I have to keep going. Just one day at a time. I got up this morning, I got dressed and I went to work. I can keep doing this, I can!
Samantha closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “I can do this,” she said aloud. Her voice was shaky and hoarse – the sound almost startled her. She grabbed her work bag and her purse and started up the driveway.
“Hey.”
Samantha’s eyes flicked up from the ground and landed on Rust. He was standing there, in front of the door to her apartment, with a large bouquet of roses. When he saw her face, he took a step backwards.
“I know, I know, you don’t want to see me right now,” Rust said slowly. He set the roses on the ground and spread his hands. “But I have something else to say to you.”
Samantha eyed him warily. She felt acutely embarrassed for the way she’d acted earlier, but seeing Rust again was making the pain feel sharp once more.
“I had to apologize,” Rust said. He took a cautious step towards Samantha. She swallowed hard. Up close, she could see the sun reflecting in his amber eyes. She frowned. He didn’t look predatory. There was nothing intimidating about him – he looked like a giant, friendly teddy bear of a man. She nodded slightly, jerking her head to the side.
“Okay,” Samantha said softly. “Apologize, then.”
Rust nodded. He looked nervous – Samantha realized she could see his pulse beating at the side of his throat. “I wanted to tell you how deeply sorry I am that you were suffering,” Rust said in the same low, soft voice. “I had no idea that I was ever going to be a father. That wasn’t me, you know? And when I found out what had happened…” Rust closed his eyes and shook his head bitterly. “I was beyond horrified,” he finished simply. “I couldn’t believe I had a hand in causing a stranger so much pain. I am so, so sorry.”
“And I know you have a lot to process but the doctors said that when my people and your people have children, it doesn’t have any bearing on…that is to say me being a Shifter didn’t play any part in…” Rust trailed off.
Samantha was startled to see tears welling up in the man’s eyes. She was humbled by the outpouring of intense emotion – even though she knew Trevor had mourned, it had seemed to cut him off from her. Rust was the opposite – his emotional reaction was drawing her in, making her feel connected to him.
“It hurts,” Samantha said softly. She gazed into Rust’s eyes and watched as he wiped away a tear. “And not having anyone made it hurt even more.”
Rust nodded. “Just know how sorry I am. I never believed that I would cause someone so much pain, and I can sense how badly I’ve hurt you.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a slip of paper. “I wrote my phone number down, you know, in case you ever wanted to talk.”
Samantha froze. “Okay,” she mumbled. “Thank you.” She reached forward and took the slip of paper, sticking it in her pocket with a mechanical gesture.
“I’ll be going now,” Rust said. He nodded at Samantha and then loped off, down the road. Samantha watched as he climbed into a Jeep. She waited for the car to move but it didn’t, and the pain in her chest seemed to throb with the acute closeness of what had just happened.
It was his baby, too, a voice inside of her said.
“I can’t think about that right now,” Samantha said aloud. She reached down and picked up the bouquet of roses. “I have to take care of you guys,” she said to the flowers. “You look a little wilted.”
Going inside, Samantha dropped her bags at the door. Then she went into the kitchen and trimmed the stems of the roses, placing them all in a clear glass vase shaped like a cone. The phone mounted on the wall caught her attention and she stared at it for a long time, acutely aware of the slip of paper in her pocket. It felt hot, like Rust’s number was going to burn a hole through her clothes.
Finally, she gave in and picked up the receiver. As she dialed, she closed her eyes.
“Hello?”
“Hi, this is Samantha,” Samantha said nervously. “Do you have time to see me today? I could really use a talk.”
--
Twenty minutes later, Samantha was lying on the couch in her therapist’s office, across town. Dr. Delaney was a woman in her early fifties, with a comforting smile and a gorgeous sweep of icy-white hair. She nodded at Samantha with compassionate eyes.
“It’s nice to see you,” Dr. Delaney said warmly. “It’s been a couple of weeks. How are you?”
Samantha didn’t reply. She pursed her lips, staring at the poster of flowers that was tacked on the ceiling. “I had a bad day,” she said softly. “I….I ran into someone that I didn’t ever want to meet.”
Dr. Delaney frowned. “What happened?”
There was a long pause. Samantha had begun attending therapy shortly after she’d moved out of Trevor’s house. Dr. Delaney knew all of the gritty details of Eric’s stillbirth, but Samantha felt reticent discussing Rust for some reason.
“A man came into my office today and said he needed to talk to me.” Samantha closed her eyes, finding it easy to speak when she wasn’t staring her therapist in the face. “He told me that he’d donated sperm to some kind of research project, and it had been accidentally used to impregnate me.”
