Claiming What's His (20 page)

             
Sam and Maggie walked side-by-side as they crossed the street to Jette Motors.  Looking around, each bay had a car parked in it.  And, Betty was in one of them. 

             
Dom walked out from the office and smiled.  “Ladies.  How are we today?”

             
“Good, Dom.  It would be better if I knew Betty’s condition,” Sam replied, eager to know the condition of her baby and hoped that there wasn’t a lot of work to be done.

             
“Sam, I keep telling you to just upgrade and get a new –”

             
Sam quickly jumped and smacking his arm with one hand while covering Dom’s mouth with the other as he garbled un-audible words beneath her hand.

             
“Shame on you!  She’s sitting right there.  She can hear you!” she hissed, taking her hand from his arm to point at her car.

             
Turning away, she walked over to Betty and gently rubbed her hood, coaxing her with her undivided sympathy and affection (or at least what she had to give). 

             
“Don’t worry, girl.  I won’t get rid of you that easily.  They might have to just pry us apart with a crowbar.”

             
She heard Maggie snicker behind her, “Like we don’t do that already.  It’s sad, really, how much you love this piece of junk.”

             
Then, she heard Dom chuckled.

             
Sam slowly turned to glare at the two and stubbornly stuck her tongue out at the both of them, wishing they would leave her alone about Betty.  They didn’t understand how much Betty meant to her.  Or maybe they did and still chose to pick on her because of Betty’s age and condition.

             
“What’s going on here?”  Sam heard the rumble of a familiar voice behind her. 

             
She whipped her head around to see Alex and Dean standing behind Maggie, Alex’s arms crossing his broad chest.  One look into Alex’s hard eyes and she knew she didn’t want to be there at the moment to havoc the wrath that Sam knew he had.

             
But, at that moment, she wasn’t sure who the wrath was specifically for.

             
Coming to a stop next to Dom, Sam asked snootily (mainly trying to deter the situation on Alex’s mind), “Are you two surgically attached to the hip?  Why are you always together?”

             
Dean threw his head back and burst out laughing.

             
Wow. 

             
The sound of his laugh struck her to the core.  He had a
great
laugh.  It was strong, rumbly, and manly.

             
Alex must’ve seen the look on her face because it went hard, or she should say, harder.

             
Behind them, Sam saw Nick walk out of the building, headed in their direction as well.

             
After he stopped laughing, Dean shrugged, his still lips twitching. “No reason, just discussing some work stuff.  And Alex graciously volunteered to show me a little bit of Comfort, unless you’d like to volunteer and be surgically
attached
to the hip with me.”

             
Alex growled, “Watch it.”

             
Dean grinned as Nick came to a stop beside him, also with a grin on his face.  Obviously, he had heard that last comment.

             
Maggie watched the interaction between the two briefly before deciding to pipe in and switch the subject. “Alex, you remember Dom.  Dom, Alex.  And this is Dean.  Dean, Dom.”

             
Dom extended his hand and muttered, “Hey.”

             
Alex shook it and replied back, “Hey.”

             
Dean stepped forward for a hand shake.  Dom shook it.

             
Alex spoke, “It’s been a while since I’ve seen you.  You’ve done very well with your garage I see.”

             
“Yeah, you should have seen it when it was a mess.  Took a while, but everything got cleaned up, mostly thanks to Sam…

             
She quickly elbowed him in the ribs before he finished that sentence.  

             
He grunted.  “Ugh!  What the hell was that for Sam?  That hurt.”  He winced, rubbing his ribs where she jabbed him.

             
“Sorry, bad reflexes,” she replied, stretching her arms around and adding fake grunts to make it seem more believable.  

             
Nick and Dean laughed.

             
Alex did not.  He was still not amused.  It seemed his face was harder than before.  Any harder and she was sure his facial muscles would break.

             
Sam wasn’t sure what his deal was, nor did she care.  She had other matters to worry about, like, for instance, her car. 

             
“Sam, here, was the one who straightened out our books for us for the past two years.  And I’m still paying my bill, right Sam?”  He added as he chuckled, throwing his arm around her shoulders.

             
Alex’s eyes narrowed in at his arms, then Dom, then Sam.  Then he asked, “How
exactly
are you paying your bill?” 

             
Sam had never heard of his voice growl like that.  It sounded almost as if he was jealous.  The way his eyes glittered, repeatedly flicking back and forth between her and Dom.  But why would he be jealous?  Just because they were together one night (several times throughout the night) doesn’t mean that they were anything to one another.  Well, sure, she had loved him since high school, and he gave her that awesome apology in the shower, but that was it.  It wasn’t like they were
together
together.  They never discussed that particular topic and based on that look on Alex’s face, she had a feeling they would be hashing it real soon.

             
“I do maintenance work on Betty –” Dom started.

             
“For
life
,” she finished and decided to change the subject of her own.  “What are you guys doing here anyways?” 

             
“We were about to head out, but we saw you two standing here, thought there might be a problem.  Who’s Betty?”

