Chapter 13

“That’sbecause you didn’t see her,” Blanca said while putting the overfilled salad bowl next to the lasagna on the dining table. She offered Sam, who was already seated next to Greta, a sly smile.

Across the dining room, their friend Lolly followed Blanca out of the open kitchen basket of bread in hand. “Come on,” she tutted. “And this smoke show was there for you?”

“Hey!” Sam feigned offense, clutching her chest and leaning back in Greta and Blanca’s dining chair. The three of them had been friends since college and knew how to poke at each other.

“And I saw you two sneak away.” Blanca peered at her with all-knowing mom eyes. “So don’t pretend nothing is going on.” She sat down, signaling that the foursome could start eating.

“Manisha is going to be so sorry she missed this tea party,” Lolly said, red hair pulled back in a tight bun. “She’s obsessed with your love life.”

“Tell me about it. I’m the one who gets a weekly email from her all about how I, as a Taurus, should modify my day to increase my chances at love.”

Lolly laughed. “My wife just wants you to meet a nice girl and settle down.”

Chuckling, Sam shook her head. “Natalia is not nice, and she’s most definitely not a girl.”

“I feel like she for sure has a red room,” Greta chimed in, a hand through her short, bleached hair. “And I’m not saying I wouldn’t do things to see it.”

Sam tipped her head to the side. She hadn’t been inside Natalia’s house, but she had a strong suspicion Greta was right. Her pulse jumped into her throat at the intrusive image of Natalia dressed up like a dominatrix. She’d never had that particular kink before, but as her mouth went dry, she accepted that it was something she’d love to see, too.

“Oh, my Lordy, you slept with her.” Blanca slowly lowered the fork from her mouth like sudden movement might set off a landmine.

The room shrank. Three pairs of eyes turned on Sam at once, each more curious than the last. Her skin was too tight, her temperature too hot.

“Holy shit, you did.” The usually mild-mannered Greta leaned in like she wanted details.

“I’m not one to kiss and tell.” Sam poured herself a glass of merlot, eager for a little space to decide whether she wanted to talk this out. To make sense of it.

“Bullshit,” Blanca fired back. “What’s going on with you two?”

Sam rested an elbow on the table and took a few healthy gulps from her glass. “Seriously, nothing. We had one night?—”

“I knew it!” Blanca’s thunder clap shook the windows.

“But it was just one night.”

“And the make-out sesh you had tonight,” Greta mumbled, before filling her mouth with the baked pasta. When they cracked their necks turning their attention to Greta, she shrugged. “Pretty sure Sam didn’t start out the night with lipstick on… or wearing Chanel number five.”

“Alright, forget all this and start at the beginning.” Blanca pinned her down with her gaze. “What the hell is going on with you and Natalia Flores?”

Sam exhaled, like completely emptying her lungs would help. “She has ulterior motives. She’s actually been surprisingly forthcoming about that. Natalia is interested in me for the Lilith myth. She has a client who wants to buy the film rights to my theories and interpretations.”

“What? That’s huge.” Blanca beamed. “That’s so exciting! I told Greta I could see this as a movie. Didn’t I, babe?”

“She did.”

“It’s not happening.” Sam served herself a heaping mound of Caesar salad.

“Why?” Lolly took the salad tongs next. “Don’t you want to be rich and famous? How many people can say Hollywood is banging down their door?”

“I’m not giving anyone the power to manipulate the myth for entertainment value.” She took a bite.

“What are the terms of the deal?” Greta asked, her prior life as a corporate lawyer flickering under her sweet demeanor.

“I didn’t waste my time listening to them.”

“You’re being stubborn,” Blanca decided.

“Petulant I’d say,” Lolly chimed in.

“Why? Because I won’t offer up the most special part of my career as a burnt offering to the Hollywood altar?” Sam’s resolve hardened, but she reminded herself that her friends didn’t understand how these things went.

Blanca shook her head. “You said yourself that you shot her down without even listening to her offer. How do you know you don’t want it? You haven’t given it a fair chance. More than just academia should get your work.”

“Bulls, man,” Lolly said with a laugh, as if having been born a Taurus was some kind of curse. “So, fine. You don’t want to sell your book. It seems to me her interest wasn’t strictly professional.” She topped off Blanca’s wine glass.

“What does my star sign have to do with anything?” Sam chuckled. Lolly and her wife were obsessed with this.

“Um… everything?” Blanca picked up her drink. “What’s her sign?” She was reaching for her phone before Sam had a chance to say she didn’t know. “Oh, Jesus. She’s a Capricorn. A goat and a bull. Lord help us.”

“We can’t all be Aquarian butterflies or Piscean Koi,” Sam joked, pointing between Greta and Blanca.

“Now who doesn’t believe in horoscopes?” Lolly pointed at her. “Capricorn and Taurus can be a very challenging match. Capricorns are all about ambition, status, and success. Not that there’s anything wrong with that,” she added quickly. “But they can be very focused on their goals and not great with emotions.”

Lolly glanced at Blanca, who nodded in agreement. “Tauruses, on the other hand, are much more easy-going and stable. You want comfort and security. So a driven Capricorn might make you feel pushed out of your comfort zone.”

“The sex though…” Greta wiggled her brows. “Hot.”

“Not to mention,” Blanca continued undeterred, “Capricorns can be very controlling. They want things their way. And you...” She gave Sam a knowing look. “You don’t like being told what to do.”

“And yet here you are anyway,” Sam said with a chuckle. “I appreciate whatever this is,” she drew circles in the air, “but there’s nothing to worry about. I don’t know what Natalia and I are doing, but I doubt it could ever be serious.”

