Chapter 21
CAM
FIVE DAYS LATER
PLEASE.
Six letters.
One simple word that says a thousand.
How long did it take her to get the nerve to send the text?
Minutes…
Hours…
Days…
How long has she sat there, staring at the screen, finger hovering over the send button?
It’s been a week since I made that promise to her again.
A week since I saw her.
Since I touched her.
Since I tasted her.
And every moment since then, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it.
The look in her eyes when she asked me to do it. The plea in her voice. The way her body trembled under my touch and how she came apart on my tongue. The wash of her release coating my mouth and filling me with an ecstasy I had no right to feel.
I’ve obsessed over what happened with her, and after my talk with Dale, I’ve put all that angst and uncertainty onto the canvases that now line the walls of the studio.
Images that depict not just her pain—that I was so adamant I didn’t want to show—but the raw beauty I saw in it and in her as she fought to stay above water and avoid drowning in her misery. As she asked for my help and accepted it.
Has she been thinking about it this entire time?
Considering taking me up on my offer?
How many times did she press the keys, then delete, only to retype it again?
Likely as many as I’ve started the car and thrown it into drive to head back home tonight, only to lose the nerve, put it in park, and shut it off again just to sit and stare at her house.
I move my hand to the ignition button to start the car, to do what I should have that night. When she opened that door and I stood there in the rain, in the gloom of the storm that had surrounded the house without that damn porch light, I should have walked away.
But as soon as I saw her face…the moment I witnessed how the same dark cloud that consumed me was swallowing her whole, I couldn’t leave.
I couldn’t let her wither and die with him.
That same need to save her, to offer her anything that might keep her afloat in the raging tempest I have made her reality finally forces me to ignore Dale’s warnings.
To pull my hand back from the ignition.
To open the door.
To take that first step across the pavement toward the house.
It is what pushes me up the front walk and to the porch and makes me knock.
I can’t use my key tonight.
I can’t just let myself in like I have so many other times.
Not for this.
Ivy doesn’t answer, and maybe it’s a sign I should turn around and go. But my phone dings, and I pull it out of my pocket and find a message from her.
Come in
Those two little words, coupled with the one she sent earlier, are enough to shatter any resolve I have left to walk away before this goes any further.
I made her a promise.
One I intend to fulfill.
My whole body vibrates in anticipation as I step inside, the thought of why she asked me to come over making every nerve in my body tingle while simultaneously causing my conscience to recoil.
Don’t do this, Cam…
She may want it now, but she’ll regret it later.
That little devil on my shoulder whispers louder the farther I move in, trying to drown out any thought about why this is so wrong and all those reasons Dale gave me only a handful of days ago.
Give her what you both want…
I shake my head, trying to stop the warring voices, but they’re both still there as I make my way back to the bedroom.
Their bedroom.
Their bed.
So many things I swore would never happen, that I fought so hard to keep from coming to fruition, have slowly occurred over time. Promises to myself broken due to my own weaknesses and failures and through Ivy’s persistent presence in my head.
Before I step in, I take a fortifying breath, but all that does is drag her scent into my lungs, making my cock stir to life before I’ve even seen her.
Get your shit together.
I’m not sure which voice is saying that—the one that wants me to leave or the one that wants me to fulfill my promise to her.
A promise I never should have made, because giving her what she wants now will only grow into something more complicated later, and we both know it.
This cosmic pull that seems intent on bringing us together over and over again doesn’t seem to care about the fallout.
And right now, neither does Ivy.
Maybe I don’t, either.
I make it to the door and find her lying on the bed, facing me.
She doesn’t say a word, just watches me as I step in and cautiously approach. Her gaze rakes over me—hot, needy, begging without saying a word for the very thing I swore I would give her if she ever asked.
Relief.
From all the turmoil I’ve brought into her life.
From all the agony she’s suffering.
I’m the last person who should be giving it to her. The last person who has any right to touch her and love her the way she’s asking, but I also can’t say no to this woman.
Not when I see her in distress.
Not when there’s something I can do about it.
