by Kristi Gold
Andi laid a hand on his arm. “I know you, Sam. You’re a good man. A good father.”
He studied her with weary eyes. “Am I, Andrea? I am a father who must leave his son. There is nothing good in that.”
“You can enjoy the time you have with him now so he can get to know you as his father.”
“Perhaps it would be best if he never knows.”
Best for whom? Andi wanted to shout. Best for him, no doubt. No ties except for providing money. No commitment to their son, or to her. “Let’s not talk about this here. I need to be with Chance.”
“I only wanted you to know that I am considering our son’s well-being. If that entails giving him up, I will not hesitate to consider it.”
Andi’s heart plummeted, causing a painful ache in her chest brought about by an overwhelming sadness. “If that’s what you want.”
“I promise you, Andrea, it is not what I wish at all. But it could be the best decision for Chance.”
Too tired to fight, too heartsick to talk, Andrea walked away to see her son, the only constant in her life.
Sam spent the better part of the week getting to know his son. While looking on with the eye of a concerned parent, he’d taught Chance how to hammer a nail. Yet he felt it necessary to treat the boy as if he had no deficit. On the surface Chance appeared to behave as any normal boy would, active and enthusiastic, embracing life to its fullest. But now that Sam had witnessed the effects of his disease, he worried all the more.
At least Andrea seemed to be very optimistic, now that Chance had begun using a pump that kept the medication flowing into his body. She had told Sam that his levels were much better, and that Chance was much more energetic than before. A very good thing, Sam decided. And he certainly could confirm his son’s zeal for activity.
Presently Chance was helping him sweep the aisle between the stalls. With his small hand—a miniature version of Sam’s own—poised on the push broom that was almost as tall as the child, he asked, “Do I look like my dad?”
Sam carefully weighed the question. “Yes, to some degree.”
“Like how?”
“The color of your skin and your hair. I believe your eyes are lighter in color.”
Leaning the broom against one stall, Chance studied his arms then wrinkled his nose. “I’ve got Mama’s freckles.”
Sam laughed as he had many times in previous days over his child’s antics. “Yes, you do.”
Chance toed a pile of hay with one booted foot. “My friend Bobby says that where you live it’s nothing but sand.”
As Chance had done, Sam propped his broom against the opposite stall. “That is true to a point, we do have quite a bit of sand. But we also have trees and mountains. And a very good university we’ve built in the last few years as well as an excellent hospital.”
Chance frowned. “I hate hospitals.”
Sam’s first fatherly faux pas. “I’m certain you do, and with good reason. But they are necessary.”
“I still hate ’em.” Chance turned his eyes to Sam, eyes so very much like his own. “Do all the people look alike in your country?”
“Most have dark skin and features, but they are all very different.”
“Are they nice?”
“As it is in America, there are some very good people and some not so good people. There are mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers who play together and argue with each other. Teachers, doctors and builders. Overall, it is a very peaceful place to live.”
“Do you live in a palace?”
“Yes. It has been in my family for many generations.”
“Can I come visit you sometime?”
Sam’s chest tightened with remorse, wishing that were possible. “Perhaps when you are older.”
He released a long sigh. “I sure wish you could stay here. Don’t you like America?”
“I like it very much. In fact, I was born here, in the state of Ohio.”
“Then if you’re American, how come you don’t live here?”
At times Sam had desired that very thing, now more than ever, but he still had a strong allegiance to his country. Although they had made many strides, there was still much to be done. “I cannot live here because my father is the king of my country and I am to take his place one day.”
“Maybe you could call him and tell him to hire someone else to do it.” His eyes widened with innocence. “One of the girls at camp said her dad doesn’t have a job. Maybe he’d do it.”
Sam knelt at Chance’s level with a tenderness radiating from his heart over the child’s simple logic. “It is very complicated, Chance. I was born to lead my country, to help my people.” He brushed a tendril of hair from his forehead. “Do you understand now why I must leave?”
He shrugged. “I guess, but I still wish you would stay.” Chance wrapped his frail arms around Sam’s neck in an embrace, taking Sam by surprise and his heart by storm. “I still wish you were my dad.”
Andi stood outside the barn, frozen in place while awaiting Sam’s response to Chance’s wish. Yet he only said, “Let us finish our work so we’re not late for supper.”
She leaned back against the outside wall of the barn, closed her eyes against the setting sun and released a slow uneven breath. He’d had the perfect opportunity to tell Chance. Maybe he was still honoring her request that she be there when the moment arrived. Or maybe Sam was serious about not telling Chance the truth.
That made her incredibly troubled that she would continue to live a lie. If Sam insisted that Chance not know, should she tell him anyway? Maybe when he was much older, then she would make the revelation—and more than likely face his wrath because of her deceit. Would Chance blame her or would he blame Sam? Would he ever understand that his father thought it best? Would he realize that Sam was being unselfish in his decision, and that it had caused him great pain?
“You’re looking a little pale, Andi girl. Did you work too hard today?”
