In a short time, Izzy managed to soak both the comforter and the sheets beneath with her tears. She lifted her head and hiccupped. It was Saturday. She and Sam met in the park every Saturday to go running. Or, really, to sit under a tree, eat jelly doughnuts and talk. But she couldn’t meet him today. A best friendship could never survive a near-poisoning, one-turns-into-an-animal incident. She’d have to tell him the truth and she couldn’t. He’d think she was crazy, or maybe worse: crazy in love.
Izzy had never been in love with anyone but Sam. When she was with him, she was at ease at the same time as she felt the stomach-churning anticipation of being in the driver’s seat of a racecar about to take off. Silence didn’t matter, and neither did noise. Sam liked Izzy for Izzy. Even her wild ginger hair relaxed around him. She’d never experienced that with anyone else, and now she had lost it, had messed everything up by not being truthful with him. Her best friend. How could he ever trust her again?
Maybe she’d done it on purpose. Who wanted to be in love? All you did was open yourself up to pain when the relationship inevitably ended just as every relationship in her family had. There were far more exes in the Hart family than spouses, so many that the exes sometimes joked about hosting their own separate reunion each year.
Wearily, Izzy began stripping off her clothing and headed toward the bathroom, leaving a trail behind her. She’d have a shower. A long hot one, with plenty of steam to try and wash away her shame. Not that it would work, but at least she’d be clean. It was a start.
She stood under the pounding water long enough that it began turning cool and then cold, so she turned off the tap and stepped out, her wet feet leaving prints on the memory foam mat. She wrapped herself in a fluffy white towel, tucking it in at the top, and rubbed a circle clear in the steamed-up mirror. With a large comb made especially for the explosion of curls that covered her head, she worked through her hair until it lay, reasonably tame, around her shoulders, droplets of water still clinging to her skin. And that’s when she heard it, loud enough to overpower the noisy fan in her bathroom: a pounding. Steady. Insistent. Loud. Someone was knocking at her apartment door.
She heard Sam’s raised voice. “Open the door, Iz.”
Her heart lifted, but she beat it back down with a practicality stick.
“Izzy. I know you’re home.”
“I’m not,” she answered from the safety of the bathroom. She’d only cracked that door open a little.
A pause in the pounding. “Come here.”
“I don’t feel like running today, Sam.”
“Then feel like coming to the door.”
Izzy sighed. She pulled her towel tighter and padded toward the door in her bare feet. She shivered and leaned her head against it. “I’m tired.”
“Doesn’t matter.”
“I’m not dressed.”
“Neither am I.”
What? “Are you insane?”
Izzy unlocked the door and pulled it open. Sam stood before her, a rumpled, whiskered, gorgeous, loveable mess, still in his clothes from yesterday. She stood before him, bare of any makeup, with wet hair and only a towel covering her. His blue eyes held hers, and Izzy watched as uncertainty crossed his face.
“Can I come in?” he asked.
Izzy stepped aside, letting him pass. She closed the door with one hand while holding on to her towel with the other. Then she straightened, waiting.
He scratched behind one ear. “I don’t remember a lot from yesterday. But there is one thing that keeps coming back to me.”
She closed her eyes and readied herself. Yes, I really did turn you into a cat. It was an accident. Not that it helps.
His next words were deliberate, each word carefully enunciated. “You told me that you love me.”
Oh. Izzy wrapped her arms around herself, holding tight. That.
“Everything else is a blur, but I swear I heard you say that.”
She’d never felt so vulnerable, so exposed. She knew Sam’s deepest secrets; he knew hers. Except one.
“Izzy. Talk to me.” He hesitated. “Please.”
Once the words were out, at least when they were both sober and human, that would be it. He would be gone out of her life. She lifted her chin…
“Jelly doughnut?” she asked, gesturing toward the kitchen.
He closed the short distance between them and put his hands, strong and warm, on her bare shoulders. “You’re the best friend I have. I don’t want to lose that.” His voice was rough, ragged around the edges.
“I don’t either,” Izzy whispered, trying to focus on his words instead of the sparks shooting through her at the touch of his skin on hers.
“I’m taking a big chance here.”
She shook her head, confused. If she hadn’t had so much to drink last night, she never would have told him.
“I love you.”
Now he’d break up their friendship, all because she— Hold on.
“You what?” Was there such a thing as wishful hearing?
“You heard me.” Sam’s chin lifted.
She shook her head. Had she?
“I thought…” He dropped his hands. “Hey, I’m as nervous as you are about this.”
“You don’t get nervous about anything.”
“That should tell you something.” He tried cocking an eyebrow, but without his customary confidence it wiggled instead. “Right?”
She stared. “You so do not love me. In that way.” Not only was it next to impossible, but she was not about to be the object of anyone’s pity. Especially not Sam’s. She jammed her hands on her hips until her towel began to slip, then clutched at the top of it until her fingers hurt.
“Because you say so?”
“Because you know so.” She shivered again, violently this time, afraid to say anything more, afraid to move. What if he…meant it?
His fingers slowly reached toward her chin. She held her breath.
He changed direction at the last moment and grazed her lips gently with his index finger then let his hand drop to his side. His eyes held regret. “Never thought I’d say this,” he rumbled, “but my best friend refuses to listen to me.”
Her heart sank. Not that. Never that.
