by Cat Schield
There were two bedrooms and three bathrooms along with the private balcony/terrace that added an extra two hundred square feet to the suite. The master bedroom and en suite bath boasted a view of the sea from behind one-way glass. He could see out, but no one could see in.
And in spite of his surroundings, Sam felt...on edge. He stalked out to the terrace and let the cold wind slap at him. Glancing down at the nearly empty deck of the bow, Sam noticed a woman with long, wavy red hair and it felt as though someone had punched him in the chest.
“It’s not her. Why the hell would she be on this cruise?”
Still, he couldn’t look away. She wore white slacks and a long-sleeved green shirt and her hair lifted and twisted in the wind. Then she turned sideways and Sam saw that she was very pregnant. Disappointment tangled with relief inside him, until the redhead stopped, looked up and seemed to stab his stare with her own.
Mia?
His heart jolted and his hands fisted on the cold, white iron railing. She’s pregnant? Why wouldn’t she tell him? Why didn’t she say something? What the hell was she doing here? And why didn’t she take off her sunglasses so he could see the green eyes that had been haunting him for months?
But she didn’t comply with that wish. Instead, she shook her head, clearly in disgust, and then stalked away, disappearing from view in less than a moment.
Mia. Pregnant.
Here.
Sam went inside, rushed across the room and hit the front door at a dead run. Somebody had better tell him something fast. He didn’t waste time with a phone call. Instead he went down to the main deck where passengers were still filing onboard. The purser was there, along with two of the entertainment crew, to welcome people onto Fantasy Nights. Ordinarily, Sam would have been impressed with how easily his employees handled the streaming crowds—all smiles and conversations. But today, he needed answers.
“Mr. Wilson,” Sam said and the purser turned. Instantly, the older man straightened up as if going to attention.
“Mr. Buchanan,” he said with a nod. “Is there something I can help you with?”
“Yeah. Has a woman named Mia—” he almost said Buchanan, but Sam remembered at the last minute that his ex-wife had returned to her maiden name after the divorce “—Harper, checked in?”
The man quickly checked through the list of names on the clipboard he held. Then he glanced at his boss and said, “Yes sir. She did. A half hour ago. She—”
That was Mia. A very pregnant Mia.
“Which suite is she in?”
He knew she had a suite because all of the staterooms on the Fantasy Nights were suites. Some more luxuriously appointed than others but every suite on this ship was roomy and inviting.
“It’s the Poseidon, sir. Two decks down on the port side and—”
“Thanks. That’s all I need.” Sam threaded his way through the crowd already spilling into the atrium, the main welcome spot on any ship.
On Fantasy Nights, the atrium was two stories of glass-and-wood spiraling staircases, now draped in pine garland. There was a giant Christmas tree in the middle of the room boasting what looked to Sam like a thousand twinkling, colored lights, along with ornaments—that the passengers could also purchase in the gift shop. There was a group of carolers in one corner, and miles of more pine garland draped like bunting all around the room.
Hanging from the ceiling were hundreds of strands of blinking white lights, to simulate snowfall and on one wall, there were tables set up, laden with Christmas cookies and hot chocolate.
Sam barely noticed. He didn’t have time to wait for the elevator. Instead, he headed for the closest staircase and took them two at a time. He knew every ship in his fleet like the back of his hand, so he didn’t need to check the maps on the walls to know where he was headed.
The Poseidon suite was one of their larger ones and he wondered why Mia had bothered to book a two-bedroom suite. If she was pregnant, why the hell hadn’t she come directly to him months ago? He had no answers to too many questions racing through his mind, so Sam pushed all of them aside, assuring himself he’d solve this mystery soon enough.
The excited chatter of conversations and bursts of laughter from children and their parents chased him down the first hallway on the port side. On most cruise ships, hallways dividing the staterooms were narrow and usually dark in spite of carefully placed lighting. Fantasy Cruise Line hallways were wider than usual and boasted overhead lighting and brass wall sconces alongside every stateroom.
Here, the floorboards were also teak and on each door was attached a plaque describing the name of the suite itself. For example, he thought as he stopped outside Mia’s suite, her doorway held the image of Poseidon, riding a whale, holding his trident high, as if ready to attack an enemy. He wondered if that was an omen for what was to come.
He didn’t have long to think about it. He knocked and a moment later, the door was yanked open. Long red hair. Sharp green eyes. Green shirt. White pants. Pregnant belly.
But not Mia.
Her twin, Maya.
Was he feeling relief? Disappointment? Both? Sam just stared at her. Damned if he could think of anything to say.
Maya didn’t have that problem. She glared at him then and snapped, “Happy anniversary, you bastard.”
* * *
Almost instantly, Mia appeared behind her twin. Rolling her eyes at her sister’s drama, she said, “Maya. Stop.”
Her sister stared at her for a second or two. “Seriously? You’re going to defend him?”
“Defend me from what?” Sam asked.
“What?” Maya repeated, shifting a hard look to him before turning back to her twin. “Really? Even now you want me to play nice?”
