Chapter 39 Lila
Chapter thirty-nine
Lila
The city slides past the tinted windows like a movie I’ve already seen and don’t need to watch again.
Inside the car, it’s quiet.
Not the old quiet.
Not the kind that feels like a room full of broken glass and one wrong breath away from bleeding.
This quiet is warm.
Cam sits beside me, close enough that our knees brush when the car shifts lanes.
My fingers are still curled in the sleeve of his jacket around my shoulders. It smells like him. Clean soap. A hint of cologne. The kind of comfort that makes my body soften before my brain can argue.
Every few minutes, I catch him looking at me.
Not staring.
Checking.
As if he’s still making sure I didn’t vanish into the noise.
I keep my eyes forward, but the corner of my mouth keeps betraying me. A small smile that won’t stop showing up, like my face forgot how to be guarded.
When we reach the building, Manny is there. He gives Cam a look that says one mistake and I bite.
Then he gives me a look that says I’m here, if you wobble.
I love him for that.
We ride the elevator up. The doors open, and the penthouse greets me like it’s been waiting.
I pause in the doorway.
It looks the same. White couch. Glass walls. City lights like scattered jewelry. Everything polished, expensive, curated.
But it feels different.
Lighter somehow.
Cam steps in behind me and closes the door gently.
The click is quiet.
Final.
His hand lingers on the handle a second, like he’s making a decision with it. Then he turns toward me.
I’m still wrapped in his jacket. Still warm from the stage lights and the adrenaline and the fact that he said wife into a stadium full of strangers.
We stand there for a beat, looking at each other like two people holding something fragile and enormous.
Then we move.
No big plan. No discussion. Just gravity.
We end up on the couch. Me first, cross-legged, tucking my feet under me. Cam sits forward, forearms on his knees, shoulders wide, posture protective without trying.
I twist the cuff of his jacket sleeve around my fingers until the fabric creases.
My voice comes out small.
“I thought I lost you,” I whisper. “That night we fought… I thought I ruined everything.”
Cam’s head dips. He stares at the floor for a second like he’s reading something there.
“I thought I ruined everything,” he says.
Cam’s mouth twitches. Not quite a smile. Almost.
“This whole time…” My fingers keep twisting. “I kept waiting for you to turn out like my ex.”
Cam’s jaw tightens. His eyes flick up, sharp, then soften when he sees my face.
“To cheat,” I continue, forcing the words out before they can rot inside me. “To walk away.”
Cam’s hands flex once on his knees. Controlled. Contained. Like there’s a tackle happening in his chest and he’s refusing to go down.
“So you pushed me away first,” he says quietly.
It isn’t accusation. It’s understanding. Which somehow feels worse and better at the same time.
“I didn’t want to,” I say, shoulders lifting in a helpless half-shrug. I can hear the embarrassment in my own voice. I hate it. “But fear got loud.”
Cam nods once.
Slow.
Steady.
“I can understand that,” he murmurs. “I was afraid too.”
I blink hard.
Because I didn’t expect him to give me that.
Most men want to be the hero in the story. They want my fear to be a problem they solve, not a thing they admit they also have.
Cam’s gaze drops again, and I brace for him to stop there. To retreat. To lock the door on his heart the way he usually does.
But tonight… something in him is different.
Something loosened on that stage. Something unlatched.
“I pushed you away too,” he says.
My breath catches.
“The lawsuit, that wasn’t the first issue I’ve had with women,” he continues, voice low. “Usually they only want to be with me for the attention. Money. Benefits.”
He says it like he’s reciting facts he’s had to memorize for survival.
“And when the shine wears off,” he adds, “I get left behind.”
My chest aches.
Because I know that feeling, just from the other side.
Being wanted for the surface. Dropped when you have needs.
Cam’s fingers curl and uncurl once, like he’s fighting the urge to clench.
“So when things got complicated with you,” he says, “every insecurity I had lit up. I told myself you’d drop me the second the PR stopped being useful.”
I stare at him.
My throat tightens.
“Cam,” I whisper. “I never wanted you for PR.”
He lets out a small, humorless laugh. It’s not bitter. It’s tired.
“I know that now,” he says.
I reach out before I can overthink it. Hesitant. Slow. Like I’m approaching a wild animal that might bolt if I move too fast.
My fingertips land on the back of his hand.
His hand turns under mine, meeting me. Warm skin. Solid. A quiet acceptance.
We shift closer without thinking.
The walls between us feel thinner, like heat dissolving ice.
“I don’t want fear running my life anymore,” I say. My voice steadies as I speak. “Or running us.”
Cam looks at me with something warm and devastating in his eyes.
“Then we stop running,” he says.
It’s so simple it almost makes me laugh.
“We can choose each other?” I whisper. “That seems so easy.”
It feels naive to say it out loud.
Cam nods once.
Slow.
Certain.
“Every time,” he says.
Something in my chest unclenches. A knot I didn’t realize I’d been carrying loosens.
I lean forward until my forehead rests against his. The contact is gentle, but it steadies me like a hand on my back.
His hand rises to cradle my cheek.
So careful.
Like he knows exactly how fragile I am in this moment and refuses to treat it like spectacle.
There are no contracts here.
No cameras.
No expectations.
Just us, finally unburied.
I pull back slightly, breath trembling. My heart is fluttering like it’s trying to learn how to beat in a safer rhythm.
“There’s something I want to share,” I say.
Nerves spark under my skin. Not stage nerves. Not performance nerves.
The kind that says this is real and you can lose it.
Cam’s brows lift.
I start by humming the melody. A line of music that has lived in my chest for weeks, crowded out by fear, finally getting air.
“A new song?” he asks.
I nod.
I start to sing the first few tentative lines.
Cam goes still.
The room feels smaller. Safer. Like the city outside can’t reach us up here.
When I finish the small piece I dare to share, that warm silence pools between us for a moment.
Cam’s eyes soften.
“Lila,” he whispers, like the name itself is a touch. “That sounds like… love.”
My heart flutters wildly.
I lift my eyes to his, smiling through tears.
“Yeah,” I whisper.
My voice is steady.
“It is.”