Secondhand Heart (15 page)

The college was a satellite school, since we were too far away from the city for a real college, and the classes were at a former rope company. Dad said my great-grandfather worked there after the war. Rumor had it, the place was haunted. The huge building held many businesses, mostly medical, but also the town’s unemployment office. Blood, guts, ghosts, and desperation.

The perfect environment for higher education. Just enough to scare you into paying attention. I loved it.

Today I was nothing more than a warm body taking up space. We were so close to the end of the session, I could see the beach at the end of the tunnel. Today people started to do their end of class presentations, which I hadn’t even touched yet. Crap. Between Cam and Ev, my present was interfering with my future.

Cam asked me to come back to the house after class, which ended at noon. Time crawled. I could practically see it dragging its ass, stopping to nurse sore muscles, and mocking me while I listened to someone drone on about the possibility of a new political party making an impact with voters. Usually, I would have been interested, but today, not so much. If I had a brain in my head, I would have paid attention just so I could have lifted some of the information for my presentation next week. But my brain was fried on Cam, and as far as learning, I was actually going to have to fend for myself.

I rang Cam’s doorbell, having left the key behind. I felt anxious, standing there waiting for him to let me in. When he opened the door, he leaned against it, looking even tanner in daylight wearing a white T-shirt, his bare feet sticking out of worn jeans. My eyes wandered up and down his body, it was like I was seeing a completely new person.

I’d never felt quite like this before. I wasn’t sure what was happening.

He chuckled softly. “Hey.” Once I looked back up at him, his eyes were twinkling. He kind of needed a haircut. I say kind of because I liked it untamed and beachy from the salt water.

“Are you going to let me in?” I mimicked his half smile.

“Oh,” Cam seemed to be lost in the same dreamland I was. He moved sideways so I could walk in. “Yeah. How was class?”

“Endless.” I stopped in front of him, my fingers curling in the collar of his shirt, I couldn’t keep my hands off of him. I went up on my tip toes to kiss him. “Time away from you.”

The hand Cam had had on the door frame was now on my ass. “I missed you, too. Come back here with me.”

I followed him back to the deck, where he’d set up lunch. He even held out my chair for me to sit down. It looked like he’d had it catered. More likely, he’d gone up to The Lobster Pound for lobster salad, which waited for us on the prettiest salad I’d seen in a long time, a bed of lettuce with cucumbers, bright red tomatoes, and olives framing it. “This looks awesome.”

“I spend seventy hours a week at the restaurant. Something had to sink in, eventually. Iced tea?” He filled my red plastic cup from the Tupperware pitcher.

I nodded. “You don’t have to wait on me, it’s your day off.”

“If I do things for you now, maybe you’ll return the favor later.” He wriggled his eyebrows.

“Ulterior motives.” Like there ever was any doubt. I put a bite of lobster in my mouth. Heaven. “I see how you are.”

Cam shrugged. “I see it as the gift that keeps on giving.”

I insisted on clearing the plates, not like it was any big sacrifice, I knew a house like this had to have a dishwasher. Cam followed me into the kitchen, I could tell he wasn’t used to letting people do things for him. I’m sure Ashley never lifted a finger. Ugh. I wondered if she was still lurking around town, or if she’d been satisfied with fucking up just one night royally.

His hovering made me a little uneasy. If I had company in the kitchen, it was usually my mother, nagging me until I lost my appetite. “What do you want to do now?” I asked him.

“Did you bring your suit?”

“No.” So dumb. “I didn’t expect to come back. I should have stopped at home, but I didn’t think.”

“That’s okay.” He came up behind me, and I sucked in my breath as he lifted my hair up off my neck. I knew he was going to kiss it, and let’s face it, neck kisses are just so good. “We can do without it.”

I turned around to face him, sliding my hands around his waist. “But I love the beach, and we’re right here.” I looked up at him and stuck my bottom lip out in a fake pout, squealing when he nipped it.