Andi opened her eyes to find Tess staring at her inquisitively. She pushed off the wall and folded her arms across her chest. “Sam leaves tomorrow,” she said.
Tess patted Andi’s shoulder. “I know, honey. And I wanted to talk to you about that very thing.”
“I’m going to be okay.”
“You will if you do what I tell you to do.”
Andi rolled her eyes skyward. “Do I really have to hear this?”
“Yes, you do.” Tess forked a hand through her short gray hair. “Tonight I want Chance to come to the bunkhouse and stay with me. That will give you the opportunity to say your goodbyes to Sam, and I want you to do it properly.”
“I don’t think that’s necessary.”
Tess sent her a stern look. “Yes, it is. You take tonight and you spend it with him. You make those memories because they’ll be all you’ll ever have. You keep them in your heart and you bring them out when times are tough.”
It sounded simple enough, but past experience had taught Andi it was anything but simple. “I don’t need more memories, Tess.”
“Yes, you do. I could never have made it without mine all these years.”
Andi sported a frown of her own, confused over Tess’s veiled revelation. “Does this have to do with you and some man other than Riley?”
Glancing away, Tess muttered, “Yes,” then after a pause continued. “It was a long time ago. He was a soldier, a real good-looking fellow, not that I couldn’t hold my own back then,” she added with a grin. “He asked me to marry him before he left for the war, and I turned him down.”
Andi shifted her weight from one hip to the other. “And he didn’t ask again when he came home?”
“He never came home.”
“Oh, Tess,” Andi said, hugging her aunt against her. “I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t be,” Tess said when they parted. “I confess I regret that I didn’t say yes, but I regret more that the should-have-beens have kept me from living my life all these years. I don’t want that to happen
to you.”
Andi sighed and pushed back the tears. “It’s going to be so hard, letting him go.” Harder than the first time. Harder than anything Andi had ever done before.
Tess braced Andi’s shoulders and gave her a little shake. “But you have to let him go. You have to for your sake and for your son’s. You take tonight and you show him that you love him. Tell him that you love him, because I know you do. If he walks away after that, then it was never meant to be in the first place.”
The “give them wings” theory that Andi was coming to despise. But she saw the logic in her aunt’s advice, and she made the decision to have one last night with Sam, her lover, the love of her life.
Chance came bounding out of the barn door shouting, “I’m hungry!” interrupting the emotional moment.
Tess caught him on the fly and whirled him around. “You eat as much as a moose these days.”
“I am a moose,” Chance proclaimed, followed by a high-pitched giggle.
Tess set him on his feet and grinned. “Tell you what, Mr. Moose. Why don’t you come spend the night in the bunkhouse with me? Riley’s coming over and we can play some checkers.”
Chance’s expression brightened. “Can Riley teach me how to play poker?”
Both Andi and Tess laughed then. “I guess we can do that, Little Bit,” Tess said. “As long as your mama doesn’t mind.”
Andi pretended to think long and hard before saying, “As long as you don’t bet away the house and the horses.”
“We’ll stick to pennies,” Tess said. She turned her attention back to Chance. “Then it’s settled. Right after dinner, we’ll play some poker.”
“Can Sam play, too?” Chance asked.
Tess sent Andi a meaningful glance. “I think Sam has a few things to tend to tonight with your mama.”
Sam had longed to tell Chance the truth, yet he hadn’t. He had longed to declare that he was the father Chance had wished for, yet he couldn’t. If he had made that admission knowing he would leave the next day, never to return, it would have been selfish on his part and totally unfair to his son. And he couldn’t return, not after knowing what it would be like to remain a part of this blessed family. Knowing each time it would be more difficult to leave. He could only hope that one day Andrea would find a suitable father for Chance. That consideration made him wince with a pain so deep that it threatened to consume him.
“It is for the best,” he kept repeating to himself as he had during dinner, quite possibly the last meal he would ever share with his son or Andrea.
The finality sat heavily on his heart as he began to pack the rest of his belongings. He’d saved the most significant for last—the baseball, Paul’s graduation gift to him, even the pair of tattered jeans he had left behind before. All mementos from the past that he would cherish throughout his future. Yet when he opened his suitcase once more, he found lying atop his clothing a souvenir that captured the present.
The photograph was much the same as the one of him, Andi and Paul except Chance had replaced his uncle. Tess had taken it earlier in the week, but he had no idea when she’d had it developed or how it had ended up among his things. Perhaps she had placed it there when he had returned to the stable for one last look after the evening meal. Perhaps it wasn’t Tess’s doing at all. If his instincts served him correctly, Andrea had left the keepsake, another precious gift she had given him.
Andrea.
He wanted desperately to go to her, to take her in his arms one final time, to spend a few more moments in her presence, to make love to her as he had desired to do the past week. He would deny himself that pleasure for he did not deserve her attention. And more than likely she would refuse if he dared make the offer tonight.
