Love and Marriage

Chapter Thirty-Three

As Sam pulled back the covers that night, she thought back to Brad's visit at the park and Martin's reaction to it. She wasn't really mad at him for being jealous; he couldn't help how he felt and she wouldn't try to censure his emotions. She could even deal with the fact that he was downright rude to Brad. After all, Brad had interrupted them at a bad time. But the thing that got her upset was the fact that Martin made her feel like he didn't trust her. She got the impression that she was under scrutiny simply because she had been talking to another man.

The rest of the picnic was tense for them so they got Claire and left shortly after the conversation with Brad. Since their arrival back home, they avoided the subject altogether and focused on different things. But the air around them had changed and she really hoped that the progress they had been making wasn't going to be swept away because of this. She didn't want to go back to being mad at him or fighting with him all the time.

She looked over at Martin, who was already in bed and engrossed in a book. They had to talk about this before the gap between them got wider. So she took a deep breath before talking. "Martin, can we talk about earlier?"

"I guess now is as good of a time as any." He put down his book and sighed. He knew that they were going to have to talk about the incident with Brad at the park, although he wished they didn't. It wasn't one of his finer moments and he could tell that his behavior with Brad had upset her. But there was something about Brad's attitude that screamed trouble.

He could recognize the look Brad had in his eyes when he looked at Sam because it was the way that he had been looking at his wife for years. It was a look full of desire and he didn't like another guy looking at his wife like that.

"What was your attitude about?" She asked, trying very hard to not sound defensive or angry.

"Me?" He wasn't going to get blamed for the whole thing. "I wasn't the only one who had an attitude. Why aren't you asking Brad too?"

She rolled her eyes. "Because I don't care why Brad had an attitude with you. He's not my husband. You are."

"Damn right I am." Martin replied softly.

She barely heard his comment but was angered by it. "I'm not sure why you're acting like this, but it's annoying. So I'm going to ask you again. What the hell was your attitude about?"

"I didn't like the way he was acting around you." Martin replied honestly. "I think Jake has a crush on our daughter and his father has a crush on you."

She laughed as she fluffed her pillow until she saw that he was being serious. "That's absolutely ridiculous." Brad didn't like her in that way. There were just friends and he knew that. She was positive that Brad knew they were just friends. "He just got out of a really bad marriage. The last thing on his mind right now should be another woman—yet alone me."

"Yeah. I agree about that, but his mind is definitely on you." Martin informed her.

She placed her pillow back on the bed and shook her head. "I disagree. You don't know him…"

"And what? You do?" He asked. "You seem to be an expert on him. Just how well do you know him?"

Leslie wouldn't want her to explode at Martin, so instead of yelling at him, she calmly counted to three before saying anything else. "You better be careful about what you're accusing me of."

Her voice was low and he knew that he was pushing her to her limit. Unfortunately he couldn't stop. He needed to get answers. "I'm not trying to accuse you of anything. I'm simply curious about how well you know this guy."

"He's not my best friend or anything. But I see him when I go to things at Claire's school and occasionally I'll see him at the park." She explained. "We talk about things."

"So you see him whenever I'm not around." He deduced. "What do you talk about?"

She sighed, climbing into bed. "Don't do this Martin."

"Don't do what?" He asked innocently. "I'm simply trying to figure out how well you two know each other. I'm taking an active interest in your life."

"No you're not." She laughed. "You're being very jealous and it's not a quality that I like very much." She took a deep breath to calm herself down. "Why is it such a crime for me to be friends with Brad?"

"It's not a crime." He sighed.

"Then why are you treating me like I'm a criminal that you're interrogating?" She asked softly. "I don't do the same thing with you and Bethany."

"Bethany?" He was confused. What did Bethany have to do with this? "Why are bringing her into this conversation?"

"Oh come on Martin!" She chuckled softly. "You can't honestly tell me that you are completely oblivious to way that she looks at you or the way she is always flirting with you. It's disgusting! She gets within ten feet of you and starts pulling down her shirt to reveal more cleavage."

