and she looked at him, Annabelle waved and the elevator door opened. “Don't do this, Sam …please …for both our sakes.” It had been much easier than this when he'd left her for Daphne. He had seemed so sure then, and now he seemed so broken, and she was no longer clear what she owed him.
“I'm sorry, Alex,” he apologized, looking desperately unhappy. “Can I see you sometime?” He looked panicked. The elevator was waiting.
“No.” She shook her head and hurried toward Annabelle, sorry she had come at all. “I can't, Sam …” She couldn't do that to Brock, or herself. She just couldn't. “I'm sorry.”
She stepped into the elevator then, next to Annabelle, and his eyes blazed into hers as the doors closed. And all the way home to her apartment, she tried to force him from her mind, and everything he had said, and think of Brock, as she clung to her daughter.
“Was Daddy mad at you?” Annabelle glanced up at her, looking puzzled, in the chill wind, as Christmas shoppers hurried past them.
“No, sweetheart. He was fine,” she lied, wondering why children always saw all the things they shouldn't.
“He looked sad when we left.”
“He was probably just unhappy to see you go, but he wasn't mad. I promise.” Only sad. And very foolish.
It was a relief to get home to Brock, and the rich smells wafting from her kitchen. He was making spaghetti sauce and garlic bread, and Alex had promised to make soup and pasta and salad, and hot fudge sundaes.
“Everything go okay?” he asked, glancing at her as she took her coat off and warmed her hands. She seemed very cold and somewhat shaken.
“Fine,” she smiled, slipping her arms around him as he stood at the stove, and forcing herself to forget everything Sam had told her. But no matter what she did that night, or how tightly she clung to Brock as he lay beside her, Sam's words continued to drift around her like spirits.
Chapter 22
Annabelle spent a week with Sam, starting on Christmas Day, and Alex made a point of not seeing him when she dropped her off. She let her go up alone in the elevator at the Carlyle. Alex hadn't heard from him again since the last time she saw him, and she could only assume that he had come to his senses. And whether or not he was thinking clearly again, she knew she was.
Christmas Eve had been wonderful with Brock and Annabelle. And they had rented the same house in Vermont for the week between Christmas and New Year's. And this time she skied and had a great time. She had never felt better all year. Her hair had grown longer by then, and she was wearing it in a stylish bob that Brock said he loved, and thought was very sexy. And after a few days in Vermont with her, he relaxed about Sam. Brock knew how much Alex loved him, and he felt suddenly foolish to have been worried.
They also learned, while they were there, that Sam had filed for divorce just after Christmas. And Alex was particularly relieved to hear it. He had obviously come to his senses. Leaving the past behind was difficult for both of them, but there was no question in her mind that they had to do it.
She and Brock talked about getting married quietly in June, and she reminded him again that they still had to work things out at the law firm. They even talked about their honeymoon as they lay by the fire on New Year's Eve, and Alex said dreamily that she would love to go to Europe.
“I think that could be arranged,” he said, sounding warm and comfortable and sexy. They had just made love, and he was half asleep lying next to her, as she smiled up at him and smoothed his hair back. He looked like a boy to her sometimes, a huge overgrown child, so innocent and trusting, it made her love him even more as she held him.
And on New Year's Day they drove back to New York from Vermont. It was a long drive, and they went to the apartment first, and dropped off their skis and suitcases. And then she walked over to pick up Annabelle at the Carlyle still in ski clothes. She called Sam from the desk downstairs, and he asked her to come up just for a minute. She hesitated, and then decided there was no harm in