Chapter 2 - Sam

Sam held the small present in her hands as she scanned the crowd at the soup kitchen’s dining hall. The smell of baked turkey and ham wafted through the air, and the diners sounded rather excited as a result. For once, they weren’t serving Swiss meatballs. Even she was sick of them, and she didn’t even have to eat them.

She craned her neck, ambling along one side of the large room. With every table she checked, her heart sank a little more. Jacob wasn’t here. Again.

“Hey,” Greg said behind her, his voice quiet and soothing.

She turned, eyelids drooping, shoulders collapsed.

“He’s not here,” she whined.

“I’m sorry. I’m sure he’s fine, though.” Greg wrapped a strong arm around her shoulder and guided her toward the back of the room.

“I really hope so,” she said. “I just . . . I don’t know. He’s so young and his father so . . . lost. If you’d met them, you’d understand better.”

“I understand. I just don’t want you to assume the worst.” His blue eyes smiled at her, trying to make her feel better.

Several weeks ago, Jacob and his father had stopped visiting the soup kitchen. At first, she hadn’t worried, but after several days hauling Jacob’s present in her backpack, a niggling itch had started in the back of her mind.

Sam had asked around, but no one knew anything. She tried to tell herself it was a good thing. Not needing to dine at a place like this could be counted as a huge blessing, one she hoped Jacob had been granted. Except she wasn’t so sure that was the case—not when she remembered the boy’s father, and his numb indifference to the world in general. Or when she listened to the nagging feeling that didn’t seem to leave her in peace for even a second. Sam couldn’t help but worry.

The boy had stolen her heart the very first time he and his father showed up in the food line. She still remembered how—with those big, blue eyes—he’d looked up at her and asked if he could have a second roll. His cheeks flamed with shame and the upside-down shape of his mouth told her he hadn’t been expecting her to say yes.

The surprise and huge smile on his sweet eight-year-old face when Sam produced not one, but two extra rolls was all she needed to fall in love with him. Later, as she and the other volunteers finished serving the large crowd, she watched him from behind the food line. He ate with relish and made sure his father did more than just push his own food around the plate.

When she finished serving and got ready to leave, Sam noticed the boy waiting for her. He approached with shy steps and mouthed a quiet “thank you.”

Sam squatted to his level. “No worries. It’s just a couple of rolls,” she said.

“No,” he responded. “It’s tomorrow’s breakfast and lunch.” And with that, he kissed her on the cheek and ran back to his father.

From then on, Sam sneaked extra food for Jacob every time he was there. She also used her allowance to buy him nonperishable food items to take with him, trying to make sure he had enough to eat the next day. When she had discovered his love for reading, she’d added comic books to the supplies and sat with him looking at the illustrations and wondering how the heroes would save the world in the next issue.

Sam sighed and prayed Jacob was all right.

Prayers won’t do you any good, that very annoying, very niggling part of her said.

It was her Morphid side, she’d decided, a side that might as well be speaking in a dead tongue for all the sense it made. What she wanted to know, though, was what her Morphid side had to do with Jacob? Were he and his father also Morphids? Was she meant to help them? It certainly felt that way half the time.

A caste manual would have been nice.

As they reached the back of the room, Greg took the wrapped present from Sam’s hand and put it back in his pack. Jacob would have loved the detailed illustrations of all the classic fairy tales in the books. She’d bought the set sure the kid would enjoy reading the stories with her.

Greg slung the pack over his shoulder. “Maybe his dad found a job. Or a relative came to the rescue. Or they moved to a better city. West Lafayette, Indiana isn’t high on job market lists, you know. Don’t be pessimistic. Any number of good things could’ve happened.”

“I know. I know. I guess I just miss him.”

“So, if you’re honest with yourself, you’re actually being selfish.” He gave her a gentle hip bump and tipped a half smile. She pushed him back, but couldn’t hide her own smile. He could always get her out of a funk. He didn’t even have to add any teeth to his sexy grin.

They walked out of the soup kitchen and headed toward Sam’s new car, a fairly beat-up, blue Taurus that had replaced her new, burnt-to-a-crisp Prius. He opened the door for her and helped her in. Sam watched him as he walked around the car’s front, his steps self-assured, his broad chest looking too damn hot in his tight t-shirt.

Good lord. She almost fanned herself.

“Where to?” he asked after getting behind the wheel. He liked driving her, and she didn’t mind letting him feel like a gentleman.

She looked at her watch. “Home, I guess. It’s still a little early to get ready, but . . .” She was all for being punctual.

Greg started the car and said in an up-beat tone, “Home it is.”

As they got on their way, Greg fooled with the radio, the perfect song eluding him as usual.

“Want to play something from my phone?” she asked.

“No, I’m getting tired of the same old songs.”

She smiled. Her playlists were getting old. Rolling down the window, she let in some fresh air. A breeze blew in, rustling her long, brown hair and caressing her face. She squinted and, without meaning to, caught sight of her vinculums.

One intact and bright, the one that linked her to Greg.

One torn and pale that had once connected her to Ashby.

A now familiar pang of guilt and pain hit her square in the chest, almost leaving her breathless. She shook her head and looked away. Enough hours had already been wasted in staring at the severed link, wondering if, for the rest of her life, it’d feel this way every time she saw it.

Her Morphid side seemed to taunt her with the notion that there was something to be done about it. But what that was, she had no idea, and it drove her mad to be so clueless about her skills.

“Like this song?” Greg asked.

Sam snapped back into the moment. “Never heard it.” She listened for a few seconds. “It has a good beat.”

“We’re here,” Greg announced a few minutes later.

Funny how Rose’s apartment had become home. Sam often thought about her adoptive mother, Barbara, alone in that big house and wondered—not without a little remorse—how she was faring. More than once, Sam had tried to reach out and patch things up, but it had been in vain. There was no reason to feel bad. She had tried. Barbara wanted it this way.

They got out of the car and met on the sidewalk.

“What about your stuff?” She hooked a thumb toward the parked car.

“It’s in the trunk. I’ll get it later. C’mon.” He ushered her forward.

He had been really secretive about what he was wearing to the party tonight, but she was trying not to be one of those nose-all-up-in-your-business kind of girlfriends.

“I’m more worried about what you’re gonna wear,” he said, wiggling his eyebrows.

They’d been looking forward to this party for days, and Sam had stressed over what to wear for just as long.

So he’d better like it.