And Then Came You (30 page)

“No,” Sam said tightly, silently congratulating herself on her restraint. “I really don’t.”

Cynthia smiled again and Sam wanted to belt her one. But she didn’t. Not only because she couldn’t very well hit a
pregnant
woman, but because in reality, it wasn’t the blonde screwing with her. It was Jeff.
Again
.

“There. I
have
upset you,” Cynthia said sadly.

Sam shoved her hands into her jeans pockets and forced a smile she didn’t feel. “Not at all. Ripping off a blindfold isn’t always pretty. But you can see a lot clearer without one.”

“Exactly,” Cynthia cooed and risked patting Sam’s forearm. “I’m so glad we understand each other.”

“Oh, we’re crystal clear,” Sam said, and knew, without a doubt, that Cynthia had done this purposely. The woman had known Sam didn’t have a clue about the baby—and she’d made sure Sam took the full hit. Couldn’t really blame her, though, Sam thought. She was fighting for what was hers.

It was Jeff Hendricks Sam was going to ream the first chance she got.

“Good,” Cynthia was saying. “I’m delighted that we have this resolved.”

“Oh, it’s resolved. Trust me. And I hope you and Jeff are very happy together,” Sam said, forcing each word out of her mouth as though she were spitting out something foul. “I think you’re made for each other.”

“Aren’t you sweet?” Cynthia’s smile was a little hesitant this time, but not one to pass up a victory, she accepted Sam’s surrender. “Well then, I’d better be going. Don’t want to be late. Jeff worries so.”

“I’m sure.” She stood in the shade of the old trees and watched as Cynthia slid into her silver Mercedes coupe. She held her breath while the blonde fired up the expensive engine and blew it out as she finally pulled away from the curb and drove off down the narrow, tree-lined road.

So Jeff was worried about Cynthia, was he? Well, why wouldn’t he be? She was pregnant. With his
child
, dammit.

A sick emptiness opened up inside Sam. And the only way to fill it was with anger. She let it pour through her, until her nerves danced and her hands shook. Worried about Cynthia? Well, Jeff had better spare some concern for Sam.

Things were about to get
real
bumpy.

“Why don’t we just go into the city and break his legs?”

“Tempting, Mike,” Sam said, shaking her head. “But no.”

“Why the hell not?” Mike stormed around the interior
of the second kitchen, instinctively stepping over the scattered debris. “He so deserves it.”

“He
deserves
a hell of a lot more,” Jo muttered, keeping her gaze fixed on Sam. “You slept with him, didn’t you?”

Sam cringed. “Sleeping wasn’t a big part of the night’s festivities, but yeah.”

“God, you’re an idiot.”

“Thanks, Mike. I love you, too.”

“Shut up, Mike.” Jo reached out and hugged Sam tightly, briefly, then let her go again. “You still love him, don’t you?”

“Yes, but I’m thinking a lobotomy will take care of that.” God, Mike was right. She
was
an idiot. Ever since Cynthia left, Sam had been mentally kicking herself. She’d done it again. Let herself be sucked into Jeff’s orbit only to get splattered.

Sure, he’d agreed to a tentative custody agreement. He’d
needed
Sam on his side. He had a wedding, for God’s sake, in three weeks. Not to mention, she thought with another mental kick, another
child
on the way—a fact she hadn’t told her sisters about. After all, there was only so much humiliation she was willing to share.

Jeff had needed Sam to settle things between them. And the only way for him to get her signature on divorce papers had been to convince her that he’d be fair about the custody settlement. So what’d he do? Sign a paper agreeing to be fair—not an actual declaration of what that “fair” was going to be, mind you—and then bed her, so she’d stop thinking and just go with the heady rush of hormones. A little “understanding,” a little sex, and
poof
, Sam was putty in his hands.

Oh, he was good.

He was very good.

And she’d been taken for another ride.

“How could I have been so stupid?” She slapped the heel of her hand against her forehead. “My God, if you could have heard Cynthia talking . . . how she and Jeff
discussed
me and just how
awkward
it was dealing with a woman who couldn’t let go.”
And how pregnant she is and how they want their little family together and settled, without Jeff’s “ex” hanging around to muddle everything up
.

