Amelia (21 page)

“We were in the storm shelter. It took us a while to get out with all the debris. My phone wouldn’t work down there.”

“But you’re all okay?” She let out a breath, but her heart still pounded in her chest.

“Yes. Are you and Sam okay?”

Amelia reached for Sam and took his hand. She gave it a squeeze as she looked around. “We’re fine. We’re at your house.”

“My house?”

“It touched down out here.”

“Oh, no,” her voice had trailed off on the sigh. “The house? Do I even want to know?”

Amelia looked at the other end of the house where the large tree was balanced. “The tree out front. It crashed into the house.”

“Oh! Oh!” She could hear the tears in Vivian’s voice.

“Penelope’s car is damaged too.”

She heard her relay the message and Penelope began to sob.

“You’re safe. That’s all that matters.” Sam wrapped his arm around Amelia. “We’ll come to you. Don’t leave. And don’t come back here until it’s safe.”

Sam was pulling her out of the house. Everything around them creaked. She knew it wasn’t safe for them to stay a moment longer.

“Let’s go. I don’t want you in there when that tree finally goes through.” He quickly moved them through the house and back out the way they came.

Amelia’s hand shook in his and her heart raced uncomfortably. She gave Sam’s hand a yank once they were outside.

“I need to sit for a second.”

He reached for her shoulders. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” She took a breath. “I’m fine.”

She sat down on the soggy ground and just let it all sink in. Around her she could hear emergency sirens and Sam walked toward the road with his light to let them know the house was empty.

She took in one breath and then another.

So many things raced through her head as she heard the noise of emergency crews. The hysterical cries and loud voices of those who couldn’t see what had happened in the dark—who didn’t know who might have lived or died.

Her mind wandered from the wet ground she sat on and the noise around her. Had her mother known she was dying all those years ago? She’d never thought much about it until she’d been faced with the firsthand account that people she cared for might have been in that house.

Had her mother’s death been sudden, like the storm? Did she think immediately of her family back home, just as Amelia had of Vivian, Penelope, and the girls?

They’d become her family.

Sam had become her family.

She stuck her head between her knees.

Amelia was a strong fighter. She could kill a man with her bare hands, but she couldn’t handle what might have been.

Tears began to strain in her throat. Adam had screwed her over and in this very demented way he’d given her two more sisters. Two which she cared about as much as the two she was born to. What would she have done if the family she knew now had been torn apart just as her childhood family had been?

Sam started back to her.

“They want us to leave the area. Are you okay to go?”

She nodded. “We need to go to the house. The old house. They were there.”

“Why?”

“I have no idea. We agreed we weren’t going to work. We took the night off.” She shook her head and looked at him. “Do you think they just knew? I mean—instinct?”

“I don’t know.” He held out his hand and helped her to her feet. “All I care about is you’re okay and so are they. We’ll head over.”

“God, look at this.” She stopped and looked at the house which was in such bad repair to begin with. “They lost their home, Sam. She lost her husband and now she lost her home.”

“C’mon. Keep walking. She’s going to be fine. I’ll call my friend and we’ll get her into that townhouse.”

Amelia nodded. “That’s a good idea.”

As they walked through the yard, Sam’s arm around her waist, she realized that everything in her life was perfect because of Adam Monroe and his lies. What a strange thing to be thankful for at a moment of pure devastation.

Chapter Twenty-Five

The streets were now full of emergency lights. If you were safe, you were told to stay inside and keep that way. But in a small town, that was just talk. People were going to go to their neighbors and offer help.

Sam pulled the truck up in front of the old house. Candles flickered inside through the windows. Amelia stepped out of the truck and Sam quickly came around the other side to her.

He took her hands in his. “Are you sure you’re okay? You were really quiet.”

“I’m fine.”

“That shook you up back there. I didn’t think anything could shake you.”

Her lip trembled, but she didn’t like that he’d seen her in a weak moment. Worse, he was mentioning it.

“I said I was fine. I just wasn’t ready for that. But I’m fine.” Her words were sharp.

He nodded. “Okay.” Sam kept her hands in his and gave the ring he’d placed on her finger a slight twist. “Leave it to me to make your proposal one you’ll never forget, huh?”

