“Ss . . . S . . . ham?”
A moment of silence, then his concerned voice, “Lee, is that you?”
“S . . . Sam . . .” She couldn’t get anything else out.
“Lee, what’s the matter?” He sounded panicked.
“Oh, S . . . Sam, In. . . need you so b . . . bad.” A huge sob broke from her as she clutched the receiver with both hands.
“Lee, are you hurt?”
“No . . . No, n . . . not hurt . . . j . . . just hurting. Please . . . c . . . come . . .”
“Where are you?”
“At h . . . home,” she choked.
“I’m coming.”
When the line clicked, her arm wilted toward the floor with the phone dangling from her lifeless fingers and she begged him, “Pl . . . please hurry.”
She was sitting slumped over the kitchen table ten minutes later when Sam Brown ran up the walk and burst through the front door. He skidded to a halt in the middle of the hall, chest heaving. “Lee?” He caught sight of her as she flew out of her chair. They met in the middle of the hall. She flung herself against him, sobbing abjectly and clinging to his comforting body as she burrowed into him.
“S . . . Sam, oh, Sam . . . h . . . hold me.”
He crushed her to him protectively. “Lee, what is it? Are you all right?”
Her body was heaving so much no answer was possible just then. He closed his eyes and pressed a cheek against her disheveled hair as hot tears melded his shirt and his collarbone. Her tormented body was wracked by shudders so he wound his arms around her tightly, waiting for her to calm down.
“Sam . . . Sam . . .” she sobbed wretchedly, over and over.
Never had a body felt so good. His hard chest and arms were a haven of familiarity. His scent and texture comforted immeasurably while he stood like a rock, his feet widespread, his long length shielding her. Forgotten were the hurts they’d caused each other. All forgotten was the pain of separation. Barriers fell as she sought his strength, and he gave it willingly.
“I’m here,” he assured her, spanning the back of her head with a wide hand and pressing her securely to him. “Tell me.”
“My b . . . boys, m . . . my babies,” she choked, the simple words becoming an outpouring of her soul while he remained unflinching, the solid foundation of her life.
“They were here?”
She could only nod against his neck.
“And now they’re gone?”
Again she nodded and felt him stroke her hair. She pulled back. “How l . . . long have you known?”
His hands spanned almost the entire circumference of her head while his thumbs stroked the tears that were her healing. “Almost since the beginning.”
She looked up through a bleary haze while her heart swelled with love for him. “Oh, Sam, I was s . . . so afraid to t . . . tell you.” She buried herself against him.
“Why?” His voice was thick, and she heard in it vestiges of the hurt she’d caused and promised herself she would make it up to him. “Couldn’t you trust me?”
Fresh tears spouted again while she clung to him. “I was so af . . . afraid of what you’d th . . . think of me.” Her shoulders shook even as relief overwhelmed her because he knew at last.
“Shh, don’t cry. Come here.” He pushed her back gently and slipped an arm around her shoulders, urging her toward the stairs. He sat down on the third step and tugged her down between his knees on the step below, then pulled her back against him. His broad forearm crossed her chest and hugged her tightly while he squeezed her upper arm and rested his chin against the top of her hair. “Now tell me everything.”
“I wanted to tell you the l . . . last time we were together. I wanted to so badly, b . . . but I didn’t know what you’d think about a . . . a mother who had her kids taken away from her in a divorce court.”
His lips pressed the top of her head. “Darling, I saw their beds the first day I came here. I’ve been waiting since then for you to tell me about it.”
“You’ve known all that time. Oh, Sam, why didn’t you ask?”
“I did once, but you let me believe they had died, and I realized then that you had to tell me. And that last night we were together, I . . . oh God, Cherokee, I’m so sorry for what I did. But it damn near killed me that you couldn’t trust me enough to tell me then. I’ve had a miserable week, thinking of how I’ve hurt you and wondering if my suspicions about your kids were right. At times I even found myself wondering if you were with your ex-husband, and I told myself if you were, it was no more than I deserved.” His arm tightened perceptibly across her chest.
