Secondhand Heart

by Kristen Strassel

  An old lady’s eyes grew wide with my F bomb. She looked down at the kids and shook her head. That’s what she got for eavesdropping.

  “It’s not Cam that bothers her. It’s Jordan.” Bree blurted out, and now I had the same look on my face as that old broad who I offended with my language.

  “Why would Jordan bother her? He’s not here to bother her anymore, if you haven’t noticed.” I didn’t understand this at all. She and Jordan were friends. I never knew there was a problem, and this seemed like a hell of a time to bring it up.

  “She was always jealous of Jordan, Daisy. Because you guys were just so good together.” Bree looked down at the curtain package. “And she’s got to try so hard for everything. She knows that her marriage isn’t going to measure up. But just forget I said anything, okay?”

  How the hell was I just supposed to forget that? Ev didn’t think she could measure up to me? That was crazy. Ev had talent and passion, and I’d had a husband. Had. Was that why she was giving me such a hard time about Cam? Why did Bree drop this on me in the middle the curtain aisle?

  “Why are we even here? Did Cam give you a budget or something?” she asked, throwing the curtains in the basket. They landed on Lucas, who’d climbed in to ride along. He thought that was great, and picked up one of the packages to hit Landon over the head with.

  “Guys, don’t do that.” I put a stop to that. We were probably close to getting kicked out without those two pulling out their WWE moves, and I was more than thankful for the change in subject. I just didn’t know what to say to her claim. “No, he didn’t. But sometimes there’s cute beachy stuff here.”

  “You’re insane,” Bree pointed out the obvious. “If I had carte blanche, I wouldn’t be shopping here with all the blue hairs. Do you really want these? Because I say screw this place, let’s go to Pier One. Or wherever else is better than this. I don’t know. Half my crap comes from Savers. Or whatever my mom buys for me on her home shopping channels.”

  “I feel dirty spending his money.” I lifted Lucas out of the basket. “Something about it feels little whorish.” Especially after just talking about Jordan.

  “Don’t. He’s made more money than we can even comprehend since he won The Spotlight. Whatever we think is going to be extravagant won’t even make a dent in his bank account.”

  “You don’t know that.” I shot Bree a look as she backed out of the parking space. Her preoccupation with Cam’s money rubbed me the wrong way. “And I don’t want him to think I’m just with him so I can shop all day. I feel like he’s trying to get away from that.”

  “Well, what I’m saying is that he grossed four million dollars the year he won The Spotlight. Four Million.” Bree sounded like Dr. Evil, the way she emphasized the amount. “And that was five years ago. So—“

  This needed to stop. Now. Bree was hyper-aware of money, since she had absolutely zero, but whether or not Cam had money didn’t change anything. I wasn’t asking him for any. I thought of this as doing him a favor. It was still his stuff. “So that doesn’t mean shit. It could be all gone. Do you think if he was on top of the world, he would have opened a bar in Plymouth? I don’t see Tim McGraw opening restaurants.”

  “Toby Keith has a bunch of them.” Bree shrugged. “And he’s huge.”

  “Maybe it’s something that country people do. I don’t know. But it’s a little creepy, the way you keep coming up with all these fun Cam facts. Stop stalking my boyfriend, Bree.”

  “I only ever pick up losers. I’m living vicariously through you. The last guy I dated stole my EBT card.”

  “Anthony? What a dirtbag. Not surprised.” I never understood why Bree attracted such jackasses. I’d call it a talent if it were a good thing. I’d given up encouraging her to date because some variation of that always happened.

  “You shouldn’t be. At least I had the good sense to not let that one move in.” Bree shuddered. “I’m getting better.”

  “I guess.” Baby steps, right? “Listen, I don’t want you to tell Ev about Cam giving me his credit card.”

  “Why?” Bree’s mouth dropped. Crap, I hoped she didn’t already.

  “Because things are weird between us about it anyway, and what you told me just made it even weirder. I don’t want her to think I’m doing this for the wrong reasons. More than she already does. And I don’t know how much Cam is paying her, because I don’t think anyone actually pays Ev for her publicity work.”

