30. Ivy
IVY
J ust like the first time I showed up at the studio uninvited, unease crawls up my spine and tightens around it, making my hand shake where it grasps the massive metal door.
It grinds along the old track as I tug it open.
The piercing sound makes me wince.
Tonight, there isn’t any music playing to absorb the noise.
Absolute deathly silence clings to the studio, making it feel lifeless, like stepping into a tomb instead of the vibrant life that pulsated in it two nights ago.
Goosebumps spread across my skin.
The familiar scent of fresh paint fills the air, and a blank canvas lies on a tarp on the floor in his work area. Brushes and trays of black and white acrylic sit beside it, ready to be used—all completely untouched.
Almost like he got interrupted before he could even begin…
Considering he promised to stop by after his meeting tonight, I wouldn’t have expected him to come to the studio at all, but given how shaken he seems after his meetings sometimes, maybe he needed to blow off some steam this way.
But I can’t deny I’m worried about him.
Last night, he seemed so tormented by his guilt. As if being in my house, even with my assurances, was weighing far too heavily on him.
Which is why I made the drive across town again to check on him tonight, even when I probably should have given him some space to sort through his conflicting emotions.
I just can’t seem to stay away.
Drawn like a moth to a flame.
And that’s what Cam is—a dangerously beautiful inferno that burns brilliantly bright but will also consume all the oxygen and sear your soul.
Why else would I be here except that, for some reason, I like the exquisite pain. I crave it. It’s so much easier to live with than the crushing agony of living alone without Drew.
“Camden?”
His name echoes off the high ceilings and metal beams as I take a second step in with my heart in my throat.
The soft clink of glass hitting the floor hard draws my attention to the far-left corner of the loft, near where the windows overlook the street.
Cam sits shirtless with his back to the brick wall, skin brushing against the rough material, knees up, bare feet planted on the floor, a bottle of whiskey dangling from his fingertips.
A needle and a packet of something that makes my stomach turn sit a few feet away from him, next to his lighter and cigarettes.
All well within reach.
With his head dropped down, thick, dark hair tumbling across his face, I can’t get a good look at his eyes.
But I don’t need to see his face to understand the gravity of the situation.
Oh, shit…
My heart plummets into my churning stomach, my steps faltering. “Cam?”
Slowly, he lifts his head, and his red-rimmed eyes meet mine. Shadowy circles sit under them, tear stains running down his cheeks.
Bile threatens to gag me, and I force it down, trying to process what’s happening without losing my shit. Because that’s what he looks like at the moment, as if his entire world has imploded with him inside it, crushing him under the cataclysmic weight.
He doesn’t say a word, just lifts the bottle to his lips and takes a long pull from it. Watching the amber liquid disappear slashes at my heart like a knife, flaying away parts of it as I watch him drink away his hard-won sobriety.
My eyes shift to the drugs on the floor near him, but I can’t tell from here if he actually used them yet.
Fuck .
I move in cautiously, keeping my gaze locked on him, afraid that if I look away, he’s going to drown in that bottle or pick up the needle and do something very stupid.
“Cam, what’s wrong?”
Something drove him to this .
After over a year of not touching drugs or consuming any alcohol, I can smell it now, that sweet and spicy scent mixing with that of the paint and desperation clinging to him.
And it is desperation I’m seeing.
He looks utterly destroyed .
This isn’t the same man who left my house last night with a sexy grin on his face and promises to see me tonight after his meeting.
This is someone completely different.
This is the Cam he warned me about.
One corner of his mouth twitches slightly, but there’s absolutely no humor in the half-smile he gives me.
And he doesn’t answer my question, just uses his free hand to motion absently to a small, partially crushed box open on the floor in front of him that I can’t see into from my position barely inside the door.
I narrow my eyes on it as I approach. “What is that?”
He swallows another gulp of his liquor and watches me warily. “It came in the mail. Apparently, the reroute from my place in London took a while because it got lost along the way somewhere, stuck in some facility. They finally delivered it today…”
The unsteady waver in his voice makes my chest tighten even more.
What the fuck could it be?
