15. Cameron
I had one shot at this, and I was damn lucky I was being given that. If anything went wrong tonight, I wouldn’t be surprised if Ava kicked me out of her life for good. There’d be no more giving her shit. No more seeing that smile. No more seeing her eyes melt when I stepped within three feet of her.
I’d have nothing.
Which meant I really needed to not screw this up. Considering how I’d handled pretty much every interaction with her since I was eighteen, I wasn’t feeling all that confident.
Except, like she always seemed to do, Ava surprised the hell out of me by stepping out onto her front porch as my truck pulled into her driveway. She had a soft, timid smile on her face that became more nervous when she bit her bottom lip. She had a glass of what looked like wine in one hand, and she leaned a shoulder against one of the pillars at the edge of her porch.
Fuck. She looked as excited and terrified as I felt inside. I could do this. I could finally step up and be the man she needed.
I climbed out of my truck and opened the door to the back seat of the cab when she called out, “Need any help carrying things in?”
I leaned back around the edge of the door. “I got it. Thanks.”
She smiled, nodded, and stayed right where she was as I grabbed the bags and hauled them up to her. Stepping back, she opened her door and then held it for me as I entered.
A massive change to her home made me pause when I was in the process of slipping out of my shoes. “Your furniture came.”
“Got the call as I was coming back from the creek. Perfect timing.”
“Looks good.”
It was a cream-colored couch, with one end that had a lounge chair and more cushions without the backing. Chaise? Is that what they were called?
Whatever. I kicked out of my shoes and stepped further inside so she could close the door behind me.
“What’d you bring to cook?”
“Chicken and dumplings.”
I kept walking into her kitchen, but based on the quiet—nothing coming from behind me—she hadn’t moved.
“That’s my favorite meal,” she finally said, and her voice sounded strained.
“I know. Called your mom to get the recipe so I could make sure to grab everything.”
“You called my mom?” Yeah, pretty sure that was panic making her sound a little shrieky.
“Calm.” I turned to her and smiled. “Told her Emily wants to try some new recipes, and she texted me. She doesn’t know I’m here.”
“Yet,” Ava muttered.
Ouch. Okay, she was right. People would know. I didn’t know who the neighbors were, but guaranteed if they saw me, they’d know me. I wouldn’t make her go out in public with me on a date until she was comfortable, but I wasn’t going to hide either.
“Ava.” I waited until she was looking at me. “Letting me be here tonight, having dinner with me, isn’t a mistake.”
“Yeah, well, I’m not always known for my smartest decisions.”
“Don’t,” I warned her. “One, don’t talk about yourself like that, and don’t say shit unless you’re sure you mean them.”
I wasn’t even trying to be an ass, and it still felt like I was. I earned her mistrust. I’d take her pain.
“You’re right.” She sighed and took a sip of her drink. “I’m sorry. I’m nervous and I’m scared and I’m not sure this is the best thing, though. So you have to be at least a little bit patient.”
I paused from where I’d started pulling groceries out of the bag and braced my hands on her narrow island. “How about this? I’ll make you a deal if it helps.”
“What’s that?”
“I won’t kiss you, I won’t even touch you until you ask. Until you’re ready.”
She huffed, but a smile cracked on her pale face. “You don’t mean that.”
“It’ll be difficult as hell, but I’ll do whatever you need me to do to earn your trust. Make this easier.”
“Hmm.” She sipped her drink and set the glass down on the counter. A blush crept up her throat as she thought. Considered.
Hopefully she was thinking of how hard that would actually be and if she could do it. Wait. Keep her hands off me. Ask for it. For me, it was going to be as painful as getting sacked with the full weight of a three-hundred-pound defensive tackle.
“Deal,” she finally said.
I held out my hand.
She smirked. “You said no touching.”
I rolled my eyes. “Fine, smart-ass. Do you need the recipe for this dish, or do you know it?”
“I’ve known it by heart since I was twelve.”
“Then I guess that means you’re leading this dinner-making plan.”
Ava chuckled, and it was so easy, so light, it felt like it was all those years ago when things were like that between easy.
The chicken and vegetables made the house smell like heaven. Ava and I worked together, mostly with her handing me vegetables to chop while she took care of the chicken and everything else.
Now she was working on the salad while I was stirring up the dumpling batter. There hadn’t been a lot of talking while we worked, outside the cooking instructions. While I didn’t mind cooking and had been doing a lot more of it since I moved out of Caleb’s house and no longer had Raul, his personal chef, cooking for me, doing it with someone who enjoyed it made the entire process a hell of a lot more fun.
