A Missing Heart (20 page)

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

SO MANY WORDS
have been exchanged over the last hour, and I’ve barely heard any of them. All I can do is watch the two of them together. Ever has Cammy’s mannerisms and a lot of her looks. I’m enamored with how amazing Cammy is with her. Regardless of the brick wall Ever has up in front of her, Cammy’s sweetness is something that even the angriest person can’t always reckon with.

I have been in this pizza shop a million times throughout my life, but none of them have felt like this. I will never look at this joint the same way again.

“I haven’t been here in years,” Cammy says, finally taking a minute to look around. “It hasn’t changed at all.”

Neither have you, Cam. “Cam—Cameron, do you remember that night we came here after junior prom?”

She tucks a loose strand of hair behind her shoulders and peers down to the table as she smiles shyly. “Yeah, I do,” she says, laughing with her breath.

“I have to use the bathroom,” Ever says, standing up and excusing herself from the table.

“Can she go by herself?” I ask Cammy, as if she’s suddenly an expert at raising a teenage girl.

They look at each other briefly, and Ever looks disturbed that I’d even suggested she couldn’t go to the restroom alone. “I think she’ll be okay,” Cammy says.

We watch Ever as she makes her way across the restaurant and into the bathroom. Once she’s inside, Cammy turns back to me and sighs heavily. “I know this is a lot right now,” she says.

“Cammy,” I pause, looking for the best way to say what I want to say.

“It’s Cameron,” she corrects me, quietly.

“I
know
what your name is,” I correct
her
. “It has been thirteen years; I’m just upset that I missed out on all of that time with her.”

“Me too,” she agrees.

“So now what?” It’s a broad question that will require a complicated answer. I’m not sure our situation could be any more challenging than it is, but it still needs a resolution.

“You know I’m a planner, AJ. I plan everything. But this, I didn’t plan for, and I feel so out of sorts right now.”

“I hear ya,” I tell her, scratching at my chin as I lean back into my seat and stretch my legs out under the table. I accidentally nudge my boot against her leg and she jumps and gasps from surprise. “Oh, I’m sorry!” I say, but I’m not really sorry. I shouldn’t want to touch her in any way I can right this second. I’m married.

“We have to make this work somehow,” she says. “Maybe we can move here for a while.” Maybe that could be the best thing ever—just a silly little dream come true that I’ve wished for throughout the years.

“Don’t you have a job and stuff?” I laugh.

“I run my own practice and hired Casper to be an associate.” I want to punch the air with my fist and tell her how fucking proud of her I am, but she’s smiling in a way that tells me she already knew I’d be thrilled to hear this.

“What about Casper, would he be up for the move?” I’m not trying to silently summon the demon away but it would make things easier for sure.

I’ve been blocking out the thought of telling Tori any of this, and I’m going to continue doing that until I get home, hoping that sometime between now and then, I figure out how to dive into my past that I have kept as hidden as hers.

I reach into my pocket and pull out my phone, searching through my pictures for a good one of Gavin. “Look,” I say, passing my phone across the table.

“Oh my gosh, he’s beautiful, AJ. He looks just like you! Some pretty dominant genes you got there, buddy,” she says, holding her gaze on my phone.

I watch as she scrolls with her finger, which is definitely the Cammy I remember, assertive and unafraid of offending. I’m guessing this is one of the many great qualities that made her into a successful attorney.

“Who’s this little doll?” She holds the phone up, with Olive’s goofy grin taking up the whole display.

“That’s Olive, Hunter’s daughter.”

“He ended up with Ellie, huh?” she asks. “She looks exactly like Ellie with that blonde hair and all those freckles.” Cammy smiles at the picture for another second and passes the phone back to me. “How is Ellie? I loved her.”

The same sensation I get every time anyone asks about Hunter and Ellie, or just Ellie, runs through my nerves, like I’ve just been wrapped up in a wet, frozen towel. “Ellie passed,” I say simply.

Cammy places her fist up against her mouth as her eyes widen. “What?” Her one word comes out muffled, in disbelief.

“During childbirth.” She wasn’t my wife or my best friend, but she was like a sister. While I don’t talk about my grief when it comes to Ellie, out of respect for the heartache Hunter lives with, it hurts like hell to mention her name or the fact that she’s gone.

Cammy hiccups and gasps for air. “Oh my God, I don’t even know what to say,” she cries.

“It’s been nine years,” I tell her.

“I had no idea,” she says.

“Life comes and goes during the blank spaces,” I say, reaching across the table for her hand. “We’re all okay. Olive is a spitfire and perfect, just like Ellie was. She is basically Ellie, so we all feel like she’s still around sometimes, you know? Besides that, Hunter is remarried to a great woman who also has a daughter, Lana, and the companionship for both Olive and Hunter has been perfect. Life for them is moving forward.”

She squeezes her fingers between mine. “I’ve been thinking of moving back here for years,” she says. “D.C. has never felt like home and I miss that feeling.”

“It’s funny, home didn’t feel like home to me for a long time. I’m not sure if it’s the location that makes a place feel like home, Cam.”

Her golden gaze is locked on mine, and I know she can read between the lines.

“I’d love to meet your wife and Gavin,” she says, pulling her hand from mine.

“And I’d love to know where our daughter went,” I say, standing from the booth, realizing Ever has been in the bathroom for at least ten minutes now. I know there are no windows to climb out of in there, but I don’t know her well enough to judge what she’d be doing in the bathroom for ten minutes.

“I was just thinking that,” Cammy says. She stands up from her seat and walks across the restaurant, strutting perfectly in her four inch heels, which shamefully, I realize makes her ass look way more perfect and mature than it once did. Cammy pokes her head into the bathroom and then walks inside.

