by Stacey Lynn
Tears dripped down my cheeks, and I didn’t bother to swipe them away.
“I’ll call you later.”
Chapter 13
David
The look of confusion mixed with pain and then understanding slamming down on her face hit me in the chest like she’d thrown a rock at me.
It took everything I had in me to stay still, to not abandon the still-seizing man in front of me and go for her.
Dropping my head, I inhaled a deep, steadying breath. “Damn it.”
This was too much. The attention, the people…This wasn’t how she was supposed to figure out the truth. I was supposed to tell her.
Damn it! Why didn’t I tell her?
Flashing lights in the distance caught my attention as Camden disappeared into the darkness at the end of the pier.
“David,” Declan said, rushing forward. “You okay? You can go after her. We’ll tell them what happened and get this woman and her husband situated.”
Next to me, Milly’s hand touched my forearm. Her still-trembling soft voice wrapped around me and chained me to my spot. “Please. I don’t know…Harold’s always talked to the doctors, and you know what to say.”
I covered her hand without dragging my eyes off Declan. “I’ll stay with you. Don’t worry.”
Patting her twice, I watched the EMTs hustle down the pier toward us, a stretcher between them, thudding rhythmically over the wooden dock. The man had been seizing for over five minutes. Other than making sure he didn’t choke or injure himself, there wasn’t much I could do. Hopefully the nearest hospital or clinic could give him something to help. Mostly, I wanted him watched overnight.
“David.”
I lifted a hand and silenced Declan. To most, his large frame was intimidating. Standing in front of me, hands fisted at his sides, he didn’t scare me. The last time I hadn’t been able to do my job, everything had gone ass-over-teakettle, as my mom would say. That couldn’t happen again, whether or not I was still a practicing doctor. “I have to go with them. They’re elderly. I want to make sure he’s okay and help explain it to her. And who knows what his medical condition will be.”
“David,” Chelsea said, scurrying up to me, her breath ragged. She’d run after Camden and then hurried back to the crowd still lingering as the stretcher rolled behind her. I didn’t have time for this.
I didn’t need another woman pissed at me.
“Where is she?” I asked.
“She said she’s leaving.”
Shit. For a moment, I wondered if I was doing the right thing. But I could fix things with Camden later, when I got back. Harold and Milly needed my immediate help.
“Chelsea, I need to help them. Please…tell her that I’ll explain everything.”
Chelsea shook her head and stepped back, wrapping her arms around her stomach like she needed to hold herself together. “You don’t get it, David. She’s gone. Left.”
I stepped toward her, reaching for her, when the stretcher came between us.
“Excuse us,” one of the young men said, his voice thickened with the local accent.
I bit my lip so harshly I felt the sting of blood in my mouth. Chelsea stepped away, shaking her head. “You hurt her,” she said, her eyes wide and her voice a mere breath in the heavy, tense air. “I didn’t think you’d be the guy to do it. But I think you broke her heart.”
“Chelsea, please…whatever you can do to get her to stay…” My gaze flickered down to Harold. The sting of Milly’s nails cut into my forearms. I couldn’t go. She was pale and terrified, and who knew what would happen in a foreign hospital where they knew no one?
“I followed her, David. She didn’t even go back to her bungalow or yours. Just hopped in a cab dropping off other guests at the front of the resort’s main entrance. She’s gone.”
I stepped forward, out of Milly’s touch. “She what?”
“David,” Aidan said, cutting in front of Chelsea. “We’ll take care of Camden. We’ll figure out where she went, okay? You get to the hospital, take care of Milly and Harold here, and we’ll do the rest.”
Blood bubbled in my veins, frustration at my own stupidity, my own inability to just tell the freaking truth from the beginning. But I hadn’t figured out if I was ever going to return to being a doctor. What was the point of sharing it? If I didn’t, Camden would have had to get used to being with a bartender.
I needed that. I needed that security, just like I knew she craved hers in her own way.
My cheeks puffed out and I blew out a breath. There was nothing I could do to help Harold, but hell if I could walk away.
“Find her,” I whispered, my voice hoarse and gritty.
The clanking of the stretcher being lifted snapped my focus back to the task at hand, and I moved back to Milly.
“Just tell her I can explain.”
“Would help,” Aidan replied, “if you would have told us what the hell was going on for the last five months, you know. Secrets have a way of getting out and it never turns out well when they do.”
“Not really the time for that now, is it?” I snapped. Of course I could have told my friends what had happened in Chicago. Of course they’d understand, or at least be supportive.
Aidan took a step back, reaching behind him and taking Chelsea’s hand in his. His lips tugged downward, and he ran a hand over his face. “I know. Not the time, but some fucking honesty would have been nice for all of us. You didn’t let me hide when I needed you.”
Memories licked my skin, making me shiver. I couldn’t handle it. I resisted the overwhelming urge to run and jump off the pier, straight into the sea, and hide from all of it. Death, deception, the pain I saw lashing through Camden’s features as reality clicked together.
