I totally knew Dad was not entirely okay with that.
Dad went on.
“He loves you like I love your Mom. I see in him what I feel when I look at her. And you can believe that because after Cooter, I would never, honey, never say this kinda shit to you if it wasn’t what I felt was the God’s honest truth.”
I knew this last to be true.
Dad wasn’t done.
“That said, my Kiakee deserves to have it all. She deserves a rich, famous, good-lookin’ man who thinks the sun rises and sets in her. She deserves a decent, good, loyal man who thinks the same. Sam is both ‘a those. But she also deserves to have everything she wants. If she’s willin’ to give it all, she should expect it in return. And if this doesn’t feel right, honey, right there,” one of his hands moved to press my chest, “you go with that feelin’. Because my girl is back and she deserves decent, good, loyal, gentle, rich and famous and she always did. But if that’s not givin’ it all, my girl deserves to find a man who will give all of himself right back to her.”
I stared in my Dad’s eyes.
All he said was beautiful. It was right. It was wise.
But it didn’t help me one bit.
Then Dad, being Dad, helped me.
He pressed in at my chest again and whispered, “Listen to that. Always, always listen to your heart. It’ll guide the way. You’ll know, it’s enough, it’ll tell you. You’ll know, it’s not enough and never will be, it’ll tell you. Listen to your heart, Kiakee. And when the time comes to make the final decision, your heart will lead the way.”
In that moment, a moment of blinding clarity, I knew he was so right.
Two days before I married Cooter, I couldn’t get to sleep because my heart hurt. I didn’t get it, not at my age back then. I thought it was nerves and excitement. But two days later, I didn’t rush down the aisle, beside myself with glee to be marrying the ex-quarterback of the high school football team.
I did it with uncertainty.
Because my heart was talking to me and I wasn’t old enough or wise enough to listen.
Now I was both.
And now, I was there. I let Sam kiss me and change my mind because right now, what I had with him was enough. I didn’t need it all.
Tomorrow that might change.
And until the final decision needed to be made, I would burn every moment into my brain, just as I promised. I might not need those memories. But I’d have them all the same.
I wrapped my arms around my Dad, held him close, pressed my cheek to his shoulder and whispered, “Thanks, Dad.”
Dad’s arms around me gave me a squeeze. “Anytime, Kiakee.”
Memphis, patient until now, yapped.
I pulled away and looked down at my dog. She jumped a few feet and strained the lead.
“We better walk Memphis,” Dad muttered.
“Yeah,” I muttered back.
Dad took my hand and the lead out of my other one that also held my coffee.
When he did, I took a sip of coffee.
Then I took a walk on the beach with my Dad.
An hour later, Sam still sweaty in his running gear, bags loaded in the car, Sam and I stood in the drive and waved as Kyle backed out.
My family waved back.
We stayed where we were until they were out of sight and I knew Sam hit the button on the remote because the gate started closing.
Now it was only Sam and me.
Oh man.
I felt the tears pool in my eyes, one slid over and trailed down my cheek.
Sam turned into me and with a hand at my jaw he tipped my head back so he could look at me.
His eyes moved down my cheek.
Then he whispered, “Seein’ that kills me.”
Right. There it was. The decision I made just over a week ago was the right one.
It wasn’t about Sam’s kiss.
It was about Sam giving me beauty just like that.
I closed my eyes and did a face plant in his sweaty-shirted chest. His arms closed around me.
“You’re gonna miss them,” he surmised.
I nodded, my face moving against his chest.
“Anytime you wanna go back, baby, you tell me and I’ll get you to your family.”
“Okay,” I whispered, my arms got tight around him and I pressed close.
“Kia, honey, I’m drenched with sweat,” Sam told me.
“I don’t care,” I replied.
That was when his arms got tight. Then I felt his lips brush my hair. Then he just held me until I pulled away. He turned me to his side, arm around my shoulders, mine around his waist and, with Memphis bouncing at our heels, Sam walked me to the house.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Do You Love Me?
Two and a half weeks later…
I watched Luci flip her phone closed as I worried my lip with my teeth.
“Well, that’s done,” she murmured, her eyes sliding away.
We were having lunch in Kingston at Luci’s favorite restaurant. It wasn’t the first time we did it but, after hearing her end of the phone call where she accepted an offer on her house, I feared it would be one of the last.
“You okay?” I asked quietly and her eyes slid back to me.
Then she pulled in a breath, I thought she would speak but her gaze drifted away again.
“Luci?” I called and she took her time but she finally looked at me.
“I’m having second thoughts.”
I pressed my lips together in order not to shout, “Yippee!”
This was because, since Luci realized she needed to come to terms with the loss of her husband and look to her future, I was never sure about that meaning she needed to move back to Italy.
This was partly selfish. She was my only friend in North Carolina and we’d grown super close.
This was partly because of what Sam told me about her before I even met her.
She was, of course, sultry, exotic, glamorous and beautiful.