             
“No problem.  I came to check on my baby.”

             
Alex blinked.  “You have a baby in a car shop?”

             
“Yup.  I came here to pick her up, if she’s ready.”  She shifted her eyes to Dom and raised her brow, hoping he caught the silent hint.

             
Alex looked confused and Maggie rolled her eyes, deciding to answer the questions in his eyes to put him out of his misery.  “She means her granny of a car that’s way past her prime years.  Sam refuses to get a new car.  And the other two are her little rugrats of a puppy.  Have you seen them yet?”

             
Sam scrunched her face at Maggie.  “Next time you get in, she’s going to eject you far,
far off the road
.”

             
“Yeah, I would never get in Betty if my life depended on it.  I’d rather be eaten by wolves on the side of the road before I get into Betty.  And you know she wouldn’t be able to go on the highway because she can’t go that fast.”

             
Sam stuck her tongue out.

             
Maggie returned the gesture.

             
“Come on, I’ll give you a ride home,” Alex told her, reaching out to grab her arm.

             
Instead, she took a step back, hitting up against Dom’s brick of a body. 

             
“That’s okay.  I’ll walk home.  It’s just a few blocks away,” she told him then added, “Plus, you have to show Dean around.”

             
“I’ll drop you off,” Alex insisted firmly.  “Maggs, you mind showing Dean around.”

             
“Not at all,” she asked while batting her lashes.  “Where would
sir
like to go today?”

             
Dean grinned and bowed at his waist.  “Wherever
milady
takes me.”

             
They both laughed as they walked away.

             
“I’m going, too,” Nick announced.  “Got a date.”

             
Sam glanced on her cell phone.  “It’s only 4:30,” she pointed out.

             
“Then, it’ll be a nice,
long
date.”  He winked at her, then turned and walked towards Conrad.

             
Alex walked up and tagged Sam’s hand, heading back towards Conrad, but she halted and bellowed, “Wait, I still need to get Betty’s status.”

             
Before she could turn around and ask, Dom shouted, “She’s gonna need some work done, Sam.  I’ll let you know when she’s finished.”

             
Sam sighed.  This was the wonderful life of not getting an updated car.

             
Alex continued again, his long stride that made her double her steps.

             
She tried again, halting her steps, “I need to go into my office and check on stuff.”

             
“Later,” he clipped.  Their heels echoing through the garage as he continued dragging her.

             
He beeped the locks and shoved (yes,
shoved
) her into his Suburban, rounded the car, got behind the wheel, and roared out the garage. 

             
Sam wasn’t sure what to make of his behavior.  This seemed to be the act of someone who would be jealous and it was a constant companion these days and she didn’t like that.  Or, it could be because he was mad at her for something she did.  The thing was, she didn’t know what it was that she did!  The only thing she had been doing was standing there talking to everyone like others had, unless it was something that happened before.  Either way, she was unaware of it all.

*******

              Sam unbuckled her belt and leaned forward to pull on the door latch when he reached across to stop her, his hands gripping her arm firmly.

             
Her eyes traveled up the length of his arm up to his eyes, questioning his gesture.  “What?”

             
His answer was instant.  “What’s the deal with you and Dom?”

             
Her head jerked back, confused why he would think there was something.  “Nothing.  There’s no
deal
between us.  Dom and I have nothing going on.  We’re just friends.  Why?”

             
“Because based on what I saw just now, it was
not
anything.  I saw the way he looked at you and you two looked too comfortable around each other for nothing.  So tell me what the fuck is going on right now!”

             
Sam’s temper began to escalate as she thought that Alex was losing his mind.  “Are you
nuts
?  Dom and I have known each other since we were nine.  You
know
this.  You’ve known him just as long.  As I’ve said before and I’ll reiterate for you once more, there is
nothing
going on between us.”

             
Sam knew there would be nothing between her and Dom because he’d been in love with Nat since college.  She just doesn’t know it yet.  And for some odd forsaken reason, when Sam had found out, he made her promise not to say anything which she eventually did with him promising to fix Betty for life.

             
See, it was a win-win.

“I do know you’ve known each other a long time.  But, what I
don’t
know, or what I should say, didn’t know, is how close you two are.  If this thing between you and me is going to work out, then I need to know now.  You need to tell me.  Don’t play me.”

Don’t
play
him?

He thought there was something between her and Dom.  Of all the years they’ve known each other, she had never given him any indication that she couldn’t be trusted.  Never had she deceived him in any way.  And here he
was, not trusting her.  Not one little bit.

Sam inhaled a huge breath and spoke in her calmest angry tone, “I don’t know why you would think I would
play
you.  I don’t do that.  I have no reason to.  The fact that you laid it out how you did proved that
you
don’t trust
me
.  As a matter of fact, it’s a good idea that we don’t continue this thing between us.  It’s for the best.  Thanks for the ride.  Have a nice life.”  She shook his hand off and got out of the car, slamming the door.