Dangerously in Love (13 page)

Samantha rode the elevator alone to the fifteenth floor of the Marion Hotel. This day had been all about Hill—getting him a pass, telling him about his father’s death, preparing him for what awaited him. Tomorrow, Hill was to be released to her custody for seven days. They had to process his paperwork and program his ankle bracelet. Now that she had handled Hill’s legal business, she just wanted to relax. She had a six-hour drive ahead of her to get Hill to Chicago.

Inside the hotel room, she sat in the chair rather than the sofa. On the coffee table in front of her was the local
Tribune
. She flipped through the newspaper, but her mind couldn’t focus on what she was reading. She kept thinking about Bill. She dug her cell phone out of her purse and called him.

“I had to check into a hotel. They won’t release Hill until tomorrow afternoon.”

“So why are you calling me, Samantha? I told you, I don’t want a convicted murderer in my house.”

“My name is on the deed, too. His father died, Bill. What happened to your compassion?”

“Look, you haven’t lived here for a year, and now you want to put on airs?”

“Okay. This is unproductive. I’ll be home tomorrow evening with Hill. We’ll have dinner at the house, and I’ll figure things out from there.”

“Well, I’ll be sure I’m gone. And no matter what you decide, Hillary stays with me while that murderer is out of prison.”

***

Hill stood there stunned . . . and silent. Old friends, family, and colleagues hugged, kissed, slapped on the back, play-punched, and man-hugged Hill as he arrived. And real food. He hadn’t expected such a reception, especially on such a sad occasion. Samantha, who was pregnant when he was convicted, now had a five-year-old daughter who was running around somewhere.

The weather was perfect. The welcome even more perfect. He hadn’t had a beer in five years. He took his first sip that day. He licked the barbecue from his fingers. He played catch with a couple of the kids. He played cards with his friends. He laughed, hard and often. But mostly, he wanted to cry over his father and all the lost years.

It had gotten late, and folks were leaving. Hill stayed to help Samantha with cleanup duty, which she appreciated.

“You’re looking really good, Hill,” Samantha said as she loaded the dishwasher.

“You are, too. I can’t believe Hillary is five years old. I can’t believe you’re a mom.”

“Yeah, I’m an old battle axe now,” she joked.

“I can’t imagine that. You seem happy, though.”

She didn’t reply.

“You are happy, right?”

“You know, Hill, I can handle this by myself. Why don’t you just go relax until your brother calls with the details for the wake?”

He dropped the sponge in the soapy water and leaned against the counter. “I didn’t mean to step on a landmine, Sam. It’s been a long time and . . .”

“Don’t worry about it, Hill. But nobody’s life stopped because you were locked up. We all had lives to lead.”

“Whoa.” He reached for her hand and pulled her close. “What’s this about? What’s wrong, Sam?”

She broke into tears, covering her face with her hands.

“Come here,” he said, pulling her into a hug. “What’s going on, Sam?” He brushed the hair away from her eyes and wiped her streaming tears with his thumbs. She sniffed, wiping the tears from her nose with the back of her hand.

“First day out of prison, and you’re already after my wife,” Bill said, half joking. Samantha quickly broke from Hill’s embrace and continued loading the dishwasher.

Hill smiled at Bill. “How’s work?”

“What do you care? You don’t give a shit about my work.”

Hill laughed. “You’re right.”

They both laughed awkwardly. Hill looked at Samantha, who glanced back at him. She seemed okay, so he excused himself from the kitchen.

The windows facing the train tracks were larger than he remembered, but the building itself was smaller than he recalled. Somehow, the warehouse looked better than it had when he’d lived there. Inside, it was warm with the fresh scent of vanilla or something sweet like that. Not a speck of dust anywhere. The blinds were in tiptop shape, and the floors, pristine. It looked as if he’d never left. He turned and looked at Samantha who seemed forlorn—her face was marred by disdain. In the living room, a vase of fresh flowers was situated in the center of the cocktail table. Its fragrant blossoms added to the overall sweetness pervading the air in the room.

“I’ve been keeping up the place. I figured with what you spent on restoring it, you wouldn’t want it ruined. So I tended to it,” Samantha explained.

“Thank you,” he offered as he continued looking around, trying to remember this place, observing Samantha’s improvements, her interior decor. “It was a long ride. I’m going to the head,” he announced.

