Knocking at Her Heart (Conover Circle #1) (23 page)

“I think so.”

Could this thing get any more
mixed up? Sam picked up his coat.

“Where are you going?”

“To see Hogan. I’m not letting
him take Maddie down with him.”

Jean smiled. “You don’t sound
like a man who has given up on his girl.”

“She may have given up on me,” he
said, knowing it was likely.

It took Sam five minutes to drive
to Hogan’s house. He stood at the door and knocked for another five. He checked
the garage and it was empty.

Jeff stopped at the daycare at
the end of the day. To Carol's credit, she disappeared quickly. Maddie knew it
was only a small grace period.

Jeff had obviously showered and
shaved and he was dressed in a suit. “I talked to my boss this afternoon.”

“How did it go?”

 “Good. As good as can be
expected. Basically, he was pretty ticked off and worried about the reputation
that the firm is going to suffer. At first he was going to contact the affected
accounts. But then we both agreed that it would be better if we talked to the
clients together and let them know what happened. He's going to repay the
accounts immediately and I'm going to pay back the money to the firm.”

She tried to work up the energy
to be happy for him. She just felt drained. “That's wonderful, Jeff. Good
luck.”

“I'm on probation. They'll
probably be checking my work like a hawk. George said the only reason he didn't
fire me was because I'd been at the company for so long and the fact that I
turned myself in. He was willing to give me one more chance.”

She wasn’t getting one more
chance. Not with Sam. He’d been so angry. “You're a good accountant. I know I
want you to keep doing my books.”

Jeff picked up his coat that he'd
thrown over the back of her chair. He concentrated on buttoning it. “Sam Jordonson
is just about the luckiest son-of-a-gun that I know.”

Maddie managed a smile. She
didn’t intend to discuss the sordid details with Jeff. It was over. Whatever
she and Sam had was over. “Good luck, Jeff.” Maddie ushered him out of the door
and counted to six before Carol came charging through the kitchen door like a
bull in search of a matador's leg. 

“What is going on?” she demanded.

“You're slipping. I got to nine,”
Maddie lied.

“Yeah, well,” her friend dismissed
her comment, “I was busy saying goodbye to Kristen.”  She pulled a chair
out and motioned for Maddie to sit in it. “Talk fast. What's Mr. Numbers doing
here and does it have anything to do with the fact that Dr. Gorgeous left here
this morning looking like he'd just lost his best friend. I assume that has
everything to do with the fact that you moped around here like a dead person
today.” Carol stopped for a much-needed breath.

“I wasn't moping. I was busy.”

“Uh huh. Talk.”

“Sam and I are not going to be
seeing each other again.”

“What?” Carol was clearly
outraged.

“We decided that was best.”

“You mean you decided. You are
such a chicken.”

“I am not a chicken, thank you
very much.” Maddie sniped back. “He decided. It was his damn decision.” The tears
that Maddie had held at bay for the last twelve hours threatened.

“Oh, honey.” Carol scooted her
chair closer. “I'm so sorry. What happened?”

“He thinks I slept with
Jeff.” 

“Recently?”

“It's all a crazy mix-up. Jeff
needed my help. Sam saw my car over at his house and automatically assumed I
was involved in some decadent tryst.”

“I take it back. He’s not a baked
potato. He’s got baked potatoes for brains.”

“This is really for the better,
Carol. It would never have worked."   

“Well, you're certainly taking
this better than I would have expected.” Carol studied her closely. “You're
sure that you're okay with this?"

“Carol, I knew better than to get
involved with Sam. I broke my own rules.”

“Honey, I think rules are meant
to be broken sometimes.”

“I broke a bunch of them. I got
on the Ferris wheel with loafers. I should have had my sneakers on, the ones
that tie tight.”

“You’re not making sense.”

“When my shoes flew off, so did
my common sense. I wanted so badly to not be dull or sensible. I did not want to
be taupe shoes with a one-inch heel. You were the one who told me about the
bright purple. I wanted to play there.”

“Did you?”

“For a little while. But now, my
rainbow just has black and white and…taupe. Those are the colors of my
life.”       

*

Sam had barely shut his car door
when his cell phone rang. He looked at the caller ID and realized it was Tom.
“Jordonson,” he answered. 

“Where are you?”

Looking at Jeff Hogan’s house.
“In my car. I’m sort of busy right now.”

“Donald and I need to see you. Now.”

“I can’t.”

“You have to. It’s
important.” 

“Tom, this isn’t a good time.”

There was silence on the other
end. “I need to know something,” Tom said. “Is it over between you and Maddie
Sinclair?”

Just hearing her name made his heart
hurt. “Tom, why is this important to you?”

“It just is. When I saw you at
work today, biting the heads off anybody who made the mistake of coming too
close, I figured it was.”

“Yeah, it’s over.”

“Good. That’ll make things
easier.”

Sam started his car. “Easier?”

“Look I don’t want to talk about
it on a cell phone.  Donald and I’ll meet you at the office in a
half-hour. Percy will be there, too. Maddie Sinclair wants to sell.”

That was impossible. Something
was very wrong. “Why now?”

“Who cares?”

He did. He cared.  She loved
her house, her business. What could have prompted her to even consider their
offer? The possibility hit him, like a steering wheel to the chest. Had he hurt
her so badly that she’d do anything to get away? Was she running from him? From
the possibility that he might drop off Kelsie some day? He could not let her do
it.

“I’ll be there in twenty
minutes,” Sam said. He hung up the telephone. When he got to the end of the
street, he didn’t turn his car toward the office. Instead, he turned toward
Percy Monaghan’s office.

When he got there, Percy’s
secretary had already left for the day. Sam walked past her desk and into
Percy’s office without knocking.