  “Really? How does she survive?”

  “Like any other O’Brien girl does, she mooches off her parents.” I laughed, but Bree didn’t. “I might be totally off. I just know she was asking for rent money a lot. Cam wouldn’t screw her over if he could pay her.”

  “We hope.” Bree was right. Cam and I still had way too much we needed to talk about. “Good thing Roger got that job.”

  I rolled my eyes behind my sunglasses. “I’m sure that’s going to come with a whole new set of problems. He’ll be way too busy to help Ev with the baby, but he’ll give her a hard time if she wants to quit her job. No matter what she does, he will find some way to make her feel like shit.”

  “Daisy, he’s not that bad.” Bree looked at me once we pulled into the spot in front of Pier One. Lucas had fallen asleep, and Landon hadn’t made a peep since we’d got in the car. Baby sedation.

  “I hate him.” I folded my arms and looked away from her. Want me to go from zero to pissed off? Bring up Roger.

  “Why?” Bree asked as we pulled the boys’ sleepy, limp bodies from the car. I laid Lucas over my shoulder until we could grab a shopping cart. Landon looked dazed and confused, but he could at least try to put one foot in front of the other. “He’s not hurting her.”

  Bree hadn’t always been so lucky. Neither of us said anything for a minute, I let the gravity set in of how different my idea of a good guy was from hers. I wanted someone who made me better. Bree wanted someone who didn’t make her worse. On paper, it might seem like the same thing, but the reality of it couldn’t have been further apart.

  “No. But he finds all these subtle ways to keep her down.” I was sick of talking about Roger, and glad to be looking at pretty furniture. “Because he sucks at what he does.”

  “I wouldn’t go that far. It’s just weird. But this is cute. Would this work in the condo?” Bree leaned down to run her hand along a light blue shag rug. “I’ve always loved these, but mine would be caked with fruit loop crumbs and boy snot in a day.”

  “It would work.” Cam already had some blue accents, the color just made sense in a beach house. “But anyway, I hate to think of Ev wasting her life with Roger.”

  “You can’t take it out on her. She thinks you’re trying to sabotage the wedding.” Bree hoisted a rolled up rug into the cart.

  “What?” She couldn’t be serious.

  Bree looked sorry she said that. “She said she thinks that you want to ruin the wedding somehow. I don’t know. I just wish you two weren’t fighting. It’s stupid, Daisy. We have so much to be happy about right now.”

  I put down the mirror I’d been considering. Suddenly, I didn’t feel so much like shopping anymore. “I’m not trying to ruin her wedding. If her life sucks, it’s her own fault.” I headed out of the store. I’d come back on my own.

  “Daisy!”

  I leaned against the car for fifteen minutes, sweating as the hot afternoon sun beat down on the asphalt. Bree tried to talk to me on the way home, but I didn’t answer. I was sick of fighting with Bree and Ev over men. Wasn’t there a rule about that somewhere, not to let men come between girlfriends? Yet, we were letting them tear us into pieces.

  Now that I’d finished my classes, I had a lot of time to myself. Still in the habit of waking up at seven, and with Cam in Nashville and therefore unable to keep me up past my bedtime, I started walking on the beach in the morning.

  Most days, I just brushed my hair and washed my face, heading out in my pajamas with a cup of coffee in hand. I’d never had a chance to really look
at the beach before, the broken shells and the wave patterns the tide left behind in the sand made me feel like I was walking on the moon. Only a few other early birds shared my ritual. We nodded and smiled as we passed each other by, like there was a secret between us.

  The walks gave me time to think. God knows I had a lot think about.

  I didn’t know if it was because the classes were during the summer, or because they were requirements I wasn’t totally invested in, but I’d struggled so much this semester. I’d kept with my plan of becoming a teacher because that’s what I’d decided to do when I was sitting in my bedroom with Jordan, planning out our lives as a military family before we’d even graduated from high school. It made sense for me to teach if we were going to try to live overseas. Now, that was obviously off the table. I didn’t want to live in another country without Jordan.

  Did I really want to be a teacher anymore? Sure, I hadn’t been passionate about anything lately. It was time to get excited about something. I was ready.