“No, not that. He’s married again and they’re expecting another baby.”
“You saw him this week, too?”
“Yes, he came to pick up the boys just before I called you.”
“They live with him, then?” His quiet questions encouraged her to talk about them, and she marveled at having a man who understood her needs so well. His warm palm caressed her bare arm, and his voice was very soft and compelling.
“What are their names?”
She brushed his forearm and felt his breath warm on the top of her head. “Jed and Matthew.” Just pronouncing their names brought a sharp sense of renewed heartache. She sat quietly for a long moment, thinking of their empty beds upstairs. But she rested her head against Sam’s chest and drew strength from him as she continued. “Oh, Sam, I don’t know if I’ll ever get over l . . . losing them. That day in the courtroom was like . . . like judgment day, and I’ve been in hell ever since. It was totally unexpected. My lawyer was just as dumbfounded as I was when the judge declared that he was giving custody of the boys to Joel. But Joel had a high-powered attorney, one he could afford, and I had a less experienced one that I couldn’t afford. I just never dreamed I’d lose. My attorney kept telling me there was something called the ‘tender years concept,’ meaning basically that little kids need their mother. The boys were only three and five then. But the judge said the court found it would be in the best interest of the children to have a strong male role model.” Lee pulled away from Sam’s body, crossed her arms on her knees, and rested her head on them. “Male role model, for God’s sake. I didn’t even know what it meant.”
Sam studied her back, reached to cup a hand over her shoulders, and pulled her securely between his legs again.
“Go on,” he ordered quietly, slipping his arm across her collarbone.
She closed her eyes and swallowed, then continued in a strained voice. “His lawyer brought up the subject of economics, and mine argued, but it seems economics enter into the . . . the emotional well-being of children. I had no means of support, no career, no prospects. I’d been a wife raising babies, how could I have?” A shudder went through her. She swallowed and opened her eyes. Tears slipped down her cheeks, and a lump lodged in her throat.
“Oh, Sam . . . have you any idea wh . . . what it’s like to have your children t . . . taken away? What a failure you f . . . feel like?”
A hot tear dropped on his arm. He squeezed her shoulders and chest in a bone-crushing gesture of comfort, resting his cheek against her hair. “You’re not a failure,” he whispered thickly. “Not to me . . . because I love you.”
How many times this week had she longed for those words? Yet at the moment they tore at her soul, for it was because she loved him too that she wanted to be perfect in his eyes. But she wasn’t—oh, she wasn’t—so, she went on purging herself. “This week I realized I’m totally inadequate as a mother. The courts were probably right to take them away from me. She’s done a better job than I ever could. I d . . . did everything wrong. I l . . . let them get s . . . sunburned and I—”
“Lee, stop it.”
“I didn’t know how to c . . . comfort Matthew when he had a b . . . bad dream and—”
“Lee!”
“And I . . . I . . .” The tears broke free again, and she struggled on in self-recrimination. “I c . . . can’t m . . . make—” He grabbed her rou
ghly and swung her around until her face was pressed against his chest where the last word came out a muffled sob—“lasagna.”
“Oh God, Cherokee, don’t do this to yourself.”
“I d . . . did everything wrong.” She clung to the back of his shirt, wailing out her pitiful litany.
“Shh . . .” He patted her hair and held her head tightly with both hands.
“They ran to h . . . her and f . . . forgot all about m . . . me when she . . .”
His mouth stopped her words. He had jerked her roughly up to him and held her now in an awkward embrace, twisted as she was at the waist while they perched on their two different steps. He kissed her savagely, then lifted his head and held her jaw as he studied her face.
“They’ve been away from you for a long time, and they’re used to her now. That doesn’t mean you’re a failure. Don’t blame yourself. It breaks my heart to see you like this.”
