Best Kept Secrets (Complete Series)

by Kandi Steiner

  Cameron let out a breath. “I just… I can’t believe this. You’re really here,” he mused, tracing my jaw with his thumb. “You’re really mine.”

  My stomach twisted as he leaned in to kiss me, and I pressed my hands to his chest to stop him.

  “There’s something else you should know,” I whispered. “Before we go any further.”

  Cameron tensed, his chest tightening under my hands.

  There was no easy way to say it, no tender way to drop such a heavy bomb.

  “I’m pregnant.”

  Those two words sucked all the air out of the room, and neither Cameron nor I even struggled for a breath as he let me go. I felt ice water seep into my veins when his warmth was gone, when he took a step back, and it flooded my system altogether when his wide eyes disappeared from view as he turned his back on me.

  “I just found out,” I said, voice shaking as much as my hands. “And I… I don’t know who…”

  Bile rose in my throat as Cameron pressed his hands against our bedroom window, the same one I’d let Jane free from.

  “It could be yours. Or it could be…”

  “His,” Cameron finished for me.

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered, so softly I wasn’t sure he’d even heard me.

  I sat back down on the bed, my hands finding my stomach, as if the child that grew inside it could somehow give me the strength I needed in that moment.

  “I don’t know how long yet,” I continued. “I don’t know when I… when it happened. But I’ll go to the doctor soon, and when I do, I can ask about getting a test.”

  Cameron still stared out the window, his slow, steady breaths the only sound in the room.

  “Please, say something,” I begged him. “Anything.”

  I smoothed a hand over my stomach, comforting the little one growing inside. No matter what Cameron said, no matter what he chose next, I would be a mother to that baby. I would love him or her unconditionally, and give them the life they deserve. I would teach them, help them grow, love them on the good days and the hard days, too.

  Even if I had to do it alone, I would raise that child.

  Cameron was so still, I wondered if he’d gone into shock. I wondered if he was debating flinging our window open and jumping out of it, just as Jane had — only he wouldn’t fly.

  “Cameron?”

  “I don’t want it.”

  His words were a fist to my chest, my next breath stolen. They were loud and final, as sure and steady as a rushing rapid, and the waves of it took me under faster than I could blink.

  He didn’t want it.

  If I wasn’t already sitting down, I would have fallen to my knees.

  I stared at his back, at the way it rose and fell with each easy breath he took, and the glimpse of hope and joy we’d lived in just moments before was stolen.

  Here we were at the foot of another challenge, and he wouldn’t face it with me. He wouldn’t stay. He wouldn’t love me through it.

  Though, could I really ask him to? Was it fair of me to even ask that he love me and a child that may or may not be his, let alone to expect it?

  I didn’t even have to ask the question to know the answer.

  I was a selfish woman, and I’d taken too much — from him, from Reese, from everyone around me. I couldn’t undo what had happened, couldn’t right this wrong, but one thing I knew for sure was that I would not walk away from my child.

  No matter who the father was.

  “I understand,” I whispered after a moment, sniffing back the tears gathering in my eyes again. “I just wanted you to know, and now you do. I love you, Cameron, and I choose you. But I choose this baby, too. And I get why you wouldn’t want it, I get why—”

  “The test,” he said, interrupting me as he slowly turned. His eyes found mine, his gaze fierce. “I don’t want the test.”

  I blinked.

  “I don’t understand.”

  Cameron crossed the room, carefully lowering himself to his knees as he took my hands in his. He kissed my knuckles, his eyes on mine before he dropped my hands and placed his own over my belly.

  “I want you, Charlie. I choose you today just the same as I chose you on our wedding day eight years ago. You are mine,” he said. “And so is this child — regardless of its DNA.”

  There he was.

  It was Cameron — my Cameron — who knelt before me with his hands on my stomach, welcoming the child within it as his own, whether it was or not. It was my husband, taking me for who I was — flaws and all. It was the man I chose, the man I would choose time and time again, in any lifetime, in any situation, reminding me before I even had the chance to forget why I really had no choice at all.

  I folded my hands over his, smiling through my tears, and Cameron leaned up to press his lips to mine.

  He kissed me like the horizon kisses the sun as it sets — tenderly, with the blinding promise that another day would come.

  With that kiss, we sealed our choice. With that kiss, we shut the door on the past. And with that kiss, with my hands over his, and his over our child, we began a new chapter in our story — together.

  And I knew this one would be brighter than the last.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  * * *

  Three hours earlier

  Reese

  I wished I never quit smoking.

  My body itched for the sweet relief of nicotine as I flicked the wheel of my lighter, on and off, watching as flame after flame was lit and then snuffed just as easily. At first, I’d counted each one, but I’d lost count somewhere around two hundred, and now I simply watched numbly as I rubbed my thumb raw on the lighter.

  It wasn’t that I was nervous. It was that I was impatient.

  Right now, Charlie was likely across town, telling Cameron that their marriage was over. I knew when she got to me, she’d be a mess. She’d be crying, she’d be mourning the loss of him and what they built together, and all I wanted was to fast-forward to when she was in my arms. I wanted to hold her, to rock her, to assure her the choice she made was the right one.

