Page 1 of Samuel

One

Calm the fuck down. Breathe. This isn’t a heart attack. This isn’t the end.

It was only the fifteenth time he’d had to repeat the mantra since he parked at Sal’s Bistro. It wasn’t bad enough he was stuck counting backwards in his truck trying to calm his racing heart, but the anxiety was about to make him late to dinner with his friends.

A dinner that Samuel Cooper wasn’t looking forward to attending. Because even though they were supposed to be focused on his sister’s wedding and finalizing details for late summer, he knew the attention would be on him.

And his heart.

Shit. His hands were so goddamn clammy. He should just send a text and let them all know something came up at the ranch.

“Yeah, the thing that came up is that you’re a coward,” he whispered, although that wasn’t really the right description.

When his heart had stopped, landing him in the cardiac ICU over an hour away from home, his friends and family began hovering. It was understandable to Sam. They’d almostlost him, so they were being overprotective. But he was a grown-ass man. A rancher who prided himself on being the one everyone else could count on in their time of need. He didn’t want, or need, everyone’s worry and concern.

Knowing the questions he was about to face, because let’s be honest, they were always the same, his chest tightened.

How are you feeling?

How was your last doctor’s appointment?

Are you taking it easy?

Not doing too much?

How can we help?

How can we help?

HOW CAN WE HELP?

His hands slammed against the dashboard.

It all pissed him off. He didn’t want the doting. He didn’t want the care or concern. He was rock solid. A freak heart issue didn’t change that. It didn’t change anything. Except the fact that he now had a machine implanted in his chest to shock him back to life if it ever happened again.

Oh. And now, he had panic attacks.

As if having a one-time defective heart wasn’t bad enough, his brain thought it would be fun to make him think he was having heart problems when all he needed was to calm the fuck down.

Sam turned the volume up on the music. If he focused on something other than the sound of his own breath sawing in and out of his chest, he might be able to stop the attack. He’d done a fucking good job of hiding them from everyone, he wasn’t about to make a fool of himself in the parking lot of their favorite hang out spot.

Finally, his damn heart listened and calmed down. His chest released the tightness he was getting used to, and he could breathe again. It was time to get out of his truck and face his friends. Sam grabbed his keys and headed inside.

“Hey! Sam’s here!” Johnathan Boone, his soon to be brother-in-law, patted him on the back. “Your sister was about three seconds away from sending out a search and rescue party for you.”

“Abby.”

His sister sat at the table with the rest of their friends, glaring at him. “I won’t apologize for being worried about you, Sam, so you can just save it.”

He moved around the chairs and pulled his sister into a hug. “I appreciate the worry, but I’m fine.” Turning to his group of friends, he continued. “You all know I’m fine. There’s no need to worry, or dote, or send me a million texts each day checking in.”

That last part was for his neighbor, Daisy. She’d been almost as bad as his sister with her constant worry.

“I’m trying to help you get better at using technology. Who in their thirties isn’t good at using a cell phone?”

“I have no need for one.”

“You better be carrying it on you at the ranch. What if something?—“

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