After the Storm (Chambers of the Heart Book 3)

by C D Cain

  Flossie used the bib to wipe the milk dripping from underneath the bottle’s nipple.

  Sam put her hand on Flossie’s shoulder. “I’ve got the bassinette set up. I’ll go lay her down. She doesn’t sleep as good when I hold her. Honestly, she hasn’t slept well since we left Maine. She didn’t sleep at all last night in Atlanta. I’m hoping once we’re settled, she’ll find her routine again.”

  Rayne felt as if she had walked in on a movie that was half over and had no idea what was going on. Yet, Flossie didn’t seem to be confused at all about the baby. She just kept cooing at her. “Atlanta?”

  Sam held Rayne with understanding eyes. “Soon. I’ll explain everything soon.” Softly, she lifted Addie from Flossie’s arms and carried her to the bedroom.

  Rayne was drawn to follow her as if there was an imaginary line linking her to Sam. There was the need to know the details of Addie but more than that, it was Sam. Always Sam. She had smelled her scent of eucalyptus mint when she had brushed past her. She had felt the warmth of the skin of her hand through her jeans when she held her knee. She had felt her knees buckle when her blue eyes intently held her. She leaned against the door facing and watched as Sam rocked Addie in her arms. She was different than she had remembered her the last time she was in this room. They had giggled and laughed as young women next to one another in the bed. They had kissed and shyly found a hint of exploration in each other’s body in the squeaks of the old metal-frame bed. She studied the difference she saw in the woman before her. She had grown, matured into a woman who was filled with peace and content as she held Addie in her embrace. She looked complete. She smiled when Sam nuzzled the top of Addie’s head with her nose.

  With Addie laying against her chest and her head nestled under her chin, Sam looked over at Rayne and mouthed, “She’s out.” Addie’s arms dropped across Sam’s.

  Sam laid her in the bassinette and kissed the top of her head. “Get some rest, sweet girl.” She left the door cracked behind them and followed Rayne into the kitchen. Flossie was setting the table. “It smells delicious, Flossie. Please tell me that’s for dinner. I’ve not had a home-cooked meal in I don’t know how long.”

  “It sho’ is. Got some red beans and rice with a hot pan of cornbread ready to eat.”

  Rayne grabbed a beer from the refrigerator and handed it to Sam. “Want one?”

  “Ummm, no thank you.” Sam motioned her head to the room where Addie slept. “I don’t drink that much these days, but I’ll take some sweet tea if you have it.”

  “I’ll have the same.” Flossie placed three overfilled bowls on the table and sat down. “Let’s dig in, girls. If’n I be remembering little ones, we may have ‘bout three hours before she gone wake up.”

  Sam laughed and winked at Flossie. “About that long. If we’re lucky.”

  Rayne listened as the wind blew through the top of the trees. Thankfully, its strength was much stronger in the higher elevation of the treetops than lower where she sat on the dock. Still, the chill of the air off of the water was colder than she found comfortable. She slid the charms of her necklace across its chain once more before she zipped her jacket up around her neck and tucked her hands in her pockets. Regretfully, she wished she had gotten something warmer before heading outside.

  “I thought you might be out here.”

  The softness of Sam’s voice felt like velvet against Rayne’s skin. She felt the hum of her sigh as it released to the knowledge she had no words to speak. It seemed surreal after all of this time that Sam was here. Actually, here with her at the cabin again. Unfortunately, the road which brought her here seemed impossible to overcome.

  “Do you mind if I sit with you?”

  Rayne lifted her chin to point it down toward her shoulder. She rested her eyes on the sewn patch in the jeans that covered Sam’s knee. “Not at all.”

  “There aren’t many stars out tonight,” Sam said as she sat down and stared out into the dark sky above the bayou. She ran her eyes from one side of the sky to the next. “And I can’t really see the moon, but still it’s the sight of what dreams are made of.”

  “Come again?”

  “Louisiana. This place. This bayou.” Sam uncovered her hand from the blanket over her shoulders and ran it over the surface of the wood. “This dock. How many times has this dock been in my dreams?”