  I wanted to love her — without him — and I couldn’t wait much longer.

  I started counting the flames again, and somewhere around seventy-two, there was a knock at my door.

  I jumped up like my couch was on fire, sprinting to the door and flinging it open in one fell swoop. And then she was there, on my porch, just like she had been the first night I’d had her as my own. She looked just as sad, her eyes just as dark, face just as long.

  For a solid minute, I just held the door open, my eyes tracing every single feature. I wanted to remember that moment, the one right before she was mine. I took in her long, dark hair, the waves of it broken by the wind. My eyes traveled down her slim waist, catching on the jean shorts she wore, though it was cooling down now that the sun had set. She trembled a little as my eyes devoured her legs, trailing all the way back up slowly to connect with her brown irises, and then I held the door open wider.

  “Come in.”

  She stepped in slowly, crossing her arms over her middle as another shiver traveled through her.

  “Here,” I said, reaching in the closet near my door for one of my hoodies. I ripped it from the hanger and passed it to her. “I’ll get us some wine. White or red?”

  Charlie pulled the hoodie over her head, letting it fall down to her mid-thigh. It swallowed her, and I loved her in it. There was something about the way she looked so small in my sweater, how something I wore so often felt brand new against her skin.

  She didn’t answer once the hoodie was on, just watched me with those same sad eyes. And I knew she was hurting, knew she was in pain for the choice she’d had to make, so I took the burden of any more decision-making off her shoulders.

  “White,” I said, and then I turned for the kitchen.

  I was already lighter with her in my home, already riding the high that came from having her back. I was only gone a few minutes before I returned with tw
o glasses and the bottle. I nodded toward the room where my piano waited, and Charlie wrapped her arms around herself, following me with her eyes on the floor.

  “Hop up,” I said, patting the top of the piano. I’d already put the lid down before she arrived, anticipating the night.

  She climbed up slowly as I filled both of our glasses, and I handed one to her, holding mine up for a toast.

  “To new beginnings,” I said. “And to us.”

  We clinked our glasses together, my eyes watching her as she watched our glasses. I took the first drink, but Charlie just lowered hers again, the glass trembling slightly in her hand.

  She wasn’t ready to talk yet.

  I could feel the pain without even touching her, without even holding her, and all I wanted was to make it go away. So, I set my glass next to her on the piano, took my seat, and floated my fingers over the keys.

  I played nothing at first, just warming up, letting the smooth notes flow between us. Once Charlie took another sip of wine, I transitioned into the song I’d written for her — for us — the one I’d been saving for tonight.

  It was a piece I’d started the night I’d come back into town, and the beginning was soft and slow. It took me back to the day she walked into the teachers’ lounge, that old book in her hands. I saw her eyes when they first met mine, how empty they were, how I wasn’t even sure she recognized me at all. That woman seemed so far away now from the Charlie who had come back to me. She was full of life again, full of love, and I wanted to continue making her happy — so much so that she’d spill over.

  As the song progressed, the melody turned darker, emotional, for all the nights I longed to touch her, all the days I wished for her to be mine. I built up the crescendo gently, bringing the song to a grand, expressive and dramatic climax. It was the night we gave in, the night our worlds collided, our stars uniting under one universal sky. The melody only grew louder as I mirrored my emotions watching her with Cameron, knowing he was trying to win her back. My fingers flew over the keys, my eyes closed as I felt every note.

  And then, everything ceased.

  I kept my eyes closed during that pause, feeling the weight of that silence, of the past two months. Slowly, I brought the song back to life, filling the room with the same melodic notes that mirrored the beginning, only they were happier now — comfortable and sure. It was our coming together, making it through the storm.

  The river meeting the ocean once more, just like it always would.

  When I finished, the last notes floating from the piano, I carefully opened my eyes to find Charlie.

  She was crying.

  Her cries were silent, tears streaming down her cheeks and running toward each other at the apex of her chin before they fell to her lap. She held her wine glass, still full, her eyes on me, lips trembling.

  “I named it, Where the River Meets the Sea.”

  “It’s beautiful,” she whispered, but her tears still fell, one after the other.

  I took her calves in my hands, pulling her closer to me as I looked up into her eyes. “I know you’re feeling a lot right now,” I said. “I know these past few months have been hard on you. And I know what you did tonight wasn’t easy.”

  Her face crumpled at that, and she let her head drop, shaking it where it fell between her shoulders.

  I squeezed her legs, smoothing my hands over the skin there. “It’s okay. You don’t have to talk right now. Come, let me hold you.”

  I slid my hand up to grab hers, but when I tugged, she pulled it away, still shaking her head.

  “It’s okay,” I repeated. “We can talk tomorrow. Tonight, let’s just be.”

  “I can’t.” Her voice was meek, muffled by her cries.

  “I know,” I said quickly. “I know you can’t talk right now.”

  “No.”

  Charlie jumped up from the piano, abandoning her wine as she moved for my bay window. Her hands flew to her hair, her shoulders trembling.

  “Charlie?” I asked, making my way toward her.

  “Please, just, I need a minute.”