But she wasn’t only the kind of woman who was just as comfortable drinking a beer on a deck as drifting in elegant clothes through posh events. She was actually more comfortable drinking beer on a deck than she seemed drifting in elegant clothes through posh events.
Sometimes home wasn’t where you grew up. Home was where you were meant to be.
And I sensed Luci was meant to be here.
She’d changed. The sorrow wasn’t gone but it was nowhere near the intensity it used to be. Her smiles were more genuine. Her laughter came more easily. She never tried to fake anything. And she seemed more at peace.
At the very least, I didn’t think she should shake up this process by moving to a different country even if it was the nation of her birth.
“Talk to me,” I urged, she pulled in another breath then she leaned into me and I was shocked to see it was with excitement.
“Okay, cara mia, I… it’s hard…” she trailed off, her eyeballs slid to the side then she looked back at me and declared, “Travis ruined me for other men.”
Uh-oh.
Were we back to this?
“Luci, honey –” I began but she shook her head and her hand darted out to capture mine.
“No, what I mean is… Kia, you know. They, men like that… you can’t find just any other man. You have to find a man like that.”
This was not good.
Carefully and gently, I said, “Luci, there isn’t another Travis.”
Her head tipped slightly to the side and she replied, “I know, Kia, I mean an American.”
I blinked.
“Italian men don’t wear baseball caps,” she went on.
What?
Baseball caps?
She kept going.
“Or say ‘fuckin’ this’ or ‘bullshit that’ or take so much pride in their pickup trucks you’d think they were their children.”
It was then I had to stop myself from laughing.
She wasn’t done.
“I mean, T
ravis wore baseball caps and had a pickup truck, though not as big as Sam’s, but I don’t need a man who wears a baseball cap or owns a pickup truck. I just mean a man who’s a man. And I know Italian men or French men or whatever can be men. But only American men can be, well… so… very… American.”
I couldn’t help it, I started giggling.
She let my hand go and sat back looking adorably disgruntled.
“I wasn’t being amusing,” she told me.
“Yes you were,” I replied. “But I can’t say you’re wrong. American men are the only men who can be American.”
She rolled her eyes.
I kept giggling.
Then I sobered and it was me this time who reached out and grabbed her hand. I held it tight and when her eyes came to mine, mine locked on hers.
“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do. You don’t have to take that offer on your house. You don’t have to go home. If you go home, you can come back. You can do whatever you want to do, Luci. Your whole life is in front of you.” Then I gave her my Dad’s advice. “Listen to your heart and find your happiness.”
Her face grew uncertain and she asked, “I know that, Kia, but what do you think I should do?”
I was learning that Luci needed a lot of advice. She ciphered this and went her own way but to cipher, she needed input to cipher through and asked for it.
“If I were you, I’d keep that offer, sell the house you shared with Gordo and look for smaller properties here. You already own two homes and can afford it. That way, you have your options open. And, if your preference runs to macho American men, you’ll find a lot more of them here than you will in Italy so you need a base from which to launch your offensive.”
She grinned.
I let her hand go and sat back
But Luci surprisingly didn’t cipher and decided right away. “I will do this. I will call my real estate agent when I get home and set up viewings.”
Excellent!
“Good,” I murmured.
The waitress came with our bill and we did our usual arguing over who was going to pay for it. I finally convinced her of the truth that it was my turn, I paid then we gathered our purses, left the restaurant and headed to our cars.
Her Corvette was parked in front of my Cherokee and I asked something I’d wanted to know since before I met her.
“What is with your cars?”
Her head snapped to me and the way it did, I realized she wasn’t quite there and I’d messed up. I should have been more sensitive. This had something to do with Gordo and she wasn’t ready for me to blurt the question like I did.
Then she looked at her car and her face grew pensive.
God, I was such an idiot.
“Luci, sorry, I shouldn’t have asked like that. It wasn’t nice.”
Her eyes came to me.
“Travis would hate this car.” Her gaze moved back to the Corvette. “I hate this car. It is not me.”
“It’s a cool car,” I said softly and she looked back at me. “But you’re right, it isn’t you.”
I didn’t know what was her but she wasn’t about flash and dazzle or the need for speed.
She was… well, like me.
“Maybe…” she said quietly, pausing then, “maybe I thought, if I did something he hated, he’d show up and stop me. He worked hard for his money, he didn’t come from it. Although I had it and he made a good salary, the way he grew up, he didn’t throw it away. He would dislike me doing it. Clothes, shoes, bags, makeup, things like that he didn’t mind.” She smiled sadly at me. “They made me pretty and he liked me pretty. They made me happy and he liked me happy. But this,” she tilted her head to the car, “was just madness. It would not make him displeased, it would make him angry. And maybe, well, maybe I was angry. Angry at him for leaving me. So I wanted to make him angry too.” She looked at the car and whispered, “Foolish.”
“Understandable,” I whispered in reply and she again looked at me.
Then her face changed and the way it did, my breath caught.
“I love you, Kia Clementine,” she said suddenly and I closed my eyes.
