When Sam walked through the cafeteria door Red's pulse had spiked so hard and fast that for a moment she feared she was having a heart attack. She had heard that he would be back today, but to her surprise, one look at his face set her on the verge of tears. She'd beaten a hasty retreat to her office before he spotted her and slammed the gate shut, leaning against the wall.

Her hands were trembling and she tightened them into fists, then opened them up and held them out in front of her. Still shaking. As she tried to get control of herself it hit her—hard like a shock but also soft and quiet, like a long known truth.

She was sixty years of age, and—for the first time in her life—she was in love.

Dmitri had seemed a like a good choice when they married. He was besotted with her, a girl much too pretty for him but much too mouthy and shrewd for the other men. He had wanted to please her. He was kind, he was a friend, they wanted the same things, they were from the same neighborhood. When he proposed it made sense to say yes. She hadn't been expecting hearts and flowers and she never felt real fireworks when she was with him but it was solid and it was good. Until it wasn't. But she had loved Dmitri in her way, once upon a time.

But Sam? Sam who was suddenly Sam to her and not Healy, Sam who had been the background and the backbone of her life for so many years, Sam who had awoken something inside of her with a crate of corn….This was different entirely. This was sleepless, stomach churning, heart pounding emotion. This was irrational and dangerous and exciting and fragile. This was something so deep that it could be the best story of her life, or it could take her down and ruin her.

Alone in her office, Red confronted this new reality and let it sink into her bones. Then she wiped her tears on the edge of her apron, pulled herself together and prepared to hide the emotions churning inside of her.

She was a good actress when she needed to be. Her indifferent performance convinced everyone-including Sam. She couldn't stand that sad, betrayed look in his eyes. The fact that he believed she didn't care when all she wanted was to pull him to her and tell him everything she was feeling...What choice did she have but to chase after him?

And now, she realized with a start, she was standing in the middle of the cafeteria staring at the exit. She shook herself, stomped back to the kitchen, stepped over a puddle of spilled milk and yelled at Maritza to grab a mop. When she looked up Norma was standing there, gazing at her with a curious, probing expression. Red raised an eyebrow. "What's with you?"

Norma shrugged but with a suspicious look that Red did not like. "Listen to me, Oh, Silent One, you may be able to fool those idiots into thinking you are all-knowing, but you are not a mind reader. So stop looking at me like that!"

Norma widened her eyes in an exaggerated show of innocence. Red huffed a smile and shook her head to soften the exchange, but this was bad news. What had Norma seen? Her back had been to the woman. Sam had been facing her, so…Ah.

For someone who had been in the prison system for most of his career, the man really had no poker face. If Norma had been watching, if anybody had seen his expression as he had gazed at her, they would know how he felt in an instant.

She should be worried. And she was, they could not be discovered. But even so, there was something thrilling about knowing that he looked at her with so much obvious and visible love in his eyes that anyone could see it.

She just had to hope that the only person who had seen it was the only person in this place who wouldn't say a word.