And from the depths of her misery she realized what she had in Sam Brown. Strength, understanding, compassion. Her hurt was his hurt for he absorbed it and his eyes became a reflection of the pain he saw in hers. She trembled on the brink of understanding the true depth of love. And, not wanting to put him through more agony, she finally made a shaky effort to control her tears. When they eventually lessened, he pushed her gently away from him, but only far enough to raise one hip and pull a handkerchief from his back pocket. When she’d dried her eyes and blown her nose, she felt better. Heaving a giant sigh, she sat down beside him on the same step. Bracing both elbows on her knees, Lee gingerly covered her burning eyelids with her fingertips and declared unsteadily, “My eyes hurt. I haven’t cried this much since the divorce.”
“Then you needed it.”
She lowered her hands and looked at his understanding face.
“I’m sorry I unloaded on you. But thank you for . . . for being here. I needed you so much, Sam.”
He studied her swollen eyes with their red rims, the fingers behind which she hid her cheeks. He reached and took one of her hands and interlaced his fingers with hers. “That’s what love is all about, being there when you need each other, isn’t it?”
She touched his cheek with her free hand. “Sam . . .” she said, quiet now, overwhelmed by love for him, certain that what he said was true.
Their eyes held, then he turned a kiss into her palm. “Have you decided yet whether you love me or not?”
“I think I decided on the day you came over here in your jogging shorts.”
A brief smile lifted his lips, then they fell serious again. He said quietly, “I’d like to hear you say it once, Lee.”
They were sitting side by side in a curiously childish position, holding hands with only the sides of their knees touching as she said into his eyes, “I love you, Sam Brown.”
“Then let’s get married.”
Her startled eyes opened wide. She stared at him for a full ten seconds, then stammered, “G . . . get married!”
He gave her a lopsided grin. “Well, don’t look so surprised, Cherokee. Not after the last wild and wonderful month we’ve spent together.”
“B . . . but . . .”
“But what? I love you. You love me. We even like each other! We’re both in the same line of work, have terrific senses of humor, and we’re even the same breed. What could make more sense?”
“But I’m not ready to get married again. I . . .” She looked away. “I tried it once and look what it’s put me through.”
“Cherokee, you’re not going to go through this again, not if you marry me.”
“Sam, please . . .”
“Please?” His voice took on an edge. “Please what?”
“Please don’t ask. Let’s just keep things as they are.”
“As they are? You mean sex every night at your house and nothing more than a polite hello at the office? I said I love you, Lee. I’ve never said it to another woman. I want to live with you and hang our clothes in the same closet and have a family to—”
“A family!” She jumped off the step and stood at his feet facing him. “Haven’t you heard a thing I’ve said? I had that once, and it was the worst tragedy of my life! I lost my sons—the only ones I ever plan to have—in a divorce court. I’m not equipped to be a mother. I told you that!”
“That’s all in your head, Lee. You’ll be as good a mother as—”
“It’s not in my head!” She swung away toward the living room. “I . . . I’m insecure and hurt, and I’ve failed once at being both a wife and a mother. I don’t think I’d be very good at either one again.”
He stood behind her in the middle of the living room.
“That’s your answer, then? You won’t marry me because you’re afraid?”
She swallowed and felt the damnable tears spring to her eyes again. “Yes, Sam, that’s my answer.”
“Lee.” He placed a hand on her shoulder, but she shrugged it away. “Lee, I won’t accept it, not if you really love me. The only way to get over being afraid of something is to try it again. You’re . . . we’re not going to fail. We’ve got too damn much going for us. I just know it.”
“It’s out of the question, Sam. I just don’t understand how you . . .” She turned to face him. “Sam, you can’t know how a thing like losing your children can undermine your self-confidence. I swore when it happened that I’d never go through such a thing again. I’d prove to the world that the judge was wrong. I wasn’t just a . . . a stupid squaw with . . . with no career and no visible earning power. I had things to prove, and I’m not done proving them yet.”