As he stood over the commode relieving himself, he noticed the floral shower curtains—no longer the sliding shower door. The tub was an antique bear claw porcelain one. He flushed the toilet and stood at the sink, washing his hands with scented soap. He pulled open the medicine cabinet and noticed the blue Tampax box, moisturizer, women’s and children’s daily vitamins, oral hygiene products, and a very purple toothbrush perched next to a pink one. None of which belonged to him. He closed the cabinet door and dried his hands on the Egyptian cotton decorative towel hanging on a circular towel holder.

As he exited the bathroom, he saw Samantha leaning against the wall across from him, her arms folded across her chest.

“I know you noticed.”

“I did. What’s going on?”

She sighed and motioned for him to follow her. She entered one of the extra bedrooms just past the one she had turned into Hillary’s room. She’d had this one converted into her own. She sat on the chaise across from her bed and patted the seat. Hill took her cue and sat beside her.

“I’ve been living here for a year now. Well, Hillary and I have been living here. Bill and I are going through a rough patch.”

Hill nodded, not seeming to be phased by any of it.

“I didn’t have anywhere else I could go since I hadn’t been working. I really didn’t have any money. And since you were locked up, I figured you wouldn’t need the place for quite a while.”

Hill nodded again.

“I took your girlfriend’s picture down and put it in the garage. I figured you didn’t need the memory. I’ll put it back up if you need me to.”

He shook his head.

“You aren’t saying much,” she observed.

“So why didn’t you bring Hillary with us when we left Bill’s house, then?”

“Bill thought it would be a good idea if she stayed with him while you’re on pass, to give you a chance to do what you need to do without a kid underfoot.”

“Oh, I see. He didn’t want his kid around a convict.”

“Something like that,” she agreed.

“What happened with you two? Before I went to prison, you were all giddy.”

She sighed. “Can we talk about something else? I really don’t have the energy . . .”

“Suits me fine. Where am I sleeping?”

“In your room . . . where else, silly?”

“Well, seeing that you’ve taken over my place . . .”

“Is that what’s wrong with you? You’re mad because I moved into your home?”

“Without ever once telling me? No, of course not. I’m not mad about that at all. My father just died, Sam. He died with me being a disappointment to him. I didn’t get to redeem myself with him. My father died thinking his son is a murderer.”

Samantha remained silent.

“I’m going to take a shower then hit the sack. Can I shower with this thing on my ankle?”

She nodded.

“Okay then.” He leaned in to kiss her cheek, but she turned her head and planted a wet one on his lips.

“I’m so sorry, Hill. I know how this must hurt terribly.”

He nodded and walked away.

***

Hill heard a thumping sound. He sat up on the side of the bed, trying to ascertain from where it was coming. He got up and followed the sounds, which led him into the garage.

“I’m sorry, did I wake you?” Samantha asked.

“What are you doing?”

“I remembered I forgot to fix the bike rack. The trains kept jarring it loose. I needed one of these things to reinforce it.” She held up a plastic anchor. “Anyway, I was about to go to sleep, and I remembered I needed to fix it.”

Uncharacteristically rough, Hill grabbed her by the arm and pulled her body next to his. He cupped her face in his hands, brushing his thumbs along her bottom lip, wanting to taste her, needing to feel her warmth. A freight train rumbled by, shaking the floor beneath them. Samantha looked up at the ceiling, watching the pendant light fixtures swaying slightly.

“See, that’s what I’m talking about. Like that . . . that’s how the bike rack fell.”

“Samantha,” Hill caressed her hair, “I need you.”

Samantha returned her focus to him, wondering what this was all about. The last time Hill had told her that he needed her, they had just started dating. And that was more than eight years ago. “Is this about your dad?”

“No,” he shook his head. “Well, sort of. But not really.”

“Which is it?”

“For five years, I lay in my cell day-after-day, replaying in my mind what went wrong. Where did I make the wrong turn with my life?” He caressed her cheek with the backs of his fingers and watched her lean into his touch. “What went wrong was that I let you walk out of my life. Since that day, I went downhill. I never realized how much you grounded me—how much I needed you. My life became
nothing
without you.”

Samantha couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Hill? Expressing
feelings
? It was so unlike him. She knew he hated talking about his feelings or even being vulnerable. Yet he stood there, staring into her eyes, telling her what she’d been wanting to hear for years—that she mattered to him.

“When you married Bill, it killed me. Almost literally. It’s silly, I know . . .”