Adrenaline pumped through Sam’s system until she couldn’t stand still. She had to move or explode.

Stomping around the room, she ignored both of her sisters and kept up a steady stream of invective, aimed at the one person who’d let her down the most.

Her own damn self.

“I let myself get carried away.” She shook her head, remembering Cynthia’s pale, smooth hand pressed to her still flat—but
pregnant
—abdomen. Then she remembered Jeff and his touch, his kiss, his . . . “I let myself forget that we’re from two different worlds.”

“Don’t be so hard on yourself,” Mike said, then jumped out of the way as Sam stormed past, shaking her index finger at her.

“Hard? This isn’t nearly hard enough. I should be kicked every minute for a solid hour. I should be strapped down in a health food store and force-fed carrot juice. I should be—” She stopped, threw her hands wide. “I can’t even think of anything bad enough.”

“I don’t know,” Mike said softly. “The carrot juice was pretty grim.”

“Nothing’s that grim,” Jo said, then walked over to Sam. “Stop kicking yourself and go kick him. If he set you up, then you have to let him know you know.”

“Huh?”

Jo smiled. “Go see the little prick. Tell him all about your chat with Cynthia. Tell him that you’ll sign his divorce papers because you don’t want him anywhere near you anymore. Then tell him you want joint custody or nothing.”

“I should.”

“Damn straight.”

Sam nodded at Mike but Jo was still talking.

“He’ll agree, Sam. He has to. He’ll know that you’re on to him and that the Marconis will make his life un-livable if he screws with you again.”

“Good point.” Okay, the pulsing, throbbing fury was easing up a little. Sam pulled in a deep breath. She could do this. She could look Jeff dead in the eye and tell him what she thought of his tactics. What she thought of his simpering fiancée and how she hoped he’d be
miserable
for the rest of his life. And she could tell him just what she thought of a man who left a
pregnant
fiancée home alone while he jumped into bed with his
wife
.

The bastard.

“Want us to go with you?” Mike asked.

“No. Thanks, but no.” Sam shook her head and lifted her chin defiantly. Some of the things she had to say to Jeff couldn’t be said with an audience. Even an audience of sisters who loved her. “This is something I need to do on my own.”

“Then get out there and kick some Hendricks ass.” Jo held out one hand. Mike laid hers atop Jo’s. Sam reached out and laid her hand atop her sisters’.

And for a moment, they stood linked, blood to blood, and Sam knew she’d never really be alone.

Jeff had it all planned out.

Finally, and at last, he’d worked out what was important in his life and he was going to do whatever he had to do to get it. That one night with Sam had solidified everything inside him. He’d found his place in the world.

Beside Sam.

Guilt still crouched within when he thought about Cynthia. But breaking their engagement was the only decent thing to do. He wasn’t looking forward to hurting Cynthia, but eventually she’d understand that this was the only solution. He couldn’t marry someone else when he was still in love with his
wife
. He smiled to himself and thought about trying to hunt down the lazy county clerk who’d never bothered to file the divorce papers. Damned if he didn’t want to buy the man a drink.

Or a car.

Or a house, maybe.

Without that lazy bastard, Jeff might never have discovered that he was still in love with Samantha Marconi. He would have gone through the rest of his life without her. Feeling only half-alive.

No doubt about it, he owed that clerk a huge debt.
He snatched a beer out of his refrigerator, then turned to look at the gleaming, spotless kitchen behind him. Not hard to be kept gleaming, since there was so rarely any life in it.

“Not like Sam’s place,” he thought aloud and his gaze slid to the wide swath of counter space. Just remembering taking Sam on her kitchen counter had him hungry and needy all over again. How had he ever convinced himself that marrying Cynthia was the right thing to do? When had he begun to believe that companionship, affection, were enough to build a life on?

Emma’s face rose up in his mind and he smiled. His daughter. Sam’s daughter. They’d be together. As they should have been from the very beginning. He wondered briefly what kind of family they’d have had by now if he hadn’t been a moron and his mother hadn’t interfered. If she hadn’t stolen nine years of his and Sam’s lives.

He took a long pull on the dark brown bottle, then lifted it in a toast. “Here’s to me, Mother. I finally beat you. I’m finally going to have the woman I should have had all those years ago. And I hope you’re spinning in whatever hell you landed in.”

