Chapter 34
Back in the villa, I nearly died of relief as the cool breeze from the air con rushed over me. I tossed down the silly little clutch bag I’d been carrying around all night and then did the most important thing, kicked my shoes off.
‘Oh, thank God,’ I moaned at the feeling of instant relief that came as I rid myself of those hell heels. I fell back onto the bed, scrunching my toes open and closed, and for the first time that night actually feeling them. My toes were back!
I lifted my head to look at Cam, who was busy loosening his tie. Little shit, I thought. Thinking he could get me all hot and bothered like that and not suffer any consequences.
‘Well, that was good,’ he said, dropping his tie on the floor.
I’d never seen him in a tie before, and I hated to admit it, but he looked hot.
He always looked hot; that had never been his problem.
‘Scuba diving with Amber and Victor tomorrow,’ he continued.
‘More time to get close, more time to listen in.’
‘We didn’t really get any useful intel tonight, but I think we achieved what we wanted to do, gain their trust. We did well,’ I added.
‘Yeah,’ he said in a very strange tone, one that made me look back up at him. He was walking towards me now, a predatory look in his eyes. ‘Maybe someone did too well tonight, though.’
‘What do you mean?’ I asked suspiciously.
He was undoing his buttons as he approached, and removed his shirt so quickly I almost didn’t see it come off, like some masterful sleight of hand.
He stopped at the foot of the bed, and that was when I realised what a compromised position I was in, lying flat on my back like this. I sat up quickly.
‘I mean, it seemed to come very naturally to you, didn’t it?’ He looked down at me and smiled. ‘That napkin.’
‘I was just giving you a taste of your own medicine, that’s all.’
‘That’s all?’
‘Yup. Besides, we’re supposed to be a young couple, deeply in love. Who apparently fell in love over an avocado.’
‘It’s a good meet-cute story, don’t you think?’
‘You hate avos, though,’ I said.
‘I do.’
‘In fact, aren’t you allergic to them?’
‘Break out in a rash,’ he said, rubbing his neck.
‘Tread carefully then, Cam. I think I handled an avo at lunch; you might want to stay right away from me.’
He gave me a slow once-over from his higher vantage point. He really did have all the power right now, because in one swift move he could have me pinned to the bed. Did I want to be pinned to the bed?
‘If I were allergic to you, I’d be flatlining by now,’ he said, and made no attempt to hide the fact that his eyes had just scanned my legs.
‘Still time, honey,’ I said sweetly. ‘Symptoms can be delayed, you know. Swelling, rapid heart rate, shortness of breath, and eventual full paralysis and death by anaphylactic shock.’
‘It’s a good thing you know how to do CPR then.’
‘If you think I’ll give you CPR, you’ve got another think coming,’ I said.
‘Oh, you’ll give me CPR,’ Cam said. His tone was low, almost dangerous. What the hell was he doing? ‘You’ll give me CPR just as you’ll let my neck go each and every time.’
‘Don’t be so sure about that,’ I said, pushing myself off the bed and standing up. We were face to face now.
‘But I am sure, Lizzy. Just as I’m sure that playing the young couple who fell in love over an avocado comes easily to you.’
‘I’m not secretly in love with you, if that’s what you’re trying to imply,’ I said firmly.
‘You sound very sure of that.’
‘I am sure,’ I snapped.
‘So why did you kiss me back?’
I blinked at him a few times. I had no comeback for this at all.
He took a step closer to me.
‘Momentary lapse of judgement,’ I said, swallowing hard. That hot, itchy feeling was creeping up my spine again.
‘Is that why you moaned, too?’ And then, before I could register what was happening, I felt myself flying backwards. One second I was standing; the next I was lying flat on my back on the bed and Cam was on top of me.
‘What are you doing?’ I managed, breathless from the shock.
He didn’t answer. Instead, he lowered his face and let it hover inches away from mine.
He was so close I could feel his warm breath, smell it, taste it.
He leaned in even closer, his lips brushing the corner of my mouth; not quite a kiss, just the softest, slightest whisper of contact.
