It Takes A Village

Hi all :) I've had some real doubts about this chapter. Certain sections have been cut out and added a fair few times. Things get kind of steamy and kind of adult in this chapter. And you may well hate me for the ending. For that I can only apologise! Please leave a review if you enjoyed it, or have any comments/suggestions. Take care xx

Chapter 6: All At Once

Cassie was cooking a risotto in the kitchen at Grey House. The radio was playing softly in the background, and she was mostly alone. Grace, Lori and Abigail were still out and George had been upstairs poring over seed catalogues when Cassie had taken him some tea. The Bell, Book and Candle had been busy for most of the day, which was a good thing in more than one way. The shop was part of her livelihood, and even though she had Grey House as another means of income, it was important to her on more than just a financial level that her shop flourished. Being inundated with customers had made the day fly by, and had also distracted her from thinking too much. She was trying not to worry about George, and she was always trying not to think about Sam. The latter was certainly easier said than done.

Cassie was so absorbed in stirring the risotto and adding the stock that she almost didn't notice the door opening. She should have known it would be him, especially as she had just caught herself thinking of him yet again.

"Cassie?"

She carefully set the wooden spoon down on the ceramic spoon rest, her stomach swirling with surprise, delight and the tiniest hint of trepidation. She put that down to nerves, though. Until yesterday, she had not spent more than a few minutes alone in Sam's presence for weeks. Just being near him had a fairly intoxicating effect on her that time apart had done nothing to lessen.

"Hi Sam,"

"Sorry to just barge in," He closed the door and stepped towards her. The movements seemed almost rehearsed, as if he were following stage directions. Perhaps, it was because this felt so inevitable. Had they been building up to this ever since he had seen her outside at the trash cans on Friday night; more fuel added to fire when he had rushed over when he had believed George was unwell. "I've been dying to see you."

"Sam," Heat flushed her cheeks; heat that had nothing to do with pan steaming on the hob. The dramatic words were unlike him, but words were important now; they were all that they had.

But, in a practised move, Sam had turned down the burner under the risotto and had manoeuvred them so that Cassie was pressed against the sideboard. Sam lowered his mouth to hers and kissed her like a drowning man gasping for air, his fingers tunnelled in her silky black hair as his lips devoured hers.

Finally he had to pull back, but neither of them could say a word as they struggled to breathe evenly again. Sam pressed his forehead against hers.

"You know," He said, still a little breathless and a fraction more composed, but not much. "George came to see me earlier. Apparently, he was faking it yesterday, just putting on a show to try and push us back together."

"No," She was caught between a gasp and laugh, feeling unsteady. "He wouldn't, would he?" But damn it, it was just the kind of hare-brained scheme could have expected from her father in law, but it would have been less of a surprise if Abigail had been involved.

"He loves you Cassie, like you're his own daughter so I guess he's entitled to a little meddling." Sam's first reaction when George had come clean to him had been a sense of rage, but now that Cassie knew too he could almost see the funny side of it.

"Wow," Cassie did chuckle now. "Next time he want a cup of tea, he can make his own." She paused. "Oh, the risotto." She broke free from Sam's clutches and went to stir the dinner, relieved it hadn't stuck to the bottom of the pan. "You could stay for dinner, if you'd like."

Dinner was quite frankly the furthest thing from Sam Radford's mind right now. He needed his lips on hers again and he wanted to slide his hands under that ice blue silk shirt that Cassie was wearing. He took a breath and tried to focus on anything other than what she might be wearing under the silk shirt in question.

"I can't. It's my turn to cook tonight. Don't worry, it's frozen pizza. Even I can manage not to mess that up."

Cassie smiled fondly but it was as if someone had poured cold water on her. Just because Sam could still kiss her senseless didn't mean that anything else had changed. He was still going home to cook dinner for his son and his ex-wife as if they were still a family, and that stung. She supposed that deep down, what she really wanted was Sam in her kitchen, helping her to prepare dinner for their family.

Sam wished he could read her mind because it felt like he'd just lost her all over again; all of the passion and fire from their kiss forgotten.

"Cassie, I still want you."

The words warmed and saddened her simultaneously.

"Sam,"

He kissed her again, his hands on her waist as his lips danced over hers. She let her lips part; let her tongue twine with his. She didn't stop him when his warm hands slipped beneath her shirt and she pressed herself against him when his palms rubbed over the cups of her bra. Her body was tingling and heavy with arousal, but another part of her wanted to weep. How could he be so close to her, but feel a million miles away? How could this feel so perfectly right, and yet break her heart all at once?

"Sam," She pressed her hand against his chest, absently noticing that his button down was the same shade of blue as hers. "Please stop."

It was like the spell had been broken. His hands fell away, smoothing her shirt back in place and then he let them fall to hang uselessly at his sides.

"I'm sorry,"

"Don't be." She felt a little calmer now he had taken a step back out of her personal space. "It was just a lot."

"I know."

They stood looking at each other for a few moments. The sound of the oven timer broke the silence. Cassie switched it off and turned to stir the risotto to try and salvage it. She added more stock and turned the heat back up. Sam watched her for a moment.

"I should get back," He sighed; restless, aroused and ashamed of himself.

