Page 123 of Sing it, Sam

I tug at his earlobe. He grunts. “Well, now you need to listen. I want you to go to the doctor. Not Ben, who you have beef with, but me. It might be nothing. The appointment could be a waste of time, but you won’t know until you go.”

“He’s just gonna spin the same shit as last time,” Sam grumbles. “What’s the point? I’m trying to move forward, remember?”

“I know you are, Sam, and the people who care about you want that too. You need the best care possible along the way. You need to get on board with that, Sam.”

Sam stares through me as if I’m invisible and he’s searching for something way off in the distance.

“Do you think it’s more than the wine that made you collapse tonight?” I ask.

He blinks in quick succession and shrugs one shoulder. “Maybe?”

I gulp down. “Maybe?” There’s something more to this—I know it. He needs to be looked at. “Make. The. Appointment,” I say in a deep robotic tone.

“Fine,” Sam says through gritted teeth. A smile teases at his lips. “I’ll go see him.”

Hope fills me from the inside.I’m getting through to him. “You promise?”

His brows knit together. “Yeah, but what if it’s bad news?”

I place my hand on his bare chest and revel as his heart beats against my fingertips. “Then we deal with it together. Simple.”

“I love it when you get bossy,” Sam says, his voice husky. His hand shifts up the sides of my pyjama top.

“Yeah, well you gave me cause to.”

He tweaks at my nipple, causing it to pebble. “I should piss you off more often.”

Sam’s hand explores down my stomach, and tugs at the waistband of my shorts. “Why are you wearing pyjamas?” he asks, as if the fact that I am is the most ridiculous thing in the world.

“Um, I’m not exactly sure. Force of habit?” I lift the covers enough to confirm that Sam is already hard.

“Well, get ’em off, Janie. I’ve got plans for us.”

After tonight he still wants to get busy?“Are you sure? We don’t have to. I mean, you’re probably tired.”

Sam rolls his eyes. “Don’t care. I’ll push through it. Now, deal with the PJs.”

And he reckons I’m bossy. I peel off my top and shorts, and toss them on the floor. “Your brother is right next door,” I say in a quiet voice.

“Then I’ll try to keep my screams to a minimum.”

“Sam, it’s okay. There’ll be another time.” And yes, I’m panicking that Ben will hear us. Once things get started, there’s no muting the sounds that might burst from my mouth.

“Janie?”

The bed shifts as I kneel on the edge of it and crawl towards Sam. “What?”

He pulls the covers back and lays his head back on the pillow. “I can’t tell you how many nights I laid awake just wishing for an opportunity like this. To have you alone, have you in my arms. If my hands were the way they used to be, I’d always be touching you somehow.”

“There’s nothing wrong with your lips,” I whisper.

A grin tickles at his mouth. “No. There ain’t.”

Sam reaches out and slides his hand between my knees. A shiver creeps up my spine as his fingers climb the soft flesh of my inner thigh. I grip the timber bedhead either side of his shoulders and straddle his lap.

“I’m not wasting a chance to have you, Janie,” he says as his fingers slide beneath my wet folds. “I never will. You know, seize the girl and all that.”

My hair teases at his face as I lean down and giggle against his mouth, playfully biting his lips. “That’d make a great song title. Seize the Girl. Like that saying ‘seize the day’, fromDead Poet’s Society.”

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