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Unless Joe wasn’t coming.
Samantha picked up the phone and said, “Hello.”
“Sam?” It was a little girl’s voice. “Is that you?”
“Abbie?” Cautious now, she sat back in her chair. In seconds she was all choked up, her eyes brimming with tears. It had been so long since she heard this precious little girl’s voice.
“Hi.” Abbie sounded relieved for a second.
“Hi, baby.” Samantha smiled, finding the moment bittersweet. “How are you?”
“I’m okay,” Abbie said tearfully.
“Really?”
“Well—” Abbie hesitated “—maybe not so okay. I know I’m not supposed to call, but Daddy’s not here. And neither is Monica. There’s just the baby-sitter, and she thinks you’re just a friend of mine from school. So I thought it would be okay. Is it? Okay, I mean?”
“Oh, Abbie.” Samantha closed her eyes, and the tears slid down her cheeks. She knew what she had to do, but she wasn’t sure how she’d find the courage. The last thing in the world she wanted to do was hurt Abbie. “Did your father tell you not to call me?”
“Yes. But I found the number in his desk drawer, and I thought as long as he didn’t know, it would be okay. I miss you, Sam.”
“I miss you, too, sweetie. And Sarah. How is she?”
“She’s okay, I guess. She’s mad that we had to move to a new house just because Monica had to have a bigger one, and she doesn’t like her new teacher, but she has a friend in her class. I do, too. The house is big, and it has a great backyard. But there aren’t any kids close by. And Daddy’s…well, Daddy’s okay. Monica is, too, I guess. But…I still miss you so much.”
“Abbie, I’m sorry. I love you very much. You know that, don’t you? And I always will.”
“I don’t understand why you had to go so far away.”
And Samantha simply couldn’t explain it to her, except to say, “You know the worst thing about being a grown-up is that we don’t always get to do what we want or to live where we want or to see the people we love as much as we’d like. But I do love you. I won’t ever stop. And I love Sarah, too.”
“You just don’t love Daddy?”
Samantha sighed, then drew in a shaky breath. Richard didn’t love her anymore. That was the problem. But she couldn’t make him the villain here, not to his daughter. Samantha wanted Abbie and Sarah to be happy now with Richard and his new wife, even if it had broken Samantha’s heart to lose the girls. And if she wanted the girls to be happy, she couldn’t blame their father for what happened.
“Abbie, I’m so sorry. If I could, I’d wave a magic wand and everything would go back to the way it was before, and we’d all be together again.”
“But you can do all sorts of magic,” Abbie argued. “I saw you. Lots of times. Can’t you fix this? So we can be together again?”
“No, sweetie, I can’t.”
“Well…can I at least call you? When Daddy isn’t here? So we can just talk sometimes?”
“Abbie, it’s long distance. Your father’s going to know you called when he gets the bill and sees my number there.”
“He will?”
“I’m afraid so. You’re going to have to tell him.”
“But he’ll get mad.”
“Maybe not so mad if you tell him first, Abbie. Tell him you’re sorry, and then ask him if it’s okay if you call again sometimes. Maybe on my birthday. Do you remember when it is?”
“May?”
“Yes, in May.”
“But that’s four whole months away! What if I don’t want to wait that long? What if I need to talk to you?”
Swallowing hard, barely managing to keep her voice steady, Samantha said, “You’re going to have to ask your father and do what he says. Because he’s your father.”
Whereas, she was nothing to Abbie anymore, at least not according to Abbie’s father. Never mind that Samantha spent three years mothering Abbie and Sarah, or that she couldn’t love them more if she’d given birth to them.
“Abbie?” she said softly, working hard not to let the bitterness come through. “Your father is the one who gets to decide about these things, okay?”
“It’s just not fair,” Abbie said tearfully.
“I know.” Samantha had to cover the receiver for a minute, because she was crying so hard and she didn’t want the little girl to hear. It would only make this harder. “I love you, sweetie. Tell Sarah I love her, too.”
And then Samantha hung up the phone and wept.
Chapter Three
Joe had no choice but to bring Dani along when he took Luke to Dr. Carter’s office. He picked them both up from the late-stay program where they stayed from the time school ended until he got there after work. Then they drove straight to Dr. Carter’s, because that was the only way he was going to make it on time.
In the truck Dani had a million questions about where they were going and why. Once she knew Luke was in trouble, she was beside herself with glee. While Joe tried to deal with whatever Luke had done, she danced around Joe, pointing out that she hadn’t done whatever Luke had.