"Now look who's jealous." Martin laughed.

"This isn't funny. She has been after you since the first day she met you."

"No she isn't." Martin replied. He had never thought of Bethany as anything other than a friend and hadn't noticed any overt attempts to seduce him or anything.

"Yes she is." Sam argued. "She wants you and apparently she doesn't seem to respect the fact that we're married."

"Well neither does Brad." Martin pointed out.

She sighed. "Look, the point is this. I don't start interrogating you every time I see you with Bethany. Sure I don't like it and I'd like to use her as target practice, but I have learned to live with it because I trust you not to do anything with her. Am I wrong to place that much trust in you?"

"No." He replied. "You're not wrong." He hadn't known that she felt threatened when he talked to Bethany and didn't know that it upset her. He'd always just considered Bethany a friend.

"Then why won't you trust me with Brad?" She asked calmly. "Have I given you a reason to doubt my fidelity?"

"No." He shook his head.

"So then why are you being so…difficult about this?" She truly wanted to know. Her suspicion was that he was just being insecure again, but she wanted to hear him admit that.

He was silent for a moment, contemplating how to word it. "I guess because I don't want to lose you to him or any other guy."

She scooted closer to him so that their shoulders were touching and placed her hand on top of his. "You're not going to lose me to another guy—especially not Brad. He's a nice guy but I'm not in love with him. I love you."

It helped to know that she didn't seem to have any romantic feelings for Brad, but he couldn't shake the feeling that he would lose her. "But…"

Before he could say anything else, she held her finger up against his lips to silence him. "There are no 'buts', Martin. I love you—end of story. I don't know why you feel so insecure. I don't know if it's because of something I've done or haven't done, or if it's just a problem that you have that is completely separate from me. But I don't know what to do to help you with it. I don't know how many different ways I can let you know how much I love you. Maybe you can work through it with Leslie because I'm at a loss here."

He grabbed a hold of the hand she was using to silence him and pressed it to his lips, placing a small kiss on the back of her hand. "Leslie and I are going to try and work through it."

"That's good." She smiled. "Because I don't like seeing you so jealous about someone that could never mean as much to me as you do."

"I'm sorry." He apologized. "I didn't mean to act that way earlier."

"I know." She nodded. "That's not the kind of guy you usually are."

"What do you want me to do about Bethany?" He asked hesitantly. "Do you want me to stop being her friend?"

Sam thought about it for a moment, considering what that would mean. It would mean that she wouldn't have to worry about seeing or hearing about Bethany flirting with her husband. But at the same time, she didn't feel right about censoring whom Martin got to be friends with. "I guess we have to face the fact that we have both married a very attractive person and that other people might come along and be attracted to us." She reasoned.

"While I don't like the way Bethany flirts with you, I don't think that I have the right to tell you who to be friends with. I think we just need to trust in each other and the strength of our marriage. So go ahead and continue to be friends with her but I swear if you ever cheat on me with her, very bad things will happen."

"I understand." He replied. "Believe me, I don't ever plan on cheating on you—with Bethany or anyone else."

"Good." She smiled. "Because I don't plan on cheating on you with anyone either."

"Good." He grinned, wrapping his arm around her waist and pulling her close to him. "So do you forgive me for this afternoon?"

"Yep." She leaned down and kissed him passionately.

"When is Claire's next school function?" Martin asked between kisses.

"Well the school year ends on Friday, so not until next fall. Why?" She didn't understand why he was interrupting their kissing to ask about something like that.

He kissed her nose. "I just want to make sure that I have them marked on my calendar in big, bold letters so that you never have to go by yourself again."

She knew that one of the reasons he wanted to go was to keep guys like Brad away from her and that she should be slightly offended by it. But she couldn't help being happy about the fact that she wouldn't have to go to those things alone.