27. Sam
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
sam
“Are you kidding me, Nina?” Sam snaps the second the door closes, the pleading in Cooper’s brilliant eyes almost more than she can bear. “This isn’t the fucking CIA. What the hell was that?”
“Please.” Nina snorts. “The CIA wishes they had me.”
That’s probably accurate. “You didn’t have to drag him out of here like that.”
“You promised me a finale to remember. That means no talking before we’re live.”
“I wasn’t going to—”
“Save it. You were about two seconds from mounting each other and we both know it. Now, I just got word from Trish.”
Sam’s heart lurches so hard she needs to steady herself against the vanity. Her throat suddenly runs dry. She has to swallow before she speaks. “And?”
“We’re a go.”
“Really?” The word comes out as an embarrassing squeal as her hope balloons so rapidly she almost can’t breathe. “They said yes?”
“They said yes.”
“You have it in writing?”
“I’ve got the updated contract right here.”
“Give me a pen.”
As any good businesswoman would, Sam takes a moment to review the changes from the last draft. They’re exactly as requested. Granted, she should probably have her friend from legal give it a final once-over, but there’s no time. She glances at the clock. The show starts any minute. If she wants to win Cooper back and secure her sister’s business, it’s now or never. So she flips to the last page and signs on the dotted line.
It’s happening.
It’s really happening.
Sam catches her reflection. The energetic buzz beneath her skin matches the rosy flush of her cheeks and the brilliant shine in her eyes. Behind her, the room is brighter, no longer a drab and dull gray but a vivacious and crisp white. It’s like looking through the window on those rare snow days from her youth, the world sparkling with a thousand possibilities as each hopeful flake falls. She feels like a kid again, full to the brim with the buoyant, naive idea that somehow everything’s going to be okay—a sense time and puberty and life ground out of her, now suddenly returned.
This must be what optimism feels like.
“Keith just went live,” Nina says, one hand pressed to her headphones while the other clutches her clipboard. She finds Sam’s eyes in the mirror. “They’re leading the guys out now. A clip reel is playing. You’ll be on in five. You ready?”
“To put Ethan, Chad, and every other fame-hungry asshole who played with my sister’s heart in their place while simultaneously getting everything I’ve ever wanted?” She spins around on the stool and straightens her shoulders with a defiant tilt of her chin. “I was born ready.”
“You know, I think I actually feel a little bad for those guys. The poor bastards have no idea what’s coming.”
Sam stands and brushes the lint off her dress. “Nina?”
“Yeah?”
“Fuck off.”
The producer laughs and holds out her arm. “Come with me.”
Walking out onto the stage is surprisingly easy. Waving to the adoring audience. Sitting beneath the blinding spotlights. Talking to Keith about the season. Telling off the jerks. Giving all the sweet guys their due. She takes it all in stride. The first two-thirds of the show pass in a blink. It’s not until her conversation with the runner-up starts to wind down that Sam’s palms grow sweaty. Doubts tunnel like worms beneath her skin, wiggling and writhing, carving closer and closer to her heart.
What if this doesn’t work?
What if the audience turns on me?
What if he says no?
There are a million ways this could go wrong. But there’s one possibility she cups between her palms like a wounded bird waiting to take flight.
What if it all goes right?
Keith Holson looks at the audience as the runner-up walks off. Sam’s ears ring so loudly she doesn’t hear a word he says, but deep down she knows what’s coming. The cameras shift at the same instant, all pointed somewhere offstage. Her gaze follows instinctively.
And there he is.
Cooper stands in the shadows, just outside the spotlight, his hat riding low over his brow, those red curls sneaking out behind his ears. His green eyes smolder in the darkness, bright as fire on a starless night. The sight of him in a suit hits her even harder than it did that day on the beach now that she knows the man beneath the body. A cowboy with an artist’s soul. A son who loved his mother more than anything in the world. A restless spirit who said in her he finally found a home.
Love slams into her like a tidal wave, stirring up every fear, every doubt, every memory of everything that ever came before him. She thinks of what he said back in the dressing room. I need her like I need air. I’m drowning without her. The words hang there while she flips in the current, spinning, churning, lost in the rush. Her chest burns.
And then he’s there.