A tiny breath escaped me, and he smiled.
‘Also a lapse of judgement, I assume?’
I swallowed, trying not to react, but my heart was thudding so loudly I was sure he could hear it. He lifted a hand and brushed the hair from my face. ‘What about when you let me touch you like this?’ His fingertips traced a line from my cheek down to my jaw. ‘Still a momentary lapse of judgement?’
I didn’t answer. I couldn’t.
His lips grazed my ear, and I bit back a moan. I did not want to react to this. I would not react to this! But then his mouth traced a slow path downwards from my ear.
‘And this?’ He pressed the faintest kiss into my neck.
This time, no matter how much I told myself not to react, I couldn’t help it.
I let out the softest exhale. Then a moan.
I looked down to see Cam’s hand snake between us.
And then, without warning, he grabbed a handful of my dress and twisted, wrapping the fabric around his fingers.
The message was obvious. He had me. I was his.
And like this, he could do whatever the hell he wanted with me. A feeling I usually hated, but . . .
He twisted the fabric again, like he was winding a corkscrew, and the material tightened around me even more, pulling at my sides and back. I gasped, and the primal part of me flared, the part that wanted to fight him, to place my hand over his and twist as he was doing. But I didn’t.
He tightened the fabric again, and again, and then I heard the pop, pop, pop of stitches ripping.
‘You said you hated this dress,’ he said.
I nodded. ‘I do.’
‘What say I rip it right off you then?’ He twisted his hand again, and more stitches popped.
I couldn’t hold it back any more; it had been building and building and . . .
‘Fuck, Cam,’ I moaned, and as soon as I did, he stopped, pulling back just enough to look down at me smugly.
‘You might want to check on your judgement there, because it’s clearly gone AWOL.’ He said it almost gleefully, and now I knew this was all part of the game. And I kept falling for it.
I arched my body as high and hard as I could and then twisted and rolled.
The sudden movement was enough to throw him off balance, which was exactly what I wanted.
A gap appeared between us and I took it.
I turned onto my side, and then my stomach, and slipped out from under him.
Before he could recover, I started crawling towards the edge of the bed, but Cam’s hands shot out and caught me by the thighs, he dragged me backwards with infuriating ease.
I twisted my body again. I had trained so many times for this move and could do it in my sleep.
Pivoting on one arm, I kicked my legs up and around, catching him squarely across the shoulders.
In one fluid motion, I clamped both thighs around his neck, locking my ankles behind his back.
His weight shifted, his hands grabbed on to something for balance, but I had him.
Playing rugby ensured I had thighs stronger than most men, and I knew that.
And so did Cam. I squeezed a little more, cutting off his next smug line before he could say it.
‘Still think my judgement’s gone AWOL?’ I hissed.
He let out a strangled grunt, somewhere between pain and admiration.
‘Okay,’ he admitted. ‘Maybe not completely.’ It looked like he was going to smile again, so I increased the pressure.
‘You know,’ he said, his voice raspy, ‘we were so good together, Lizzy. Professionally . . .’ his eyes met mine in a meaningful way, even though they were starting to bulge somewhat and he was going a bit red in the face, ‘and physically.’
He reached up and took hold of both my ankles.
But not hard, not like I thought he would.
I thought he might grab them and attempt to rip my legs apart.
Instead, he rubbed his thumbs gently across them.
I swallowed and tried to say something sarcastic and defiant, but failed miserably as he slid his hands down my legs, briefly circling my knees with his thumbs before moving them to my thighs, between my thighs .
. . And then he did his worst, a slow, barely there drag of his finger just below my panties.
I felt my legs start to relax and almost come undone.
He smiled. ‘Thank you for finally admitting that.’
I released the hold, letting him fall back onto the mattress with a bounce. ‘I didn’t admit to anything,’ I said, and then got up off the bed, legs shaky.
Cam made a show of stretching all his muscles out, as if he was cooling down after a workout.
‘We should get ready for bed,’ he said casually, now working his arms, one at a time.