  “It has?”

  “Oh yeah. Too many times.” Sam’s lips spread in a half-smile. “This place is magical to me. I used to believe it was because of the,” Sam paused, “experience out here. As I traveled away from Birmingham and well…myself, I realized it’s the presence of this place. This place is its own little world. Don’t get me wrong. Maine was beautiful.” She drew her knees up against her and wrapped her arms around them. “But it wasn’t this place. I didn’t feel it like I do here.”

  Rayne was taken off guard with the openness of Sam’s words. She was baffled by the person saying them as she remembered someone much more protective of her feelings to let her words give them away. She didn’t know what to say and felt the shiver of her silence. She tucked her hands deeper into her pockets.

  “Hey, you’re freezing.” Sam brought her arm away from her body. “Wanna share my blanket? It’s nice and toasty.”

  Unintentionally, Rayne nodded her head. Her thoughts had given their own physical expression.

  “What?”

  Rayne continued to nod her head back and forth. “I don’t even know the words to say or what I’m feeling. The last time I saw you it wasn’t so pleasant. We weren’t overly nice to one another. How many times have we broken each other’s hearts? And here you are. You’re actually here. On this dock with me again. Of course, I’ve dreamed of it too.” She calmed herself with a deep breath. “So many times I dreamed of it. I never thought I’d see you again and here you are. I guess it’s taking a minute to process it all.”

  Sam dropped her arm back down by her side. “I get it,” she said sadly. Reality had a way of creeping in at the most inopportune times. “You’re right. I’m sorry. I guess I got carried away with being out here again that I forgot about all of the rest.” She lifted her hand to point it to Rayne and then back to herself. “There’s stuff between us.”

  “Stuff? Yes. And a baby. I mean, you’re a mom now, right?”

  Sam couldn’t stop her smile with the mention of Addie. “Yeah, I am. Crazy, huh?”

  “I do believe that is the definition of an understatement.”

  “I love her, Rayne. Like I’ve loved only one other. Like my life has purpose. Nothing I’ve done before matters. It only matters what I do now. What I do for her. It’s what brought me back here.”

  “Which I don’t get entirely. Why here?”

  “For many reasons.” Sam stopped and turned to look at the cabin. The interior and exterior lights of it illuminated brightly in the backdrop of the night. She looked back at Rayne. “The most important is that cabin, the woman in it and the town she came from, and most importantly, the woman sitting out here with me.” Sam stopped and turned her ear to the sky. “Listen.”

  “I don’t hear anything.”

  “Exactly. I couldn’t have this kind of quiet for her to grow up in if I had gone back to Atlanta. Sure, I could’ve in Maine, but there was something more important that I couldn’t have had for her if I had stayed there.”

  “What is that?”

  “Family.”

  “See, that’s what I don’t get. You seem to be trying to say me and Flossie are her family. I don’t get that at all.”

  “In a way, you are.”

  “You’re going to have to explain that one to me.”

  “I want to. Have wanted to. Granted, not out here with the temperature dropping and us freezing our asses off because you won’t share your body heat with me.” Sam cut her eyes toward Rayne to see if she had appreciated her attempt in humor to
break the tension.

  Rayne huffed as she rolled her eyes and scooted over closer to Sam. Surprised, yet happy, by her reaction, Sam lifted her arm and wrapped the blanket over Rayne’s shoulder. After all of this time, after all of her experiences, Rayne still felt like she was the missing piece to a puzzle she hadn’t known was incomplete.

  “Hmpf,” Sam murmured.

  “What?”

  Sam took such a deep breath of night air that she caught the scent of Rayne’s shampoo. She breathed in again just for the scent of it. “Nothing.”

  Rayne felt the prickle of her hairs at the back of her neck when she snuggled in closer against Sam. She laid her head on Sam’s shoulder and whispered loudly enough for Sam to hear, “I feel it too.”

  Sam rubbed her thumb across Rayne’s shoulder. “Where do I start? You remember Gentry Bell, right?”

  “Bits and pieces.”

