To him, if it wasn’t out of a microwave, it was gourmet.
“I also found some plates and bowls and set the table. There was a layer of dust on those plates,” she said with a reproving look for him.
“Hey, I rinse them off before I use them.” He looked at the small round table he rarely used. There were two place settings. It was a civilized meal, something this house rarely saw.
“Have a seat,” she suggested, and prepared two big bowls of her invented dish. She smiled.
Sam looked at his bowl. She was not entitled to his smile, not even with the surprising gift of dinner. She was lucky she wasn’t sitting in the holding cell in Pine River right now. But Libby’s smile remained steady.
“Don’t,” he warned her, dipping his fork into her concoction.
“Don’t what?”
“Don’t even think of smiling at me after what you did today. I’m frustrated as hell with you.” He put the fork into his mouth and almost slid off his chair—the Greek thing, or whatever she was calling it, was delicious.
“Yeah, well . . . I’m pretty frustrated, too.” At his skeptical look, she insisted, “I am. You would not believe what I—” She stopped, shook her head, and picked up her fork.
“You what?”
She shook her head again. “Believe me, when I tell you, you’ll be even more frustrated. And you’ll get that look on your face—”
“What look?”
“That look,” she said, making a swirling motion at his face with her fork. “The I-can’t-believe-this-chick look. And you won’t listen.”
“Come on, Libby, I’ve listened to you,” he scoffed. “More than once, I might add.”
“I know, you have,” she said. “You, of all people, have listened to me.” She poked around her bowl with her fork.
He watched her a moment, wanting her to eat. He didn’t like to see her so glum.
He forked another healthy bite. “This is delicious, by the way,” he said. “You’re an excellent cook.”
“Spoken like a hungry man,” she said with a rueful smile.
That was the thing that made Sam cave. He loved Libby’s smile. It was one of the few things in life that made him feel good. He sighed, too, and put down his fork, his gaze on Libby again. He took in her hair, which she had pulled back, but several long tendrils of curls had drifted away. “I know you want to talk,” he said. “But first, I want to know if you understand that I could lose my job by not taking you in for the violations? For covering for you? Do you understand that I have stuck my neck out for you more than once?”
“Yes, of course. Sam, look—I know I don’t make sense to you. Or to anyone. And as much as I’d like to clear it all up, I never seem to find the right words to explain myself, you know? When you tell me that I make no sense, I understand why you’re saying it. But in my head, I do make sense, and I find I am constantly trying to mesh what everyone tells me with what I feel. But today? Today was different. Today I fell for the hopes of an eight-year-old girl.”
Sam was dubious. He focused on his food.
“I swear it,” she said. “Here’s what happened,” she said, watching him closely, as if she expected him to cut her off at any moment. But Sam just shrugged and continued to eat his meal as Libby told him about Alice’s phone calls. About how she’d believed the little girl—maybe not everything she said—but that Ryan knew she was calling and it was okay because he was sorry. “She just wanted to talk to me,” Libby said. “She just wanted me in her life.”
“And you wanted to believe her,” he said. “Just like you wanted to believe there was some hidden message in what Ryan said in the parking lot that morning.”
“You’re right,” she said, nodding. “You’re so right, I get that now. I was stupid, and—well, you heard Ryan. He summed it up for everyone.”
Sam had heard Ryan, all right. He really despised that man, the way he had treated Libby. He finished his bowl and leaned back, watching Libby continue to move her food around. “What do you think of Ryan now?” he asked, his voice betraying his disdain. “Still think he’s the guy for you?”
She looked up at him, and Sam instantly regretted his tone. He could see the remnants of an old hurt in her. “No,” she said quietly. “I think he’s an even bigger ass than the day I picked up the golf club.”
She suddenly reached for his wrist, wrapping her fingers around it. “All I wanted was a chance to keep Max and Alice in my life, and I just . . . hoped,” she said. She glanced away, and her fingers slid away from his wrist, back across the table, to her lap.