“We can still do the beach.” He looked at me like I was missing the most obvious thing.

I looked down at my clothes, my standard T-shirt and denim shorts. “I’ll get dumb tan lines.”

Cam rolled his eyes and pulled me away from the counter by my arm. “You’re not going to get any tan lines.”

I followed him upstairs, figuring he was going to bring me to bed, but we walked right past it and on to the second floor balcony. His condo had one off of the kitchen and the master bedroom, in case you thought this place could get any more perfect. It couldn’t. There were two lounge chairs waiting for us out there, separated by a round glass table.

I looked at him, questioning, but didn’t move.

“Me first.” Cam pulled his shirt up over his head. “Your turn.”

“We’re outside.”

He held his arms out wide on either side of his body. “There are walls.”

I gulped. Underwear was just like a bathing suit, right? I rolled my shirt up and took it off, holding it in front of my chest, feeling bare. “People are on the beach.”

“They can’t see anything, this part of the beach is private. And the way the decks are angled, it’s really private.” Cam undid his belt and shimmied out of his jeans, leaving his boxers. It was like a deranged game of strip poker. “Relax.”

“It’s not that,” I sputtered. “Well maybe, because you, my friend, are turning out to be quite the exhibitionist. But everything with us is about sex.”

“What’s wrong with that?” Cam smiled up at me from his chaise, squinting slightly.

His answer caught me totally off guard. Part of me expected him to react like a girl and apologize or try to justify himself. But instead, he owned it, turning it around on me to feel like I should back pedal. “It’s just that, well, shouldn’t there be more?”

Cam grabbed the shirt I’d been clutching to my chest, and threw it in to the bedroom. I sat down, facing him, waiting for his answer. “I don’t think that’s it at all. I love spending time with you, and we have a lot in common. It’s been a long time since I’ve had such a good time with a woman.”

I looked down at my bare skin, my sheer bra keeping no secrets. “But it always winds up like this.”

“And that’s a bad thing?” Cam looked confused. “I’m not going to apologize for being attracted to you.”

And the debate went to Cam in a landslide.

I couldn’t look him in the eye, his confidence sapped mine. “It’s never been like this before.”

Cam got up and sat next to me on my chaise, pulling me into his side. He rubbed my arm. “How old were you when you met Jordan?”

“Eleven.”

“And when did you guys start being more than friends?”

I smiled at him. “Don’t ask.”

“Nice.” Cam nodded and raised his eyebrows. “I know you didn’t expect to be starting over, now or ever. There’s not a book for this stuff. It’s going to be different every time.”

That familiar burning feeling started in my eyes. Shit. “It’s just that—“

“You keep saying that,” Cam turned my face to his. “I’m going to kiss you every time that you do.”

“That’s supposed to make me stop?” A rogue tear escaped when I closed my eyes to welcome Cam’s lips on mine.

“I just want to let you know the consequences of your actions.” Cam brushed the tear away from my cheek. “But it sounds like you’re trying to make excuses for yourself.”

“I’m not.” Maybe I was.

“Do you want to be here right now?” His fingers were still on my cheek, brushing near my hairline.

“Yes.” It felt so good, Cam so close, the salty air kissing our skin, the sounds of the beach off in the distance, I never wanted to be anywhere else. Some girls raved about spa days, screw that. This was bliss.

“Then what’s wrong with what we’re doing?” He leaned in to kiss me again. This time I raised my hands up into his hair, twisting fistfuls of curls as his lips moved against mine. “All I could think about all morning was waking up with you, wondering how much longer until you came back from your class.”

“It’s just that,” I laughed as Cam came back in to make good on his promise. “The other night, you were talking about moving me moving in here.”

I paused, giving him a chance to react. A way out. “Yeah.” He took just a hair too long. Exactly what I was afraid of.

But I had to play my hand now, even if I’d seen his. “And everything with us is so intense. What happens when that fades away?” I dropped my hands to my lap and looked down at them. Even though some questions had to be asked, it didn’t mean I was going to be ready to hear the answer.