  “Yeah, she told me she moved out of town when you were younger. Anyway, she’s Imogene’s granddaughter, which you know.” Sam inadvertently squeezed Rayne’s shoulder in her frustration of stumbling over her thoughts. “Of course you know that. The parts you don’t know, I can’t share fully out of respect for Gentry’s privacy. Needless to say, she had a very trying childhood. One filled with neglect, abuse, and a great deal of pain. One no child should ever have to go through.”

  “I never knew that about her.”

  “No, I don’t imagine you would’ve. It was Addie who saved her, really. Addie who raised her for all practical purposes. Gentry has the softest soul I believe I’ve ever known for what she went through. She’s one of those who literally puts others before herself. All of that she credits to what she learned with the love she got from Addie. Again, for reasons I can’t fully explain, she ended up living with Addie when she was a teenager. Addie was the only mother figure she ever really had in her life. That’s why we’re here. Addie’s spirit is here. All the things she loved most in this world are right here.” Sam stretched her other arm across her body to hold Rayne’s forearm and cover them fully in the blanket. Rayne’s head moved from her shoulder to her chest as Sam’s arm pulled her in closer against her. “You. Flossie. This bayou. I think Gentry would want Addie to know this kind of love of family. I can’t give that to her by myself.”

  “Where is she? Gentry.”

  “Honestly, I don’t know. I woke up to a whole new meaning of Black Friday when my mother handed me a note Gentry had left for me.”

  “Your mother?” Rayne was surprised yet not enough to change anything about her position to look at Sam for clarification. She would let their words do that.

  “That part is too long of a story for now but in essence, let’s just say we have a whole new relationship. She is eaten up with Addie. I don’t know how I would’ve made it without her.”

  “And Gentry? How did you even meet her?”

  The slight chill Sam had been feeling was beginning to warm to Rayne’s arms around her. The combined body heat was only part of the reason. The other was Rayne. She moistened the dryness of her lips as she thought of the engagement party and how broken she was when she met Gentry in the diner. It seemed like a lifetime ago filled with a pain she did not want to remember right now. Especially when they sat like this. Rayne. She smiled to the name as it quietly crept across her thoughts. She rubbed her fingers over Rayne’s forearm. “I met her the last time I was in Louisiana. Can we save that story for another time? I don’t want to think about that time between us right now. This feels really nice. I don’t want it to stop with feelings or memories from long ago.”

  “Me either. May I ask if you’re okay though? As in, are you hurting with her leaving?”

  “I hurt, but I’m okay. I have to be for Addie.”

  “Did you love her? Do you love her?”

  Sam was quiet for a minute. She wondered how much of the truth she should tell her. If Gentry taught her nothing else, she taught her the strength in being open with your feelings. “Yes. I did and do love her. I miss her.”

  Rayne closed her eyes tightly as if she could keep them from seeing Sam in love with another woman.

  “I think I’ll always feel a sense of missing and loss when I see her in Addie’s precious face. Although, I’ve come to realize there are different shapes of love. Different levels and depth to love.”

  Rayne sat quietly while Sam talked. She had watched the stillness of the bayou’s water as she listened to her words. She had been entranced by the slow steady beat of Sam’s heart heard against her chest and the scent of her skin through the fibers of her shirt. She understood the gist of Sam’s words as to the meaning of the why she was here with the baby. Yet, even with her explanation, she found it unreal to be back on this dock with her and in her arms no less.

  Sam. She thought silently. She wrapped her arms around Sam until her fingers were able to clasp together. She felt Sam breathe in deeply before she relaxed her head against Rayne’s.

  “So many different depths of love,” Sam whispered.

  Rayne knew nothing but the utter completion she felt in Sam’s embrace. She couldn’t have been more in a sense of home than she was in that very moment. On her dock. Over her bayou. Behind her cabin. In her Sam’s arms. She, too, was now home.

  “And you? Who has your love, Stormy?”

  Immediately, her body jumped to answer “no one.” Then the vision of Mo flashed. The sound of her voice earlier on the phone. The conversation they had. Moments before Sam called, she and Mo had vowed to try to make a go of their relationship. Rayne pulled away from Sam to look at her. “I can’t believe this is happening.”