“Really.” Mia tugged on her sister’s arm. “I love you. Go away.”
“Fine,” Maya said, throwing both hands into the air. She threw one last hard look at Sam. “But I’m not going far...”
“What the hell?” Sam muttered, keeping a wary eye on the woman as she walked away.
This was not the way Mia had wanted to handle this. But then, nothing about this trip was how she’d wanted it. She hadn’t planned on bringing her entire family with her, for instance. But there was nothing she could do about that now, except maybe keep Maya away from Sam.
“Yeah, she’s not your biggest fan,” Mia admitted, then stepped into the hallway, forcing him to move back to make room. She pulled the door closed behind her, leaned against it and lifted her gaze to the man of her dreams.
Well, she amended mentally, the former man of her dreams.
He was tall. She’d always liked that. Actually, it had been one of the first things she’d noticed about him the night they met. She was five feet nine inches tall, so meeting a man who was six foot four had been great. That night she’d been wearing three-inch heels and she’d still had to look up to meet his eyes.
And they were great eyes. Pale, pale blue that could turn from icy to heat in a blink of time. His black hair was a little too long for the CEO of a huge company, but it was thick and shiny and she’d once loved threading her fingers through it. In fact, even after everything that had happened between them, Mia’s fingers itched to do it again.
He was wearing a suit, of course. Sam didn’t do “relaxed.” He wore his elegantly tailored suits as if he’d been born to wear them. And maybe he had been, Mia mused. All she was sure of was that beneath that dark blue, pinstriped suit, was a body that looked as if it had been sculpted by angels on a very good day.
Her heartbeat jumped skittishly and she wasn’t surprised. She had met him and married him within a two-month, whirlwind span and though the marriage had lasted only nine months—technically—she knew it might take her years to get over Sam Buchanan.
Then he started talking.
“What are you doing here?”
Mia scowled. �
��Well, that’s a very gracious welcome, Sam. Thank you. Good to see you, too.”
He didn’t look abashed, only irritated. “What’s going on, Mia? Why is my ex-wife on this cruise?”
Hmm. More ‘wife’ than ‘ex’, she thought, but they’d get to that.
“This was the only way I could find to get you alone long enough to talk.”
He snorted and pushed one hand through that great hair. “Really. You couldn’t just pick up the phone?”
“Please.” She waved that away. “Like I didn’t try? Your assistant kept putting me off, telling me you were in a meeting or on the company jet heading off to Katmandu or something...”
“Katmandu?”
“Or somewhere else exotic, far away and out of reach apparently, of my phone.”
Sam tucked his hands into his slacks pockets. “So you take a fifteen-day cruise?”
Mia shrugged. “Seemed like a good idea at the time.”
“With Maya.”
“And her family.”
He glanced down the hallway and then to the closed door, as if expecting to see Joe and the kids pop out of hiding. “You’re kidding.”
“Why would I kid?”
The door flew open and Maya was there, glaring at him. Mia sighed, but gave up trying to rein in her twin.
“Why wouldn’t she bring her family along as backup when she has to face you?” Maya asked.
“Backup?” He pulled his hands free, folded his arms across his chest and glared at the mirror image of Mia. “Why the hell would she need backup?”
“As if you didn’t know,” Maya snapped. “And another news flash for you, Mom and Dad are here too, and they’re not real happy about it.”
He looked at Mia. “Your parents are here?”
She lifted both hands helplessly. Mia hadn’t actually invited any of her family along on this trip. She’d simply made the mistake of telling her twin what she was planning and Maya had taken it from there. Her family was circling the wagons to keep her from being hurt again. Hard to be angry with the people who loved you because they wanted to protect you.
Also hard to not be frustrated by them.
“Are Merry and her family here too?” Sam asked. “Cousins? Best friends?”
“Merry didn’t trust herself to see you,” Maya snapped.
Thank God, their older sister Merry had decided to stay home with her family or things would have been even wilder. It was comforting to realize that at least one member of her family was sane.
“Maya,” Mia said on a sigh, “you’re not helping. Close the door.”
“Fine but I’ll be listening anyway,” she warned and slammed the door so that the sound echoed along the hallway.
And she would be, too, Mia knew. “Merry stayed home to keep the bakery running,” she said. “Christmas is our busiest time of the year.”
“Yeah, I remember.”
“So busy,” she continued as if he hadn’t spoken, “Mom and Dad are cruising to Hawaii, but they’re going to fly home from there to help Merry.”
“I don’t get it.”
“Which part?”
“All of it.” He shook his head, took her arm and steered her further from the door, no doubt because he knew that Maya was indeed listening to everything they said. “I still don’t know why you’re here. Why you felt like you needed an army just to face me.”
“Not an army. Just people who love me.” Mia pulled her arm free of his grasp because the heat building up from his touch was way too distracting. How was she supposed to keep her mind on why she was there when he was capable of dissolving her brain so easily?
And that, she told herself, was exactly why the family had come along.
“We have to talk.”
“Yeah, I guessed that much,” he said, shooting a glance at the still closed door.
