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The March wind whirled around Madeline with a howling laugh as she hurried down the street. She was so ready for spring. Why had her life become so gloomy lately?
She knew the answer to that question. Sam.
Or lack of Sam. It had been well over a month. She should be over him by now.
She made it through the kitchen door of her parents’ house and inhaled the smell of gumbo. A perfect night for it.
With hush puppies on the side.
“Hey, honey,” her mom said. “Come on in. Dinner is almost ready.”
“Thanks for inviting me,” Madeline said. “I’m starving.”
Ruby smiled softly. “Well, we had a special request for some gumbo.”
Madeline went to the refrigerator and grabbed some water. “Oh, yeah. Melissa? Daddy? Uncle Jaybo?”
“No.” Ruby shook her head. “Someone else.”
“Me.”
Madeline almost dropped the glass of water. She turned and saw Sam standing in the doorway from the den.
“What are you doing here?”
He shrugged. “I missed your mother’s gumbo.”
Madeline held the water glass so tightly, she figured it was going to shatter soon. “You came a mighty long way for meal.”
His eyes did a Sam-sweep over her. “I was really hungry.”
Ruby went into busy mode. “Let me go find some napkins and where is your father, anyway?”
Sam stepped closer, the outdoors smell of him enticing Madeline even more than a bowl of gumbo. His hair was still shaggy and wild, his jeans sun-washed and worn, his boots scuffed. His leather jacket crinkled when he moved.
“I didn’t really come for the gumbo,” he said, sweeping her into his arms.
Madeline breathed for the first time in weeks. Really breathed in life and love and need and want. Sam was here. He’d come back for her.
“I smell gumbo,” Roscoe called as a warning before he and Ruby came back into the big kitchen. “Let’s eat.”
Sam let go of Madeline and laughed. “I love your family.”
They sat down and ate gumbo.
Two hours later, Madeline and Sam left together. “Where are you staying?” she asked.
“My old room at the Swamp House.”
“How long are you staying?”
“As long as it takes.”
“I walked here,” she said.
“I drove here,” he retorted. Then he reached up and touched her hair. “I’ll drive you home.”
She nodded, too keyed up to argue. He was here again and her heart was beating again, and she couldn’t understand how she had fallen so hard and so fast for this man who still held a piece of himself away.
“Let’s walk,” he said after they were by his car.
She shivered and pulled her heavy sweater close around her. “Okay.”
“I need to tell you something.”
“Okay.” Then she turned to him. “Did you drive all this way just to break up with me again?”
“We didn’t break up,” he replied. “We never got that far.”
“So what are you doing here, Sam?”
“I wanted to explain to you—about being the best man.”
“You did a great job there. Nothing to explain.”
“No, it’s everything to explain,” he said, swallowing and looking lost. “I need you to know before ... before I kidnap you and take you home with me.”
He really was a pirate, after all. “Okay, so what do you need me to know?”
They’d reached the park near her building. He tapped his boots against the ground and stared up at the windy trees. “I told you I was in love once with a woman who had substance abuse problems.”
“Yes. That left you kind of gun-shy.”
“Real gun-shy.” He took off his jacket and wrapped it around Madeline’s shoulders. “We almost got married.”
“Wow.” The warmth of his leather jacket surrounded her, but his words left her cold. “But something stopped you?”
He nodded. “I wanted to believe she’d changed. She’d been to treatment and we were doing pretty good. She convinced me we could make a go of it. So we planned our wedding and...things were okay. But I noticed all of the signs. And ignored them. Tried to make it right. Always, I tried to make it right.”
Madeline saw the tense line running along his jaw. “What happened, Sam?”
“She was high at the rehearsal dinner and...my best man was also high. They had gotten high together earlier and then...when he stood up to give the toast, instead of toasting my bride and me, he asked her to leave with him.”
“And she did?”
“She did. Too high to care. She only stayed with me because I was so easy to manipulate and ... use.”
