Believing in Tomorrow

by Kimberly Rae Jordan

  “Learn something new every day.”

  “And I’m sure you were dying for that bit of information.” Samantha laughed. “We tease Kenton about the girls he goes out with, but we’re hoping he’s smart enough not to marry one. So far, so good.”

  “Has he brought any of the girls home?”

  “Nope. He knows better than that. We’d be able to see right through a girl who was only with Kenton because he was a hockey player, not because of the neat guy he is.”

  As they talked more about Samantha’s family, Levi was glad to see her tension slip away. He enjoyed hearing the stories she shared about growing up with six brothers. The relationships she shared with them didn’t resemble what he’d had with Davy. That longing he’d felt earlier returned. He didn’t want to be part of the family to just take what they offered but to also contribute to it. He wanted to be part of rallying around those who needed support. It was a sense of community and belonging that he’d never experienced before.

  “Were you close with your brother when you were younger?”

  “No. Not particularly.”

  “Where is Davy now?”

  “In jail for the next year.”

  “So he’s been to trial already?”

  “He pled guilty. The evidence against him was pretty strong. Caren should have spent some time in jail as well because I know she helped Davy pull it off, but they didn’t charge her.” Levi thought back to his mom’s reaction when Davy was sentenced. “I still can’t understand why my mom is treating me the way she is. The money Davy took from me was considerable. It wasn’t like he slipped a hundred-dollar bill from my wallet. And he even pleaded guilty. That should have let my mom know that he had done what I said he did, but she’s blind where Davy is concerned.”

  Samantha frowned. “I’m sorry to hear that. That must be frustrating to deal with.”

  “It is. Very frustrating.” Levi let out a long sigh. “But I keep hoping she will come around. She’s my mom. The only family I still have.”

  As they’d talked, they’d moved closer together, leaning over the table and their empty dishes. It was what Levi had wanted. A chance to get to know a bit more about her. To strengthen whatever it was they needed to build between them in order to succeed as co-parents to their little girl.

  “Why did you choose nursing?” She knew why he’d gone into landscaping, but he didn’t know what had set her on the path to her current career.

  “I can’t remember a time when I didn’t know that I wanted to be a nurse. Growing up, I just wanted to help care for people. I tried to do it with my siblings, but the only one that would ever let me play nurse was Tristan. He’d let me wrap his arm or leg like he’d broken it. Or I’d bandage his head. He was very patient with me. As long as he could still hold a book and read, he was happy to go along with whatever I wanted.”

  “Are you still happy to be a nurse?”

  Samantha smiled. “Yes. I can’t imagine doing anything else. I worked for my dad’s company for a while when I was in high school and university, but that just wasn’t for me. Not the way it was for Makayla.”

  “Your parents didn’t try to force any of you to work for the company?”

  “No. They already knew that Kenton wouldn’t be working there, and Gabe made it clear as well that he had no intention of settling down and working at C&M. Ryan went into the military like our bio dad, but he only did one tour and then he went to work for BlackThorpe Security in the Twin Cities. Tristan got his degree in architecture and does a lot of design work for the company. Bennett and Makayla had both gotten degrees in business, so they stepped into management roles with our dad. Mitch supervises the on-site crews. He enjoys the more hands-on approach.”

  “Will the younger two work at the company?”

  Samantha shook her head. “I doubt it. Dalton is much more focused on his music, and whatever it is he does on YouTube. Danica…I’m not sure what she’s going to end up doing, but I’ve heard her talk about becoming a teacher, so that might be her eventual career choice.”

  “I wish Davy had gotten a career. Most recently, he’d been working for me, but it wasn’t what he enjoyed doing. I have no idea what he’ll do when he gets out of jail. He definitely has made his life more difficult with what he’s done, but he never was one for looking at the long-term consequences of his actions.”

  Levi often wondered how Davy was doing, but the one time he’d gone to the prison, Davy had refused to see him. Sometimes he felt guilty about not trying as hard to maintain a relationship with his brother as he had with his mother, but he still struggled with the betrayal from him after all Levi had done to try and help Davy.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  “Do you want a refill?” Levi asked after he had drained the last of his coffee. At her nod, he went up to the counter and got them each another drink. Coffee for him. Hot chocolate for her.

  “Thank you,” Samantha said as she took the mug from him when he returned to the table. After taking a sip, she lowered the mug, keeping it grasped between her hands.

  “Do you plan to work at the care home indefinitely?”

  Samantha glanced at him, her eyes widening slightly as if surprised by his question. “I do prefer the care home work. I worked at the hospital for a year and a half, but it wasn’t where I wanted to be.”

  “Why is that?” Levi asked.

  “I like building relationships with the people I care for.” Samantha gave a quiet laugh. “Although working nights isn’t really giving me many opportunities for that. I do hope that in the future, I’ll be able to get daytime hours.” She paused, her brows drawing together. “That would work better for childcare as well.”

  “Had you planned to keep working after having kids?”

  Samantha didn’t answer right away. She lifted her mug and took a sip, before setting it back on the table, her gaze never meeting his. “No. I’d thought I’d work for a couple of years after getting married and then I’d stop—at least full-time—until the children went to school.”

