The smile left Sunshine’s eyes and she nodded. “It’s a shame, really. If she had the chance to know Sam, she’d feel differently.”

“Something else Mom is forgetting,” Beth said. “This is my life. I’m twenty-five and fully capable of making my own choices, dating whomever I want.”

“Yes, you are,” Sunshine said, agreeing with her. “How did you ever cope with the way she controlled you?”

“Music has always been my escape,” Beth confessed.

Sunshine nodded in understanding. “As art has been mine.”

“When I felt as if my mother was burying me under the weight of her expectations, I’d sit at the piano and immerse myself in music. Sam is a musician, too.” Although he hadn’t mentioned it, she wondered if it was when he relinquished his daughter that he took up playing the guitar. Music must have helped him deal with the burden of his choice. Playing together, they had found a common language, a way of communicating that went beyond words. They had learned to read each other through a shared passion.

“Stick to your guns when it comes to Sam,” Sunshine advised, and smiled as she said it. “I don’t have any idea of what sticking to your guns has to do with anything, but it sounds good.”

“I will,” Beth said with determination. “I’m not giving Sam up … unless he gives up on me first.”

Sunshine looked surprised. “Is that likely?”

“I’m a little afraid of what will happen once I’m on my own again. He doesn’t seem to see a problem, but I’m not so sure.”

“Oh?”

The comment invited a response.

“Things are bound to change,” Beth said, uncertain of how best to share her fears.

“In what way?”

Beth had yet to give voice to her concerns and she needed a moment to think matters through. “Sam has been my guardian angel through this ordeal. I fear he sees himself as my protector. I don’t want or need him to be that. I don’t need a guardian, but I’d be grateful to be his friend.”

“And lover?” Sunshine arched her brows suggestively with the question.

Beth was afraid her cheeks filled with color. “When the time is right, yes.” It didn’t take much to imagine Sam as her lover. He was a man of passion, and she found it easy to believe that same hunger for life would translate well into lovemaking.

“I like Sam,” her aunt told her. “I have from the first. If he has a problem being overprotective, set him straight. He’s a smart guy, he’ll catch on fast enough.”

“And if he doesn’t?”

Her aunt cocked her head to one side with a knowing look. “I’ve seen the way Sam is with you. That boy is smitten. He isn’t going to do anything to risk what he’s found in you.”

Smitten. What a lovely word that was, and one Beth hadn’t heard in a long time. “What do you think he’s found in me?” she asked, curious to hear her aunt’s thoughts.

“Renewed hope,” she said without even the shortest of pauses. “That first time we met, shortly after the accident, he seemed shiftless, lost. True enough, he was concerned about you, worried. Even after a short acquaintance I realized that below the surface there was more to him than meets the eye. Almost immediately I recognized something in him … something we share. I sensed that he had given up.”

“What have you given up on?” Beth felt compelled to ask.

“I’ll get overemotional, so I’d rather not say.”

Beth speculated that it had something to do with the name she’d mentioned earlier. Peter Hamlin.

“What do you think Sam has given up on, then?”

Sunshine shrugged. “I couldn’t say, and even if I could it wouldn’t be my place. My point is that over the last six weeks I’ve noticed subtle changes in Sam. I’ve witnessed this transformation. I’m guessing this time with you has been a welcome surprise to him. I doubt he ever expected to meet someone like you.”

Funny Sunshine should say that, because Beth was the one who felt she’d received a gift by knowing Sam and making music with him.

Chapter 18

Sam

This was the day, and Sam refused to miss it. Beth was being released from the rehab facility after three weeks of intensive physical therapy. Sam couldn’t be more proud of the work she had done and the improvement she’d made in such a short amount of time. She was able to walk without the cane now, although she tired easily. He took the day off work so he could be there when she walked out the door.

Sunshine arrived before him to pick her up and drive Beth to her apartment. As a surprise, Sam waited outside the rehab facility with a bouquet of flowers and five big, colorful balloons. They’d both eagerly anticipated this day. Beth could finally get back to her real life, to teaching her students the music she loved, to everything she’d managed to build in the short amount of time she’d been in Portland.

It started to drizzle rain as Sam stood outside, impatiently waiting. He glanced toward the sky and sighed. His head was buzzing with small concerns—big ones, too. Beth had talked about her own worries, fearing what was only natural for someone in her situation. Sam had a few of his own.

They hadn’t talked much about the sure-to-be changes in their relationship once she was discharged. Inevitably it would shift. No doubt there. He didn’t know how or what the future held, and dwelling on it did nothing good for his digestion. Sam felt a stronger connection to Beth than he had to any other woman since Trish. That alone offered its own set of qualms. He understood that Beth was nothing like the other woman, but at the same time he remained reluctant to risk his heart a second time. Yet he’d found it impossible to maintain his guard.

He’d never enjoyed time with a woman the way he did with Beth. Their nightly jam sessions had been some of the happiest times he could remember in years. The fact they could laugh together and tease each other had been foreign to him. They’d bonded over the music and had agreed to return to the rehab center at least twice a week and play for the patients and the staff, as much for their own enjoyment as for others’.

This thing with Beth was uncharted territory for him. He hoped they’d be able to move forward, to continue as a couple, but he was prepared to let matters fall where they would.

The misty rain continued, typical of autumn in the Pacific Northwest. Discharging Beth was taking much longer than he’d expected. He’d assumed when Sunshine went inside that it would be only a matter of minutes before she appeared with Beth. Not so. It’d been fifteen minutes already and he saw no signs they’d be coming out anytime soon.

Another fifteen minutes passed when Sam caught sight of Beth and her aunt. The sliding glass doors parted and he stepped forward.

As soon as Beth saw him with the flowers and the balloons, her face lit up with joy. “Sam,” she cried, “you’re here.”

“Wasn’t going to miss seeing my girl walk out of that facility.”

She headed straight for him with her arms wide open, her smile as bright as a summer’s day. She bubbled with laughter as she tossed her arms around him.

Sam hugged her back, the balloons and flowers tangling. Every doubt and worry he had fled the instant she was in his arms.

Beth rode with Sunshine, holding on to the flowers while he dealt with the balloons and followed behind in his truck. They went directly to her apartment, which was close to the high school. It was a one-bedroom place with an impossibly tiny kitchen. The apartment was like Beth, bright and cheerful. He felt her warmth the moment he walked inside. Knowing she came from money, this must have been quite an adjustment from what she was accustomed to in her Chicago home. But it was hers, and just the way she paused and breathed in the atmosphere, Sam knew she loved it. He wasn’t the least bit surprised that the first thing she did was walk over to the piano and run her fingers over the keys.

“How are you feeling?” Sunshine asked, once the array of flowers was deposited in a pitcher. Beth apologized that she didn’t have a vase.

“Wonderful. I want to throw out my arms and twirl around. I’m home at last.”