This had to be what it felt like to be in a really nice jail.
Her brother-in-law Spencer had arrived about two hours ago, clearly rattled after having been escorted from a business trip in Philadelphia to where his family was being held in DC. Angela had been so happy to see him she’d burst into tears and rushed into his arms.
Scotty was in the main room playing video games with his cousin Ethan, so Sam took advantage of the opportunity to steal some alone time.
Weary and out of things to talk about with people who wanted answers she didn’t have, Sam stretched out on the bed in the room she’d been assigned. She wondered what her MPD colleagues were thinking about how she’d been taken from a crime scene by the Secret Service. Freddie had to be taking it hard. He’d blame himself for not being able to stop the agents from taking her. When she got a chance, Sam would tell him there was nothing he could’ve done to change the outcome. The agents had been operating on the orders of the vice president, and nothing could’ve stopped them.
She also wondered if they had any new information about the body in the river. Was it Ruby Denton? Would they be able to figure out what’d happened to her and get some closure for her poor parents?
Sam hated being cut off from her life this way. It was a form of torture to someone used to being in the know at all times.
Though she wanted to wait up for Nick, she couldn’t keep her eyes open and dozed off, only to be tormented by crazy dreams about being chased through an underground bunker. Water running in the attached bathroom had her sitting up on the bed, shaking off the feelings of doom from the disturbing dream. She bolted out of bed and was heading for the bathroom when the door opened to reveal her husband, stripped down to boxers, his magnificent chest on full display.
Sam rushed to him, and he met her with arms wide open, lifting her up and into his embrace. She had never, in all her life, been so happy to see anyone as she was to see him, to breathe in the scent of home, to feel his strong arms around her, to know he was safe and sound and back where he belonged.
Before she could ask any of her burning questions, he was kissing her with weeks’ worth of pent-up desire exploding between them, making the questions secondary to the need to reconnect with him.
She wrapped her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist, losing herself in the kiss. Then she was falling onto the bed with him coming down on top of her, heavy, strong and hard as a rock. Before she took total leave of her senses, she broke the kiss. “We need to talk.”
“We will.” His lips moved on her neck, feeding the fire inside. “This first.”
Whatever he needed to tell her would keep for a few more minutes.
“Missed you so much,” he whispered as he made quick work of getting her naked.
“I missed you too. I hated every minute without you.”
“Same, baby.” And then he was surging into her, hot and strong and deep.
Sam arched her back, gasping from the impact and the pleasure and the nearly painful need he aroused in her. “The door...”
“Is locked. It’s okay.”
She relaxed ever so slightly, knowing they wouldn’t be interrupted but still anxious about what he had to tell her.
“You’re all tense,” he said when he was deep inside her, throbbing and pulsing with life.
“You’re not?”
“I have been, but I’m better now that I’m with you and everyone we love is safe. Give me fifteen minutes to have this, to be with you, and then we can deal with everything else.” He wrapped her up in his arms and rocked into her, over and over again until it wasn’t possible to think about anything other than him and the magic they created together. “Love you so much,” he whispered in her ear. “So, so, so much.”
“Mmm, me too. Don’t ever go away again. I can’t deal with it.”
“I can’t either. I hate being away from you.” His lips found hers in another hungry, desperate kiss.
Sam clung to him, drawing strength from his love to face whatever had to be done to keep their family safe. With him here now, she was less anxious and afraid than she’d been earlier.
“I was so scared something had happened to you.”
He tightened his arms around her and picked up the pace, letting her know he was alive and well and home where he belonged. “I’m sorry you were scared. I never wanted that.” Reaching to where they were joined, he touched her right where she needed it most, drawing a sharp cry of pleasure from her as she came hard.
“That’s what I’ve missed so much,” he whispered gruffly into her ear as he gave in to his own pleasure.
Sam kept her arms tight around him and ran her fingers through his hair as she kissed him until her lips were numb, all the while wishing they were at home in their own bed rather than locked up in this underground bunker. She wanted to stay wrapped up in this moment with him so she wouldn’t have to face whatever had put them in this place to begin with.
“Tell me,” she whispered when their breathing had returned to normal.
“It’s bad.”
“I’d already reached that conclusion all on my own.”
He withdrew from her, moved onto his back and reached for her hand. “I wish I didn’t have to tell you this.”
Sam’s stomach began to hurt, and her recently relaxed body was once again filled with tension.
“Early this morning, my office received a letter. It was typed on plain white paper with no other identifying marks, and it spelled out in very specific detail that the vice president’s family had better be on guard because people were watching and waiting for their chance to teach us a lesson in humility.”
Sam’s mind raced with questions and scenarios. “Did your staff save the envelope?”
“They saved everything, and the FBI has it for further analysis. The postmark was smudged, so they couldn’t see where it originated. I was made aware of it twenty minutes after it happened and began making arrangements to come home right away. Due to some things that were going on there, it didn’t happen as quickly as I wanted it to, which made for some significant tension with my detail. I wanted out of there, but they needed time to put things together.”
“You said they spelled out in very specific detail what would happen. What kind of detail?”
“That’s the part I don’t want to tell you.”
“You have to. I need to know what we’re dealing with.”
“Come closer to me. Let me hold you.”
She rolled into his arms, her head on his chest where the strong beat of his heart soothed her. “Just tell me. The not knowing is the worst.”
He held her close, his lips sliding over her hair. “They said they would take someone who matters greatly to us and make them sorry they were ever born before returning them to us in pieces. They included photos of each of the kids that were taken in public places. Scotty at camp, Brooke at work, the others at the playground or pool. They wanted us to know they knew where to find them.”
Sam gasped and her stomach turned from the horror he described. The thought of such a thing happening to anyone they loved was unfathomable. “Did they say why?”
“No.”
“Does the threat meet the MO of a group already on the Secret Service’s radar?”
“Not completely. Parts of it are familiar to them, but other parts, like the mention of humility, were new. They’re thinking homegrown versus foreign.” Nick ran his fingers through her hair, the gesture so familiar that it was soothing even as she churned with thoughts and fears. “You’re shaking, Samantha.”