Chapter 26
Anya
Five months later
“I can’t believe I got invited to do this!” I said, excitedly tapping my foot on the ground.
I was huddled with Kara, Shania and Cam in the VIP line at Gamer Con, a major yearly convention for gamers like myself. It had hundreds of booths with merchandise, freebies, and chances to speak to game designers and writers, and almost everyone was dressed up as their favorite game character. Some people might think it was kinda lame, but I thought it was super fun. I’d chosen to dress up as Sylvanas Windrunner, the banshee queen from World of Warcraft, as she’d always been a favorite of mine.
The four of us had VIP tickets to the event because I’d been asked to do a presentation. After all my years of game streaming experience, the event organizers had asked me to do a live game stream for hundreds of fans on one of the main stages, and it was unbelievably exciting.
“All those years of being a nerd finally paid off,” Kara said, playfully elbowing me.
“Says you, who keeps dating guys she meets off games,” Shania interjected with a giggle.
“Hey! I’ll have you know, I’m dating a guy I met at work now, thank you very much!” Kara replied with a grin. “But he does play a lot of StarCraft…”
Cam shook his head and sighed dramatically. “How did I end up here with such a bunch of geeks?”
We all laughed. “Hey, I didn’t force you to dress up as Prince Arthas from Warcraft,” I said, slipping my arm around him.
“You practically did. I hardly even know who he is,” he replied before lifting up his fake sword. “For the Horde!”
Kara snorted with laughter, and I arched an eyebrow. “Arthas would never say that, but good try.”
“Nerd,” he replied, gently smacking my ass.
We finally got inside, and I marveled at the sheer size of the event as we strolled around for the next hour or so, checking everything out. Several people recognized me from my Elune gaming channel and said hi, and one person even asked for a photo with me.
“Now I really know what it felt like to be you back in the day,” I said to Cam after he’d snapped the photo for us. “All famous and everything.”
“Pretty soon you’ll be getting blackout drunk and falling out of bars for the tabloids,” he replied with a wink.
I rolled my eyes and chuckled. “Sure, sure.”
He squeezed my hand, and we stopped at a booth that Kara wanted to check out.
“I’m going to the bathroom,” Shania announced. “I’ll come back and find you guys soon.”
She disappeared into the crowd, and Cam and I moved over to another booth several yards away to look at a bunch of cool figurines and playing cards as Kara checked out the booth she was interested in. After a few minutes, I turned to get Cam’s attention so I could show him something, but he was gone.
“Cam?” I called out, looking around.
No reply.
Craning my neck, I finally spotted him back over at the other booth with Kara. They were huddled together, deep in conversation, and when Kara whispered something in Cam’s ear, I knew there was something weird going on. They’d become pretty good friends in the last few years, but they’d never behaved like this.
I sneaked up to them and tapped Cam on the shoulder, and they sprang apart like scalded cats.
“What’s going on?” I asked, my eyes narrowing in suspicion.
“Nothing,” they replied in unison, a little too fast for my liking.
I arched an eyebrow. “Spill.”
Kara glanced at Cam. “Um…I guess we’re having a secret affair…or something?” she said.
Cam nodded. “Uh-huh. Yep, that’s definitely it.”
They couldn’t have made it any more obvious that they were lying, and I crossed my arms, a small smile turning the corners of my lips up. “Oh, really? A secret affair? That’s nice. Well, go ahead then. Prove it. Kiss.”
Cam looked horrified, as did Kara, and I grinned triumphantly. “A-ha! I knew it. You guys were plotting something else.”
Cam sighed. “Fine. We were going to save it as a surprise, but we found out that your outfit won best costume for the whole convention today.”
My eyes widened. “Really? Wow, that’s cool. I didn’t even know that was a thing here. You guys didn’t need to keep that as a surprise from me!” I said. “Anyway, I need to head over to the B stage. I’m on in fifteen minutes.”
As I turned away, I could have sworn I saw Kara shoot a sly grin at Cam. Dammit. They were still up to something.
Shania texted us to find out where we were a moment later, and she met us at the side of the B stage as two of the event coordinators set things up and told me exactly where to stand during my presentation. There was an enormous screen at the back of the stage, and anything I did on the onstage computer would be played on that screen for everyone to see.
“Please, no sex tapes this time,” Kara called out, poking her tongue at me.
“Oh, very funny,” I said, shaking my head at her with a grin. That scandal had happened so long ago that it was nothing but an awkward memory now.
Ten minutes later, I was ready to go, and I walked onto the stage and flashed a smile over at Cam, Kara and Shania as they waited for me to be announced.
Once upon a time, I would’ve been terrified of doing something like this in public, especially in front of so many people, but over the last few years, Cam had taught me to be more confident in myself. After all, when a man that sexy looks at you like you’re the hottest thing he’s ever seen and tells you he believes in you no matter what, that’s enough to put a spring in your step and make you feel like you can do absolutely anything. Besides, he was right near the stage, standing only a few feet away, so even if I totally screwed up or tripped over, he’d be there to catch me and we’d be able to laugh about it later.
“Okay, everyone, we’re happy to announce that everyone’s favorite streamer is here with us today!” the emcee said, his voice booming out to the gathered crowd. “She’s going to be showing you how to singlehandedly take down the wraith of the Black Lair. Give it up for Anya Cruz, otherwise known as Elune!”
I smiled and waved. “Hi, everyone!”
