Sun Chara - A Match Made in Heaven?

He slitted his gaze. “You mean we, what are we going to do, right?”

Blobs of batter dripped at her feet, adding a new dimension to the scruffy linoleum. “No.” She considered him for a long moment. “What are you going to do, Johnny?”

Her challenge, a gauntlet hurled at his feet, and he swooped it up.

“I’ll get a new license … I’ll sign this one … I’ll—”

“Signature on wedding license does not match groom’s identification,” she read. “Document false. Signature forged.” She stared at him, sure her eyes were huge and accusing. “What were you thinking?”

He straddled a chair. “I was thinking about you.”

“Huh?”

“I was mesmerized by your … er … beauty if you remember.”

She shook the spoon at him. Minute batter missiles sprinkled his face and his shirt. “Johnny Belen, I’m warning you …”

He ran a finger down his cheek and licked the drop with his tongue. “Mmm, this is good.”

“Johnny.”

“Okay, Sam.” He leaped up, a sheepish grin on his lips. “Guess I forgot … but I was sure—”

“I don’t believe it.” She plunged the spoon back in the batter. “You don’t forget a thing like that.” Swinging open the cupboard, she grabbed two plates, shoved them at him and slammed it shut.

He set the chipped dishes on the bottle-cap sized table. “You’ll recall ours was no ordinary wedding.”

Sam sighed. “Yes.” For a fleeting moment, her wedding day replayed at speed before her eyes and emotion swelled inside her. Abruptly, she crammed the memory aside and opened the refrigerator, welcoming the frosty air on her hot cheeks. “I re-re-remember.”

“It was easy to overlook—”

She took out the butter and banged the fridge door shut with her elbow.

“—a thing like that.” What could he say? It was a rhino-size blunder and he felt like a heel for it. He bashed a tuff of hair dangling on his forehead back with his fist. Thoughts of cuffing snoboy into cyberspace had distracted him, and subconsciously he must’ve scribbled Scott’s name on the wedding doc.

He shot Sam a covert glance.

She shot one back.

Until he checked the copy in their safety deposit box at the bank, he’d be in the doghouse under lock and key. “There is a funny side to this, Sam.” He tested the waters, his words half question, half statement, his lips tugging at the corners.

Silence.

“Sam?’

“Oh, you’re impossible.” She set the bowl on the counter, crumbled the letter in a ball and took aim.

“I wanted to get you away from that jerk fast and—”

The paper missile ricocheted off his chest, and she gripped the wooden spoon, stirring the batter. “One.” She paused for emphasis. “I’ve put up with your chronic unemployment—”

“Reverting to high and mighty socialite are you?” His eyes darkened. “I couldn’t just be temporarily between jobs?”

“Tempo-perma is what you mean,” she let fly, her words stinging.

“Aww, Sam, that was a low blow.”

“You’re always out of a job, Johnny.” She absent-mindedly created figure eights in the batter with the ladle.

“Nope.” He fixed his sights on his very pregnant wife, and his gut hitched. Fool, to think love could bridge the gap between them.

Love never fails.

The silent message lit his brain. He wrinkled his brow but couldn’t recall where he’d heard those profound words. Was what they shared enough to transcend social status pressure? He smirked and nearly guffawed at his naiveté, even at thirty-four. At a loss, he gulped down the self-deprecating sound, thinking it might be time to ’fess up. “I’ve bought … er … working … I’ve wanted to tell you about—”

“Heard that before, Johnny.”

Her words were like ten-pound weights crushing his shoulders.

In the heavy silence, the batter sloshed in the bowl, keeping time with the ticking cuckoo clock above the stove.

“Two.” She smacked the ladle on the batter, speckling the counter. “I’ve put up with living in this drabby matchbox for two years.”

“It won’t always be that way, Sam.” He stepped closer, encircling her shoulder, but she shrank away. “I thought it was our home … and I’ve wanted to tel—”

“Oh, it is, Johnny. It is.” Her tone softened a tad, giving him hope.

He pulled her into his arms, and she laid her head on his shoulder. “Then, what is it?” He stroked her hair, the motion soothing…arousing. “I’ve wanted to tell you about my, our good fortu—”

“Not legally wed.” She jerked away and grabbed the frying pan off the shelf and banged it on the stove.

He rubbed the back of his head and breathed a sigh of relief she’d found another target.

“What will people … I mean—”

“Mamma …” he inserted for her.

“… think.” She turned on the gas element and it flared to life.

“You made a choice on that score when you married me.” He flexed his shoulder muscles. “But if that matters so much to you, Sam, maybe you shouldn’t have said ‘I do.’” He’d just given her an out if she wanted it, and his heart faltered.

By social standards, he was an ordinary guy from the poor ’hood, and she was high society from the ritzy side of town. His roots stemmed from Irish farmers tilling land for survival. Her ancestry was linked to the English aristocracy. While he’d pounded the pavement for work during the day and studied for a business degree at night, she hung out at the café on campus, sipping designer lattes with her socialite friends.

Maybe he should’ve joined her there … maybe that’s where he’d made his mistake. Regardless, it was time he found out the truth about why she married him. He’d been putting it off until after the baby came, but the grenade in that letter was about to blast them apart. He’d have to toss in his ammo prematurely and either neutralize or detonate matters between them.

‘Rich debutante jilts catch of the season to marry poor boy Belen.’ Isn’t that how the society page read in the Beverly Hills Weekly? His tone sounded empty, his heart padlocked.

“Doesn’t matter, now.” She scratched a dried disc of batter with her slipper.

“Why’s that?”

“We’re not married.”

“Easy to fix.”

“No, it isn’t.” She yanked open the cutlery drawer, took out a knife, sliced a slab of butter and tossed it in the pan. It sizzled.

“Why not?” He removed the knife from her fingers, placed it on the countertop and closed the drawer before she could slam it shut.

She shrugged, not quite meeting his searching gaze.

Johnny plowed a hand through his hair, breath blasting from his mouth. Heck, she still thought him the peasant barely making enough to keep a roof over their heads. Of course, his pad in North Hollywood couldn’t compete with her family’s Beverly Hills mansion. The recent news of their union, or lack thereof, had her speed-redialing about their life.

“Why’d you marry me, Sam?” An air pocket jammed in his throat, and his pulse jerked off beat.

“Because … I …” She twisted her wedding ring around her finger.

“Maybe it was to get back at your mother and get away from that bozo, Scott.”

“Leave my mother out of this,” she snapped. “And as for Michael, well … you could be kind.”

“You defending that circus clown?” he bit out.

“Not exactly.” An unbidden smile brushed her mouth, and then vanished in the onslaught of their verbal shoot out.

“I’m supposed to know what that means?”

“He’s a family friend.”

“And that makes this” –he pointed to her and himself, then slashed his hand through the air— “all right?”