Joe could be reading Luke the riot act for pulling his sister’s hair, and the next thing he knew, Dani would be smiling and chanting, “I didn’t pull anyone’s hair. I didn’t pull anyone’s hair,” which infuriated Luke even more and didn’t do much for Joe’s mood, either.
Joe finally decided a bribe was in order, because he didn’t want the good doctor to think both his kids were heathens. He told Dani that if she behaved, didn’t break anything or steal anything and managed to keep fairly quiet, they would find out where she could get a glow-in-the-dark toothbrush, too.
“Pink?” she said.
Anything, Joe thought. If only she’d behave for the next ten minutes.
“Pink,” he said, praying that glow-in-the-dark toothbrushes came in pink and that Dr. Carter could find her one.
They pulled into the parking lot and climbed out of the car, Dani singing a limerick at the top of her lungs that had Luke begging Joe to make her be quiet. Joe had the fairy. Luke was dragging his heels. Joe put his hand at his son’s back to propel him toward the door.
“Do y’think she’s gonna be really mad?” Luke said, as if that meant much more to him than making his father mad.
“I think she’s going to be disappointed that you would take something that didn’t belong to you, especially something of hers, because she thought you were her friend.”
“Oh.” Luke looked even more miserable than before, and his steps had slowed to a crawl.
“It’s not going to get any easier,” Joe said, holding open the door so Dani could dance through.
“You sure about that?” Luke hung back on the sidewalk.
“Positive.” Joe motioned for him to move along. “In. Now. She stayed late tonight to talk to us.”
Dani was gazing at the fairies in the display case with the same sort of awe Luke had shown the day before.
“Don’t touch anything,” Joe warned her as he approached the window to the receptionist desk.
A young woman with reddish hair and a bright smile whom he hadn’t noticed the day before was waiting for him. Three more women, all staring at him and smiling, stood behind her.
“Mr. Morgan?” the redhead said.
“Yes.” Lord, he was infamous at the dentist’s office. His kid pulled teeth and lifted fairies from the waiting room.
All four women smiled at him.
“And this is Luke? And…?”
“His sister, Dani.”
Dani turned around and grinned. “Daddy, it’s just like in the book! Luke’s magic book!”
Joe winced, the legend of the tooth fairy growing ever larger in the minds of his children. “Don’t touch anything, sweetheart, okay?”
He turned back to the women, who were still waiting, still smiling. Didn’t they have anything to do?
“Samantha’s in her office. She’s expecting you,” the redhead said. “If you’d like to have a word with her first, Luke and Dani can play here for a few minutes. I’d be happy to keep an eye on them.”
Joe hesitated. Did he trust himself alone with Dr. Carter again? Maybe she’d pull another scarf out of his shirt pocket. Or explain to him how she made the ceiling glitter like that and how stars came to shoot across the starry sky she’d created in her examination room.
He glanced back at the kids, Dani in awe of the fairy collection, Luke sitting miserably in the corner.
“Don’t worry,” the woman said. “I have three kids of my own, and dozens come in here every day. I know all the possibilities for trouble in this room.”
Joe worked up a smile and tipped his head to her. “Thank you, ma’am. I would like to talk to the dentist.”
He told the kids he’d be back shortly, warned them again about behaving, then headed down the hallway grinning like an idiot. He was here to return a piece of stolen property, after all, and to beg for a trick toothbrush for his baby girl.
This in no way resembled a date, even if he had tried to take a bath in the sink at the office after work to get rid of the worst of the grime and the sweat clinging to him, then thrown on the clean shirt he tried to remember to keep in the car for those days he was summoned to Luke’s school on the way home from work.
Hell, he wouldn’t know what a date was, but he for damned sure knew this wasn’t the way to make a good first impression on a woman.
Striding down the hall, Joe thought about how much he’d love to get away, thought about the satisfaction he could find planting himself on the back of a horse and riding from dawn to dusk, even eating dust and smelling bad-tempered cows all day.
He missed Texas. He missed working the ranch and being so tired at the end of the day he just fell into bed and didn’t so much as blink until the sun was nearly up again and it was time to go to work and do it all over.
It had been another life, he reminded himself, one he couldn’t go back to. Besides, the life he had, while frustrating, even infuriating, at times, wasn’t that bad. He had Luke and Dani, and that was forever. No one would ever take them away from him.
And this was all a part of being a parent, Joe told himself.