God, I was an idiot.
“I gotta go.”
I clapped Aidan’s hand and he murmured, “Keep us posted, yeah? We’ll deal with the rest of this later. It’ll all work out.”
“Yeah.” I dropped his hand and gave Chelsea a pleading look. “Chelsea.”
She shook her head and looked at the pier where Camden had disappeared. “This is Camden, David. You know that and you know her.”
It was a warning. A statement of truth. One that made me know how completely royally I’d just fucked up.
“She’s not the kind of girl that gives second chances.”
Tyson’s voice rang clearly in my head, making it pound against my skull. Damn it. Fuck!
“I know.” I said goodbye to everyone else and hurried to the ambulance where Milly was still standing, staring at the now closed doors.
“Fifty-two years of marriage. He just wanted to see Jamaica, always did. Harold can’t go like this. Not on this night.”
“He won’t.” I draped my arm over the woman’s shoulder and pulled her toward the front of the hotel to find a ride so we could follow the ambulance. “Come on. Let’s get you to the hospital, and I promise I’ll be there to help you with anything I can.”
“You’re a good man,” she said, turning to me and giving me a tight smile.
I was an incredibly stupid man. I was a broken man.
And if Camden ever found it in her to hear me out, I’d prove that I wouldn’t be so epically idiotic ever again.
—
Chelsea hadn’t lied earlier. Camden was gone, and I was the idiot who watched her walk away. I was the idiot who stood by and did nothing, all in a vain attempt to be helpful. To somehow be who I was supposed to be.
It was never enough.
How wrong I was. Again.
Lungs burning from tearing through Camden’s bungalow and then my own, just to make sure she hadn’t changed her mind, all I’d found was both of our places exactly how they’d been left. Camden had run off the island with only the purse she’d been holding.
I was still breathless when I reached Aidan and Chelsea’s bungalow.
After knocking, I waited a few moments and cursed myself. It was the middle of the night, way too late to be s
howing up unannounced.
A pale light flicked on and the door flung open.
Aidan stood in the doorway, jaw clenched. He scanned my face, relaxed minutely, and stepped aside.
“Thanks,” I muttered, still panting. I released my hold on the doorframe and walked past him.
“How is he?” Aidan asked, closing the door behind me.
Ignoring him, I focused on Chelsea. She wrapped her resort-issued robe tightly around her waist. “How is she?”
“Gone.” Her hands twisted together, knotting around the belt. Red swollen eyes told me she’d been crying. “Caught the last flight out at one thirty.”
Damn it!
“Nothing you can do tonight, David. Go to bed and rest. We’re all heading out tomorrow, anyway.”
I gawked at the middle school librarian like she’d grown a third head. My mind was already whirling with possibilities and none of them meant staying on this island another eight hours, letting Camden get any farther away.
“David,” Aidan repeated. He stepped to me, clasped his hand on my shoulder, and squeezed. When he had my attention, I turned to face him.
“What?”
“How was Harold?”
I shook my head and heard Chelsea’s gasp.
“No, it’s not that bad.” My eyes flicked to hers and caught her relief. “He had another seizure after we were at the hospital. They called an air ambulance. He and Milly are off the island on their way to Miami. Jamaica didn’t have the necessary medical equipment to handle him.” I wiped my hand down my face and sighed. “Okay. I’m going to get out of here. I’ll see you when you get back.”
Chelsea stepped forward. “You’re leaving? But why? Another plane won’t take off until eight at the earliest and we’re leaving right after, anyway.”
I bit back my smirk and looked at Aidan. He arched a brow, curious. “Chartering a plane?”
“If I can get someone to fly it, yeah.”
He smacked my shoulder. “I’m sure you can coerce them into it.”
Because the McGregor trust fund provided millions and I rarely touched it, except for emergencies. I considered this one my largest ever.
“How?” Chelsea’s brows bunched together in confusion.
“Trust fund.”
“What?”
Aidan laughed softly. “I’ll explain later,” he whispered to her, tugging her close to his side. Then he speared me with a glare. “And so will you.”
“Everything.” I nodded. “Promise. After I tell Cam.”
“David,” Aidan said, stopping close to Chelsea and wrapping his hand around her waist. He tugged her gently to his side, pressed his lips to her head, and turned to me, grinning. “Have a safe flight.”
With my hand on the doorknob, I looked at Aidan over my shoulder. “I’ll talk to you soon.”
I left, closing the door behind me without saying goodbye.
I had been a fool to think I could handle all of this bullshit by myself, and it was time to stop running…and start chasing.
Chapter 14
Camden
After I paid the cab driver, I trudged up my driveway.
Exhaustion pressed down on my shoulders and from outside I could hear my bed calling my name. After catching the last plane out of Jamaica at one thirty in the morning, I’d flown standby and gotten a direct flight from Miami to Detroit that left at eight A.M. Unable to sleep for a single minute on either plane, I’d been awake for over twenty-four hours.