Ava turned and lifted the lid on the stove. Steam wafted up. She turned down the heat. “How are the dumplings?”
“All mixed.” I tipped the bowl in her direction.
“Perfect. Do you want to scoop and dump, or do you want me to do it?”
“Scoop and dump?”
She grinned, that same easy grin she’d done earlier. The one I always used to get all those years ago and hadn’t seen much of in years. It was a metal-dipped dart to my gut every time I saw it. All the time I’d made us lose…
“Cameron?”
I yanked my gaze off her mouth and up to her eyes. Confusion wrinkled her brows.
“You okay?”
“Thinking about how much I missed that smile of yours.” I bumped her out of the way of the stove. “I’ll scoop and dump.”
I had no idea what look she’d give me for admitting that, but I wasn’t ready to see the hurt in her eyes again.
Figuring it was exactly what she made it sound like, I scooped some of the dumpling batter onto the mixing spoon and dumped it in.
As soon as I was done, she replaced the lid. “That’s it. Now we wait a few minutes while the dumplings cook, and we’re done.”
“Can I refill your drink?”
She’d had a glass of wine in her hand when I arrived, but none since we started cooking.
“Sure. There’s drinks in the fridge too if you want something.”
I needed to get up early and get back to Denver early in the morning, so I forewent the beer she had in the fridge.
Beer she would have bought for me, because on the times Ava drank beer, she always chose something American and light, and the only beer she had in the fridge was Guinness, my personal favorite.
While I refilled her wineglass, she loaded the dishes.
Her table had placemats set out, but nothing else on it. “Want me to set the table?”
“We can eat in front of the TV.”
“And watch Pitch Perfect?” I asked. Years ago, it’d been her favorite movie. Isaiah had spent an entire year calling her a pitch afterward instead of a bitch.
A heavy silence followed, and I looked up.
Ava stood opposite the island from me, with the glass of wine in her hand and a sad look written all over her.
“What?” I asked.
“You don’t have to do this.”
“Do what?”
“Be so obvious with letting me know you know all my favorite things. The dinner”—she waved her hand toward the stove—”the movies. I get we’ve known each other for a long time.”
I hadn’t been choosing her favorite things to prove a point, at least not intentionally. “Point made.” I nodded. “But the movie suggestion wasn’t because it’s your favorite.”
“No?” One brow arched. “You’ve become a Pitch Perfect fan in the last twelve years?”
The fact she knew exactly how long that movie had been out made me grin.
“No. But see, seventeen-year-old me has a very vivid memory of the night you and Meredith forced us to watch it on the projection screen in my backyard, dressed in your pink and white bikini, and I spent all night, thanking God it was dark so no one could see my hard dick every time I caught sight of you leaning down to grab your popcorn, and your tits jiggled.”
Her face flushed as I spoke. I twisted so she couldn’t see the boner I was growing at the mere idea of that memory.
She sputtered, licked her lips, and finally said, “That is a very specific memory.”
She was still gaping at me. Not turning around or telling me to knock it off. It was the opposite. Her grip on her glass tightened, and her thighs pressed together. Yeah, this was turning her on. I needed to change the conversation before I embarrassed myself.
Except the way she was looking at me, pupils blown and licking her lips, I couldn’t. I pushed. It was what I did.
“Wanna know how many times I thought of that? When I was alone? Hard and aching in my bed, especially when I was away at school?”
She pressed a hand to her counter, and I enjoyed, far too much, the way her knees weakened. “You said we’d go slow.”
I leaned forward. “I said I’d be patient. And I said I wouldn’t touch you or kiss you until you asked. I’m not doing either, and I never promised not to use my words to tell you exactly how I felt about you or all the times I thought about you.”
“Right,” she rasped and closed her eyes. She squeezed them tight, like she was trying to wipe the image of me wrapping my hand around my cock and jerking off to the thought of her out of her mind. “You’re not being much of a gentleman then.”
I scoffed. Was she kidding? “When it comes to you, there’s absolutely nothing gentlemanly about what I think. In fact, it’s downright filthy.”
“Jesus,” she said, choking on a laugh. “I can’t believe you’re saying this stuff.” She gulped her wine and turned to grab more, but she stood frozen in front of her open fridge for far too long.
I’d give her a break. Let her cool off.
Something hissed and sizzled on the stove, and she still didn’t move.
“Ava?”
“Yeah?” She opened her eyes. Pupils were still blown, and her eyes had a hazy hue to them. God, it was like that night I had her in my bed after she came all over my fingers.
I grinned, and I had to have a feral look on my face because I sure felt like a goddamn animal. “Dinner’s ready.”