  “Okay.” I held up my hands, and when she turned, I kept them there. Slowly, I stepped toward her, and the more I watched her face, the more it twisted with grief, the more my stomach knotted. “What’s wrong?”

  She cried more, shaking her head.

  “He’ll be okay,” I tried. “I know it was hard. I can’t imagine how you’re feeling but I’m here. I’m right here,” I told her. “Just let me hold you, let me take the pain away.”

  “It’s not Cameron.”

  I paused, still holding my hands up. “What is it then?”

  “I haven’t gone to him,” she whispered. “I haven’t been home yet.”

  “Oh,” I answered, confusion sweeping over me. “Well, did you want to talk before you go? Do you want me to go with you?”

  Her bottom lip slipped between her teeth. “Reese…”

  At the sound of my name, the coldest chill of my life swept over me in a rush.

  It was the way she said it, the way her face crumpled as it tumbled from her lips, the way the syllable rolled off like an apology.

  My confidence was zapped like a bug drawn to a false light, one designed to kill, and the truth settled in like the darkest death.

  “It’s him.”

  My voice broke with the words, with the way Charlie’s hands flew to cover her mouth when I said them.

  “It’s him, isn’t it? You’re choosing him.”

  “Reese—”

  She reached for me, her small hand wrapping around my forearm, and my instinct was to pull away. But once she touched me, I knew I couldn’t.

  I would never be able to.

  “No,” I said, shaking my head, my eyes searching hers. “Charlie, you can’t. You can’t choose him. It’s us, it’s always been us. I make you happy, can’t you see? I love you. I love you. Don’t you love me?”

  “I do,” she cried. “Reese, I love you so much it hurts.”

  “But you love him more?”

  She pressed her lips together, squeezing her eyes shut just the same as she set more tears free.

  Black invaded my vision, and I moved back to the piano bench, falling down into it harder than I intended. One hand braced on the keys, sounding a loud, abrasive collision of notes, and the other found my bouncing knee.

  “He hurt you,” I whispered. “He cheated on you, Charlie.”

  “He didn’t.”

  I looked up, watching as she moved slowly toward me.

  “He never slept with her.”

  My mouth fell open. “What? How…”

  “I walked in when she was on top of him, but he had already told her to get off. She told him she wanted him, and he said no.” Charlie shrugged. “Yes, he betrayed me. He found comfort in another woman when he should have come to me. But he never slept with her,” she said. “It was me who cheated, Reese. And only me.”

  “But he still left you. He wasn’t there when you needed him, when you were grieving.”

  “But I wasn’t there for him either.”

  Charlie took the seat next to me, wrapping her hand around mine.

  “Reese, Cameron hurt me. And I hurt him. Neither of us is perfect.” She squeezed my hand. “But he’s my husband. I made vows to him, the same as he made to me, and I can’t turn my back on those vows at the first warning sign. Every couple has challenges they face — and those challenges either make or break them. Sometimes we run from our problems, and other times, we hold hands and go through them together.”

  “And you don’t want to run.”

  “I can’t,” she said easily. “And I know if you were in my shoes, you wouldn’t either.”

  I sat there as disbelief colored every inch of me, hitting me in different waves. One moment I was angry, the next I was in shock, and somewhere underneath it, maybe I knew it all along. Maybe I saw it coming.

  “I love you,” she whispered. “And I know you love me, too. But it’s a
different kind of love than the one I have with Cameron. You and I, we’re friendship and forbidden want. We’re late night music and talks. We’re the kind of love that burns bright and fast, but fizzles out just the same. We’re a comet — a shooting star. We can’t last, Reese.”

  “No,” I said, shaking my head.

  “It’s true, and you know it. We want each other, we always have. And when we have each other?” She laughed. “It’s… explosive. Catastrophic, maybe. I’ve never felt passion like that, the way I have with you. But it was born out of years of want, years of being told no, and at the base of it all, you’re looking for something that doesn’t truly exist in me,” she said. “The same way I looked to you for something I should have found in my husband.”

  My heart ached with her words, so much so that I doubled over.

  “I remind you of home,” she said. “I remind you of your family, of Mallory, of your parents. I remind you of your youth, of a simpler time when you had them, when you had time to figure everything out in your life. I’m a piece of your life before it hurt. But now, you’re thirty-five, your family is gone, and no matter where you end up — whether it’s here in Mount Lebanon or back in the city or somewhere completely different — no place or person will ever bring them back,” she said, and her voice dropped lower with her next words. “Not even me. Not even as much as I wish I could.”

  Emotion pricked my eyes, and I blinked against it, the ache in my chest growing stronger with every second. Oxygen hurt just as much as not taking a breath at all.

  It was true, every word she said, and the truth had never hurt so badly.

  “You love me for who I used to be, for the wide-eyed, untouched girl I once was. But I’m a woman now. I have scars. Cameron was there when they were made, and though he may have lost his way just as I did, he has his own scars, too. We both have them, and we both slipped into this dark hole together.” She paused, her hand sliding up from mine to grip my wrist. “We have to climb out just the same.”

  Her words faded off, and the suffocating silence of my house surrounded us. It was like a weighted cloud, dark and heavy, and I let it take me under its grasp.