He picked up the photo and studied it a moment longer, admiring the faces of the woman he had always loved, of the child he had grown to love. Tomorrow he would say goodbye to them both and wish them well, then return to his homeland and pretend that nothing had changed. Yet everything had changed, especially Sheikh Samir Yaman.
“It’s a nice picture, isn’t it?”
His hands froze on the framed photo at the soothing sound of Andrea’s voice coming from behind him. After carefully tucking the photo beneath a few garments to protect it, he closed the suitcase and closed the chapter on what could never be.
Slowly he turned to face the woman who had so easily secured his heart years ago. “I will cherish it always,” he said. “Thank you.”
She took a tentative step forward and stopped at the end of the four-poster bed. “It’s the least I could do.”
“It is very much appreciated.”
As a heavy silence hung between them, she pushed her red-gold hair away from her face but failed to look directly at him. Finally she walked forward and stood face-to-face with him, so close that he could see that her heartache had settled in her beautiful blue eyes. He opened his arms to her, and she moved into his embrace.
Andi settled her cheek against Sam’s chest, not certain whose heart was beating more rapidly, his or hers. But her heart was in the process of totally splintering.
On that thought she kissed his whisker-rough jaw and gathered all her courage to tell him the one thing she had avoided until now. “I love you, Sam.”
He touched her face with tenderness and gently kissed her brow. “As I love you.”
She experienced an overwhelming joy that raced to her soul and settled on her wounded heart. “Then stay with me. Be a part of our lives.”
“You know that I cannot do that.”
She stared at him in frustration. “Then you don’t really love me.”
His rough sigh echoed in the silent room. “Yes, I do, more than you will ever know. But that does not change my situation.”
“It could if you wanted it to.”
“If only that were true.” He guided her to the edge of the bed and seated her next to his side, then took her hands into his. “I also love our son, which is why I have decided that he need never know I am his father.”
Exactly what she’d feared. “But what about when you come back?”
He glanced away but not before revealing an abiding sadness in his stoic expression. “I will not be coming back.”
Andi’s heart started another descent. “But you have to come back. Chance needs you. I need you.”
“You need to resume your life without me. You need to find someone who will care for you and our son. Someone who is deserving of your love.”
“I don’t want anyone but you,” she said, warm tears now raining down her cheeks in a stream of sorrow.
“You say that now, but you will change your mind once I am gone.”
He pulled her tightly into his strong arms. If only Andi could absorb some of that strength. If only she could have foreseen where this would lead. In reality she’d known all along what would happen, that he would leave her again, but she had chosen to believe that somehow, some way, it would be different this time. That he might actually change his mind, that she would change his mind. How foolish she’d been.
She had no choice but to claim the sadness, to accept defeat. But she didn’t know how to accept his leaving. “I don’t know how to let you go.”
“You must.”
She raised her head and looked at him straight-on, determined to try one more time to make him see things her way. “Even if you give up your wealth, your status, just look at what you’d be getting in return.”
“How well I know this.”
“Then why does it have to be this way? Why do you have to go? Why? And what is it you’re not telling me?”
He remained silent for a moment before drawing in a deep, cleansing breath. “I am to marry another.”
Nine
Sam had been prepared for Andrea’s shock over his sudden announcement. He had not been prepared for the seething anger boiling beneath the surface of her calm facade, apparent from the narrowing of her blue eyes.
“And you’ve known this all alo
ng?” Her tone was surprisingly controlled.
Sam wished she would shout at him. He deserved her hostility, her fury. “Yes, I have, but I must explain what this involves.”
She bolted from the bed, away from him. “You are damned right you must explain.”
He knew not where to begin, since there seemed to be no excuse for his behavior. “This marriage is an arrangement and nothing more. The details are to be finalized when I return. But rest assured, I do not love her, Andrea.”
She wrapped her arms about her middle. “Well, great. That makes me feel a whole lot better.”
“I have also decided that I will discuss this marriage with my father on my return. I am considering not going through with it.”
She glared at him. “Bully for you.”
How could he get through to her? How could he convince her that his heart was solely in her possession? He rose and clasped her slender arms. “I’ve decided I cannot live that lie, Andrea, not with what I’ve found with you. Maila is a good woman, and like you she deserves a man who can give all of himself to her.”
“When did you figure this out, Sheikh Yaman? Before or after you had sex with me?”
Anger roiled within Sam. “I made love to you, Andrea, and if you recall, at your insistence. I have always been weak in your presence. Always. I have never been able to resist you from the moment that Paul brought me here.”
“So it’s my fault that you cheated on your fiancée, is it?”
“It is my fault for not being a stronger man.”
“So answer this,” she said sternly. “If you’re getting out of this marriage, then why can’t you be with us?”
“Must I remind you again about my status?”
She took a few more steps away from him. “Heavens, no. If I hear that one more time, I’ll scream. But it seems to me that you just don’t get it. All the finest things in the world will never replace love, Sam. Your son’s love. My love. But if your riches and your title mean so much to you, then you’re right, it’s better that you leave for good.”