The crowd whooped and cheered, and as I took my place near the standing computer desk where I was going to be playing, I breathed a sigh of relief. So far, so good. I hadn’t tripped or fallen over yet.
Cam clapped and let out a wolf-whistle as I started things off with the game, and I grinned and looked over at him for a second. ‘I love you,’ he mouthed to me, and my smile grew even wider.
I was the luckiest woman on earth.
I had everything I’d ever dreamed of in my life right now. The sports agency I’d helped to set up with Cam was doing really well, my game streaming was still fun and successful as evidenced by today’s Gamer Con invitation, and my family was awesome.
Shania had lived in the city for almost three years now, and my Mom and Pierce had welcomed her with open arms. There’d been no awkwardness or drama, only love and support. Mom and Pierce’s marriage was still going strong, too. They’d been married for almost four years now, and we caught up with them every week for a family dinner.
As for Cam, he was amazing, as always. We were one of those lucky couples who got to live together and work together, and we never got sick of being around each other. Sure, sometimes we’d have silly arguments, but we were able to resolve them quickly, and overall, we were the best of friends. To me, that was a key component in a healthy, lasting relationship. You had to genuinely love the other person as a friend as well as a lover…and that’s exactly what we had. Cam was one of the best friends I’d ever had, and we did everything together—lived, played, and worked.
Speaking of work—when I was younger and in college, I’d never thought that one day I might end up managing a sports agency for racers, but I’d also never thought I’d end up in a relationship with a wealthy ex-bad boy player who happened
to be my stepbrother, either. I guess sometimes life just takes you in a crazy direction, and everything still works out for the best.
I finally finished killing the Black Lair wraith on the stage computer, and I called out to everyone.
“And that’s it…all you really have to remember is to keep out of the ice vortexes that pop up at random!” I said.
The crowd was dead silent. There wasn’t even a tiny smattering of applause; in fact, most people looked rather shocked. My heart began to hammer, and I bit my lower lip as I tried to figure out what was going on. Had I done something wrong? Was my game-playing not impressive enough? The Black Lair wraith was one of the hardest in-game monsters to solo-kill, so I’d thought it would be a cool thing to show everyone.
Apparently not.
I turned my head to the side to seek out Cam’s reassuring gaze offstage, but he wasn’t there anymore. Then I felt a tap on my shoulder, and I turned around to see him standing there with a cheesy grin on his face.
“What are you doing up here? You’re…”
My sentence stopped short as I saw the big screen behind me. In huge purple letters, there was a message saying ‘Anya, will you marry me?’, and my hand flew to my mouth as Cam sank to one knee on the stage.
He pulled out a small crimson jewelry box and opened it up to display the most beautiful diamond ring I’d ever seen, and I stared in shock, almost unable to believe it was really happening.
Cam looked up at me, his eyes filled with hope. “So…will you?”
“Oh my god…yes!” I said, nodding like crazy as I struggled to hold back the tears of joy.
The crowd saw me nodding and went wild, whooping and cheering as Cam slipped the ring onto my finger, right where it belonged.
“It’s so beautiful,” I murmured.
Cam rose to his feet again. “It was my mother’s,” he said. “She got it from her grandmother, and her family gave it to me along with her old cabin. They said she’d been planning on giving it to me herself when she apologized, in the hopes that one day I’d find a happier relationship than she ever had, considering all the problems she had.”
It was so sweet how after everything she’d done in the past, Cam had been so willing to forgive his mother, even though he’d never had the chance to do so in person. I was proud of him, and I knew his Dad was too.
“Thank you,” I said, tears falling from my eyes in earnest now. “I can’t believe you’re giving me something so special.”
“Well, you’re the most special person in my life,” he said. “She’d be happy that I gave it to you. I just know it.”
The crowd was still cheering, and I practically threw myself on Cam to hug him, almost knocking the empty box out of his hand. He wrapped his arms around me and brought his lips down to my face, and just before he kissed me, he murmured something.
“I love you. I always will,” he said.
“I love you too,” I replied, and then his lips finally crashed down on mine.
As we embraced, it was like I was kissing him for the first time all over again. The whole world seemed to stop spinning, and the butterflies in my stomach made my whole body tremble as my heart raced like mad. Cam Meyers was all mine, I was all his, and we were crazily, undeniably head-over-heels in love. Just the way it was supposed to be.
God, I was so lucky.
When we finally broke away from our kiss, we waved at the cheering crowd, and something suddenly occurred to me.
“This is what you and Kara were whispering about earlier, right?” I asked, turning back to Cam.
He gave me a cheeky smile. “Yep. She helped me set this up with the event organizers, along with Shania. When Shania said she went to the bathroom earlier, she was actually sneakily checking to make sure it was all still in order. Oh, and we got someone to film it and send the video to my Dad and your Mom. So they’ll probably be calling us any second now.”
I giggled. I wasn’t just lucky to have Cam; I was also lucky to have such great friends and family.
A moment later, I wiped the tears of joy from my cheeks and held out my hand, admiring the beautiful ring again as it sparkled under the bright convention lights.
“Well…now that you’ve officially locked me down, you can’t be a devilish playboy ever again,” I said, looking back up at Cam with a mischievous smile and a teasing glint in my eyes.
He grinned. “Nah, I’m still a playboy,” he replied, squeezing my hand. “Only this time, I’m playing for keeps…”
THE END
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Playboy - A Stepbrother Romance Page 19