He sits next to her and takes her hand. Just like that, she’s saved. The second his fingers wrap around hers, warm and solid and sturdy, she draws in that first fresh breath of air since she stepped out of his car and the slate wipes clean. Nothing matters, nothing except the here and now.
“So, Emily and Cooper,” Keith says in that warm yet hollow hosting voice. “Where do things stand since we last left you with that beautiful proposal in the Maldives? Still happily engaged?”
Cooper keeps his eyes glued to her, dissecting every curve of her face, every iridescent shimmer of her eyes in the spotlights, searching for the right answer. But it’s not his answer to give.
Sam turns to Keith. “Actually, Keith, before we get to that, there’s something I need to confess.”
The hand threaded through hers tightens. Despite the murmur of the studio audience, it’s the soft hiss of Cooper’s sharp inhale that grabs her full attention, the sound balanced on the edge of hope and hurt, two sides of the same blade.
“Confess?” Keith asks with a put-on laugh. He turns to the audience with a wide grin, but it pulls at the corners. She’s going off-script and he has no idea what to expect, which is good. Nina said it would play better if he was just as confused as the audience. “What do you think? Should we hear what she has to say?”
“Yes! Yes!” come the shouts.
“Well, Emily. Take it away.”
“That’s just the thing.” Sam swallows. She turns to Cooper, lifts his hand to her lips, and presses a soft kiss against his fingers. His gaze darts rapidly back and forth from one of her pupils to the other, as if he’s unsure he can trust the message he’s reading there. But he can. This is real. This is happening. “I’m not Emily.”
The gears in the backs of Cooper’s eyes shudder to a stop. Sam tightens her fingers reassuringly and turns back to Keith, who is watching her with an unsure expression.
“Don’t tell me,” he suddenly blurts with a nervous laugh as he glances quickly off camera. “You’re Mrs. Kelley already?”
“Nope,” Sam answers, letting the p really pop off her tongue. Then she grins. “I’m Sam. Well, Samantha Rose Peters if you want to be exact. But everyone calls me Sam.”
The audience gasps.
“Sam?” Keith says slowly, the panic rising in his eyes.
“That’s me,” she chirps, turning back to Cooper, pulled toward him by some inner instinct she doesn’t want to temper. The crinkles at the corners of his eyes tell her everything she needs to know. He leans back in his seat and drapes his arm around her, then hugs her against his side as his chest swells with what she knows is his first full breath in three weeks. “Though someday, maybe, I might be Mrs. Kelley, too. I haven’t decided if I’m really the taking-my-husband’s-last-name type, but it does have a nice ring to it.”
Keith stares at her, then at Cooper, then somewhere offstage. If downtown Los Angeles had crickets, they’d be chirping up a storm in the silence that follows. It’s probably no more than a second or two, but beneath the blinking red lights of a dozen cameras, she feels as though it goes on for a year. Suddenly, the host snaps out of his daze and looks directly into the lens.
“We’ll be right back.”
The on air sign blinks off.
“What the FUCK,” he explodes, jumping to his feet. Nina runs onstage and starts talking to him too softly for anyone else to hear. Every member of the studio audience launches into conversation all at once. In the center of the storm, Sam watches Cooper, and he watches her, each wearing a silly, stupid smile across their lips.
“Couldn’t have given me a little heads-up?” Cooper comments, arching a brow. “I’ve been out of my goddamn mind, Cuj.”
“Yeah? Just wait until you hear what’s next.”
“What?”
“Hey.” Nina snaps her fingers, drawing their attention. “Thing One and Thing Two, save it for the show.”
Sam rolls her eyes.
Cooper grunts.
“I am not going to miss her,” he says under his breath.
No, you definitely won’t. Sam laughs softly. A ten-second countdown begins as the producers scramble to quiet everyone down. She leans up until her mouth hovers beside his ear, needing to give Cooper one moment that’s just for him.
“I was out of my goddamn mind, too, cowboy,” she whispers. “I love you.”
He whips toward her.
The countdown hits one.
They’re live.
“So, Sam ,” Keith says, the easygoing laugh back as he keeps his cool, collected mask firmly in place. “You sort of dropped a bomb on us there. Care to explain?”
