Melt Your Heart

Thank you for your reviews & comments on the previous chapter, I'd been a bit nervous about posting it so I'm glad you liked it. Hope you enjoy this one, too :)

Chapter 16: Pandora's Box

Feeling numb, and sleep deprived, Cassie went downstairs to check on James, who was still sleeping soundly. She couldn't see a light under the bedroom door, so she assumed that Abigail and Catherine were also still asleep. She went back to her own room to change her clothes, barely suppressing a shiver when she took off her bra, remembering the touch of Sam's fingertips, and his lips.

After a quick wash and dressing in her usual more casual outfit of grey slacks and a black sweater, Cassie projected a calm she did not feel. Between her hot date with Sam last night, James' sickness, and her discovery in the attic, she wasn't feeling like herself at all.

There was only one person she wanted to reach out to, someone who she knew would ground her but he was the one person she couldn't reach.

But when she went down to the kitchen to boil the kettle and start preparing breakfast, there was a tap at the back door.

Sam? She wondered, with a thrill of anticipation. How would things be between them in the cold light of day?

"Good morning," he stepped into the sun drenched kitchen with a smile, stopping to pull Cassie into his arms for a brief, but sweet, kiss. "How is James this morning?"

"Much better, thank you," Cassie fiddled with the tea bags, feeling as foolish as a schoolgirl with a crush. "I'll keep him off school today, but he should be fine by tomorrow."

Sam followed her around the kitchen island, she was being cool with him and he didn't like it. Where was the woman who had been so warm and passionate in his arms last night?

Oh god, please don't say she regretted anything that had passed between them?

"Cassie?"

"Hmm," she looked up at him, as if surprised to see him there even though they'd just engaged in a pleasant conversation about her son's health.

"Is everything okay?"

She wanted to tell him that no, no it wasn't all okay, but she needed some time to figure this out for herself. And she needed to talk to Abigail before she confided in Sam.

"I'm sorry, I just didn't get much sleep," she apologised, and it wasn't a lie.

"Come here," he said softly, holding out his arms.

Unable to refuse the offer of comfort, Cassie stepped into the warmth and safety of his arms. She wrapped her arms around his waist and buried her face in his chest, praying that she wouldn't cry.

It just felt so good to be held.

A little taken aback, Sam stroked his hands through her dark, glossy hair. There was something about this embrace that moved him more than their passionate kisses and explorations of each other the night before.

She was moving him, body and soul.

He was so shaken that he allowed Cassie to brew him a mug of her tea-that-tasted-like-coffee, but he was happy just to stand in the kitchen and enjoy the start of the day with her.

"About last night..." he began, toying with the handle of the mug. "I hope I didn't push you too far."

Cassie nearly choked on her own tea.

"No, oh Sam no, you didn't. I was with you one hundred percent."

Relieved, and maybe a little bit proud, he gave her a lopsided grin.

"I'm happy to take things at whatever pace works for you...but you are kind of irresistible."

His words and the corresponding warmth in his eyes sent jolts of electricity through Cassie's bloodstream. She couldn't help but wonder what might have happened last night if it hasn't been for Abigail's distress signal.

"You're not so bad yourself," she grinned back at him.

She had been so sure she was going to push him away while she figured out whatever the heck Abigail had been hiding from her, but she couldn't bring herself to shut him out. She was more worried about how deeply she was prepared to let him in.

Depositing his empty mug in the dishwasher, he turned to Cassie and kissed her forehead.

"I need to get to the hospital now, but call me if you, or James, need anything, okay?"

She nodded, hesitated, and then pulled his face down to hers for a long, deep kiss.

"Wow," he grinned, amazed to find that he, badass emergency surgeon, was blushing.

That would certainly keep him going through a long, arduous shift.

"Bye Sam," she couldn't help but beam at him.

Feeling more in control again, Cassie picked up the mug of tea she had made for Abigail and went upstairs to wake the rest of her family.

She tapped on Abigail's bedroom and stepped inside. The sight of her cousin fast asleep, with her daughter wrapped in her arms almost melted away the frustration and betrayal she felt. She set the cup of tea down on Abigail's nightstand, and gently shook her shoulder.

"Morning," Abigail said, blinking her bleary eyes.

Catherine stirred in Abigail's arms and reached out for Cassie to lift her from the bed. Cassie almost groaned under the weight of her daughter, why did it seem like the twins were getting bigger every single day? To Cassie it felt like, if she looked away for more than a moment they would be teenagers.

She couldn't even imagine what being a parent of two teenagers would be like.

Over the top of Catherine's head, Cassie levelled a serious look at her cousin.