Cassie waited until she knew he was gone before wiping away the one tear that had dared to escape. Her body still sang with the memory of his kiss; his sure and greedy hands. No man had ever shaken her like that with his physicality before. Jake had been patient, loving and attentive. Her other lovers had been satisfactory, but not memorable. But Sam, he was different. They had barely begun to explore the physical side of their relationship before everything had screeched to a halt for them. She had always known that underneath his Southern gentleman manners and his white coat that he was a passionate man and she was afraid she had overreacted. She wanted everything with him, but she seemed to be settling for nothing at all.

"This is delicious," Grace announced, waving her fork enthusiastically with a big grin on her face. "Best risotto ever, Mom."

Cassie's face flushed with pleasure, although a lot of that might be to do with the interruption she had received while she had been cooking. She clamped down hard on the memory, locking it away in a box in her mind until she could be alone.

George had been watching her carefully, but Cassie pretended not to notice. Neither of them had spoken about the incident yesterday, but they both knew it would come up sooner rather than later. For once, Cassie didn't think she had the emotional fortitude to deal with the conversation. Especially if it was George's confession to Sam that had caused him to rush over and nearly seduce her in the Grey House kitchen.

Cassie felt another blush on her cheeks, and sipped more of the rosé wine she had served with dinner to give her an alibi. Not that it was easy to hide anything from the prying eyes of her daughter or cousin. Grace and Abigail seemed to not being paying attention though, which Cassie considered to be more suspicious but she decided to let it go.

"Yeah, it's a pretty great risotto," Abigail beamed. "You'll have to give me the recipe, I'd love to know what the secret ingredient is."

Cassie wondered how her cousin managed to look like butter wouldn't melt and like the cat that got the canary all at once. Probably part of the Merriwick lineage, she supposed.

After the dinner things were cleared away, everyone started to go their separate ways.

With one hand on the banister, Abigail turned to Cassie.

"I saw Linda in the Bistro earlier," she said casually. "Stephanie had all but talked her into catching that new arty French film at the theatre tonight."

"I didn't know Stephanie liked foreign cinema."

"She doesn't, but you haven't seen what the lead actor looks like."

Cassie chuckled, that did sound more like Stephanie although she was surprised that her bubbly friend wanted to spend time with Sam's ex voluntarily. But then it was in Stephanie's nature to charm everyone into submission, she had even tried it with Sam when he first arrived in town.

"Well, goodnight." Abigail said, and Cassie was certain she had winked at her before she ran soundlessly up the stairs in her pantyhose-clad feet.

Cassie sighed, caught between what was right and what she wanted. Biting her lip and making up her mind, she went up to her room to change.

Linda had had no intention of socialising with Stephanie, even if the French flick was kind of tempting. She had no doubt that Stephanie was a lovely woman, but she didn't think the two of them could possibly have anything in common. She had already spent far too much time away from the house and away from Nick. Any longer and Cassie would have her claws back into Sam again as she always seemed to whenever she was away for any length of time. Linda couldn't even be sure that wasn't why Abigail had really asked to meet her; to give her cousin some time alone with Sam. But Abigail had been too convincing, hadn't she? Tapping notes into her phone and asking Linda to repeat the names of restaurants or museums that caught her attention. If it was just a ruse, it was an elaborate one.

Linda arrived home; that was how she thought of it now. If it was the place where her family lived then by definition wasn't it her home? She hung up her coat in the hall closet and pulled off her boots, walking through to the kitchen to find Sam sliding two frozen pizzas into the oven. He had already popped open a bottle of beer, which Linda found a little surprising. He was quite fastidious about what he ate and drank, so she was a little shocked to find him indulging in both pizza and beer on the same evening. Maybe he felt like he deserved it after his run that morning.

Linda wished she hadn't thought about that because it reminded her of their accidental meeting outside of the bathroom. She fought back a surge of desire as she remembered how the droplets of water from the shower had looked sliding over Sam's still well defined pecs. Wishing she had a little Dutch courage of her own, Linda crossed the kitchen to where Sam was taking a pull from his bottle of Bud. She snatched the bottle from his hand and pushed her body against his, pressing her lips to his in a hard and demanding kiss.

Feeling a little foolish; a woman in her forties sneaking out of her own home to meet a man, Cassie folded her arms across her torso. Rekindling some of the passion she had felt earlier under Sam's hands, she had changed into a matching set of white lace lingerie than left more than a little to imagination and has swapped her ice blue silk shirt for a long grey sweater with a V neck over fitted black leggings.

She didn't approach the front door, it had never been like that with her and Sam. They just dropped in on each other without ceremony. Instead she went around to the side of the house like she always did and found the door unlocked. Something stopped her when she placed her fingers around the door handle and she almost turned to walk away right then. Blaming it on her heightened nerves and her slightly bruised heart, Cassie forced herself to open the door and stepped inside.

The sound of her heels tapping along the linoleum should have alerted Sam to her presence, but he was too busy trying to free himself from the clutches of his ex-wife. But Cassie had seen enough, with a choked sob that no one heard but her, she fled the Radford kitchen and ran back to the sanctuary of Grey House.