“There’s not much to explain.” She shrugs, trying to keep as calm as possible as nervous bolts snap down her spine. This is it. They have to believe me. They will believe me. Everything—her heart, Cooper’s ranch, Emily’s business—it’s all riding on this moment and this one little white lie she absolutely needs to get right. “I’ve been Sam the whole time. When my mom went on Wake Up, America! asking for help finding my sister a boyfriend, she didn’t realize that Emily had recently gotten back together with her high-school sweetheart. No one except for me knew about it. Things were still fresh. My sister never imagined that the clip would blow up. She never dreamed the producers of our favorite show, The Love Match , would come calling asking her to be the new lead. But when they did, she couldn’t accept. She was already in love. It wouldn’t have been right to lead thirty men on when her heart belonged to someone else. But we both knew what this kind of exposure could be for her jewelry business, a dream she’s been chasing her entire life, a dream I want more than anything for her to achieve, especially since I’m also the CFO of the company. So I suggested we pull a trick out of our old identical-twin playbook and switch places.”
“Switch places?” Keith asks.
“I told her I would come on the show and pretend to be her. No one would know the difference. I was single at the time. We could still give America exactly what they wanted. I thought I would come out here, date a bunch of cute guys, wear my sister’s fabulous jewelry, and then go back to my life, simple as that.”
Keith glances between her and Cooper, then drops his gaze to their intertwined hands. “And then you met Cooper?”
“And then I met Cooper.” She laughs and shakes her head. “What was I supposed to do? Let a little thing like my name come in between us? I mean, look at him, ladies.” Sam gestures at him, grinning as the audience hoots and hollers their approval. She looks up at the man in question, hoping he sees the complete honesty shining in her eyes. “I knew falling for him would break every single one of my rules, and I tried not to. Lord, how I tried. But when have rules ever mattered when it comes to love? I knew being with him would risk everything. I knew there was a chance that all of you amazing people watching the show would never forgive me or my sister for lying to you like this. I knew my actions could destroy her dreams. I knew all of that, but when he looked at me, none of it mattered.”
The audience swoons.
She has them in the palm of her hand, and yet, just as she said, none of it matters. The only things that matter are the warm green eyes lighting her up inside, the arm holding her close, the thumb drawing circles on the back of her hand. She’s not speaking to them—to the cameras, the audience, Keith, the producers. They all fade away, until it’s just her and Cooper in the middle of their own universe.
“I’ve been scared for a long time, scared of giving my heart to someone, afraid they might break it. But when I thought of walking away, of never seeing you again, I realized something. You already had it. The moment we met, I gave you a little piece of myself. And with each passing day, I freely gave more and more, until eventually, I looked around and realized you had it all. Falling in love with you was so easy I didn’t even realize it was happening until I was completely head over heels, but I know what this is now. I know what we are, and I’m sorry I ever doubted it. I’m not afraid anymore. I need you. So…”
Sam disentangles herself from Cooper and scoots back on the couch. She removes the ring on her finger and holds it out to him.
“The first time you gave me this ring, you didn’t know what you were agreeing to,” she says. “Now it’s your choice. Break my heart if you have to, Cooper. I probably deserve it. Or be with me, the real me. No rules. No limits. No fear.”
The studio is utterly silent, as if everyone is waiting on the same collective inhale. Cooper takes the ring between his pointer finger and his thumb, the brush of his skin like a match to sandpaper, setting her on fire. Her heart races. Yet he’s utterly calm as he slowly twists and turns the gem, as if inspecting the cut. Suddenly, he tosses the ring high and deftly snatches it from the air. Beneath the brim of his hat, he wears an expression that can only be classified as sinful while he lifts his chin to look at her.
“I have one rule, Sam.”
She gulps. “What’s that?”
“I want your tomorrows.” He tugs on her hand so she falls against his chest, then presses his lips to her ear, too quickly for the cameras to change angles as he whispers for her and her alone, “I’m a greedy man. I want them all. You say yes and every last one of them is mine. Understood?”
She leans back to look him in the eyes and places her palm over his heart. “They’re already yours, cowboy.”
“Well then…” He grins, slides off the edge of the interview couch, and drops down on one knee right there—in front of the studio audience, the cameras, and the ten million people watching at home. With her fingers clutched in one hand and the ring suspended expectantly in the other, he flashes those dimples, making her and about nine million other women swoon. “Samantha Rose Peters—I said this once, and I’ll say it again—will you marry me and make me the happiest man in the world?”
