Chapter 20 Nadine
NADINE
It haunts me. Those three words.
I miss you.
I think of them when Camden arrives home from his road trip, looking a bit worse for wear after that hit and the travel.
I miss you.
I think of them as I play on Erik and Molly’s living room floor with Kai, making him giggle with funny faces during my day off.
I miss you.
I think of them as I head back to Camden’s penthouse, knots in my stomach at what I can expect to be our conversation, but he has an early appointment with his PT, so he only has enough time for a jut of his chin and quiet, “Morning, Riv” as he scoots out the door.
I miss you.
I think of them as he comes back after his day of practice, sitting down to have dinner with Paisley and me. We made a simple lasagna.
He loves it, helping himself to a second plate, complimenting us. Saying it’s better than what his chef makes.
Camden and I haven’t been openly hostile in a long while, but we also haven’t been this awkward. We can barely look at each other. Both of us aiming questions at Paisley so we don’t have to talk to the other. And she notices, frowning.
“What the hell?” Paisley signs, nose scrunched in disgust at each of us, in turn. “Stop being so weird.”
Then she grabs her plate and leaves us to our middle school standoff.
He sits across from me, eyes coasting everywhere but in my direction.
Like at my eighth-grade graduation dance, when I’d been so sure Toby O’Roark was going to ask me to dance. He kept finding me from the other side of the auditorium, and yet he never came over.
I wait and wait and wait for Camden to say something, but he never does.
So, I offer a subdued, “See you tomorrow,” and head home.
It’s the next morning when he already has my tea steeped and waiting for me when we both finally try.
“I wanted to ask—”
“We should—”
“You first.”
“No, you first.” I gesture. His cheekbones flush a ruddy red, and I’m right back to that dance with Toby.
“I was hoping you’d come to my game on Sunday,” he says, one hand on the counter, the other pushing the mug of my morning Earl Grey toward me.
“You want me to bring Paisley?”
He nods, motioning vaguely, and it’s cute. That he’s so nervous. None of that overconfident Camden Long I know in sight. But from the way his mouth quirks to the side, I think he likes that he has the ability to quell my attitude now and then.
“I want you to bring Paisley, yes, but I want you there,” he tells me. “I have seats saved with the other guys’ families.”
Molly attends every once in a while, but I myself have never sat in the WAGs section. Me being there for Camden would be a declaration of sorts.
Before I can agree, I revisit that text. “You missed me?”
He nods. “I always miss you.”
“An uptight bitch?”
“I have never called you a bitch,” he says with this finger in the air. “Uptight, yes. Never bitch.”
“You told me I needed to get laid.”
“It was an invitation, of sorts.”
When he shrugs, I lose the fight against my growing smile. “What about the hot tub melting my skin off?”
His eyes rove over me, and my nipples pebble beneath my bra as his gaze practically devours me whole.
“There are some things I’d like to melt off, yes, but…
” He skates his tongue over his lower lip, his teeth following before his dark eyes lift to meet mine, and they’re practically black.
“There are much better things I can think of for your skin.”
I shiver, incapable of coming up with any words to respond to his outright flirting. His sexual innuendos.
Clearly pleased with himself and his ability to make me stupid with lust, he smiles and combs his fingers into my hair, holding on to the side of my head, leaning down, his intention obvious, and I lift up, ready to meet him.
To finally taste his lips. Learn what his smile feels like against my mouth.
But Paisley stomps into the kitchen, huffing and puffing. I suppose it’s because of the big test she has today in science. She hates science. Even more than math.
And I fling myself away from Camden, even as his hands are slow to leave me, his fingers grazing my side as I turn away from him to greet his sister.
Being a Friday, he would normally take her, but he’s been doing some extra deep tissue massages after that hit aggravated some old injuries.
So it’s on me to drive her in this morning.
I motion for her to take her stuff, and I don’t bother saying goodbye to Camden.
Not able to form even the simplest of words after those confessions.
At least on his part. I was too mesmerized to tell him how I felt.
That I think I might be in love with him.
I spend the day applying to a handful of graduate programs. Because of Camden’s generosity, I have the money and time to earn my degree, so it’s only a matter of finding the best fit for me and my goals.
After that is done, I get in a workout with Brendan, who’s been a bit standoffish since the display with Camden a few weeks ago, which left him with the impression that we’re together.
Although, with what happened this morning, I can’t necessarily promise that nothing is going on.
And I don’t know how to feel about a man being so possessive over me that he’d try to physically intimidate a stranger.
I appreciate a healthy amount of jealousy.
I am not immune to it, and I have—admittedly—fantasized about poking Valerie Blondeau’s eyes out on occasion, but I’d never actually do it.
Only I’m not so sure Camden wouldn’t follow through on his threats to have Brendan fired, and isn’t that ridiculous? Immature and self-centered?
To be so protective of me that he’d been blinded to the reality of the situation.
Except as I shower off my sweat and change into jeans and a Founders hoodie, I wonder if Brendan did have some ulterior motive.
Sure, anyone might be terrified of Camden Long, but if he really wasn’t doing anything “wrong,” why is he so hands-off now?
I’ve never worked with a personal trainer before, and while Brendan is friendly, and I never got a creepy vibe from him, I suspect that if he’s suddenly afraid to touch me, maybe he shouldn’t have been doing it to begin with.
Maybe his goals weren’t all about my fitness.
And maybe I should cancel my appointments with him.
