Chapter 10- Sam
Outside, she turned to me. “Can I drive?”
I narrowed my eyes. “My truck? It’s too big.”
She tilted her head, one brow lifted like she was daring me to say no. “It’s a Range Rover. Not a tank.”
“Sweetheart, it costs six figures.” I tried another excuse.
She smiled like she knew exactly what that smile did to me. “So.”
I stared at her for a beat, jaw flexing, but tossed her the keys anyway.
She drove like a madwoman.
She peeled out of the driveway like we were in a Fast & Furious reboot and she was Vin Diesel’s understudy. One hand on the wheel, the other switching through the playlist on her phone, thighs flexing every time she hit the gas.
“Jesus, Zane,” I muttered, bracing one hand on the dash. “You’re not being chased.”
She just laughed and kept going fast as fuck.
The music was loud—something slow and sultry from Mariah the Scientist—but her mood didn’t match it. She was hype, leg bouncing, grinning.
She started singing.
Half the words where off-key. And she was loud.
It should’ve been annoying.
It wasn’t. She made even annoying seem cute.
But then she took a sharp turn, one hand still doing air choreography like she was performing on Tiny Desk, and my life flashed before my eyes.
“Zane. The road. Pay attention to the goddamn road.”
She stopped mid-lyric, mid-gesture, and rolled her eyes so hard I saw it from the passenger seat.
“I’ve got it, Sam,” she said, real dry, like I was being ridiculous and getting on her nerves.
“You’re driving my shit like it’s a go-kart!”
“Relax,” she said, completely unbothered, flipping her blinker on two seconds too late. “It’s insured.”
“That’s not the point! “I barked.
She bit back a laugh. “It’s a little bit the point.”
“What about dying?”
She laughed at me like I was a joke.
I exhaled through my nose. Deep. Slow. Trying not to say anything else that sounded like I was afraid for my life.
She was glowing. Joy looked good on her. She looked like she hadn’t just caught her husband fucking my wife less than two days ago, and I wondered if I had anything to do with that.
We pulled into the Publix lot. She threw it in park and turned to look at me, eyes all big and innocent but filled with mischief too.
“We’re having a picnic on the beach.”
“Are we?” I raised an eyebrow.
“Yes. It’s a nice day. Sun cures sadness. You want me to be cured, don’t you?”
I blinked. “I’m not sad. And you didn’t have to be dramatic. I was going to say yes.”
She laughed—head thrown back—then jumped out of the truck and came around and opened my door for me. Her fingers curled around my hand without asking.
My hand closed around hers.
We walked like that into the store. Through produce, past the rotisserie chickens, down the freezer aisle. Like it was normal. Like we knew each other.
I was just grateful my shirt was long enough to hide the situation going on below my belt.
What kind of man gets hard from holding hands?
Apparently, me.
Halfway through seafood, she suddenly cleared her throat and dropped my hand as if she suddenly realized she was walking around a public place with a married man that wasn’t hers.
I looked down at the space where she’d been and then up at her.
She looked guilty but was pretending to study the shrimp.
I didn’t say a word. I helped her pick out sandwiches, strawberries. She ordered steamed crab legs and shrimp. Grabbed a couple slices of cake.
We were on the way out when she told me, “I need to use the restroom,” she said before she turned back to go inside.
I had unloaded what we bought and was sitting in the driver’s seat when she came back, opening my door.
“Why can’t I drive?” she asked. I could hear the pout in her voice. I didn’t even look over at her little self. I spoke, sunglasses covering my eyes, one hand on the wheel, the other resting on the gear shift.
“Because you drive like you ain’t scared to die. Go get in, sweetheart.”
She laughed, but walked around the car, taking her time, frowning at me through the windshield.
The beach was crowded when we got there, but not enough to stop us from finding a space.
When we did, she peeled off her shorts and shirt so fast I barely had time to process it.
My head went right to left. There were too many men’s eyes turned in our direction. I gritted my teeth, my face going hot.
“Put that back on, you in your underwear,” I barked, sharper than I meant. She was wearing black lace with her smooth skin peeking through the fabric, fat pussy print very visible.
She turned over her shoulder to look at me, short hair wild from the wind, eyes wide. “Sam, it’s literally the same amount of fabric as a bikini.”
She wasn’t wrong. I shut up, reminding myself this wasn’t my woman. I bit my tongue while she ran toward the water.
We sat on towels. She made a mess and laughed with her whole body when the wind blew napkins across the sand, then she chased them laughing harder. We built the world’s worst sandcastle. Lopsided. Crumbling.
Then she pulled two bottles from the bag like it was a surprise party, looking around like the police would jump out at any moment.
“For me,” she said, showing off the Sutter Home. Then a bottle of gin. “For you.”
“When you steal those?” I joked.
She grinned. “When I went back in the store to pee. I made a detour. But I paid for them.”
How she got fucked up off Sutter Home is beyond me. One moment we were talking about nothing and everything, then her words slowed, and her head started falling to one side when she smiled.
“Are you drunk?”
“No. I’m fine, pretty man. Let’s go, I gotta pee.”
She tried to stand, to grab the cooler, missed the handle completely, and burst out laughing like it was the funniest thing in the world.
“All right,” I said, already moving toward her. “I got it.”
She took one wobbly step toward me, arms outstretched like a kid about to fall.
I caught her before she could.
“How you get just as drunk off cheap wine as whiskey?” I asked, already bending to lift her.
Before she could answer, I had her off the ground—her legs dangling, arms wrapped around my neck, her face buried in my collar like she belonged there.
“You smell like sun, pretty, pretty man,” she mumbled, voice syrupy and low.
I didn’t respond to the sun comment or her calling me pretty. Just held her tighter and started walking, her laughter bouncing in the dark.
She kicked her feet once like she was on a ride, then laid her head down and sighed so hard I felt it through my chest.
At the house, she had sand in her lashes, salt dried on her neck, a sleepy smile glued to her face.
I turned on the shower while she leaned against the counter, one eye half-closed. She stripped down boldly like she didn’t care what I saw. She stepped into the spray with a sigh that sounded like relief.
I turned to leave.
“No, stay?” she nearly screamed, eyes fluttering. “So I don’t drown or fall or... do something dumb?”
I sat on the toilet, fists clenched on my knees, too stupid to look away.
She hummed something under her breath—some song from earlier—while dragging her soapy rag over her nude body.
I liked how confident in her skin she was, that her moment of self-doubt hadn’t been the usual her.
She didn’t know what she was doing to me.
Either way, I sat there watching her, a man on fire, trying not to burn the whole house down.