“You weren’t supposed to propose.”

“I know. And I’ve been a rule follower my whole life. Good thing you did the proposing.” He stepped in closer to her. “I shouldn’t have been thinking the things I was thinking when we were at your husband’s funeral either.”

“He never was my husband. A man and wife aren’t strangers through their marriage.” She moved to him and wrapped her arms around his neck. “I’ve known you a few months and I feel closer to you than I ever could have imagined with him. You told me you loved me. You bought me a ring.” She laughed and held her hand up so she could see it in the dim moonlight, but in her mind it sparkled.

“I do love you. And I’d understand if you took that ring off and shoved it in your pocket. I get it. I understand that.”

Amelia pressed her forehead to Sam’s. “It’s never leaving my finger.”

“You’re living together,” Vivian’s voice broke through the dark. “Don’t you get enough of this at home?”

Amelia couldn’t have imagined there would ever be a day when she was happier to see Vivian Monroe. With Sam guiding them up the steps with his flashlight, Amelia hurried toward the woman in the doorway and pulled her into her arms.

“I was so scared. I’ve never been scared in my life. Tonight I was scared.”

Vivian wrapped her arms around her. “I’m safe. We’re all safe. The only tragedy we can see is the front window blew in. I don’t know about the roof.”

Sam nodded. “I’ll look tomorrow.”

Amelia pulled back. “I don’t think I ever believed in fate. But everything about tonight and the past few months have been all fate.”

Vivian began to laugh. “I think something is wrong with you. You sound like Penelope now.”

“What does that mean?” Penelope asked from the hallway where she stood with Emma and Ava at her side.

Amelia moved to her quickly and pulled her into her arms. “It means I’m developing a kind and soft side.”

“Oh,” she said softly.

When she pulled back, Vivian looked at her. “My house is really damaged?”

Amelia looked at Sam and he walked to her side. “I don’t know that it will be structurally fixable. That was one big ass tree.”

“I told him years ago, when we bought that run down piece of junk, that it needed to come out. Just like everything else, he neglected it.”

“You call your insurance company tomorrow,” he said resting a hand on Vivian’s shoulder. “Tonight we all need to get some rest.”

They nodded as the girls each clung to her legs.

“What about my car?” Penelope asked.

“Honey, I don’t think it’s going to be drivable now. You’ll have to turn it in to insurance too.”

She frowned in the light of the flashlight. “I don’t have insurance. I couldn’t afford it.”

Amelia closed her eyes tightly trying to figure out one more expense between the three of them when Vivian nudged her.

“Don’t you suppose everything had a purpose?” Vivian asked.

“What are you talking about?”

Vivian’s teeth were white in the light. “Adam seems to have a car.”

Amelia smiled. “You’re right.” She looked at Penelope. “He does have a car and I personally know it’s fully insured because I pay for that.”

“Are you kidding me? The Mustang?” Penelope’s voice rose in pitch.

“It’ll get you to work. Your boss is a tyrant. You won’t want to be late,” Amelia said.

“You guys.” Penelope pulled them both in for a hug and the girls giggled as they hugged legs.

They’d closed up the old house after Amelia and Sam did their best to cover the window. Vivian followed Sam to his house. He had a spare bedroom and a pull out couch. There would be plenty of space for them all for one night.

By the time they’d reached his house, the power was on. Thank goodness they only had a few branches off of trees and patio furniture blown around.

Vivian tucked the girls into the bed upstairs. She left the light on in the hallway and walked back down to the kitchen where Sam was making a pot of water for some tea.

“I hope they fall asleep quickly,” Vivian said as she fell into one of the chairs at the kitchen table.

“How did they do in the storm shelter?” Amelia asked as she took down four mugs from the cupboard.

“They acted like they’d been through this a million times. They were calm and followed directions.”

“They were calmer than I was,” Penelope admitted.

Vivian ran her hands over her face. “I suppose had we been home it would have been a different story.”

“Well you weren’t. We’re just going to be grateful for that,” Amelia said setting down the mugs on the table.