“No, it isn’t, Hill. I appreciate you sharing how—” But before she could finish, Hill had kissed her—passionately, intensely—with such an urgency that Samantha could hardly catch her breath.

“Lay with me tonight,” he asked. “I just need to feel you beside me.”

“I don’t want to just lay with you, Hill. I want to make love to you—not just once, but until you don’t have an ounce of energy left to give.”

“It’s been five years, darlin’—that might take a while,” he joked.

Eugene, Hill’s oldest brother and the new patriarch of the family, called Samantha to tell her the location had been changed. The funeral home had made a clerical error and double booked for the same room at the same time. Lizzy, the judge’s wife—they were married shortly after Hill was convicted—had offered the judge’s house as the new venue. Eugene had called to tell her that. She asked if he wanted to speak to Hill, but Eugene declined. It was rare that any of the siblings spoke to Hill, especially now that he was a family disgrace.

“I swear, Sam, if the warden wasn’t going to be there, I would just skip the memorial service and pay my respects in my own way—without my so-called family.”

“Well, you’re going for Lizzy. Just remember that,” Samantha said as she looped his tie around the collar of his shirt.

“Not one of them . . . as a matter of fact, Sam, you’re the only one who came to visit me. Dad came a couple of times, but when he retired and had no reason to travel to southern Illinois, he stopped coming, too. Sometimes I wondered if the only reason why you came was because you were my attorney.”

“There,” she said, satisfied with the knot she had made. “You look very handsome.”

“So your visits were official then?”

“Hill, let’s not get into this today, okay? I mean, we had a beautiful night together, you’re about to say goodbye to your father, and you only have five more days of freedom. Let’s just enjoy it, okay?”

He kissed her forehead. “Okay. Are we stopping to pick up Hillary?”

She shook her head. “No, there’s no reason for her to be there.”

“Right,” he nodded. “Right.”

***

The memorial service was beautifully done. Lizzy was well composed, all things considered. The food was great. The family was surprisingly pleasant. Everybody who was anybody was there, including Hill’s warden, Judge Sterling, who greeted Hill as if she’d seen a long lost relative. Even Perry showed up, although he was preoccupied with a case that was heating up. It was a beautiful send-off for the judge. He had been cremated, so Lizzy displayed the urn next to his photo.

The judge’s attorney had scheduled the reading of the will for that afternoon since everyone who needed to be there was already in town. So that afternoon, they all met at Lizzy’s for an early dinner and the reading of the will.

It wasn’t pretty. What the judge didn’t leave to Lizzy, he left to Hill. That was it. A fifteen-minute reading was all it took. Lizzy served dessert. Eugene and Hill’s other siblings were livid. They cussed and fussed and made a big scene about contesting the will.

“He wasn’t there for us in life, why would we expect that he’d be there for us in death?” Eugene shouted.

“You can have my inheritance,” Hill offered.

Lizzy patted Hill’s shoulder. “No. No, you will not. Your father was very thoughtful when he decided how to distribute his assets among you. Which of you, who are complaining, visited your father just once while he was sick? Lenny remembered Hill checking on him. Lenny remembered Hill calling him. Lenny remembered that Hill lost everything when he was convicted of a crime we all know he didn’t commit. Of all of you, Hill will need the inheritance most. That’s what Lenny decided. And that is how it shall be. And Hill, you will not disgrace your father’s memory by throwing away what he so thoughtfully gave you.” When she finished her speech, she stood up and said, “The rest of you can either enjoy dessert with me, or you can go home and be miserable. But you’re not going to ruin this day with your bickering.”

“I don’t know that Hill didn’t kill those people. And you don’t know it, either,” said one of the siblings.

“He was convicted in a court of law,” Eugene said.

“Well, if you had attended any part of Hill’s hearings, you would have known he pled guilty as part of a plea deal so that he wouldn’t spend the rest of his life in prison for a crime he didn’t commit. Hill is not a murderer,” Samantha said emphatically.

“Nobody pleads guilty to a crime they didn’t commit.”

Hill tapped Samantha’s knee just as she was about to retort. He shook his head, coaxing her to silence.

“I don’t care if you believe I’m a murderer or not. I don’t really care what you think of me. You’ve never been a part of my life, and I don’t expect that you ever will be. Like I said, if a five hundred thousand dollar policy and some law books are that important to you, you can have it. I go back to prison in five days for another five years. I’m sure I’ll never see you again.”

“We don’t want your money. We just wanted our father to finally acknowledge us in some way,” his sister said.