Then I opened them and moved into her, folding my arms around her and holding her tight.
“Right back at you, Luciana Gordon.”
She gave me a squeeze. I returned it.
Then we broke apart but leaned in and touched cheek to cheek. She got in her car and I hoofed it to the Cherokee and climbed in. I started it up and headed home to Sam.
Then I smiled.
After our blowout three weeks ago when I almost decided to leave him, Sam changed and stayed changed. We were back. Things were good. No more mysterious outings and long workouts.
Two days ago, we even had a chat about my future. I liked Kingston. I liked clothes. I liked handbags. I liked jewelry. But, although Kingston had some fun shops, it didn’t have a cool women’s clothing and accessories shop. It didn’t even have an uncool one. It was a female clothing and accessories wasteland.
So Sam told me there was a community college close by, I could take business courses, get an associate’s degree but before that, pick his Mom’s brain and learn from the master. He even suggested we fly out to California and I work with her in her shop for a couple of weeks to see if it was my thing.
I liked this idea. It was something to explore. Something exciting. Something I may or may not be good at but it was something. A direction. A possible future.
As for Sam, although the mysterious outings had disappeared, the private phone calls didn’t.
I had chosen to ignore this. They didn’t put him in a bad mood that he took out on me or a bad mood at all. They didn’t take him away from me for hours on end. And they didn’t send him off to do stuff unknown.
He didn’t want to share, okay. Maybe one day he would. Maybe he wouldn’t and one day it would get to me.
Now, it wasn’t.
I was going with that.
It was part of Sam and I was accepting what he could give to me since the dark days were gone and we were back to everything he gave me being beauty.
And that was definitely something I could go with.
I drove home and a couple houses down from ours I hit the remote for the gate then hit the button for the garage. By the time I was ready to pull in both were open. I did the button thing again the minute I cleared the gate then shut the garage door behind me after I turned off the car.
Then I went up the stairs to the kitchen.
I thought I’d hear the game but I didn’t.
And Memphis didn’t yap at me.
Hmm.
“Honey! I’m home!” I called and that was when I heard Memphis yap.
It was coming from upstairs.
But nothing from Sam.
I rounded the stairs and looked through the living room.
No Sam.
“Honey?” I called and got another yap from Memphis; I looked up and saw her at the top of the stairs. She yapped at me again. “Hey, baby,” I called as I moved up the stairs.
Memphis yapped her reply.
Three steps from her, I leaned in and she bounced into my arms.
Cuddling her, I was heading toward the office but heard something in the bedroom so, brows drawing together, I moved there.
Then I stopped dead in the doorway.
Sam was packing his big black leather duffle. The duffle he used when he went to Italy then went with me to Crete and Indiana.
I didn’t get a good feeling about this.
“Sam?” I whispered, my eyes going to him to see his movements were economical, practiced and swift.
He dumped something from the dresser into his bag, what, I didn’t care and his eyes came to me.
“Baby, got a gig I gotta do. I’ll be gone three weeks, month tops.”
I froze.
He had a gig where he’d be gone three weeks, a month tops?
What.
The.
Fuck?
&nb
sp; “Sorry?” I asked and my voice sounded strangled.
Sam didn’t repeat himself. But as he moved to the walk-in, he kept talking.
“I’ll text or call to let you know when to expect me home.” He disappeared into the walk-in and kept speaking. “But until then communication will be random and infrequent.”
He was suddenly and without notice leaving for three weeks and telling me communication would be random and infrequent.
Was he high?
Seriously?
I forced myself to come unstuck, wandered partially into the room and he came out with a load of jeans and shirts.
“You’re leaving for three weeks?” I asked.
He shoved the stuff in without folding it. I already knew this was why his shirts were so wrinkled. I didn’t try to break him of this habit before and, for obvious reasons, I didn’t mention it now.
“Yeah,” he answered.
“You’re leaving for three weeks,” I repeated as a statement this time.
His eyes came to me but only to skim through me before he looked down at the bed and I saw him pick up his passport.
His passport!
Then he repeated, “Yeah,” as he shoved it into the back pocket of his jeans.
“You can’t be serious,” I whispered and he looked at me but this time he held my eyes.
“You might wanna take this opportunity to go home,” he suggested. “You do, let me know, just text me or leave a voicemail if I don’t pick up. You decide to stay awhile, when I’m done, I’ll go to you in Indiana.”
Then he went to the nightstand, picked up his watch and started to strap it on.
This wasn’t happening. He didn’t seriously think that I could leave him to have lunch with Luci, be gone a few hours, come back and find him packing, taking his passport and telling me he was going to be gone an indefinite amount of time with little to no communication, no understanding of where he was going and what he was going to be doing there and I’d be okay with that.
“Sam, honey, you need to stop a second and give me a little time,” I said quietly.
He looked from his watch to me. “Kia, baby, wish I could but I don’t have a little time. Wheels up in an hour and the drive is forty-five minutes. I gotta hit the road.”