When I pick up Paisley from school, she informs me that she doesn’t think she did well on the test, but that she was invited to a friend’s house tomorrow.
I tell her she will have to talk to Camden about it.
If it’s okay with him, it’s okay with me.
I’ve been volunteering once a week at the school, mostly to help with admin work, but I put my name down on the substitute list and made friends with all of the teachers and secretaries, so it doesn’t take much for me to find out more information about this girl and her parents, and they seem like good people.
We’re only home for a few minutes before Camden shows up with a gift bag hanging from the tips of his fingers, but Paisley reroutes him immediately, asking if she can hang out with her friend.
Begging, more accurately. He flicks his gaze to me, and when I shrug, he says he wants to talk to whoever the friend lives with, and I smile to myself.
He’d been so afraid he’d fail at being Paisley’s guardian, but he’s been doing all the right things.
Giving her space to grow and try new things, while also being smart about her safety.
Paisley texts him the contact information for the girl’s parents once she has it and then flits off to her room, finally leaving Camden alone with me. And whatever is in the bag he holds out to me.
Without a word, I take it from him and whip out tissue paper to find a brand-new jersey. I barely have it lifted in front of me before he has his hand around the back of my head, forcing my eyes up to his. “If you’re sitting in my seats, I want you wearing my name and number.”
I don’t answer with words. Instead, I hop up onto my toes, throwing my arms around his neck to kiss him.
There is so much distance between us, he has to bend, stooping his shoulders, his hands cupping my face, his mouth meeting mine without hesitation.
His groan is one of relief, but when I part my lips, his tongue finds mine with a growl.
He tastes like mint gum and feels like a man deprived of the sun finally being allowed outside.
He isn’t soft or gentle. No, he is ravenous.
He tangles his tongue with mine, pulls at my lips, almost as if he’s afraid the sunshine will fade away, and he’s wrangling as much as he can now.
If I thought he was possessive before, it’s nothing on this kiss that is like he’s trying to inhale me.
His fingers spear into my hair, arms towing me to him, but when I’m as high as I can go on my toes, he lifts me up, one forearm banded across my back, the other under my butt.
I wrap my legs around his waist, and he pins me against the wall, his teeth scratching my jaw, his mouth landing on my throat, sucking and biting, and I let my head fall back with a moan. “God, Camden.”
He doesn’t stop kissing and licking at me, but he does readjust his hold, curling his giant hands around my thighs, holding me open and up like it’s nothing, and I can feel every hard inch of him between my legs, where he rubs himself against me.
“I’ve wanted you for so long,” he murmurs, breathing hard, another torturous grind over where all the blood in my body has pooled.
“River,” he whispers, almost pained, “River…”
His moan anchors me to reality and the question I’ve wanted answered for the last month.
I tunnel my fingers into his hair, gripping the short strands tightly so he can’t nibble on my ear anymore.
I tug so he shifts, his face in front of mine, eyes wide, pupils blown, cheeks flushed.
He moves, obviously wanting to go back to what he’d previously been doing, but I stop him. “Why River?”
He blinks as if coming out of a trance and slowly lowers my feet to the floor, every soft part of me sliding against every hard part of him, and it takes both of us another few moments to recover.
He plants his hands on either side of my head, and I hold on to his T-shirt, steadying myself as I ask again, “Why do you call me River?”
His Adam’s apple bobs, mouth quirking in embarrassed amusement. “I’ve been calling you that for years in my head. I didn’t even realize I started actually saying it out loud.”
He backs up an inch, enough room so that we’re not plastered against each other and I don’t have to tip my head back so far. Still, I don’t give him an out, merely patiently waiting. He shrugs, a bit sheepishly, as he finally confesses, “Your eyes. I saw you that night…”
“The engagement party?”
He nods. “Your dress was that ice-blue color. Reminded me of a frozen river. Like your eyes.”
That’s why I’d chosen it. I thought it best matched my eyes, blue with a hint of gray.
He gives his head a rueful shake, smiling, like he can’t believe he’s about to confess it, but… “I swear I’ve dreamed of your eyes for the last five years. I see them in my mind when I can’t sleep.”
“I’ve been haunting you,” I say with a laugh, and he dips his head, kissing my temple, cheek, and mouth.
“Little witch.” He goes in for another kiss, but I keep it chaste, my hands on his chest, needing time to process what we just did, what is happening. And I’m not sure if we want his sister walking in on us by accident.
When I relay all of this to him, he nods in agreement but hesitates to step away from me. His gaze tracks over me, heated and longing, and it does nothing to cool my own temperature, calm the racing of my heart, or stop the tingling in my core.
“I should try to call this girl’s parents, huh?” he says, referring to Paisley’s friend. Still, he stays in place.
“I should go home, finish writing my essay.”
“Essay?”
“Some of the programs I’m applying to need an essay.”
He clasps my face between his bear paws. “I’m so proud of you. More than anything else, I’m so goddamn proud of you for doing what you want. For not giving up.”
I cover his hands with my own, nuzzling into him with a smile. “I’m proud of you too. For proving all those motherfuckers wrong.”
He chuckles softly. “I lo—ike you.”
I swallow the sudden boulder in my throat, voice paper-thin. “I really like you too.”
But it’s more than that. I know he wanted to say more than that.
I feel more than that.
But not yet.
There is still so much to talk about, to think through, and we can’t say it yet.
So he walks me to the door, offers me a sweet kiss on my mouth along with a caress of my cheek and waves as I step onto the elevator, both of us holding each other’s gaze until the doors close.