“Sam ....”
He took Madeline’s hands in his. “I’ll never forget it, Maddie. I knew in my heart things wouldn’t change and I loved her anyway. I would have done anything for her.”
Madeline touched a hand to his face. “You’re that kind of man.”
“Yes, and when I met you and then we talked about things—about your life with Evan and about me having to give a happy toast, I panicked. After my wedding plans ended in such an ugly, public way, I went to the other side of the earth and became a killing machine just to get away from what had happened that night.”
“And I forced it all right back on you.”
He nodded, closed his eyes. “You forced me to finally face the truth.” He looked at her, his eyes a rich dark green. “I didn’t want to see the truth. I thought I’d failed. So I gave up. Until I saw you. You changed all of that, Maddie.”
Madeline’s heart burned with love for this gentle giant. “Are you sure you’re ready for this?”
“I just need to know that you’re ready to move on.”
“I am, but I didn’t realize that until I met you. I wanted revenge, but he took care of that all by himself. He shot himself in the foot by being so unprofessional after we locked him up and took away the keys. I don’t think he’ll be coming around anymore.”
Sam pulled her close. “We’re free and clear then.” His whisper tickled at her hair. “I don’t just want to learn the way of the gumbo. I want to cook gumbo with you.”
Maddie held him, his warmth like a blanket of contentment.
Then he stood back and smiled down at her. “Will you run away with me?”
“Is it warm in Driftwood Bay right now?”
“Very warm.” He kissed her to prove that point.
Maddie returned that kiss, her decision made. “I can’t stay forever but a few days would be lovely. Let me grab a few things. And Spike. He has to come with us.”
He smiled at her. “I’ll go get the car. Meet me back here,” Sam said. He walked away and then turned and kissed her again.
She called Melissa and told her to check in on the boutique. Then she called her parents and told them she was taking a few days to visit Michelle. Her mom promised to help out with Madeline’s Closet. Her dad grunted.
The Camaro idled in front of her apartment. She came out with a bag full of not much. Sam opened the passenger side door and then moved the purple plastic Mardi Gras cup lying on the seat to the back. “I like my cup. Carry it with me when I’m on the way to kidnap my woman.”
Maddie shook her head and laughed. “I go willingly.”
He kissed her and the said, “Well, get in. I’ll take care of you, Maddie.”
She believed him. “I’ll do the same for you, Sam.”
In a matter of minutes, Madeline was in the car beside Sam and they were zooming south toward Florida. She wasn’t sure when she’d be back. She wasn’t sure what would happen next.
She only knew that she wanted to be with this man.
One week later
Madeline sat on the porch at Uncle Jaybo’s cottage and watched the sun rising off to east. Pulling the comforter around her, she stroked Spike’s wiry fur and waited for the new day. And Sam.
Then she saw him jogging along the shore. No shirt, no shoes. He was running toward her, laughing.
She stood and hurried out to meet him, her cotton gown flying like a kite out behind her, Spike barking and trotting along with her.
Sam swept her into his arms and kissed her.
“I have to go home,” she said.
“But you’ll be back.”
“Soon.”
“You owe me another dance.”
He waltzed her around, the cold ocean water nipping at their bare feet. “I love you, Maddie.”
“I love you, too.”
“I don’t want this dance to end.”
“It won’t,” she said. “I promise. I have a few things to take care of and then ....”
“And then we get married in the spring, on the beach.”
“Yes,” she said, tears pricking at her eyes. “Yes.”
Sam scooped up Spike. “I have a family now.”
“You sure do. Always.”
She kissed Sam and held him close while the waves crashed around them. “No more best man duties for you. You’ll be the groom this time.”
“Ha. Payback for Brodie.”
She laughed at that. She couldn’t wait to open Madeline’s Seaside Closet, located right next to Sam’s Surf Shack, where together they would cook lots of gumbo.
She was expanding her operation.
And her horizons.
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The End