  Now that I was out of my parents’ house, I could breathe again, think. I didn’t have to fall into all my old routines, their routines. When everything around you was the same, but you were completely different, it was like being stuck in a too small box that someone forgot to punch holes in.

  Now, I could do any damn thing I pleased. I hadn’t seen much of Cam since moving in with him, but this was the most me I’d seen in, well, forever.

  It felt good. So much better than I’d expected. For so long, I’d been scared to really let my mind wander, and listen to what was going on in there. Why didn’t anyone tell me that listening to myself would probably solve all of my problems? I wasn’t eating my emotions, either, probably because food was freaking expensive. It had only been a couple days, but my shorts already weren’t pinching at the waist like they were before.

  I’d only started taking classes when Jordan got deployed. This had been my first semester back at it. I’d checked the fall schedule, and they were offering a couple classes in my concentration. I’d give those a try, and if they didn’t rock my world, I’d do what my dad would suggest. Drop back and punt.

  That was the easy stuff. I had control over it. Fixing what I’d fucked up with Ev was going to be harder. I didn’t even know what to do about what Bree had told me. Was it worth even bringing up? Ev was still being short with me on text, and she blamed the wedding and the baby for not coming down to visit. Bullshit. She made it down here just fine before I moved into Cam’s. I could go up there, but I was at the beach and she was in the city. And it was July. So she needed to come to me. One of us would have to apologize, the thought of which made both of us nauseous. Normally, I wouldn’t worry about it, we disagreed all the time. When you were as close as Ev and I, you said what you thought or went nuts. But you couldn’t hold a grudge. This was going on too long, and the divide was getting wider.

  Everything with Bree was still weird since our last shopping trip, too. She kept acting stalkerish about Cam, and getting me in trouble with Ev. It didn’t exactly encourage me to want to talk to her.

  And then there was one.

  Much to my surprise, I was really getting in to the decorating thing. Who knew that stuff could be so satisfying? I’d been hanging curtains, looking at Pinterest boards, I even painted a couple things. I got sand in all of my painted projects. Authentic, right? Okay, amateur.

  “Wow, did I break into someone else’s house?” Cam looked around, wide-eyed, when he came home. Shit, maybe I went too far. “It looks great in here.”

  Ev had rubbed off on me, and coupled with online inspiration, I’d picked up some end tables at the Salvation Army, and I’d been out on the deck transforming them when Cam came in. In my excitement, I dipped my fingers in my paint and then smeared it on my face and into my hair. “I didn’t think you’d be home until tonight.”

  “I left on an earlier flight,” Cam approached me with a look in his eye that made my knees weak. Like he hadn’t had a drop to drink since he boarded that plane out of Boston at the beginning of the week. “I missed you.”

  I leaned against the wall as he approached me. My breath caught in my throat. “I missed you, too.” He leaned in, his arm against the wall, his face just inches from mine. I reached up and pulled a stray curl from his hair. “You got a haircut.”

  He startled, like I’d broken the spell, then chuckled. “Yeah. I like my guy down there. Do you like it?”

  “It’s okay, but I liked it longer better.” I pushed my fingers into his hair and pulled his face into mine, so I could kiss him. Being this close to him after he was away, the need to taste him overwhelmed me.

  His lips, still curled in his crooked smile that I’d missed so much, covered mine, his tongue stroked mine, slowly, like he needed to tell me something and this was the only way I’d ever understand. His hands ran up my ribcage, flipping the underwire of my bra up to free my breasts. He just pushed the fabric out of the way so he could lazily drag the rough skin of his fingers across my nipples, which greeted him enthusiastically. I sucked in a breath when his tongue took over for his fingers, which had dropped to my shorts, unzipping them and letting them drop. Wedging his thigh in between my legs, his foot moved mine one at a time, kicking the fabric away from my feet.

