Page 295 of A Matter of Time

“And how long are you going to be around?”

“What?” My mind had been drifting.

“I asked you how long you were planning on staying around.” That was a very good question. “I hope for a long time, because I need you.”

“Me too,” Sam said quickly, his voice deep as he walked up beside me.

“Hey.” I smiled up at him. “Say hello to Beverly.”

“Hi there.” He smiled at her, his hand slipping around the back of my neck. “Hope you’re not put off by the volume in here today.”

She was stunned; you could tell. Like a lot of people, she had thought she’d seen Sam and knew what he looked like. “No.” She gulped, and I saw her pale, looking at him. “It’s fine.”

“It’s good to see you again,” he said honestly, moving his hand to massage the back of my head, his fingers buried in my hair. “My brother looks really happy.”

She nodded, and I watched her melt under his warm eyes, his gentle voice and trace of a smile. She wondered, like everyone else, how in the hell he hadn’t commanded more of her attention before. Had he always looked like that? Was she so blinded by Michael that she had missed his gorgeous brother?

“I’ve never seen you look better,” she told him sincerely.

He gave her an automatic smile in response instead of the cold, disapproving look I knew she was used to. “Thanks. You want something to drink? I’ll grab it for you.”

“No.” I put up my hand. “Let Beverly get it. Your mom will like that.”

“What?” Beverly asked anxiously, turning from Sam to me.

“I’ve watched Regina—she likes to see people making an effort to join in and help each other,” I told her. “Really. Go in the kitchen and tell her you’re there to get Michael a drink, and one for Sam as well.”

“Oh, okay.” She nodded, moving around me fast. “Thanks, Jory.”

I watched her go as Sam stepped behind me and wrapped his arms loosely around my neck. He leaned down and kissed my ear as his father yelled for me to get into the living room and watch football with him. Like I even did that.

I sighed heavily. “What’s with him pushing my buttons tonight? He’s never been like this before.”

“Ask me what he said every time I came over here,” he whispered in my ear, giving me goose bumps.

“What?” I smiled as heat raced along my skin.

“He said, ‘So, idiot, when are you gonna go get your boy?’”

“Are you kidding?” I was stunned. He’d called me Sam’s boy?

“No. He embraced me having a man in my life fairly quickly.”

“Is three years quickly?”

“For Thomas Kage, oh hell yeah,” he said, pressing a kiss into the crook of my neck. “You smell so good.”

“Quit.”

“You wanna see my old room?”

“No.”

“I think ya do.”

“No.” I smiled, but I didn’t laugh. It was a victory for me.

“How ’bout my old bed? It doesn’t creak much.”