He’d come here to please his wife; there’d been a time when he’d have done almost anything to make her happy. She’d been pregnant with Luke and uneasy about the whole process and about being a mother, and she’d thought it would be easier having her own mother close by. They couldn’t very well keep following the rodeo circuit—not with a newborn baby. It was time to settle down, and they’d settled here in Virginia.
Joe had considered moving back to Texas after Elena left, but this was the only home the kids had ever known, everything that was familiar in their world at a time when so many things had changed. They’d panicked when he’d even mentioned the possibility of moving, and he’d decided to stay put for their sake. They needed all the stability he could offer them at the moment—same school, same friends, same house. And as much as Elena’s parents had disapproved of him at first, they’d been great to him since Elena had left. They seemed as baffled by their daughter’s behavior as he was, and embarrassed, as well. They were great to his kids and understanding and supportive as Joe fumbled his way through life as a single parent.
He was fumbling right now—over teeth.
Resigned to guiding his son through his apology to the lady dentist, Joe lifted a hand to knock on the door next to the plaque that read Dr. Samantha Carter.
But the door wasn’t quite shut, and as he paused in front of it, he heard something. A muffled strangled sort of sound. Pushing the door open another two inches, he glanced inside and saw the slight figure of a woman hunched over the big desk. Her shoulders were shaking, her head buried in her hands.
Glancing around the office, he saw that she was all alone, and Joe couldn’t quite stomach that. Something about a woman crying her heart out, all alone, just didn’t sit right with him. He had to help her.
Even as he told himself it was none of his business, that he couldn’t let himself touch her, couldn’t hold her, he did, anyway. He didn’t let himself think about the fact that he barely knew her or about how very much he wanted to hold her.
He pushed open the door, then closed it behind him, because she didn’t need an audience right now. She needed a shoulder, someone to hold on to, someone to whisper in her ear some empty meaningless words like “Everything will be all right,” and Joe was the only one here. He’d have to do it. No self-respecting gentleman would have left her alone with her tears.
Joe wasn’t afraid of those tears. He had three sisters, after all. One of them was always crying. He walked across the room and put his hand on her back. “Doc?”
She froze, caught her breath, then turned around slowly, cautiously, as if she couldn’t believe she’d been caught like this. Her eyes were red and glistened with unshed tears. Her nose was a little red, as well. Tear tracks led down her cheeks, giving way to splotches of wetness on her dark blue blouse, and her mouth was trying to work itself into a smile, but failing.
She looked utterly miserable. And adorable. And very kissable.
He wanted to kiss her. That definitely wasn’t part of the plan. He was just supposed to make her feel a little better, to hold her until she managed to dry her tears—no kisses involved.
She hung her head, apparently not willing to meet his gaze any longer. Joe dipped his head low and tried to get her to look at him again.
“Wanna tell me what’s wrong, Doc?” he invited, making himself comfortable leaning against the side of her desk while she remained seated in that huge chair.
She swiped at her tears, missing half of them in her haste, then couldn’t stop more from falling.
“Come on,” he said gently, leaning closer, thinking about pulling her into his arms. “You can tell me.”
He figured he owed her. After all, she’d made him laugh this morning on the phone. How long had it been since he’d laughed like that? The idea of her being stern with a kid just did him in. It was as hopeless as the idea that he’d be able to leave her alone like this.
No way, he told himself.
She rolled her chair back so she could get away from him, but he slid across the desk until he was right in front of her, half sitting on the edge of it. He leaned over, catching her chair by its arms, then reached for her hands, instead. With one fluid motion he pulled her to him, had her plastered against him and clinging to him, this trembling mass of woman, smelling incredible and feeling like a frightened kitten that needed to be gentled to his touch and taught that she had nothing to fear from him.
He drank in the scent of her, because she did smell very good. And she was a tiny little thing, all silky hair and shaky breaths and tears. They just kept falling.
“Tell me,” he said again, knowing she wouldn’t feel better until she got it out.
Her face was pressed against his chest, the contact muffling the sound as she whispered to him, “I was just talking to Abbie.”
“Abbie?” He stroked her hair and bent down closer. “Who’s Abbie?”
“A little girl. A nine-year-old girl. And she was crying and telling me that life just isn’t fair. Which I knew already. But why did she have to learn that at nine? Why does any kid?”
“I don’t know, Doc.” He sighed and tightened his arms around her, because she was still trembling badly.
He should have known this had something to do with a kid in trouble. Any woman who went to so much trouble to help little children not to be so afraid at the dentist obviously had a major soft spot where kids were concerned.