  He stopped, standing up straight and locking eyes with me, I froze under his spell. He brushed his fingers against my bottom lip, so slowly it almost tickled, pulling the skin down just so slightly with the motion. Once my lips parted, he explored the inside of my mouth as I sucked his fingers. Cam moaned softly, his lips against my neck. I was so wrapped up the feeling of his fingers in my mouth and his hot breath against my neck I never noticed he freed himself from his jeans. I cried out in surprise when he entered me, his thrusts speeding up to match the rhythm of me sucking on his fingers.

  Cam’s urgency sent my body into overdrive. My muscles clenched and spasmed and my breath became ragged, but he didn’t slow down. His hand had fallen from my lips to my shoulders, his upper body slumped against mine. One of my legs curled up against his ass, trapping him inside me. He ran his hands down the length of my body, clutching my ass, pulling me closer than I realized we could ever be.

  My head thrown back, my eyes were open but they saw absolutely nothing. All my senses had been suspended and all I could do was feel. Cam’s fingers curling into my skin, his heart beating against my chest, the sweat dripping from his face down my shoulder. My body throbbing and squeezing around his, not wanting to ever be two separate entities again. The fire built and ignited, threatening to swallow me whole, but Cam didn’t stop. He couldn’t stop.

  “You’re crying.” Cam wiped a tear away from my cheek. His body now spent, he breathed slow and heavy, his lashes weighed down his eyes.

  “I am?” I had yet to put all the pieces back together. Cam still had me pinned against the wall, probably because neither of us knew what to do as an encore. Running my fingers over my face, I was surprised when they came away wet. I stared at them and laughed. “I guess I am.”

  “Come lay on the couch with me.” Cam found the strength to push himself away from the wall and adjusted his jeans. Watching him, I don’t think I’d ever take him for granted.

  My legs felt rubbery when I stood up straight, I didn’t realize if it hadn’t been for the wall, I would have fallen flat on my ass. I started to adjust my bra, since my boobs didn’t need a visor, and Cam put his hand over mine.

  “Just take it off.”

  No one ever had to tell me twice. “Okay.” I started with the complicated maneuver that every junior high girl mastered to change their clothes in front of another person. It felt kind of dumb, since I didn’t have anything to hide. Then I’d just pull my T-shirt back down and put my shorts on.

  Cam laughed. “All of it.”

  I cocked my head at him, like my dog did when she was confused. We’d just had pretty epic sex, and there was no way he was ready for more. As amazing as Cam was, he was a mere mortal. I expected him to
pass out once we laid down. But I did as I was told.

  Cam sprawled out on the couch, still fully dressed. My heart started pounding again. I had no reason to be shy around him, if there was something Cam didn’t know about my body, I had yet to discover it myself. But there was something about being the only person naked in the room that truly felt naked.

  I sat on the edge of the cushion, and he scooted in to make enough room for me to lay with him. I tucked my feet up, and immediately Cam tangled his legs in mine. His arm came around my waist, and he kissed my shoulder.

  Once Cam picked something to watch, some reality show about buying and selling offbeat antiques, his body relaxed and grew heavy with the need for sleep. His hand now rested on the curve of my stomach. The Achilles’ heel of any girl carrying around some extra baggage, my soft white underbelly was accentuated by my tan lines. I couldn’t relax, I kept waiting for him to be grossed out that his fingers were resting against useless, ugly fat. Somehow, Cam was blind to my flaws, but I didn’t want him touching them, either.

  Every time he jolted himself out of semi-consciousness, he’d brush his fingers against my stomach. I had to dig my fingers into the edge of the cushion not to squirm.

  Cam sat up straight and looked around the front of my body. He must have sensed something was wrong. I looked up at him, slightly horrified, my hand instinctively covered my belly. At first he looked confused, but then his expression softened, and after he grabbed a blanket and threw it over us he laid back down, his hand going right back to that spot. This time he laced his fingers in mine.

  “Goodnight, gorgeous,” he murmured into my hair. That was the last thing he said before falling asleep.

  “This new producer, he seems to get my style, and I think it’s going to be really good.” Cam told me about his trip during our morning beach walk. I surprised myself by really wanting to do it, even with him sleeping next to me, I still got out of bed. Because we were still so new each other, Cam knew nothing of my former sloth like ways, and got right out of bed to come with me. “I’m excited about this.”