“Sam?”
“Yeah, I’ll talk to you tomorrow.” She closed the phone and put it on the bedside charger.
“What the hell was that?”
In as few words as possible, she told Nick about the conversation with Davis and what it had yielded. He was the only person who was ever privy to information about her cases that no one else could know. She trusted him implicitly.
Nick stared at her, his face blank with shock.
“Farnsworth confronted Conklin about it, and he says he was nowhere near G Street that day.”
“Can you prove otherwise? Is there security film or something you could check to see if he’s lying?”
“It’s on my list for tomorrow to check with Archie to see what we have.”
Nick’s sour expression made her laugh when she didn’t think that was possible. He’d recently found out about the brief fling she’d had with Archie after her first marriage ended. “Knock it off.”
“Don’t wanna.” He held out his hand to her. “Come here.”
“Give me one minute to change.” She went into the bathroom to brush her teeth and change into pajama pants and a tank before snuggling up to him in bed.
He wrapped his arms around her. “This thing with Conklin has to be a gut punch.”
Safe in his embrace, she finally exhaled after the shock delivered by Mr. Davis. “It is.”
“Any chance the guy is mistaken about who he talked to that day?”
“He picked him out of the photos of the department’s top leadership. I don’t think he’s mistaken.”
“What can I do?”
“This helps. This always helps.”
“I wish it was more. I hate to see you suffering.”
“If the suffering leads to a break in my dad’s case, it’ll be worth it.” Sam gave herself permission to relax—for now—so she could hopefully get some sleep. There was nothing more she could do tonight to pursue the lead she’d been handed by Davis. And besides, the chief had put her on notice that she would not be the one investigating it anyway. “Scotty mentioned the ramps. He asked if we’re going to take them down now that Dad is gone.”
“What do you want to do?”
“I can’t imagine our house or his without them. I can barely remember what Ninth Street looked like before there were ramps.”
“There’s no need to decide anything about that right away.”
“Remember the day you had the ramp installed and I thought someone had blown up our front door?”
His low chuckle echoed through his chest. “My Samantha is always a cop first and foremost.”
“I’m trained to think the worst.” She moved so her chin was on his chest and she could see his handsome face. “In case I forget to mention it every day for the rest of our lives, that was one of the nicest things anyone has ever done for me.”
He curled her hair around his fingers. “I wanted your dad to be able to visit us.”
“You say that as if it’s no big deal, when it was a huge deal to him and to me.”
“Anything for you—and him.”
“He loved you. I hope you know that.”
His warm hazel eyes filled. “I loved him too.”
“Remember when you were afraid he was going to have you killed for being in my bedroom?”
“I remember everything, and I’m quite certain that even in his paralyzed state, he could’ve arranged it.”
Sam laughed. “Oh, he definitely could have, but he knew you were different from everyone else the first time he saw us together.”
“After your ex-husband tried to blow us up?”
She rolled her eyes. “Ahh, yes, those were some good times, huh?”
“The best times of my entire life.”
“You need to get out more.”
“I don’t need anything other than what and who I have right here in this bed and this house.” Smiling, he gave her a gentle tug to bring her fully on top of him, putting her lips into kissing range. Anytime he looked at her that way or kissed her so sweetly, her insides still fluttered. “I think about our first days together all the time. In the midst of the madness of John’s murder, there you were, the woman I’d dreamed about for six long years.”
“Did you really dream about me?”
“I thought about you constantly. My only regret in this life is that I didn’t go after you when you didn’t return my calls.”
“My only regret is that I didn’t hunt you down when you didn’t call me like you said you would.”
“I called you the second I got back from the trip to Europe. I called you from the airport.”
“You did? You’ve never told me that.”
“If you had answered the phone, I would’ve come straight to you.”
Sam groaned at hearing that. “It’s a good thing Peter is dead, or I might be tempted to do it myself.” Her ex-husband had been her platonic roommate at the time Sam first met Nick. Since Peter had been interested in her himself, he’d failed to give her the critical messages from Nick. “What do you think would’ve happened if he’d given me those messages?”
“We’d be married for almost eight years rather than almost two.”
Sam dropped her head to his chest. “I can’t even think about it or I’ll go mad.” Raising her head, she met his loving gaze. “Thank God we found each other again, because I wouldn’t be able to survive this life without you. You can’t ever leave me.”
“Leave you? Where would I go when I can’t breathe without you? I almost lost my mind having to live without you for a week, even when I talked to you every day.”
“There are other ways you can leave me.” She couldn’t think about the people who hated him and what he stood for as vice president. If she did, she’d lose what was left of her sanity.
“I don’t want you to worry about me. I’m very well protected.”
“And yet still I worry.”
“Let’s talk about a worst-case scenario, then.”
She recoiled. “Do we have to?”
“We never have before, and every day I have to send you out there to hunt down criminals who would think nothing of taking you away from me. As much as you might worry about me, let’s face it, it’s much harder being me in this marriage.”
“I know.”
“So let’s talk worst-case. Maybe if we do, it won’t have the power to frighten us the way it does now.”
“There are about twenty million other things I’d rather talk about. Such as...” She shifted her pelvis to press against his cock, which sprang to life under her.
“Quit it. I’m serious.”
“So am I.” She kissed his neck and took a gentle bite under his jaw.
He buried his fingers in her hair and compelled her to look at him. “Tell me what you would do if the worst thing happened. I really want to know.”
“Whereas I can’t bear to even think about it.”
“Humor me.”
Sighing, she realized he wasn’t going to let this go. “After my six-month stay in a padded room, I’d probably take up drinking for a living. I’d do whatever it took to dull the worst pain I could ever imagine feeling. Just thinking about it is unbearable.”
“For me too.”
“What would you do?”
“I’d make sure that you were honored for your service the way your father was, for one thing.”
“You’re so much better at this than I am. I’m in a padded room while you’re seeing to my legacy.”
The sound of his laughter went a long way toward relieving some her tension and reminded her that despite the what-if game, he was very much alive. Thank God for that.
“I’d be out of my mind with grief,” he said. “Don’t ever think otherwise.”
“Would you remarry?”
“Would you?”
“I asked first. Answer the question.”
“I probably wouldn’t. How would I ever top this?”
“What if someone came along who made you happy again?” She seethed with jealousy at the thought of him with anyone but her.
“What would you want me to do?”
Sam flashed a big goofy grin. “Stab her with a rusty steak knife?”
“Why did I know you were going to say that?” His fingers sifted through her hair in a soothing rhythm.
“If I’m truly gone and you find someone who makes you happy, I suppose it would be okay with me if you married her, but you can’t be as happy with her as you were with me. That’s my line in the sand.”
His gorgeous hazel eyes danced with amusement. “I suppose that’s fair enough. Now, tell me what you would do.”
“I would never remarry.”
“Even if you found someone who made you happy again?”
“Even then.”
“Why?”
“Because I’d want to be Samantha Cappuano for the rest of my life.”
“Aw, babe, that’s very sweet of you.”
“So maybe I would live in sin, but I wouldn’t get married again.”
With his hands on her face, he kissed her. “No matter what happens, I’d want you to do whatever it took to be happy. I don’t care what that entails. Just be happy, Samantha.”
“I could never, ever, ever be truly happy again without you.”
“Yes, you could.”
“No, I really couldn’t, so please don’t let anything happen to you.”
“I’m not going anywhere without you, but in light of what we do for a living and the crazy-ass world we live in, I think it’s important that we have this conversation.”
“Maybe so, but I hope you’re not expecting me to sleep tonight as I contemplate the horror of life without you.”