After a short minute, the two of them come out of the bathroom and Ever looks a little different. I squint as they come closer and notice that she washed her makeup off and took some of the piercings out.

“You okay, kiddo?” I ask.

She smirks with the corner of her mouth and shrugs her shoulders as she slides back into the booth. “I figured you two needed a minute to talk,” she says.

“Ever, you don’t have to leave because of us,” Cammy says to her.

“I know you guys are probably freaked out. Having me show up must be pretty crazy, but I think I just realized how much I need to beg you both not to send me back to that crappy foster home.” Ever sits back against the bench and slouches down, folding her arms over her chest like I keep watching her do. I see the child she must have been, and I see the adult she’s avoiding becoming.

“Is that why you cleaned your face and took out some of those piercings?” I ask, and Cammy gives me a dirty look, warning me to cool it.

Instead of answering my question, Ever leans forward, takes her large, red plastic cup full of soda and drinks half of what’s in the cup.

“We’re not giving you up to anyone,” Cammy says. “We just need a plan.”

Ever looks out the window we’re sitting next to, staring out into the manicured gardens in the park area across the street, where the town gazebo sits between a mess of trees and benches. People are walking their dogs and children, and I realize most places aren’t as picture perfect as this area is seven months of the year. The other few months, with all of their snow, can just go away for all I care.

“Where did you live with your parents?” I ask. Her parents—still not getting any easier to say.

“Philadelphia, right in the city. It’s crowded and loud.” This town is the exact opposite of that. “I like it here.”

“So, I have to have a talk with Casper,” Cammy tells Ever. “And I’m sure AJ needs to have a talk with his wife, too, but we want to make things work, and maybe it would be best if that were here.”

“But your job…and you have a house,” Ever says.

“My job can move, and the house can stay there for now.” I guess when you have a lot of money, you can leave a house behind until you make a decision in life.

The waiter returns and places our pizza down in front of us, handing us each a plate. The pizza looks and smells delicious, and Ever digs in first, shoving the first slice into her mouth as if she were starving. “Looks like you haven’t had pizza in a while,” I say, watching with amazement.

“My parents wouldn’t allow anything that wasn’t gluten free into the house,” she says with a mouthful. “And this is full of delicious gluten.”

Cammy and I both laugh as we watch her chow down. “I thought you said you loved pizza?” I ask her.

“I had the school stuff sometimes,” she says, before gulping down the rest of her soda.

“That is not pizza. That’s cardboard with sauce and cheese disguised as pizza,” I correct her.

She smiles and takes another large bite. My heart has never hurt while watching someone eat, but seeing this little girl after all these years makes my heart break, as I think about all the years I missed.

I lift a piece of pizza from the metal pan and place it on Cammy’s plate before serving myself.

“AJ?” I hear from behind us.

I turn around and find—oh shit. “Hey, Tori!” Fuck! “What are you doing here, babe?”

“I—” she says, looking between me, Cammy, and Ever, “I was picking up the dry cleaning next door, and I saw you in the window.” My head has been in such a fog all morning. I didn’t consider that half of Tori’s errands occur on Main Street, right near here.

“Oh right,” I say. “Um…” I take a napkin and stand up from the table, taking Tori by the arm, over to the other side of the restaurant.

“What the hell is going on, AJ?” Considering she just found me in a pizza shop with another woman—an incredibly beautiful woman—and a teenage girl, she’s probably pretty pissed and a little confused…rightfully so.

I breathe out slowly and run my fingers through my hair. “This is going to be a lot to digest,” I tell her. This is not how I was planning to tell her. I should have told her two years ago, before we got married and had a child together. But we had our stupid ‘no past rule’ which eliminates beautiful ex-girlfriends, children that were given up for adoption, and whatever the hell makes a person have nervous breakdowns. “My past has come back into town.”

Tori crosses her arms and shifts her weight to one side, definitely more on the pissed side of things. “So what does that mean? What is she, an ex-girlfriend, wife, or something? You just decided to meet her for lunch today instead of working?”

“It’s not like that,” I tell her.

“Who’s the kid? Her sister?”

“Her daughter,” I correct.

“That’s impossible,” Tori snaps. “She must be a teenager.” I watch as Tori holds her focus on the back of Ever and Cammy’s heads.

“It’s not impossible,” I tell her.

“Okay great, so your ex-girlfriend and her daughter are in town, and you wanted to meet up. Are you bringing them home for dinner tonight too? Should I make extra?”

“Make extra dinner?” I laugh. “When’s the last time we didn’t order out?”

Tori’s eyes grow wide as if I offended her with the truth. Not that I expect her to make dinner every night, considering how busy she is with her errands and Gavin, sometimes, but this is a joke. “Actually, that’s a great idea. I’d love that. You can make one extra seat for her fiancé too.”

Tori seems to relax with the last comment. “Oh,” she says. “I can do that. I can cook. I just—I was a little surprised to see you here with a woman who looks like…that.” Her focus has not left the table I was sitting at, and I get it. I should have told her what was going on before I came to lunch, I guess. “I’ll just go finish up my errands.”

“Okay, I’ll still grab Gavin from daycare. How are you going to make dinner if you’re going to be late tonight?”

“I’ll change my plans,” she says.

“O—kay?” I say questioningly.

“That little girl is beautiful,” Tori says.

I’m staring right into Tori’s eyes now, even though she’s too busy looking at the table. My gaze holds long enough that she finally looks up at me. “Thank you,” I say.

Her head jerks back a bit. “What do you mean by that?”

I suck in my bottom lip and bite down hard before allowing the words to pour out of my mouth. “That’s my daughter, Tori.”