“Why?” Blanca cut into her lasagna.

Sam took a cleansing breath and told them about how distant Natalia was. How she didn’t have walls as much as she had siege towers and an alligator infested moat around herself. It was fun and addictive and intriguing, but there was surely an expiration date stamped on them somewhere. Natalia wasn’t going to drop her guard. There would be nothing more than a little push and pull until Natalia grew tired of not getting her way.

They’d been right about the sex being incredible — even if Natalia hadn’t let her give her an orgasm. She wasn’t shocked that Natalia wouldn’t give up even that to another person. And she didn’t mind. Watching was just as fun.

After dinner, Sam stood at the sink washing dishes before they went in the dishwasher. The transformation into her mother was nearly complete.

“Last ones.” Blanca dropped four used wine glasses in the sink and started loading the clean things into the machine to get cleaned again.

They’d been friends long enough to read each other perfectly. Sam knew what was coming before Blanca said, “You’ve never been great with risk.”

“Not true, butgo off, as the kids say.” Sam took the knot of steel wool to the lasagna pan.

“Very cute.” Blanca’s side eye smacked her in the temple.

“I know you think it’s a great opportunity, but that Hollywood glamour is just?—”

“You know that’s not the risk I’m talking about,” she replied more sternly than Sam expected.

Finished with the mess in the sink, Sam dried her hands and turned to lean against the counter. “What? Natalia? She’s not?—”

“Before your protestations begin,” Blanca put up a hand, “let’s remember, Dr. Reyes, that I saw you two tonight. When you looked at each other, all the oxygen was zapped out of the room.”

“You’ve been out of the teaching game a long time. How do you still have the terrifying English teacher voice?”

Blanca didn’t laugh. Didn’t give the slightest hint of suppressed amusement. Instead, she took two steps forward and pressed her hand to the middle of Sam’s chest. To where she knew the rings were hanging from a thin necklace. “I know your work is so important to you, but that’s not the risk I mean,” she repeated.

Sam tensed, every muscle in her body going rigid as Blanca’s fingers brushed the rings under her shirt. It was an innocent gesture, but the contact cracked something open inside her — something raw and aching that she normally kept walled off.

The rings were all she had left of Sofia, of the life and love they’d shared. Just the whisper of Blanca’s touch against them was enough to unleash a torrent of memories and emotions Sam wasn’t prepared for.

She could see Sofia so clearly — her jet-black hair fluttering in the warm ocean breeze on their Hawaiian honeymoon. Crinkles forming at the corners of her eyes when she threw her head back and laughed. She could hear the teasing lilt of Sofia’s voice in her ear, feel the brush of her lips on her cheek. Her scent enveloped Sam for a fleeting moment, vanilla and coconut, forever intertwined with love in Sam’s mind.

Grief clamped down on Sam’s chest, so sudden and acute it stole her breath. She squeezed her eyes shut to stop any tears from forming. Eight years later, the loss was an open wound that still bled if prodded. She carried the weight of it with her always, hidden under armor and humor and feigned nonchalance.

“You deserve to be loved.” Blanca’s eyes were bright and glossy.

Sam laid her hand over Blanca’s, still pressed to her chest, and met her friend’s knowing eyes. “Trust me.” She squeezed her hand. “I was already loved more than most.”

“She wouldn’t want you to close yourself off to love,” Blanca said with unwavering conviction. “She wouldn’t want you to be alone.”

Sam cracked a smile out of her use-in-case-of-emergency kit. “And I’m not, am I?”

“You know what I mean.”

“I promise that I’m not keeping Natalia at bay because of Sofia. I’m having a little fun, but that’s only because that’s all that’s on offer, okay?”

“Is that really all there is? You know this because you’ve actually tried?” Everything in Blanca’s face said she didn’t believe her. “Love once opened your eyes to unimagined joy. It can happen again if you let it. In all these years you’ve never given anyone a chance?—“

“Maybe,” Sam agreed, cutting off the rest of Blanca’s sentence. They’d had this same conversation after any date that didn’t end in nuptials. “But it’s not going to be with Natalia. She’s unavailable.”

Blanca smirked. “The way she looked at you did not read unavailable.”

Laughing, Sam shook her head. “You’re reading too much into it.”

“Am I? Or are you reading too little?” Blanca wouldn’t let her squirm away from the topic. “How about you stop playing around and straight up ask her out? Then you’ll know for sure.”

Samantha replied with an exaggerated sigh. “You don’t understand how she is?—“

“It’s okay to make space for yourself, Sam.” Blanca’s hand was warm when she pressed it against the middle of Sam’s back. “She wouldn’t have?—”

“You’re acting like I haven’t dated in all these years.”

“And how many of those dates have turned into more than a good time?” Blanca quirked her brow. “Have they ever made you feel like you met your match?”

Ready for the conversation to be over, Sam shifted her weight backward. Her skin was too tight, and she was hot from the steaming water. “I never said Natalia made me feel that way.”

“You didn’t have to.” Blanca held her gaze. “I’ve known you a long time, Sammy. And it’s been forever since I saw you look at anyone like that. If you’re so sure that nothing can come of it, why don’t you try? Worst-case scenario, you can rub it in my face that you were right. I know how much you love that.”

Sam chuckled and bumped Blanca with her hip, relieved that the interrogation was over. “I do love that.”

“You promise you’ll try to see what’s actually there? You’ll try?” Her eyes shone with so much sincere hope that Sam couldn’t resist.

“I promise,” she replied, sure that it wasn’t her putting up any resistance.