I stop at the edge of the bed, my knees bumping against the mattress, and her eyes sweep up to meet mine. She holds out a hand to me silently, and I look at it for a moment.
Her delicate, slender fingers with short nails that won’t get in the way of her work, digging around in the dirt and caring for all the plants at her shop. They look so soft reaching out for me, something that could never cause pain, that will only bring comfort and pleasure.
The way they curl slightly in offering, asking me to join her without a word, is enough to end that battle in my head.
Fuck…
I slide my palm along hers, clasping it firmly as I climb onto the bed, my knees sinking into the mattress as she rolls onto her back, tugging me with her.
Her hand tightens around mine as I settle in next to her on my side, bracing myself up on my elbow.
She loops our fingers together, dragging my arm across her expanding belly until I’m draped over her, gazing down at the face I’ve painted countless times.
Drinking her in.
Examining every feature that I know so well, that I dream about every night and fantasize about every day, to ensure she knows what she’s doing and what she’s asking for.
And her eyes are clear tonight.
No darkness rimming them that would reveal her tears.
No hesitation in the way they meet mine.
Her lips part subtly, a little breath floating out that doesn’t sound at all concerned about the fact that she called me over here to get her off when we both know I should stay far away.
I run my fingers through her thick, dark hair. So soft. Smelling of honeysuckle and hope, a combination that always completely undoes me.
She holds my gaze for a few moments in the dark, but even without the lights on and only a thin sliver of moonlight filtering in from the window, it’s clear there isn’t any reservation there.
Just a burning need I’ve seen before.
Including that night that changed everything.
Ivy lured me in then with her sweetness, her innocence, her pure light that seemed to radiate from her across the yard, through the swaying branches of that willow tree. And once I spoke with her, once I saw her smile and heard that voice, I knew there was no hope for me to walk away that night.
There isn’t now, either.
And she sees it.
Ivy lifts herself slightly to capture my mouth with hers.
The simple press of her lips after all this time ignites a fire deep inside me.
One I’ve tried so hard to put out over the last four years.
That burning need for her, the bone-deep, searing desire to give this woman anything and everything, to possess her, to consume her the way flames do everything in their path, to make her come apart in my arms and on my cock.
And that voice that only moments ago was telling me I shouldn’t be doing this, that warned me that this is just another step back in my recovery by giving in to my addiction to her, that screams at me that she’s the worst kind of drug a man like me could ever get a taste of, it silences as her tongue sweeps along mine and I get my taste of her.
She presses her hand to my chest, directly over my rapidly beating heart, her fingers clenching the fabric tightly.
I groan against her lips, and she issues a little needy moan, trying to press closer, but her growing belly prevents her from getting me where she wants me.
A whimper of frustration falls from her mouth into mine, but it acts as a momentary reminder that what we’re doing isn’t good for either of us.
Ivy is using me to ease her pain.
I’m using her to fuel my addiction.
I tear my mouth from hers, searching her face for any reservation that could end this right now. “Are you sure this is what you want, Ivy?”
Because one word is all it would take to stop this. To end this madness. To give us time to come to our senses instead of giving in to something that has only ever led to misery.
But instead of offering me that word, she nods, a frantic pant slipping from her lips. “Yes…”
That’s probably her hormones talking.
Everything I’ve read in the pregnancy and baby books I’ve spent hours going through since I found out about this baby tells me some women get incredibly hot during certain parts of their pregnancies.
It would certainly explain how easily she’s overlooking how much she hates me in order to get this.
It would explain why she can look at me and not just see the man who stole Drew from her.
But that doesn’t mean I won’t give it to her.
She might want this, might need it, in the moment, but I know she’ll regret it in the morning.
She’ll regret that she gave in to the hormones and the loneliness.
She’ll regret that she let me touch her like this.
She’ll regret the emotional fallout, just like I imagine she did last week when I walked out of here and left her in the shower.
There’s nothing I can do about that.
There’s nothing I can do to change how things worked out between us.
But at least I can give her a few hours away from those thoughts that plague her, from the agony that consumes her—and me.