"We need to talk," she watched for any kind of reaction from Abigail, but the younger woman merely shrugged and reached for her tea. "Later, just you and me."

"Wait Cassie, is this about last night?" She didn't think it was, in fact she knew it wasn't, but she knew she needed to say something.

Cassie's expression softened. "No, no it's not," she sighed. "Thank you for looking after them both."

Leading Catherine by the hand, Cassie went back to the twins' bedroom to help her daughter get ready for school. Abigail watched her go, taking a sip of hot tea from the mug. It didn't soothe her like usual though, it just added to the weight in her gut.

Was this lovely, family routine that she, Cassie, and the twins had fallen into about to be forever changed?

Abigail Pershing was a lot of things, but she didn't like to think she was a coward. She supposed she could have quickly dressed and slipped out of the house while Cassie was preoccupied with the twins, but she knew they had to have this conversation sooner or later. She was actually surprised that Cassie and the twins had lived here so long without the subject coming up. But then she supposed that Cassie had hardly had a moment to herself since arriving in Middleton, especially with the added distraction of her romantic entanglement with Sam.
A smug little smile tugged at Abigail's lips at this, despite the slight churning in her gut.

Even she couldn't have predicted how perfect her cousin and the doctor would be for each other.

She finally talked herself out of bed and dressed slowly, dragging out the task. She looked in on James before she went downstairs, he was sleeping soundly still. Abigail felt a rush of feeling towards him that disquieted her. She didn't particularly like children, certainly didn't want any of her own, but the twins were working their magic on her.

Cassie was packing up Catherine's lunch when Abigail padded into the kitchen, the little girl less than impressed that she had to go to school when her brother did not. It was hard for Abigail to hide her grin, Catherine Russell certainly had moxie.

Her cousin could not have been more proud.

"Are you okay to stay here with James, while I take Catherine to school?" Cassie asked, not looking at her cousin and not really giving her an opportunity to decline.

"Of course," Abigail replied, standing awkwardly in the kitchen like a spare part in her own house. "He was still sleeping when I looked in on him."

Cassie's heart softened a little towards her cousin when she heard this, but she was still angry and confused. She wasn't sure how even Abigail and her silver tongue were going to talk their way out of this. The walk to school with Catherine would do her good, maybe it would clear her head and knowing that Sam was there for her helped too. She was more than capable of standing on her own two feet, (hadn't the last year proved that time and again?) but she'd have been lying if she said it wasn't nice having a man in her life again.

Finding romance had been the last thing on her mind when Cassie had decided to up sticks and move her family to Middleton. What she had been looking for was a familial connection, for the twins and for herself. She had been happy and content in her bubble with Jake and their children, they hadn't really needed anyone else except a few close friends. She thought she had found that in Abigail, but now she was afraid of what she had stumbled into. But, underneath it all, her gut told her that Abigail was trustworthy. She might have less than altruistic motives a lot of the time, and a stubborn, selfish streak but Cassie had never got a bad vibe from her. Sam trusted Abigail too, and that certainly went in her cousin's favour. And, if Cassie had really lost all faith in her cousin, would she have left her poorly son alone with her?

Cassie couldn't spend too much time indulging these thoughts as every time she went out in Middleton these days she saw more and more familiar, friendly faces. They were already treating her like she belonged her, which Cassie was grateful for. She had been a little worried that the community would be too insular, and wouldn't welcome a single mother with open arms. She was happy to have been proved wrong on that count.

But, wait? Had she unearthed a buried family secret or did all of the people she encountered in the neighbourhood, or at The Bistro, or in the playground at the twins' already know?

She didn't think so, and her more rational brain told her that it wasn't the 1690s anymore - no one was going to burn her at the stake or run her and the twins out of town with their pitchforks.

The mental image made her smile a little in spite of herself, and her stride walking back to Grey House was full of purpose.

Abigail pottered around Grey House while she waited for Cassie to come back from the school. She kept an eye on James, not wanting him to fall ill under her care again. She knew it wasn't her fault, but she felt she needed to tread carefully where Cassie was concerned.

She understood why her cousin was upset, and honestly this wasn't the way Abigail hadn't wanted things to play out. Truth be told, she had become so caught up in being part of a real family again that she had effectively swept their ancestry out of sight.

Swept? Oh no, not a broomstick analogy, she chastised herself.

And if Cassie was half as perceptive as Abigail knew she was, surely the other woman couldn't be that surprised by her heritage?

She wouldn't have to wait long to find out anyway because she sensed rather than heard the front door open, and then Cassie's boots tapping down the hallway.

Time to open up Pandora's box.