He stepped to the side. “I’d better go before I make an even bigger fool of myself.”
Before he could reach it, she put one leg up to brace her foot against the front door to keep it closed. “Don’t leave,” she whispered.
He exhaled. “Obviously I didn’t hear what I thought.”
“You’re not in your right mind,” she tried.
“You have got to be kidding me, Isabelle Hart,” he bit out. “I’ve been waiting around for you for forever, but you’re too blind to see it. Or you just don’t want to. Hell, I must have made up hearing you say you love me because I’ve been wanting to hear it for so long.”
Everything in Izzy’s world came to a crashing halt: The traffic outside. The elevator down the hall. The clock in the bedroom. “You have?” she managed at last.
He searched her face. “I can’t be just your friend anymore.”
His jaw clenched, his mouth pulled into a tight line, and her heart leapt into her throat, but Izzy fought through to be able to choke out, “How long…have you felt this way?”
If he said “Since yesterday” she would die. Right now. Cause of death: Stupidity. She wanted him, yes, but not this way. Not because of any potion, and certainly not because of a temporary descent into fur.
“Since the beginning. College.” He raked a hand through his hair. “You’re the only one I’ve ever felt this way about. I love everything from the jokes you tell to the way you hate your beautiful hair to your laugh to your soft heart to your eyes to…” He paused. “I didn’t want to ruin it all by telling you how I really felt, but now…I can’t do this anymore. I can’t.”
Izzy cleared her throat, trying to process his words, trying to keep him from seeing how she trembled. “What about Erica? You said she’s the one.”
He shook his head. “Trying to get you jealous. I should know by now that it doesn’t work.” Sam looked up at the ceiling and then back at her. “Look, if you don’t feel the same way, tell me now so I can leave and lick my wounds.” At the word lick he looked momentarily confused, but then he shook it off. “Because—”
In that moment, the world came into focus for Izzy, as though she’d put on a pair of glasses that sharpened her view and intensified every exquisite color surrounding her. The rest of his words were lost as she threw her arms around Sam’s neck and kissed him, coming up for air only briefly to say, “Don’t talk,” and then, “I said it. I did. I love you, too.”
Her towel fell away as he kissed her hungrily, deeply, his hands running the length of her body before he picked her up and carried her to the bedroom and put her down on the bed. Sam’s mouth was never more than an inch away from hers, his breath hot on her face as he peeled off his clothes and tossed them to the floor.
When he was naked, they rolled over, Izzy on top, her body stretched the length of his, joy, lust and love bubbling inside her until she thought she’d burst with the intensity of it all. Sam. Her Sam.
Their hands explored each other with an urgent curiosity, fueled by breathlessness and passionate, thrilling climaxes that left her spent and him groaning in pleasure. It was the Sam she knew so well and the Sam she’d not yet known. His hard, tanned, muscled body against hers, fitting in all the right places, knowing just how to caress her and send her spiraling out of control, only to bring her back to earth again for more. They stayed in bed all day, alternately dozing, wrapped in each other’s arms, unwilling to let go and making love as though each time were the first.
As evening fell and the light coming through the curtains faded, Izzy’s stomach rumbled so loudly it made them both laugh.
“I’ll go for pizza,” Sam said, pulling on his clothes. “Stay here, exactly how I left you, noisy stomach and all.” He kissed her stomach, each breast, her neck and then her lips.
“Don’t go.”
“Your stomach has made its wishes known.” He grinned. “I’ll be right back.”
After he left, Izzy buried her face in her pillow, muffling her excited scream. She couldn’t believe it. They were together.
She didn’t know how long he was gone, because she fell asleep again, waking in the darkened room only when she realized someone warm had tucked in right next to her.
“Mmmmmm,” she said, “ready for more?”
Her fingers touched…fur? Thick fur. Cat fur.
She shot straight up and then leapt off the bed, flipping on the light. She saw a cat blinking up at her, and a strangled cry caught in her throat. “Sam, oh Sam, no. Oh, Sam,” she pleaded. “I’m sorry, so sorry—”
“For what?”
Izzy’s gaze shot to the door, where Sam lounged against the frame, his expression curious.
“I…” She pointed at the cat. “You…” She pointed at Sam. “Oh, thank God.” She ran over and threw her arm around him. “It’s a cat. Not you.”
He laughed, a gentle, rumbling sound muffled by the near-stranglehold she had on him. “I was wrong. You are ready for commitment.”
She nodded, not trusting herself to speak.
“These people had a box of free kittens in front of the pizza place. People were taking the kittens, but no one wanted the mother. I thought…we could take care of her together?”
She drew away, staring at him.
“Unless you don’t think it’s a good idea. If that’s it, it’s okay. I can take her home.”
Izzy shook her head. “It’s just that there’s something else I have to tell you.”
“I don’t want to hear it.” His voice was firm. “Other things from yesterday came back to me too. Weird, blurry, furry things. And I don’t want to talk about them.”
“But I have to—”
“You don’t. All we need to do right now is…” The rest of his words were lost as he folded her into his arms and dropped her once more to the bed. The cat left in a huff, jumping off to pad toward the kitchen.
“I love you, Sam,” Izzy said in an unusual display of perfect timing.
“I love you, Izzy,” he said in reply.
“Say it again.”
THE END