I finally make it over to the box, and this close to Cam, I can see just how awful he really looks. Not only do tears streak down his cheeks, but his bottom lip trembles as he raises the bottle to it again, red, hooded eyes glossy and unfocused.
He’s drunk…
“Cam…” I lower myself to my knees in front of the box and pull out the only thing inside it—an old GI Joe action figure. Turning it over in my hand, I glance back up at him. “I don’t understand.”
He motions toward it with the bottle. “It was my father’s.”
I stiffen, the seemingly innocuous item in my hand suddenly taking on a whole new importance. “Where did it come from?”
That sad tilt returns to his lips, and he drags the bottle back to his mouth and takes a long sip from it, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallows while staring at the doll. Then his gaze finally lifts to meet mine again. “Who do you think?”
My breath catches, and I flip the front panels on the box down to check the return address.
Drew’s handwriting.
Our address.
Addressed to Camden Usher at his place in London, with one of those stupid little stickers stuck to it saying, “We Care,” and explaining that the package got lost and was damaged.
One side of the box is smashed in, but the toy appears unharmed—old, well-loved, but intact.
“Drew sent this to you?”
He nods and takes another sip. “It’s what I was looking for in those boxes in his office…”
I watch him gulp from the half-full bottle, my concern for him mixing with the complete confusion over what’s happening. “But…it wasn’t there because he had already sent it to you?”
Cam swipes the back of his hand over his mouth. “Yeah. Look at the postmark.”
With a trembling hand, I flip the top flap on the box again, examining the other corner. It takes a moment for the date to register. “It was mailed the same day as our wedding invitations…”
Which I only know because I sent them six months to the day of our wedding.
Cam nods slowly. “Yep.”
I shake my head. “I never knew he sent this. I took care of everything with the invitations?—”
His brows rise, his shoulders tensing against the brick. “ You sent them?”
I nod. “Yeah.”
A humorless laugh, heavy with the liquor already affecting him, slips from his lips. “Did he know you sent one to me ?”
My back immediately stiffens, a vise tightening around my chest. I chew on my bottom lip and try to gauge how to answer it without upsetting him.
What does he want me to say?
What answer will stop whatever is happening right now from escalating?
Cam is clearly walking a tightrope and seems perilously close to falling from it—if he hasn’t already. Considering how much he already drank from that bottle, one foot is definitely off.
He watches me carefully, waiting for my response, his chest not moving as if he’s holding his breath.
It may not be the right thing to do in this situation, but I tell him the truth.
“No, he didn’t.” I brace myself for a reaction from him, but he sits motionless, blurry eyes locked on me.
“I thought maybe if you got the invitation, if it looked like he was reaching out to you, you’d come. You guys would reconnect…”
And now I realize how na?ve that was because I didn’t understand what had forced the rift between them in the first place.
“Fuck.” Cam drops his head back against the brick and releases a sardonic laugh, scrubbing his hand over his stubbled cheek as he stares at the ceiling.
“I thought he sent it to me and was gloating”—he tilts his head, his eyes meeting mine—“about marrying you. I thought it was a ‘fuck you’ from him rubbing it in that he won .”
“Jesus, Cam…”
His confession twists the knife in my heart, driving it in even deeper.
He gives me a little half-smile again and takes a sip.
The lower the level of bourbon drops in that bottle, the harder it is for me not to walk right over there and snatch it from his hands.
But the way he’s shaking, I don’t want to do anything that might make things worse, that might push him off that thin wire currently tethering him to whatever reality might still exist for him to stand on.
“I don’t understand the GI Joe, Cam. Why would he send this to you? Why are you so?—”
He holds up his hand to stop me, the sadness seeping into his gaze so heavy I physically feel it in my gut.
“It’s a peace offering. It was one.” One of his shoulders rises and falls, but the motion is strained, as if any movement is too much for him right now.
“My best guess is that when you two were going over the guest list and you were handling all the invitations, he had the same idea you did, to reach out to me. But this ”—he motions toward the box the toy came in—“was his way of doing it…”
With an action figure?
The alcohol must be messing with Cam because he isn’t making any sense. I stare at the doll, trying to grasp what he’s telling me, but Drew never mentioned a GI Joe.
He never told me he reached out to Cam.
None of it.
Just more secrets he kept.