7. Camille
— ? —
Camille
The silence after Alexis leaves feels heavy, thick with everything that just happened.
Nathan’s arms are still wrapped around me, solid and warm, and I let myself lean into him for a long moment before pulling back. My hands are still shaking. My whole body feels wrung out, like I’ve just run a marathon I didn’t train for.
“I need a drink,” I manage.
“I’ll get it.”
He disappears into the kitchen and comes back with two glasses of whiskey, pressing one into my trembling hands. We sink onto the couch together, and for a while, neither of us says anything. We just sit there, shoulder to shoulder, processing.
“She actually blamed me.” The words come out hollow. “She stood on my doorstep, pregnant with my husband’s baby, and she blamed me for him cheating.”
“That’s what people like her do.” Nathan’s voice is rough with barely contained anger. “They rewrite history until they’re the victim. Until their choices are someone else’s fault.”
“He told her I was cold. That I never wanted sex.” A bitter laugh escapes me. “I wanted sex. I wanted intimacy. I wanted my husband to look at me like I was something other than furniture. But every time I tried to initiate, he had an excuse. Tired. Stressed. Not in the mood.”
“Because he was getting it somewhere else.”
“Apparently.” I take a long swallow of whiskey, letting it burn.
“The really fucked up part? I believed him. When things weren’t working, I thought it was me.
I bought lingerie he never saw. I tried to plan romantic weekends he always canceled.
I spent months wondering what was wrong with me, why I couldn’t make my husband want me. ”
Nathan sets down his glass and turns to face me fully. Those gray eyes are intense, burning with something that makes my breath catch.
“There is nothing wrong with you.” Each word lands like a stone.
“Not one goddamn thing. You’re beautiful.
You’re brilliant. You’re the kind of woman men write poetry about and start wars over.
And if Jared was too stupid to see that, too weak to appreciate what he had, that’s his failure. Not yours.”
“Nathan-”
“I’m serious, Camille.” He reaches out, his thumb tracing along my jaw with devastating gentleness. “You want to know what I thought, every single time I saw you at one of those dinner parties? Every time you walked into a room wearing some dress that made it hard to breathe?”
My heart is pounding. “What?”
“I thought about how unfair it was. That you belonged to someone who didn’t deserve you. That I had to sit across the table and make small talk while he ignored you, while he checked his phone instead of looking at you, while he treated you like an accessory instead of a partner.”
His hand slides into my hair, cradling the back of my head.
“I thought about what I would do differently. How I would never let you doubt for a single second that you were wanted. How I would worship every inch of you until you forgot anyone else had ever touched you.”
The air between us has changed, charged with electricity and promise.
“So don’t you ever,” he continues, his voice dropping to a growl, “let me hear you wonder what’s wrong with you again. The only thing wrong was him. And he’s going to spend the next seven years in prison, remembering what he threw away.”
I’m crying again, but these tears feel different. Not grief. Not anger. Something closer to relief, the kind that comes from finally, finally being seen.
“Stay tonight,” I whisper before I can talk myself out of it. “Not just on the couch. Stay.”
Nathan’s breath catches. His hand tightens in my hair.
“Are you sure?” His voice is strained, like he’s holding himself back by a thread. “Because if I stay, Camille - if I come to your bed - I’m not going to be able to pretend this is casual. I’m not going to be able to act like you’re just someone I’m sleeping with.”
“I don’t want casual.”
“What do you want?”
“You.” The word comes out steady. Certain. “I want you, Nathan. All of you. Whatever this is, wherever it’s going - I want it.”
Something shifts in his expression. The restraint he’s been holding onto dissolves, replaced by a hunger that makes my thighs clench.
“Then take me to your bedroom.”
***
The walk down the hallway feels endless. Every step heightens the anticipation building in my blood, the awareness of Nathan behind me, his body heat, his presence, the weight of everything we’re about to do.
My bedroom still has traces of Jared in it. A book he never finished on the nightstand. A photo of us on the dresser that I keep meaning to throw away. But when Nathan steps inside and looks at me - only at me - none of that matters.
“Come here.”
It’s not a request.
I go to him, and his hands find my waist, pulling me close. For a moment he just holds me there, foreheads touching, breath mingling, the moment stretched tight with want.
“I’ve imagined this,” he murmurs. “More times than I should admit.”
“What did you imagine?”
A low laugh rumbles in his chest. “Everything. But we’ll start slow.”
His mouth finds mine, and the kiss is different from the ones that came before. Those were testing, exploring. This one claims. His tongue slides against mine as his hands roam down my back, over the curve of my ass, pulling my hips flush against his.
The evidence of his arousal presses against my stomach, hard, insistent, impossibly hot even through layers of clothes. A moan escapes me before I can stop it.
“That sound,” he growls against my lips. “I want to hear that sound a hundred more times tonight.”
His fingers find the hem of my shirt, and then it’s gone, tossed somewhere behind us. My bra follows. When the cool air hits my bare skin, I shiver, and then his mouth is on my neck, my collarbone, trailing fire down to my breasts.
“Fuck.” The word tears out of him when he sees me. “You’re even more beautiful than I imagined.”
His mouth closes over one nipple, and my knees nearly buckle. His tongue swirls, teases, while his hand palms my other breast, and the dual sensation makes me gasp. He switches sides, lavishing the same attention on the other nipple, and I grab his shoulders just to stay upright.
“Nathan - I need-”
“I know what you need.” He lifts his head, eyes dark with promise. “I’m going to give you everything. But first, I want to see all of you.”