I wasn’t quite sure what the point of it was, but knowing Cam, there was a point, and it was a very calculated one no doubt.
‘Fine.’ I moved off in the direction of the bathroom, desperate to finally get out of this dress, or what was left of it at least, since Cam had almost ripped it off me.
Crap! And I had let him rip it off me too.
What was wrong with me? There was no denying that at college one of the things that had defined our relationship was this ongoing tension.
It was always there, running beneath the surface, vacillating between the physical and the sexual.
One moment he was pinning me to the floor and forcing me to tap out, and then next moment the pinning felt totally different.
Now it was somehow back, except it was no longer vacillating between these two states; it seemed to have moved firmly into the sexual.
‘I’d say that’s two-all, wouldn’t you, which makes us even,’ Cam said behind me.
‘What are you talking about?’
‘You get naked for me, so I kiss you; you crawl across my lap, so I almost rip your dress off.’
I turned and glared at him. ‘You’re mischaracterising that first incident. I didn’t get naked for you!’
‘Oh wait, there was that moment on the bridge too, so I guess that means I’m up three–two.’
‘A moment? Please, that was hardly a moment.’
‘It was a moment, Lizzy.’
‘That doesn’t make it three–two, though. You’re forgetting, I did almost crush you to death with my thighs just now, so I think we can call it even.’
‘Maybe I let you think you could crush me to death with your . . . Nah, I’m lying, you could totally have crushed me to death with your thighs.
’ And then he smiled again, that knowing smile that was becoming far too familiar and that begged the question Just what the hell did he think he knew anyway?
He took a step towards me. ‘But you didn’t crush me to death with your thighs, like you didn’t choke me out either, and I think that definitely means something. ’
‘And just what do you think it means?’
‘That maybe you don’t hate me as much as you pretend to hate me.’
I rolled my eyes. ‘Keep dreaming.’
‘Actually, I think you’ve also been dreaming,’ he said, eyes scanning my face. ‘Just as much as I have. About me. About us. About what could have been.’
‘I don’t dream about you, Cam. You’re so arrogant!’
‘Come on, Lizzy,’ he said, his voice quieter and more serious now. ‘You feel it too. This thing between us. It’s still there. Don’t pretend it’s not.’
My stomach flipped. That feeling that enjoyed crawling up and down my spine was back. I didn’t like it.
‘Tell me I’m wrong,’ he went on. ‘Tell me six years apart is really enough to kill what we had. Because I don’t think so.
’ He shook his head. ‘I don’t think there’s much that could kill what we had.
Because from where I’m standing, it’s definitely still burning.
’ His eyes unashamedly traced the lines of my body up and down, up and down once more. ‘Burning hotter than ever.’
I didn’t say anything. Mostly because I couldn’t.
Because he was right, and I hated it when he was right.
And I especially hated that he knew it too.
But mostly I hated what he was right about.
Because I did feel the burning, as if I was catching fire from the inside out.
Maybe the fire had never really gone away, despite my numerous attempts to douse it.
Maybe it had just gone quiet for a while.
Smouldering. Waiting for something to ignite it again.
And now?
Now it was burning.
‘Speaking of hot, I could do with a cool shower.’ He walked past me, but paused when he got to the shower. ‘Want to join me?’
I didn’t say anything. I just rolled my eyes at him in the most disinterested manner I could, and hoped I was pretending convincingly enough that the answer was not in fact yes.
I really, really did need a shower. I needed to cool myself the hell down. But the moment the water hit my skin, I knew that nothing would cool me.
Because it wasn’t that kind of heat; it wasn’t surface heat.
It was the kind of heat that burned so deeply, all the way to your very bones and bloodstream. To the places that water couldn’t reach. It was the kind of heat that only Lizzy had ever generated in me.
Her smell was still stuck to me, as if I had worn her like my favourite fragrance.
I leaned forward and pressed my hand into the cool, hard tiles. They were no help either. I stuck my head under the water, but still, useless.
I groaned and looked down.
Yeah. I had a problem. A big one.