“Wow,” Dr. Delaney replied. She was sitting in a chair a few feet away from the couch. Samantha watched as she made a couple of notes on a small pad in her lap. “That had to feel very intense. I understand why you wanted to talk.”
The small words of compassion were almost overwhelming, and Samantha felt herself tearing up. She nodded imperceptibly. “It was,” she said softly. “It was really hard.”
“How did it make you feel?”
A tear rolled down the side of Samantha’s head. She shifted her position on the couch so she was lying on her side. “Angry,” she said slowly. “I was really mad at him for finding me.”
“And why is that?”
“I don’t know,” Samantha admitted. “I don’t know why he was mad. It….the talk didn’t go well, and I wound up storming away. When I got home, the guy was outside, in my driveway, waiting for me with roses.”
“I wonder if he wanted to make sure you didn’t feel guilty.”
Samantha opened her eyes and stared at Dr. Delaney. “What?”
“Trevor made you feel guilty, Sam. He made you feel like all of this was your fault, didn’t he?”
Samantha nodded slowly. A new wave of tears came over her. Dr. Delaney handed over a box of tissues and Samantha wiped her face before blowing her nose. “I felt guilty,” she said softly. “And this guy broke down and said that he never imagined he’d hurt so much or cause anyone else to be hurt, either. He was upset.” She bit her lip and swallowed hard. “I didn’t think he’d apologize for hurting me so badly.”
Dr. Delaney nodded her head slowly. “Sam, how do you feel right now?”
Samantha closed her eyes again. “Not great,” she admitted softly. “Like I want to go home and hide from the world, forever. Like I don’t ever want to go back to work or talk to anyone.” She crossed her arms over her chest and hugged herself tightly. “I wish this had never happened,” she said fiercely. “It made me think about the past again. I thought I’d worked on forgetting it!”
“Sometimes, we have to use what’s happened in the past to make ourselves stronger,” Dr. Delaney replied. “We can’t let hurtful things change
our goals in life, Sam.”
Samantha’s shoulders slumped. “I want a family, but I don’t even see how it’s possible,” she whispered. “I don’t think I deserve another chance. I lost one baby. What about another?”
“Samantha,” Dr. Delaney said in a strict voice. “You can’t keep blaming yourself. You know that you had absolutely nothing to do with what happened. The doctor should have been more clear.”
“He made me feel guilty,” Samantha whispered. Hot tears ran down her cheeks but this time, she made no effort to wipe them away. “And Trevor never talked to me again.”
Dr. Delaney sighed softly. “Sam, I want you to go home and think about what you really want. And the next time we see each other, we’re going to talk about how to put those steps in motion.” She gave Samantha an encouraging smile. “Everything is going to be alright, Samantha. If it’s not alright, then it’s not the end. You’re young and healthy, there’s absolutely no reason why you can’t have a family. You’re beautiful and smart and would make any man a wonderful partner. You’re going to be a great mom, too.”
Samantha sobbed. She tried letting Dr. Delaney’s words sink in, but she felt like there was a giant block on her head. “It hurts,” she said through the tears. “It hurts so much. I just don’t want it to hurt anymore! I want to be over this!”
“I’m going to tell you something that you might not want to hear,” Dr. Delaney said. Her voice was both firm and soft and something about it made Samantha open her eyes and stop crying. “You may never get over it. It might always hurt. But if you’re not being kind to yourself, you won’t be able to move on at all.” She looked into Samantha’s eyes. “Sam, you have to be kind to yourself.” Dr. Delaney tore a clean sheet out of her notebook. “This weekend, I want you to research self-care. Just take an hour and go online and do some searching. I think you could benefit tremendously from being more caring towards yourself.”
Samantha sniffled. She sat up on the couch and wiped her eyes. “Okay,” she said unsteadily as she handed over her co-payment. “I’ll do that. Thanks, Dr. Delaney.”
Her therapist nodded. “And come see me next week, Samantha. We’ll talk again.”
Chapter Three
As Samantha left her therapist’s office, her mind was filled with lots and lots of images. Meeting Rust had rekindled some kind of urge in her, and as she drove past a woman walking with her children, she was surprised to find herself smiling. It still hurt – Samantha didn’t think that it would ever stop hurting – but part of her imagined how it would feel to walk down the sidewalk with a tiny, sticky fist in her own hand. She wondered how it would feel to clean off a small cut or scrape on a toddler’s knee, how it would feel to see a smile of love and gratitude on her child’s face.