My jeans come off. Then my underwear. And then I’m standing naked in front of him while he’s still fully dressed, and the vulnerability of it makes me want to cover myself, but the way he’s looking at me roots me in place.
“Jesus Christ.” His voice is reverent. Wrecked. “Do you have any idea what you do to me?”
“Show me.”
He strips off his shirt in one fluid motion, and my mouth goes dry.
I’ve seen him shirtless before - that glimpse in his apartment felt like a lifetime ago - but this is different. This time, I’m allowed to look. Allowed to touch.
So I do.
My hands trace the planes of his chest, the ridges of his abs, that scar on his ribs that I’ve been wanting to explore since the first time I saw it. His muscles jump under my touch, his breathing going ragged.
“Camille-”
“You said you’d give me everything.” I look up at him through my lashes as my fingers find his belt buckle. “I’m holding you to that.”
The belt comes undone. The zipper slides down. And when I push his jeans and boxers over his hips, my brain short-circuits.
He’s big. Thick and hard and flushed with want, and when I wrap my hand around him, he makes a sound that goes straight to my core.
“Fuck.” His hips jerk into my grip. “If you keep doing that, this is going to be over embarrassingly fast.”
“We have all night.”
“Yeah, we do.” He grabs my wrist, pulling my hand away, and before I can protest he’s lifting me up and carrying me to the bed. “Which is exactly why I’m not rushing a single second of it.”
He lays me down on the mattress and kneels between my thighs, and the sight of him there - this gorgeous, powerful man looking at me like I’m something precious - makes my heart clench.
“Nathan-”
“Shh.” His hands slide up my inner thighs, spreading me open. “I’ve thought about this more than I should admit. Let me have this.”
And then his mouth is on me, and thinking becomes impossible.
He doesn’t tease. Doesn’t hold back. He works me with single-minded focus, his tongue tracing slow, deliberate circles that build and build.
My back arches off the bed. My hands fist in the sheets.
Sounds are coming out of my mouth that I don’t recognize, whimpers and moans and pleas that might be his name.
“That’s it.” The words hum against my skin. “Let me hear you.”
He keeps his mouth on me the whole time, relentless, never once letting up, until the pressure coils so tight I can’t hold it back any longer-
“Nathan - I’m going to-”
“Let go, Camille. I’ve got you.”
The orgasm breaks over me sudden and overwhelming, and I cry out his name as my whole body draws tight and then releases all at once. He eases me down slowly, his touch turning tender, mouthing soft kisses along my hip and thigh as I shake apart beneath him.
When he finally lifts his head, his chin is glistening and his eyes are dark with satisfaction.
“You taste incredible.” He crawls up my body, pressing a kiss to my mouth that lets me taste myself on his lips. “I could do that for hours.”
“Later.” I reach between us, finding him still rock-hard. “Right now I need you inside me.”
He groans, hips jerking into my hand. “Condom. Nightstand?”
“I have an IUD. And I’m clean - I got tested after everything with Jared.”
“I’m clean too.” He pulls back just enough to meet my eyes. “Are you sure?”
“I want to feel you. All of you. No barriers.”
A ragged groan tears out of him. He notches himself at my entrance, and for one breathless moment we just stay there, poised on the edge.
“Open your eyes,” he says softly.
I do, and find his gaze already locked on mine.
“This means something,” he says roughly. “You and me. This isn’t just sex. This is-”
“I know.” I cup his face in my hands. “I know what it is. I want it anyway. I want you.”
He sinks into me slowly, inch by inch, until there’s nothing left between us.
The fullness is exquisite. That perfect edge of almost-too-much that makes my toes curl. He’s so deep, filling me completely, and when he bottoms out we both go still, breathing hard.
“Fuck.” His forehead drops to mine. “You feel - Camille, you feel-”
“Move.” The word comes out desperate. “Please, Nathan, move.”
He does.
The first strokes are slow, measured, pulling almost all the way out before sinking back in, letting me feel every inch of him. But it doesn’t stay slow for long. The heat between us builds, and his rhythm picks up, his hips snapping harder, faster.
“So good,” he groans. “You feel so fucking good.”
My nails rake down his back as he changes the angle, driving deep against a place that steals the breath from my lungs. He hooks one of my legs over his shoulder, going deeper, and the new position has me keening.
“Right there - oh God, right there-”
“Stay with me.” His thumb finds my clit, rubbing tight circles in time with his thrusts. “Give me one more. I want to feel every second of it.”
The second orgasm catches me off guard, sharper than the first, sudden, wringing a cry from somewhere deep in my chest. I feel the exact moment his control gives out, his rhythm faltering, and he presses his face into my hair as he comes apart with my name on his lips.
For a long moment, we just breathe together. His weight pins me to the mattress in the most delicious way, and I stroke my fingers through his sweat-damp hair, feeling his heart pound against my chest.
“I can’t feel my legs,” I mumble into his shoulder.
His laugh rumbles through his chest, warm against my skin. “Then I did something right.”
He rolls to the side, pulling me with him so I’m draped across his chest. His hand strokes lazy patterns on my back, and I let myself sink into the warmth and safety of his arms.
“Camille?”
“Mm?”
“I meant what I said earlier.” His voice is quiet but fierce. “This isn’t casual for me. I didn’t wait this long just to treat you like something temporary. I’m in this. All the way.”
I lift my head to look at him. Those gray eyes are soft now, vulnerable in a way I’ve never seen from him.
“I’m in this too,” I tell him. “All the way.”
The smile that breaks across his face is like watching the sun come out.
“Good.” He pulls me closer, pressing a kiss to my forehead. “Because I’m not planning on letting you go. Ever.”