Chapter 13 #3
"I get that," I said softly. "Different version of the same thing. Frank Decker's daughter. Drake and Zayne's little sister. The team's PR director. Never just... Lana."
He fully turned to me then, his blue eyes serious. "I'm looking at you right now, and I don't see anything but Lana. Just so you know."
Something fluttered in my chest, a dangerous, fragile thing I wasn't ready to name. Outside, the rain had intensified to sheets of water cascading down the windshield, the wail of the wind creating a cocoon around our stillness.
In the enclosed space of the car, with rain drumming on the roof and the bridge swaying beneath us, something shifted between us, revealing vulnerable spaces beneath.
I was acutely aware of how close we were, how his hand still held mine, how his eyes had darkened to the color of the storm-tossed waters below us.
He leaned forward slightly, gaze dropping to my lips, and I didn't pull away. My heart hammered against my ribs, anticipation coiling tight within me. This wasn't for show. There were no cameras, no audience, nothing and no one to perform for. Just us, suspended above the world.
His free hand came up to brush a strand of hair from my face, his touch feather-light. "Lana," he murmured.
I couldn't speak, couldn't think, could only nod almost imperceptibly as he closed the distance between us. I felt his breath, warm against my lips, his masculine scent filling my senses. My eyes drifted closed, and my mind emptied of everything but just this moment, just this man.
A horn blast fractured the moment. In front of us, traffic had begun to move, drivers impatient to be off the bridge as the storm intensified. Cam pulled back, his expression unreadable as he released my hand and put the car in drive.
"Shit. Looks like we're moving," he said, his voice strained.
The descent from the bridge was steep and quick, the car picking up speed as we passed the wreck and followed the flow of traffic down toward solid ground.
As we descended, I felt reality crashing back in.
The weekend was over, we were heading back to work, to colleagues, to the carefully constructed fiction of our engagement that increasingly felt like everything but fiction.
The silence between us wasn't uncomfortable, exactly, but it was heavy with things unsaid. As we reached the mainland and the road flattened out, sheets of rain now falling in earnest around us, Cam finally spoke.
"I should probably take you straight to the rink, if it's okay," he said, glancing at the clock on the dashboard. "It's already 8:30, and with this rain, we won't make it back to your place and then to practice on time."
"Right," I agreed, my voice sounding strangely normal given the turmoil inside me. "I have that media training with Blackwood at eleven anyway."
He nodded, adjusting the wipers as the rain intensified. "Back to the grind."
"Back to reality," I echoed, my voice laced with dread.
As we pulled into the training facility parking lot, I felt an irrational urge to ask him to keep driving – to take us anywhere but here, where we'd have to resume our professional roles and pretend the weekend hadn't changed something fundamental between us.
Cam found a spot near the staff entrance and cut the engine, the sudden silence filling the car. Rain pounded on the roof as we sat there for a moment, neither making a move to get out.
"I'll grab the bags," he said finally.
"You don't have to… "
"I want to," he interrupted, his eyes meeting mine briefly before he pushed open his door and stepped out into the downpour.
I watched as he retrieved my luggage from the trunk, hunching his shoulders against the rain.
He was soaked within seconds, his t-shirt clinging to his torso, outlining every muscle, his hair plastered to his forehead.
When he opened my door, holding my bags in one hand and offering me the other, I didn't hesitate to take it, letting him pull me from the car into the storm.
We ran for the entrance, laughing despite ourselves as the rain drenched us completely. Inside, we stood dripping on the mat, water pooling around our feet.
"Well," I said, pushing wet hair from my face, "that was refreshing."
Cam grinned, raindrops clinging to his eyelashes. "Nothing like a brisk shower to start the day."
For a moment, we just looked at each other – wet, disheveled, and somehow more honest than we'd been in years. Then the double doors to the training area opened, and Logan appeared, already in his practice gear.
"There you are," he said, eyeing us curiously. "Sully's looking for you, Cam. Team meeting in ten." His gaze traveled from Cam's soaked form to mine, a knowing smile playing at his lips. "Welcome back, lovebirds. Good weekend?"
"The best," Cam replied, his eyes never leaving my face.
"Great," Logan said, already turning back toward the locker room.
"Hurry up, Hitman. Sully's in a mood. Something about Montreal's new defensive scheme — it's a modified neutral zone trap with a left wing lock component.
He's concerned that it's going to stop our breakouts from the zone if they clog up lanes and intercept passes. It's gonna be carry, dump, and chase."
"I'd better go," Cam said quietly once Logan had disappeared. He set my bag down next to me, hesitating. "Lana… "
"We'll talk later," I promised, though I wasn't sure what there was to say, what came next in this uncharted territory we'd wandered into.
He nodded, then impulsively leaned forward and pressed a kiss to my cheek, his lips warm against my rain-chilled skin.
"Later," he agreed, and then he was gone, striding toward the locker room, leaving me standing alone in the lobby, water dripping from my hair and my carefully chosen teal dress clinging to my skin.
I touched my cheek where his lips had been, the warmth of his kiss lingering. For years, I'd maintained careful professional boundaries, kept my heart guarded after that one night in college. But now those walls were crumbling, and I wasn't at all certain I wanted to rebuild them.
Like the storm raging outside, something had shifted between Cam and me – powerful, unpredictable, and impossible to ignore.
I'd come back from Siesta Key with more than just sand in my luggage and a fake engagement ring on my finger.
I'd returned with the unsteady realization that what had started as pretend was rapidly becoming the most real thing in my life.
And I had absolutely no idea what to do about it.