“Well, I’m not sure I can promise that ,” she says with a wry twist of her lips. “We both know I’m a handful. But I will be your wife.”
“Deal.”
He slides the ring over her knuckle so fast it stirs a laugh, then she’s in his arms and they’re spinning. Applause rings out, claps and shouts and cheers. Then a loud boom echoes across the stage as an unholy amount of confetti and balloons rains down from the rafters. Cooper arches his head back to release a loud bellow as they come to a stop at the center of the madness, hardly able to see each other through the paper flurries. He keeps his hands at the small of her back as he lowers her to the ground. She tightens her arms around his neck and draws him down. They kiss long and slow, enjoying every second of knowing it’s just the beginning as the romantic music blaring from the speakers hits a crescendo.
Suddenly, the spotlight shifts.
They’re left in the dark.
Without even looking, Sam senses the cameras pan away. Good riddance. She has no intention to stop making out with the drop-dead-sexy cowboy who she can now officially call her fiancé. But then someone screams. And another person. And another in an excited chain of reaction that can only mean one thing—next season’s lead has just walked out, and it’s a good one. As a loyal fan of the show, she’s dying to know who it is. Curiosity might have killed the cat, but it definitely kills the mood. She can’t help it. She takes a peek.
“Ty?” The name pops out drenched in surprise.
“Ty?” Cooper rears back. “You forget to tell me something, Cuj? Since when are you on a nickname basis with Tyler Briggs?”
“Why?” She turns back to Cooper with a smirk. “Jealous?”
“Do I need to be?”
She snorts and pats him on the shoulder. “Down boy. It’s not like that. Did I forget to mention that Winnie’s older brother plays professional hockey? He and Ty have been best friends since they were kids. The three of them grew up together. They visited us in New York a few times. I can’t believe he’s doing this show. Winnie’s going to lose her mind when I tell her.”
“She’s going to have to get in line. My ears are practically bleeding.” He winces and looks up at the crowd of screaming women, then tugs on Sam’s hip, turning her back to him with a grin. “Guess we’re old news.”
She cringes. Not exactly.
His brows immediately pull together. “What?”
Sam folds her bottom lip between her teeth, debating if she should wait, but it’s like ripping off a Band-Aid—better to get it over with. “This is probably a good time to mention that I signed a contract with Nina, pursuant to your proposal on live TV, to film a new show called Sam and Cooper: Happily Ever After? about the two of us moving in together on your ranch.”
“Cuj.”
“It’ll be great exposure for Emily’s jewelry business. Did I mention I’m going to accept her CFO offer? Not for fifty percent, obviously. But I think sixty-forty is fair, and—”
“Cuj.”
“It’ll be the perfect way to launch your new photography business. I saw the website you put together after I left, by the way. It looks great, though I do have a few suggestions—”
“Cuj.”
“Anyway, we start filming in six months during the next break between seasons. Oh, and in case this wasn’t obvious, Nina is executive producing the whole thing.”
“ Sam. ”
She gulps and leans back, trying to remain as casual as possible, which isn’t the easiest thing in the world to do when a six-foot-two cowboy is fuming in her arms. “Yes?”
“Have you lost your mind?”
“Come on.” She tilts her head to the side and fluffs her lips into that pouty expression that almost always lets her get away with murder. “You have to admit, it has a nice ring to it. Happily Ever After. Doesn’t it?”
His glower deepens as he opens his mouth. She quickly switches tactics, cutting him off at the pass.
“Before you say anything, there’s one more thing you should know.”
He scoffs. “What the hell else did you do?”
“I left my underwear in the dressing room.”
He drops his head against hers with a groan.
“What? I just thought it was an important piece of information you’d want to have before deciding your next move.”
“You can’t keep winning arguments like this.”
“Why not?” She grins as he slides his palms down the sides of her silk dress, checking for ridges that aren’t there. He curses under his breath. She licks his neck. “It works.”
“You’re a fucking menace,” he mutters as he bunches the skirt in his fists and pulls her closer.
“Maybe.” She shrugs, playing with the hairs at the base of his neck. “But I’m your menace.”
“You know what that makes me?” he asks as he takes a step back, then another and another, dragging them to a private little corner offstage. “The luckiest man in the world, Sam. The luckiest man in the entire goddamn world.”