“What the hell is that?” Vivian grabbed for her hand as she moved from the cups. “Holy cow, is that what I think it is?”

Amelia whipped her hand back. “Maybe.” Oh, she wasn’t good with this girlie stuff.

She moved to get away from the wide eyed women at the table, but Sam was right behind her his arms already coming around her from behind.

“Don’t get too mushy. She proposed to me,” he said.

“You tricked me.”

“I navigated the conversation into my direction. I’m a lawyer. That’s what I do.” He looked at the other women. “She asked me.” He kissed her on the cheek and moved back to the stove when the tea pot began to whistle.

Amelia pursed her lips and gave them all a grunt as she sat down in one of the chairs. “Okay. So, somehow I asked him to marry me and he had a ring under my pillow. So there.”

“So you’re getting married?” Penelope’s grin was brilliant.

“Someday.”

“Soon,” Sam replied as he walked to the table with the tea pot and set it on a hot pad.

“Soon?” Amelia shot him a look. “You’re out of your mind. We have too much going on. We have the house to finish. The business to start. A baby to be born. Vivian’s house to tend to.”

“That’s my business. Not yours,” Vivian added as she poured water into her mug.

Amelia narrowed her eyes. “We’re a team. I’m here to help you. You can’t do it all…”

Vivian held up a finger. “Don’t step into my territory.” She pulled a tea bag from the holder, opened it, and set it in the water. “Adam isn’t here to let me scream and yell at him for leaving the three of us in that house to live. The roof leaked. The plumbing was bad. You saw it. I won’t lose much sleep when it’s bulldozed to the ground.”

Vivian blew a piece of hair from her eyes as she bobbed the tea bag in the water by the string. “I don’t care what you all think of me. I’m mad. The S.O.B. didn’t give a crap about me or his girls. If he’s gone then that house should be too.”

She looked up at Amelia. “Don’t go hiding that ring or what you think about Sam either. There are only a few of us in this town that even know who you really are. The other day at the store Mrs. Mills told me it was real nice that Adam’s cousins were here helping me out. So there isn’t anyone who is going to think you’re doing wrong by moving on. That tornado cleansed what I had left of him. Those girls—well they’ve always been just mine. It’s going to stay that way.”

Amelia blinked hard and closed her mouth which was open. “You really feel like that? It’s not just anger?”

“No. Not just. When your husband is getting married to another woman when you’re giving birth to his daughter, you lose a lot of love for him.” She shifted her eyes to Sam. “He would never do that to you.” She took the tea pouch out of the mug and set it on a paper napkin. “You should marry him soon. It’ll be one less Monroe in this town.”

That set Amelia into laughter and as usual had the other two following suit. Sam shook his head and sipped his tea. But Amelia knew Vivian was right. One less Mrs. Monroe would certainly keep gossip down.

Mrs. Jackson.

The thought stuck in her head and then shifted to her heart. She could feel her face flush with heat. It was at that moment she realized that even though she’d thought she was in love with Adam she’d never been. Lust—yes. But this was love. That pure stuff you read about in books and saw in movies. Oh, God! She was going to be Mrs. Jackson.

She looked around the table at the other two women talking casually. These women would stand up for her. She was closer in a few months to these two women than she was to her own sisters.

She reached down to her finger and rolled the ring between her fingers. No matter how he’d done it, he’d proposed to her and he’d bought her a ring. He’d given thought to her being his wife. Her! She wasn’t domestic. She wasn’t even always nice. But he loved her and wanted her forever.

Sam’s hand came to her back in such a tender gesture it nearly brought tears to her eyes. He was still in conversation with Vivian, but he was still intimate with her.

Amelia turned to him as he was in mid-sentence, which she’d never heard.

“Is New Year’s Day too far away?”

Sam looked at her for a moment. “Too far for what?”

“To get married? Will you marry me on New Year’s Day?”

The side of his mouth turned up and there was that dimple. Damn that gorgeous dimple. “Is that what you want?”

“New year. New start. New everything.”

Sam reached his hand to her cheek. “New Year’s Day it is.” He pulled her to him and kissed her ever so gently in front of her new friends.