By the time she got home, she was feeling more emotional than ever. Samantha walked into her apartment with purpose and set her purse down on the chair. She thought about what Dr. Delaney had said. Self-care. Frowning, she walked over to her computer and opened her search engine. For the next half-hour, Samantha was engrossed in various psychology articles and feel-good blogs. She’d never heard of the concept before but it was basically as Dr. Delaney had said – taking care of herself. Sort of like spoiling a friend or a family member, but for herself.
“I’m going to have a glass of wine,” Samantha said out loud. She walked over to her wine rack and automatically reached for the cheapest bottle of her favorite white. “No,” she said, pulling her hand back. I should have something expensive. Yeah, something really nice and fancy. That’s good self-care, right?
Smiling to herself, Sam pulled down an expensive bottle of an aged red that she’d bought the year before. She did as everything online had instructed, really taking time to enjoy the fragrance of the wine before taking the first sip.
Ten minutes later, she was on the couch with her laptop, browsing pet ads. While she wasn’t exactly ready to think about a baby, Samantha had always hated living alone. Trevor hadn’t liked cats, but Samantha had always thought they were cute. Growing up, her mother was allergic so they didn’t have one but she’d always wanted a pet. She knew that having a pet was almost like having a child – something to take care of, to love, to protect. As she browsed through the cutest ads for kittens, she poured herself another giant glass of wine.
Samantha hadn’t eaten anything all day – the last thing she’d had was the iced tea, at the café with Rust. She could feel the wine working its magic quickly and as she stepped up from the table, her body swayed from one side to the other. Samantha let out a nervous giggle as she almost fell, managing to stay upright but splashing some of the wine on her lap.
“Damn,” Samantha muttered under her breath. She stumbled back to the table and grabbed the bottle of wine, pouring a fresh glass and immediately downing half of it. As she walked into her bedroom to change, she checked the pockets of her pants. There was a sweaty slip of paper inside – Rust’s number. Samantha’s body tingled as she stared at it. There was something unique about his handwriting. She could practically discern his personality just from looking at it: both measured and intelligent.
Her first thought was to call him. She dismissed that quickly, rolling her eyes and setting the paper down on her bed. But even after she’d finished changing, she couldn’t tear her eyes away from it. Finally, the wine rose in her and she felt more courageous than ever before.
Rust answered on the first ring. “Samantha?” He sounded surprised, cautious.
Samantha let out a laugh. “It’s me,” she said. “Oops!” She’d dropped the glass of wine on the floor. “I need more wine,” she said loudly into the phone.
“Have you been drinking?”
“Some really good wine,” Samantha slurred. Her skin felt hot and scratchy and she wriggled out of the clean pair of pants, curling up on the bed with her phone pressed between her shoulder and her ear. “Wanna come over?”
“Samantha, what are you talking about?”
“We should make a baby,” Samantha said. Her tongue felt too thick for her mouth, like it was going to escape. “Come over,” she added, slurring her words so thickly that they bled together.
Rust didn’t reply. Samantha frowned and hung up, tossing the phone on the floor. She wanted to get up and go get her computer, but her bed hadn’t felt so comfortable in a long time. I’ll just take a little nap, Samantha thought to herself as she closed her eyes. I’ll just sleep for a little while and then everything will be okay.
The next thing Sam knew, strong hands were pulling her out of bed and propping her up. Her whole body ached and her head was throbbing. There was a dry feeling in her mouth and her eyeballs felt like they were covered in little sticky threads.
“Samantha?”
Her eyes flew open and she was astonished to see Rust in front of her. Her vision was blurry and everything seemed to be leaning to the side. She stumbled forward and almost fell, but Rust reached out and wrapped his strong hands around her arms, holding her tightly in place.
“Samantha, what the hell happened? What’s going on?”
“Had some wine,” Samantha slurred. “Wanna sit back down,” she added in a loud, whiny tone. “My head hurts! I’m thirsty.” Her words were barely intelligible and Rust cast a worried glance at the empty bottle of wine on her nightstand.
“Samantha,” Rust said slowly. “Come with me, okay? We’re going to make sure you drink a lot of water.”
She was aware of a strange, floating sensation. When she realized Rust was carrying her, she tried to reach for the ground. But Rust was stronger and he gently carried Samantha down the hallway and laid her down on the couch.
“I can keep an eye on you out here,” Rust said softly. “Don’t move. I’m getting you some water.”
Samantha slipped in and out of consciousness as Rust darted to the kitchen and brought back a tall glass of ice water. When he tilted it back into her mouth, she almost coughed but the water felt like nectar on her swollen, dry tongue and she
greedily drank, letting the water spill down her chin and onto her shirt as Rust held the glass.
Kenny (Shifter Football League Book 2) Page 136
