Chapter 31
THIRTY-ONE
“AND WE’RE OUT.”
The guy behind the laptop tapped a few things on his keyboard then left her and Roxie alone.
“Well…” Roxie said, cheeks plumped. “That was unexpected.”
“Am I crazy?” She fell back into her seat. “Cam might be mad.”
“He didn’t look mad.” Roxie squealed and opened her arms wide to beckon a hug. “Bring it in.”
With a laugh, she sat up to embrace her friend who tightened her hold, lingering for more than a few seconds.
This would never have happened without Roxie.
No way she’d have been able to navigate the current.
Cam was everything, integral too, but Roxie took the question out of it.
Loving Cam wasn’t selfish, it was unavoidable.
“Thank you, Roxie.”
“Another win for love.” Her friend released the hug slow and leaned back. “Now tell me you didn’t do that just so you can go back to Cam’s.”
“Why?” she asked, sensing that although it was a tease, there was a whisper of suspicion. “You think we should stay here?”
“Good thing about revealing you and Cam now is we limit the chances of a second wave.”
As she’d kinda thought. “Now they get to be shocked about my existence and my relationship with Cam at the same time.”
“I would never have pressured you to do anything before you were ready, but, yeah, we can work on separating the two. Unfortunately, bombshells are scandal central. Give them one, give them two, they love to ramp up, especially at this time of year.”
“You and Zairn can make up now.”
Roxie’s smile grew. “Why would we do that?”
“The world thinks you’re in trouble.”
The beauty leaned in close to whisper, “What we are is not their business.”
“Cam told me that’s one of your mottos.”
“I love Zairn.” Roxie rearranged Ariella’s hair. “And I love the world knowing I love him.”
Which didn’t support the previous sentiment. “But…?”
“There’s something to be said for him belonging to me and only me. It’s hilarious that anyone could even think there was a chance we weren’t solid. He’s mine and he’ll always be mine. We don’t need to broadcast that for it to be true.”
Huh. “Like I just broadcast my love for Cam?”
“No.” Roxie snatched her shoulders. “No! God, no, that’s not what I was saying. That was very romantic. I guarantee there’s a weepy Jane somewhere in this house right now, probably dampening your boyfriend.”
“Jane’s so perfect.”
“She is.” Pride shone from Roxie. “Though she’d never say that. She’s as damn close to it as possible.”
“A lot to live up to with the Colliers.” She hadn’t given much thought to Cam’s family being in the building. “I rushed into this.”
“No, you didn’t. Don’t pull back now. You love him. Own it.”
“His whole family know his intimate life and—”
“Oh, I guarantee Caspian doesn’t know.” Roxie was solemn in her slow nod. “Someone will pass him a memo at some point, but Caspian will probably forget who you are as fast as he learns.”
“I feel sorry for him working so hard.”
“We all feel sorry for him, honey, but he’s happy, and who are we to question that?”
“Different strokes…”
“Exactly.” Roxie gathered their hands together. “You want to get out of this room?”
“This is an amazing setup you have. Does it follow you everywhere?”
“Kinda,” Roxie said, admiring the view she was absorbing.
“It’s always close by, but I may have been known, occasionally, to go old-skool and just webcam it alone.
Roxiverse has bumped everything up two hundred notches.
It’s nice to have someone telling me the stream’s off… I think maybe Zairn snuck that one in.”
“I remember the Australia stream.” Though she couldn’t have imagined these people would ever be a part of her life. “Was Zairn mad?”
“Z couldn’t have cared less. He’s had every minute and intimate detail of his life spread across the world so many times that being caught lying in bed with me was nothing. Helped he already knew he was in love with me.”
So casual, a shrug like it was no big deal.
“Did you know?”
“That he was in love with me? Oh, honey, that guy’s been smitten with me since day one.”
She laughed. “That you were in love with him? Did you know you loved him then?”
With an eye roll, Roxie tsked at herself.
“I didn’t know it even when he hit me with the proverbial two by four.
Zairn Lomond and me?” She scoffed. “Not a chance. He was a playboy and…” Roxie exhaled.
“The world see what they want to see in Zairn. My life was my life and I was set in that. One of the greatest gifts my Casanova ever gave me was vision. Our life experiences were so different. Zairn knew there’s nothing that can’t be achieved.
Love is a choice. He couldn’t force me into it, which was part of the reason he dumped my ass in LA. ”
“He dumped you?”
“After I’d already broken his heart a dozen times.”
What a love. “You got him back.” She remembered the Talk at Sunset engagement tale. “He came back to you.”
“Sweetie.” Roxie spread her hair across her shoulders. “That man never left me for a second. Not one, single second. He’d gifted me his heart and I didn’t recognize it until mine shattered.”
Her own guilt crept in. “Did I ever love Spence? It didn’t feel like this with him.”
“Love isn’t one thing.” Roxie cradled her hand again.
“And sometimes love needs a dry run. Our hearts practice once, twice, however many times it takes to get ready for the big whammy. I’ve seen love.