“Squaw?” he retorted angrily. “Is that what this is all about?”
“It’s part of it. Nobody will ever convince me that judge wasn’t influenced against me because I was Indian and Joel wasn’t. It has as much to do with the decision as the fact that I couldn’t support the kids. Well, I couldn’t do anything about my heritage, but I certainly could about my financial status. I set out to earn as much money as any man, in a job only men have traditionally done, but I have a long way to go before I reach my goals.”
Sam’s face was grim. “Lee, you’ve got a red chip on your shoulder about the size of the original Indian nations! You carry it there, daring anybody to knock it off—that’s why most people try. When are you going to learn you’re melted into the pot here, and stop flaunting your heritage?”
Fresh anger flared through Lee. “You don’t understand a thing I’ve said here today! Not a thing!”
“I understand it all, Lee. I’m just not willing to buy some of it. I love you and I accept you exactly as you are, without any question that we could make a successful marriage—babies and all. You’re the one who doesn’t understand that if you really love somebody past histories should be forgotten and you should put your entire trust in the strength of that love.”
She reached out to touch him, her face tight with pain. “I do love you, Sam, I do. But do I have to prove it by marrying you?” He removed her hand from his chest and held it in his own.
“That’s the usual way, Lee.” He looked up, and his dark eyes held a glint of hurt before he added softly, “The honorable way.”
What could she say? After the way they’d parted last time, the hurts they both carried since then, how could she argue with him? She saw a grave weariness settle over his features as he stood holding her palm with the tips of his fingers, brushing his thumb across her knuckles.
She stared at him, already stricken with loss. “Sam, don’t go.”
Again she saw his weariness and the burden of sadness that her refusal had so suddenly brought upon him. He looked into her eyes, and his own were heavy with regret.
“I have to, Cherokee. This time I have to.”
“Sam, I . . . I need you.”
He stepped close again, drew up her face, and placed a good-bye kiss on her lips, which were swollen yet from crying.
“Yes, I believe you do,” came his tender reply.
He studied her black pupils, touche
d a thumb to the purple skin of one lower eyelid, then turned, and a moment later the door closed behind him.
Chapter ELEVEN
IF she were asked to define exactly who brought about the changes between them, Lee could not truthfully have named either Sam or herself. She only knew they’d reached an impasse that hurt deeply during the weeks that followed. Facing him each day at the office was sheer hell. He no longer passed her desk in the late afternoon to ask what time she’d be leaving for home. She no longer asked if he was coming over. Lee knew either of them could have broken down the invisible barrier that had sprung up between them. It would have taken no more than a single word, yet neither spoke it.
On the surface everything was the same. They consulted each other on bid work, bumped into each other in the copy room, pored over plans together. But through it all Sam maintained an incredibly unfluctuating air of normalcy, while Lee gave him neither pointed indifference nor veiled languishments. Instead they treated each other with neutral geniality, which made her wince inwardly. He opened doors for her if they were heading out together, and they chatted about jobs with a heartiness that distressed Lee’s lovelorn soul.
One day in mid-September Sam passed her as she sat near the fountain eating lunch. He waved a roll of plans in greeting, never breaking stride as he called, “Hi, Lee. Enjoying the beautiful weather?” An acute sense of loss pierced her as she watched him stride purposefully into the building.
In late September six members of the office staff treated Rachael to a birthday lunch at Leona’s Restaurant in the Fairway Shops. They all piled into Sam’s car for the short ride. Lee ended up in the back seat. Being there brought back memories of the days of intimacy with distressing clarity as she studied the back of Sam’s head.
At Leona’s, Lee found herself seated at a right angle to him. As they pulled their chairs in, their knees collided under the table. “Oh, excuse me!” Sam apologized. “It’s these damn long legs of mine.” His alacrity was as impersonal as if he had bumped Frank’s knee, and again Lee felt raw inside. Yet she heard herself laugh and copy his nonchalance.