Just being this close to Sam was awakening everything inside her and Mia knew that she was really going to need her family as a buffer. Because her natural impulse was to move in closer, hook her arms around his neck and pull his head to hers for one of the kisses she had spent the last few months hungering for—and trying to forget.
But that wouldn’t solve anything. They would still be two people connected only by a piece of paper. They had never been married in the same way her parents were. The Harpers were a unit. A team, in the best sense of the word.
While Mia and Sam had shared a bed but not much else. He was always working and when he wasn’t, he was locked in his study, going over paperwork for the business or making calls or jetting off to meetings with clients and boat builders and—anyone who wasn’t her.
Passion still simmered between them, but she’d learned the hard way that desire wasn’t enough to build a life on. She needed a husband who was there to talk to, to laugh with—and they hadn’t done that nearly enough. She wanted a man who could bend and not be constricted by his own inner rules and Sam didn’t know how to bend. How to compromise. Mia had tried. Had fought for their marriage but when she realized that only she was trying, she gave up.
If he’d been willing to work on things with her, they’d still be together.
“Fine then. We’ll talk,” Sam said, still keeping a wary eye on the door of her suite as if expecting Maya to leap out again.
Mia would not have been surprised. Her twin was very protective.
“But not here where Maya’s listening to everything we say...” He frowned thoughtfully. “Once we’re underway, I need to meet with some of the crew, check on a few things...”
She sighed. “Of course you do.”
One eyebrow lifted. “You know I take these cruises to get the information I need on how our ships are operating.”
“I remember.” In fact, she recalled the cruises they’d taken together after they were married. Two of them. One to the Bahamas. One to Panama. And on each of them, the only time she really saw her new husband was at night, in their bed. Otherwise, Sam the Workaholic was so busy, it had been as if she were traveling alone.
“That’s why we’re here. On this ship,” Mia said. “I knew you’d be taking this cruise.”
He laughed. “Even knowing I hate the Christmas cruises?”
“Yes. Because it helps you avoid having to be at home with a non-Christmas,” she said.
His frown went a little deeper. Apparently, he didn’t like the fact that she could read him so easily. But it hadn’t been difficult. Sam hated Christmas and no matter how Mia had tried to drag him, kicking and screaming into the spirit of the holiday, he would not be moved. Her family had planned their wedding and he’d been surrounded by holly leaves, poinsettias and pine garlands. After the wedding, he’d given in to her need to have a tree and lights and garland, but he’d admitted to her that if she weren’t there, Christmas would have been just another day at his house.
She’d thought then and still believed that it was just sad. In her family, Christmas season started the day after Thanksgiving. Lights went up, carols were played, gifts were bought and wrapped and her sisters’ kids wrote and then revised letters to Santa at least once a week.
She’d tried to get him to tell her why he hated that holiday so much, but not surprisingly, he wouldn’t talk about it. How could she reach a man if every time she tried to breach his walls, he built them higher?
So yes, she’d known that Sam would take a Christmas cruise to avoid being at home in what was probably a naked house, devoid of any holiday cheer. It hadn’t made much sense to her until she realized that Christmas decorations meant nothing to him, but a house devoid of those very decorations only made him remember that he was different than most people. That he’d chosen to live in a gray world when others were celebrating.
“These cruises are booked months out,” he said. “How did you manage to get suites for the whole family?”
“Mike a
rranged it.”
Sam’s eyes flashed and she wasn’t surprised. His younger brother had always been on Mia’s side and thought their separation was the worst thing to happen to Sam. So Mia had counted on his brother’s help to “surprise” Sam on this cruise.
“Mike? My own brother?”
She might have enjoyed the complete shock stamped on Sam’s features, if she wasn’t worried that this situation could start an open war between the brothers.
“Don’t fault him for it either,” Mia warned. “He was helping me out, not betraying you,”
“What did you think I’d do to him?” he demanded and she heard the insult in his voice.
“Who knows?” She threw both hands up. “Fly to Florida and toss him in the ocean? Keelhaul him? Throw him in a dungeon somewhere? Chain him to a wall?”
His eyes went wide and he choked out a laugh. “I live in a penthouse condo, remember? Sadly, it doesn’t come equipped with a dungeon.”
Oh, she remembered the condo. Spectacular with an amazing view of the ocean through a wall of glass. And she remembered spending too much time alone in that luxurious, spacious place, because her husband had chosen to bury himself at work.
Okay, that worked to stiffen her spine.
“Fine,” she said. “Then we’re agreed. You don’t give Mike grief.”
“Or a Christmas bonus,” he muttered.
“He’s your partner, not your employee.” Shaking her head, Mia snapped, “You’re going to give him a hard time anyway, aren’t you?”
“I was kidding.”
“Were you?” she asked.
“Mostly. You know what? Forget about Mike.” Sam looked her square in the eye and asked, “Why are you here, Mia? And why’d you bring your family with you?”
She had needed the support because frankly, she didn’t trust herself around Sam. One look at him and her body overrode her mind. She had to be strong and wasn’t sure she could do it on her own. Still, she wasn’t going to tell him that.