  Sam smiled. “Me either.”

  Rayne’s heart fell. She tried to force a smile to match Sam’s, but she knew she had failed when Sam’s faded.

  “What is it?” Sam asked.

  “Mo.”

  Sam bit her bottom lip. “Oh.” She had to have known Mo would be her answer. The anger, resentment, betrayal, and jealousy she had felt when she saw Rayne and Mo dancing was not there any longer. Too much in her life had changed her to be filled with those emotions. What she did feel was disappointment. Surely, she had to have known before she even asked that Mo would be the one to have Rayne’s heart. She had heard nothing of Grant from Rayne nor Flossie. She wondered where he stood in Rayne’s life. No longer did the engagement ring encircle her finger.

  “No. Really no. It’s not like that. I mean, it wasn’t like that.” Rayne brought her knee up in between them. “Up until literally minutes before you called, we weren’t like that. It was just a thing. No strings. No anything really.”

  Sam looked down at her lap and began to twirl a loose string in the blanket around her finger. “And now?”

  “And now…” Rayne let her head fall back on her shoulders. She stared into the starless sky. “And now. She’s coming tomorrow.”

  Sam saw her heart’s reflection in Rayne’s face. She reached up to hold her hand against the side of Rayne’s face. Gently, she encouraged her to look at her again. She saw the worry in the lines of her face. “Rayne, it’s okay.” She tried to rub them away with her thumb. “We had and have lives outside of this between us. You would’ve never pictured us being here. Hell, I didn’t picture this, and I knew I was coming to Brennin. There’s this inexplainable bond between us that pulls us to each other when we are around one another. But, we have lives now. People in those lives.” She pressed the tips of her fingers lightly into Rayne’s cheek as her thumb ran across her jawline. “We had to move on to try to find some type of normalcy to our lives again. It’s okay. I need to take Addie to see Imogene tomorrow anyway. I’ve got to talk to her to see if this crazy idea of staying is even plausible. Hey, you know what?”

  Rayne raised her eyebrows but spoke with the sadness left in her voice. “What?”

  “We can be friends.”

  She lowered them and nodd
ed her head a single time before turning it to the side to place her mouth in the center of Sam’s hand. She lifted her hand to hold the back of Sam’s as she melted into it. She kissed her palm and whispered with her lips lingering against her skin. “Friends.”

  Sam felt a swirl deep in the pit of her stomach. She swallowed hard. “The very best of friends.”

  Comes the Calm

  In the conclusion of the Chamber of the Heart series, Rayne Amber Storm finishes her residency with no plans other than returning home to start her plastic surgery practice. It’s always been her dream—one she thought would never be the same when Memaw passed. But now, she has more than just the memory of Memaw waiting for her. She has Sam and Addie, who have become a surprising part of her life. Unfortunately, as what seems has been consistent in her life, her happiness is not without pause. Her girlfriend, Mo, is less than excited at the prospect of her moving back home to the town where her first love awaits. Rayne’s newfound strength to never again hide who she is for any reason gives little comfort to Mo’s fears of losing her to Sam.

  Dr. Samantha LeJeune has made a home in Brennin, Louisiana. She has a thriving OB/Gyn practice while little Addie brings back a spirit the town felt had surely been lost. With her time stretched between her practice and her daughter, Sam has had minimal time to herself, much less consider something as taxing as dating. She is, however, anxiously awaiting the return of Rayne. Over the last year, they’ve come into their own definition of friendship, and it’s one that she has enjoyed immensely—perhaps too much at times, as it has become increasingly difficult to keep those feelings of first love from filtering into their conversations. There’s a piece of her that worries how or if it will change once Rayne moves back home.

  The small town is set on its heels when the population increases to include Gentry’s father who has come back to claim his rights as Addie’s grandfather. Secrets are threatened to be revealed and lives are exposed to change when Sam fights to keep Addie with her. Will their bayou town ever find its calm after the storm when past and present loves sit among its banks?