When the doorbell rang, he carried his beer with him as he walked through the too-quiet condo. Soon enough, this place would be sold. He already had a drooling real estate agent working on the details.

He’d have to commute at least a couple of days a week into the city to handle work. But his life, his
love
, would be in Chandler. He was happy, for the first time in nine years. And for the first time in way too long, he knew he was doing the right thing.

Sunlight streamed through the wall of windows
overlooking San Francisco. In the distance, the Golden Gate Bridge gleamed a dull orange against the backdrop of a cloud-studded sky. Far below, on the city streets, traffic hummed and surged like a growling beast.

Still smiling to himself, Jeff opened the door—and took a solid punch to his abdomen.

“Dammit, Sam!” Bent in half, he clutched one hand to his stomach and kicked the door shut as she stomped past him.

“You son of a bitch!”

“What the hell are you doing?” He stared at her in cautious amazement. Even from across the room, her pale blue eyes sparked with a dangerous temper he remembered way too well.

Was this really the woman he’d left a few hours ago, warm and naked in a bed?

She was pacing feverishly, her boots smacking rhythmically against the hardwood floors, then muffled as she hit the area rugs. Her jeans were worn and faded, her T-shirt splattered with flecks of yellow paint, and her mouth was set in a grim slash that worried him considerably. Jeff had been on the receiving end of Sam’s temper too often to take it lightly.

Hell, she’d already hit him and was even now, he was sure, glancing around the room looking for something to throw at his head. “What’s going on?”

“Like you don’t know.”

“Not a clue, babe.”

“Don’t call me babe.”

“No problem.” He lifted both hands, remembered his beer, and took a long swig.

“You son of a bitch.”

“Huh?” he asked. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“You know damn well what I mean.” Her eyes snapped and sizzled as she stalked toward him and stopped just a couple feet short of being within striking distance.

Small favors.

“Sam, I don’t have a clue what’s going on.”

She glared at him, but he didn’t back down. Hell, he didn’t mind letting her take a shot or two at him when they were in the middle of an argument. But he’d be damned before he’d let himself be a punching bag without even knowing the reason
why
.

Damn, she looked good. Even in a fury, she was a woman who could stop a man’s heart. Color flooded her face and the danger in her eyes only made her more exciting. More
amazing
.

How had he managed to live so long without her?

“
Cynthia
came to see me this morning.”

“What? Why?” A prickle of warning slithered along his spine.

“Worried?”
She snarled the question in a deceptively soft voice.

“Should I be?” Judging from the flash of pure, undiluted rage glittering in her eyes, he figured the answer was yes. Then he looked deeper and saw more than temper. Something deeper, more painful, and a kernel of panic rooted in his guts.

“You tell me.” She folded her arms across her chest, tipped her head to one side, and studied him as if he were a less-than-interesting bug on a microscope slide.

Okay, clearly she was pissed and hurt and had decided
he was her target, but before the flame war kicked in, he wanted to know exactly what he’d done.

“Why did she go to see you?” he asked tightly. And even as he asked it, his brain galloped, trying to find a reason for Cynthia to confront Sam. But he couldn’t.

“Just what I wondered,” Sam snapped and moved suddenly, stepping close enough to drill her index finger into his chest.

He snatched her hand and held it. Staring down at her, he watched emotions flicker across the surface of her eyes, each chasing the other, with pain the only constant. “What’d she say to you?”

“What
didn’t
she say?” Sam pulled her hand free and bunched her fist. “Why don’t I start out small and end with the
real
kicker?”

“Start anywhere you want,” Jeff muttered, never taking his eyes off her. “Just start.”

“Fine. She told me all about how you two have
discussed
the problem of
me
. She told me how ‘awkward’ it was for you to have me hanging around. To have to deal with me over Emma.”

“She what?” Warning bells clanged in his brain again, but it was like hearing the hurricane-warning siren just as the wind snatched your house off the foundations. Way too late. Sam was on a tear and she was unstoppable.

“You heard me. What was last night, Jeff?” she demanded, getting right in his face. Tipping her head back, she glared up at him and Jeff felt her fury, her hurt, reach out to strangle him. “What was that? A mercy screw?”