“What if it doesn’t?” He tipped my chin back up to look at him. “It doesn’t have to fade.”

“But if it does?

Cam sighed and shook his head slightly. “Daisy, don’t worry about it. If this is what you want right now, that’s all you can control. We both got married, and we’re both alone right now. Neither of us expected that. We don’t have any say over the future.”

“You’re so smart sometimes.” Even though his words couldn’t rip away the shroud of sadness that followed me everywhere, even when I tried to close the door on it. “I just wish it was really that easy.”

“It is.” Cam pulled me in closer, his arms wrapping around me as I rested my head on his shoulder. “Move in here with me. I can’t make you any guarantees. We’ll either have one amazing day or a hundred awesome years. I’d rather have that one day then not at least try and wonder what could have happened.”

“D
aisy, you’re a widow. You can’t just shack up with the first guy you sleep with. What do you think that looks like?” Of course my parents went nuts when I told them what I planned to do. My dad wouldn’t make eye contact with me when I tried to watch baseball with him, and only mumbled in response to anything I asked him. The less my dad enunciated, the more pissed he was. My mother handled the situation with her usual joie de vive.

“Like I met someone who wants to kiss me before I brush my teeth in the morning?” I burned with rage. My mother could fuck up a free lunch. Cam could be next in line for some European throne, and still, she would find something wrong with him.

“It makes you look like a whore. With no respect for the memory of your husband.” She might as well have slapped me. It felt the same. “It’s bad enough we had that pregnancy scare when you were sixteen—“

“
We
took care of that, didn’t
we
?” How fucking dare she. If she couldn’t see that my grief for Jordan threatened to strangle me at any moment, I couldn’t help her with that. But that wasn’t enough. She brought up The Thing We Never Talk About. Pregnancy scare, my ass. That makes it sound like a case of head lice. I got knocked up in the tenth grade.

When Jordan needed a night off from haunting my dreams, I could always rely on that ultrasound to make an appearance. And if I hadn’t caved to my mother, and the councilors, and everyone else who was so sure I was going to ruin my life if I didn’t listen to their grown up wisdom, I’d have Jordan’s baby now. If only I’d known it was my only chance. She’d be almost five now, a tiny bit older than Landon. I always thought of her as a she, and I would have named her Amelia.

Bree’s life wasn’t ruined. Sure, she got housing and food stamps and could only take classes online right now, but money didn’t define a person. She loved her boys, and I couldn’t imagine her not having them.

That’s why I was so worried about Ev’s pregnancy. We couldn’t lose another baby.

So much for me not winding up a statistic, like they were all afraid of. “You were wrong then, and you’re wrong now. At least now I know I don’t have to listen to your bullshit advice.” Each word had the same delivery as if I’d shot them out of a gun.

“You are totally overreacting.” She couldn’t be serious right now. I could add deaf to the blind and stupid, because there was no way she’d actually say these things if she had any idea what they sounded like. She knew every one of my buttons, and pushed them like they were part of her favorite toy.

“I’m overreacting?” I was yelling now, and my dad turned up the volume on the TV, that had become his signal over the years to let the ladies of the house know he didn’t approve of whatever was going on. “You’re the one who’s so worried about my reputation. Sorry you’ll have to tell the girls at the gym that I’m living in sin. You can slip that in while you fill their orders to replace their broken dildos.”

I stormed up the stairs, into my bedroom and launched myself into the same bed that I laid in as a scared pregnant fifteen-year-old who didn’t want to do what everyone had told her to do. At least this time, I had a choice.

“What?” I barked when someone knocked on my door. I was shocked to see my dad come in. At the same time, I was so relieved it was him. “Hey.”

“Hey, Dee Dee.” His words were easy to understand, so he wasn’t mad at me. I scooted over to make room for him at the foot of the bed. “I tried not to listen to what happened downstairs, but you didn’t make that easy.”