“Sam! I thought we were supposed
to meet at your office.  I was just about to take off.”

“Change of plans. Tom and Donald
got caught at the hospital. There was a big car accident on the west side of
town. They’ll be there for hours.”

Percy looked at his watch. “So
the three of you have talked? You’re in the loop?”

Sam nodded. 

“Good. This will save me some
time if I don’t have to run across town to the hospital. I’m supposed to meet
Maddie Sinclair in an hour at The Blue Moon. All I need is one of you to sign
the papers.” Percy rubbed his hands together. “I knew she’d crack. It was only
a matter of time.”

“Crack?” Sam worked real hard to
keep his voice calm.

“I think it was the mice that put
her over the edge. I laughed my ass off at that. It’s one thing to have a leaky
roof or bad plumbing or even be stuck taking cold showers. It’s a whole other
thing to be sweeping up mice turds.”

“How’d you manage it?” Sam
asked.    

“You just need to know the right
people. The roof was easy. Nothing that a crowbar wouldn’t handle. We knew she
and her mom would both be gone that night of the Bachelor Auction. Our guy got
in and took care of the dishwasher. While he was there, he unlocked the outside
door to the basement. They were actually home when he was inside taking care of
the water heater.”

“Gutsy.”

“That’s what you’re paying me
for.” Percy grabbed papers out of his open briefcase. “Here.  Sign these.
I’ll meet Maddie in an hour and once she signs, the property is yours.”

Sam picked up the pen. He
carefully signed his name. When he finished, he handed it back to Percy.
“That’s that, I guess.”   

“I’ll call you once I’ve got her
signature.”

“You do that.”

*

Maddie had just finished feeding
Snowball when she heard a loud pounding on the front door. She peeked out the
upstairs kitchen window, but couldn’t see the visitor. She hurried down the
steps.

“Who is it?” she called out.

“It's me.”

Sam. Maddie froze, her fingers
just inches away from opening the door. “What do you want?”

“I need to talk to you. Open the
door. Please.”

Maddie considered her options.
She couldn’t open the door. Just that quick, she would end up opening her heart
to him. She couldn't bear to hear more of his ugly accusations. Those were not
the memories she intended to cling to.

“I don't think that's a good
idea.”

“It’s important, Maddie,” he
said.

“Look, I think we've said everything
we need to say.”

“Please. We need to talk."

She slid back the bolt lock and
looked out the privacy hole. He was staring right at her.  His eyes were
bright with intensity and there were splashes of red on his cheeks, like he was
flushed.

“May I please come in?” he asked.

How much heartache could she be
expected to endure? “For a minute.”

She opened the door and stood
back. He came in, and when she caught of whiff of his familiar scent, it almost
brought her to her knees. 

“I’m on my way out,” she said,
proud that her voice didn’t shake. “I don’t have much time.”

“I know.”

“You know I’m on my way out?”

“We’ll get to that, okay. But
first I need to tell you something.”

She sat down on the second step.
She sure as hell didn’t want to fall down in front of him.

He sat next to her and she was
reminded of that first night that they’d sat on the stairs. She’d begged him to
kiss her. She’d asked for this trouble. It was no one’s fault but her own.

“I had an interesting
conversation with my sister,” Sam said. 

Maddie nodded.

“Brad Mason was all worked up
today. I guess the guy who does his father’s accounting work has been
systematically stealing from him.”

The blood began to roar in
Maddie's ears. She was not going to get into a shouting match with him about Jeff.
“How interesting.” She pretended to examine the wood grain in the flooring.

“Yes, well I thought it was
fascinating especially when she said that it was Jeff Hogan.”

She started to rise. “Is that
all?”

He grabbed her hand and the warmth
spread up her arm. It made her ache to realize that she was never going to feel
the heat of his body again.

“Please, sit,” he said.

She did.

“You didn’t sleep with him, did
you?”

She jerked her head toward him.
“What made you change your mind, Sam? What changed in the last twelve hours?”

Sam closed his eyes and leaned
against the wall. Finally, he opened them and straightened up. “Everything.
Every damn thing has changed. Look, I’m sorry. I said some really horrible
things. I don’t expect you to be able to forgive me.”

How could she forgive him? He’d
said he loved her, but he hadn’t loved her enough to trust her.

Sam cleared his throat. “Gwen
cheated on me.”

Maddie gasped.  She hadn't
expected this. But she should have. When he’d accused her of sleeping with
Jeff, he’d said something about the fact that he wouldn't let it happen again.

“It was with another physician at
the hospital. A much older physician with an established practice. He didn’t
have any student loans to pay off. He was economically advantaged, you might
say. They'd been sleeping together for months before I found out. Lots of my
co-workers knew. But nobody had the guts to tell me. It was awful. I didn't
know what to do. I loved her when I married her, and I thought she loved me.
And you know what,” he shrugged his shoulders, “I think she did. It just wasn't
enough. She worked hard to help me get through medical school, and I think she
wanted a quicker payback. She got it with him.”

“Did you leave her?”

“Not at first. She said that she
would stop. I believed her.”

“She didn't.”

“No. I caught them together at my
house, in our bed.”

“Oh, Jesus. “What happened?”

“I left. Quietly. I didn't make a
big scene. I knew it was over. Gwen’s car crash occurred two weeks later. She
lost traction on a rain-slick road.”

“It must have been horrible for
you.”

“It's not a time of my life that
I'm especially proud of. It took months for me to get my life back
together."

“Everyone deals with grief
differently.”

Sam shrugged. “I don't want to
make that an excuse for how I acted. You and Gwen are nothing alike. I should
have looked at it more clearly.”

“I don’t know how she could have
done that,” Maddie said.

“I don’t really blame her. She
grew up like I did.”