All kinds of love. A bunch of our friends have found their forever relationships and I can tell you, not one of them is the same.
If one size fits all love was generically handed out to us all, it wouldn’t matter who we’re with, would it?
One heart would fit another. No two loves are the same.
And think about how much you’ve changed in the last couple of years. ”
“Since losing Spence,” she murmured. “Cam would never have fallen in love with me as I was back then. With Spence I was different… I don’t think… the love was…”
“Security? Faith? Gratitude? All reasons are valid. You probably wouldn’t have fallen in love with Cam as he was back then either.”
“True,” she said. “Think you would’ve fallen in love with a teenage Zairn?”
“For about twenty minutes, maybe. I was a flutterer.” Uh, okay. “He’d have fallen in love with me, for sure, and I tell you something, he’d have dedicated his existence to being with me. There would be no Rouge, no Crimson, no any of it.”
“Proving the moral of your story.”
“We become who we are with life and experience,” Roxie said, fingertips touching Ariella’s jaw. “Love’s a gift. Embrace it. Don’t run from it.”
“Rox!”
That call came from somewhere in the house. Hands linked, they hurried out to Tripp in the hallway.
“What is it?”
“Press statement from the Raiths. We’re getting it now.”
Tripp put an arm around her to take both women into the large den. Everybody was there. It was a full house.
“What does it say?” she asked again. Someone came in to hand Cam a sheet of paper. “Unicorn?”
His brow furrowed as he concentrated on the page.
“Love for Spencer,” he said. “Valued member of the family. Missed greatly.” Okay, okay.
She didn’t want to hurry him but held her breath for fear she’d scream.
“No wish to revisit the difficult past… Respect for Ariella…” That was something.
“Appreciate privacy. Wish her well for the future.”
He looked up and Knox went to take the page.
Breath left her body, but… what? “That’s it?” she asked, crossing the room to read the sheet Knox held. “They just…”
What the… In the interest of fairness, she had to admit that she couldn’t anticipate the Raiths. For the most part, they put up barriers, closed ranks and kept to themselves. Ish.
“If they came in too hard, they’d be the aggressors,” Knox muttered. “Neutral is smart.”
“Yeah,” Honey said. “It helped to see you next to the Colliers.”
“I don’t want anyone to think I’m using—”
“That’s not what she meant, Candy.” Cam’s arm came around her. “We’re united, that’s the point.”
“You’re no scared little girl anymore,” Roxie declared. “You’re part of the posse now.”
“So we wait to see if Ricardo Whey chooses to—”
“He won’t.”
The room’s chorus echoed the walls. It must’ve come from everyone simultaneously.
“How can you be sure?”
“Glass houses and stones,” Roxie said and smiled at Tripp. “And Benedict Breckenridge is used to corralling naughty little boys.”
Tripp slipped his hands in his pockets. “Dad has his ways.”
“What do we do now?”
“Let it percolate,” Knox said, handing the statement to Tripp. “We keep quiet today, let them work themselves up. Talk to Honey, decide what’s next there. We put together our own statement. Same thing. Support the Raiths. Love for Spence. Privacy.”
“Align the ideology, makes it feel like union and acceptance.”
Roxie raised an arm. “I feel I should talk for Caspian’s tears of pride. If he was here right now…”
The woman clasped her hands at her chest, batting her lashes as though controlling tears.
“Your husband needs to stop letting you out at night,” Knox said, unimpressed.
Roxie just grinned. “It’s not night.”
“You’re unhinged, you know that? They used to institutionalize hysterical women like you.”
“My love…” Jane soothed, slipping a hand around his arm.
“I’m sorry, Blossom, but it’s true.”
As their conversation continued, Ariella’s eyes traveled to Cam’s.
“That wasn’t what you meant,” he said. “You want to know what happens with us.”
“We’re doing this, right? We agreed it’s—was I out of line?”
“No, baby,” he said, wrapping her in his arms. “We stay here until the press pack loses interest, then we go home and live our lives.”
“Together?”
“Always together.”
“Oh my God,” Honey’s voice was shocked enough to attract everyone’s attention. Rather than explain, Honey fled the room without looking at anyone, though did call, “Roxie!”
“I’m coming. I’m coming. I’m coming,” Roxie said, hurrying out after her friend.
“What—”
“Old Man Appleton just died,” Knox said, phone in hand.
“What?” she asked, attention flicking back and forth between the men. “Honey’s grandfather? Oh my God. What does that mean?”
The brothers fixated on each other. “Gentlemen,” Cam said. “Start your engines.”
Any loss could be devastating, expected or not. Old, young, it could happen to anyone and that drew her closer to Cam. She rested her head against him and closed her eyes. Love could take many forms, wasn’t that what she’d been told? This felt different. This felt right. This felt like forever.
Cam had been waiting. For her. This man waited for what he could only get from her. She hadn’t known she’d been waiting too. For him. For love. For their forever.