  Levi heard the sadness in her words, realizing once again how much more her life was being impacted than his.

  “It will be a bit different now,” Samantha continued when Levi didn’t say anything. “I’ll have to figure out childcare for when I go back to work after my maternity leave.”

  Levi wished that he could take back his question. That they hadn’t headed down this path. He wished he knew what the sadness on Samantha’s face was really from, and how he could help dispel it.

  This wasn’t how he’d imagined his life unfolding either, but he would do what he can to make things easier for Samantha. “You know that I’ll help out in any way I can.”

  “I know.” Samantha looked at him then and smiled, sadness still lingering in her gaze. “It’s just going to be different.”

  Levi lifted his mug and took a sip of coffee, letting his gaze drift around the room. He was surprised—or maybe shocked was more like it—when he spotted a familiar face in the line waiting to order. It was the first time he’d seen Caren since court. Levi had no idea if she was still with Davy, but something told him that she had moved on as soon as she’d realized where Davy was headed.

  The moment Caren looked over and spotted him, she froze. Then, a smile curved her lips, making her even more beautiful—she was definitely a woman who knew how to use her looks. Abandoning the line, she walked toward him. When she reached his side, she bent down and pressed her lips to his cheek before sitting in the empty chair at the table.

  “Levi, darling, it’s been forever,” she said, her smile flirtatious. “How have you been?”

  Levi stared at her, stunned that she had the nerve to even approach him. “I’m doing fine. Especially since I got back the money you and Davy stole from me. Well, most of it anyway.”

  “I didn’t know what he planned to do,” Caren said, a tiny frown marring her face. “I wouldn’t have let him do that if I’d known.”

  Levi didn’t b
elieve a single word she said. “Well, fortunately for me, I was able to get most the money back, and, in the process, I was saved from a marriage that would clearly have been for the wrong reasons.”

  For the first time, Caren’s gaze moved to Samantha. Her eyes narrowed as she looked at her, obviously taking in Samantha’s belly. “So is that how you got him? I wasn’t quite willing to go that far. He’s not rich enough to have risked my looks for. I guess you don’t have as much to worry about.”

  Levi felt a surge of anger at Caren’s words and opened his mouth to respond when Samantha beat him to it.

  “Oh, you clearly don’t know Levi very well.” Samantha reached out and laid her hand on his arm. “He may not be the richest man around, but he treats me like a queen, and I know he’ll do the same with our daughter.”

  Caren sat up straight, frowning. “I was engaged to him. I think I know him pretty well.”

  “I don’t know Davy at all, but from what I’ve heard, if you thought he was the better brother, then you clearly didn’t know Levi as well as you think.” Samantha’s hand tightened on his arm, and Levi reached to cover it with his own. “You need to leave him alone.”

  A sly smile lifted the corner of Caren’s lips. “Afraid he’ll come back to me?”

  Levi glanced over in time to see Samantha laugh, her brown eyes sparkling. “Oh, I’m not worried about that at all.”

  Samantha’s reaction caused Caren to frown, and it looked like she was about the respond with another jab, but Levi cut her off.

  “Samantha’s right. I’m not interested in getting back together with you.” Levi was also not interested in continuing any sort of conversation with the woman.

  Thankfully, Caren didn’t make a scene. With a sniff of derision, she got up from the table. Apparently, she couldn’t think of an appropriate parting shot because she just turned around and headed toward the door of the restaurant with stiff steps.

  Once the door closed behind her, he heard Samantha say, “Wow. She’s…interesting.”

  Levi let out a sigh as he turned to face her. “I never saw that side of her when we were together. I guess I didn’t really look that deeply either.”

  “Why did you get engaged to her then?” Samantha asked.

  He thought back to their engagement and what had made him propose in the first place. “She was independent and didn’t make a lot of demands on me that couldn’t be satisfied with a few gifts. And in light of what she said today, I can see now that she was just working me for things. I was in a position where I didn’t want to be with someone who required a lot of me. Who would be one more person that I needed to take care of. It felt like I already had a lot of that with my mom and Davy. Caren seemed, for the most part, to not need me in the way they did.”

  “So why are you here with me?” Samantha asked.

  Levi realized then what his words must have sounded like to her. “This is different.”

  “Because of the baby?”

  “Well, yes, that’s a big part of it.”

  Samantha frowned then moved her hand from his arm and picked up her mug again. “I don’t want you to feel that you have to help with the baby, especially if you feel like you already have too many people needing your attention. And you certainly don’t need to do anything else for me. I would understand.”

  Levi heard the sincerity in her words and hated it. “I told you this was different.”

  “And you said it was because of the baby.”

  “Partly because of the baby,” Levi corrected her. “I know what it’s like to be rejected by a parent. I would never want that for my child.”

  A large group of young people walked into the restaurant then, and the noise level increased significantly with their laughter and conversation. A few of them broke off and came to sit at a table near them. Figuring that it was only going to get louder, Levi knew that it wasn’t going to be a good place to continue their conversation.

  “Why don’t we go?” he suggested. “We can talk in the truck.”

  Samantha appeared to hesitate at his words, but then lifted her mug and took one last sip before setting it back on the table. “I should probably get home anyway.”

  Levi knew it was important that they finish their conversation. Yet, at the same time, he was trying to figure out what exactly he was feeling and what he hoped to accomplish with Samantha. He’d told her the truth of why he’d proposed to Caren. He hadn’t wanted someone else who had needed him to take care of them, and yet, he hadn’t balked at taking on more responsibility with the baby or with Samantha. In fact, taking care of both of them was a bright spot in his life.

  Running into Caren had shown him some glaring differences in how he’d felt about her versus how he felt about Samantha. Things had gotten infinitely more complicated for him with that knowledge.

  Once they were on the highway heading back to Samantha’s house, Levi dared to broach the subject again.

  “I want you to understand that I don’t view the baby as a burden. Something I have to endure. I don’t see this situation that way at all.” Levi accelerated as a red light turned green. “This is completely different from what I had with Caren.”

  Samantha didn’t respond, and Levi felt a bit of frustration at her silence. He didn’t know what she wanted. And, if he was being honest, he still wasn’t entirely sure what he wanted either. Their time together today was supposed to have helped bridge the awkwardness of their past conversation, but here they were yet again, struggling to communicate. He wondered if Samantha was as confused as he was, trying to figure out what kind of relationship they should have versus what kind of relationship they wanted. Or were they the same thing?

  Two months ago, he’d assumed that they’d eventually become friends as they worked out how to co-parent. As time had gone on, and he’d gotten to know Samantha, Levi had—without really realizing it—come to care for her. And now…now they kept ending up in awkward conversations because Levi didn’t know what to say to her because she kept giving him mixed messages.

  Once they got to the house, Levi parked the truck. His frustration had grown throughout the remainder of the silent trip, and it spilled over once he put the truck in park.

  He leaned forward to rest his arms on the steering wheel, staring out the front window. “I mentioned this already, but I know how it feels to have a parent reject you. It was not anything I would ever want for my own child. This baby might not have been born in circumstances that I would have chosen, but that doesn’t mean I can’t love and care for it in the same way I would have had the baby been conceived and born in a more planned manner.” He paused then asked, “Can you say the same?”

  He heard Samantha gasp and, turning his head, he saw her staring at him with shock on her face.

  “What do you mean by that?” she demanded.

  Levi realized that perhaps this wasn’t the best time or place to have brought this up, but it was too late now. “Are you going to be ashamed of our daughter?”

  “I don’t understand what you’re trying to say, Levi,” Samantha said, her frown marring her face. “Why would you even ask something like that?”

  “You’re ashamed of your pregnancy. You’re ashamed that you got pregnant outside of marriage.”

  Samantha wrapped her arms over her stomach and looked away. “I told you how things were because of what I believe. What my family believes.”

  “Yes, you have. But what is going to happen to the guilt and shame you feel when you go from being pregnant and not married to being an unwed mother? Are you going to be ashamed to let people know about the baby?” Levi hesitated. “Will you post about her birth on Facebook, or will you keep silent about that just like you have your pregnancy?”

  “Why are you saying this stuff?” Samantha asked, her voice trembling. “I thought you were different.”

  Levi knew that he needed to push through this. For some reason, he knew that this was important for Samantha to face. “I’m saying this becaus
e I want to make sure that our daughter is loved by both her parents, and that she knows that both of us are proud of her. That if you should go on to get married and have more children that how you feel about those children won’t be different than how you feel about her. Our daughter deserves that. She is the innocent in all of this.”

  “I know that she’s innocent. I know that.” Her chocolate brown eyes welled with tears. “I don’t want the baby to ever feel that I’m ashamed of her.”

  “Then you need to work through your feelings about all of this. Go to confession or whatever it is that you need to do to find a way to forgive yourself and move forward without the guilt and shame that you’re still carrying around.” Levi tried to ignore the ache in his heart as he looked at the pain on her face. “Both you and the baby deserve better than to live a life filled with guilt and shame.”

  Samantha looked at him as tears spilled down her cheeks. “I need to go.”

  “Samantha, wait.” He pushed his door open and jogged around the truck to reach her side as she slid out of the cab. Coming to a stop in front of her, he reached out to grasp her upper arms, then let his hands slide down to grip her fingers. “I can see that it still bothers you a lot that you’re pregnant and not married. I need you to know that I…care about you. If it will make things easier for you, we can get married. I just want you to be happy.”

  Samantha jerked back from him, her hands pulling free. “I…I don’t know what to say.” She took a couple of steps toward the house. “Thank you for lunch.”

  Levi watched helplessly as Samantha quickly climbed the steps to the front door and disappeared into the house. Could they ever find a way to common ground? He wasn’t sure why he’d blurted out that they could get married. That had messed things up between them once before, and getting married wouldn’t help Samantha deal with the guilt and shame she felt.

  As he climbed back behind the wheel of his truck and glanced one last time at the house, Levi realized that marrying Samantha wouldn’t be the worst thing that had ever happened to him. In fact, part of him felt like maybe it would be the best because for him, it would no longer be just a marriage of convenience.