My eyes felt like sandpaper from the tears I’d shed on my flight home. David had lied to me. I still couldn’t comprehend it. I couldn’t understand why he’d do it. Why he’d tried so hard and so long to get me beneath him when the entire time, he had been lying to me. And Trina had known. All the comments she’d made, the disappointment in her eyes when I’d said I wouldn’t date a bartender, when he wasn’t one.
The anger that had been burning in my veins all day only boiled hotter as I slid the key into my door and pushed it open.
“Ugh,” I groaned. Ten stairs until I could collapse into bed. My knees wobbled at the thought.
I shut the door behind me and turned, stopping just short of stumbling over my suitcase. My lime-green one. The one I’d taken to, and then left in, Jamaica.
“What the hell?” A light turned on, and I screamed. My hand flew to my chest and I jumped back, bumping into the wall behind me.
“Welcome home,” David said, sitting in my living room chair.
He was in my living room.
My boiling rage flew from my lips, instantly overcoming my exhaustion. “What in the hell are you doing here? You scared the shit out of me.”
“I came to talk to you. And I wanted to make sure you got home safely.”
The exhaustion in his eyes mirrored what I knew mine held. I could barely look at him. Still so handsome in the same outfit he’d been wearing the last time I saw him, except now his blue polo shirt was wrinkled.
My breath came in short, quickened pants. I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t yell. I couldn’t do all the screaming and accusing I wanted to do. For the last several hours, I’d replayed that moment on the pier. He hadn’t even tried to stop me.
“I don’t even want to know how in the hell you got into my house, but you need to go.”
“I need to explain. Everything. Camden, please—”
“No.” I shook my head violently and lifted a hand to stop him. “No. You lied, and you misled me intentionally. I don’t even want to hear it.” But God…how I did. I wanted to know everything, and why it was always so fucking easy for men to take advantage of me. I was so…so freaking sick and tired of it.
He stood, pushing himself slowly off the chair as if the motion caused him pain. My back pressed into the wall behind me.
Tears burned my eyes, and my nose stung as he walked toward me.
“God, David. Just go.”
“I’m sorry I hurt you.”
I couldn’t hear this. Not when I was so close to collapsing. “Go home, David. I don’t care. It was all fun for you, wasn’t it?” And God, why was I still talking? “Seduce the uptight bitch. Get her to loosen up and get her beneath you.” Wet tears filled my eyes and fell down my cheeks. He flinched and then went blurry in front of me. “Lucky you. I mean, you got me to let my hair down, trust you, and you got laid whenever you wanted. Bet that was a great vacation for you, huh?”
“That’s not what it was like, and I’ll explain.”
“No.”
“Please…”
“No!” I couldn’t do this. Not with him. Not with pain searing my chest. To hell with it, and him. “Go! Get out of my house!” My voice went shrill as I screamed so loud it echoed in my ears.
All my limbs trembled, and it took everything I had to hold myself up.
“Camden.” He sounded broken. Wretched. I couldn’t trust it. I squeezed my eyes closed to avoid seeing him. He’d done this to me, after all the years I’d spent protecting myself from men, from this kind of man, who would lie and seduce and play with a woman only to have it be one big fucking joke. “I’m so sorry.”
I wiped my cheeks and turned away from the sound of his voice, closer to me now. I couldn’t look at him. Opening my eyes, I stared at my carpet. “Please, God, David. Just leave me alone.”
“I’ll go. For now, and I’ll let you sleep. But I won’t stop trying until you give me a minute to explain why, Camden. I swear, not everything is as bad as you’re thinking right now.”
“I don’t care about your excuses.” But damn it, I did. And it took everything I had in me to stay still, to keep looking away from him, as I felt the heat of his body draw close to me and then past me. “I don’t care about you at all, David.”
“No more lies, Camden.” He was past me now, closer to the door. I heard the click of the lock as he opened it. “Please…let’s not lie anymore. I’ve hurt you and I know it. And I’m so damn sorry I wasn’t up-front, but not all of this is easy for me, either, and I don�
�t want to talk about it. But for you, I will.”
I sniffed and said nothing. The pain in his voice echoed mine, and all the rage boiling inside me began to cool. I forced myself to look at my living room, at the fireplace at the far side of the room. My teeth were clenched together so tightly my jaw ached.
“Get some sleep,” he said softly, his voice a comforting whisper. “I’ll see you soon. But please go to bed knowing how fucking sorry I am for being the one to make you feel this kind of pain.”
My body shivered from his words that sounded so tortured. I couldn’t bring myself to be happy about it.
I stood there long after the door closed behind him. When I finally moved, I reset the lock and crawled upstairs, unable to hold myself up any longer.
When I reached my bed, I collapsed into it, barely having the energy to pull back the covers and climb beneath them.
—
“My mom’s not here.”
“I didn’t come for her. I came to see you.” He pushed his way forward, forcing me backward into the trailer. When he stepped inside, the door slammed closed behind him and made me jump.
“Why me?”
Evan’s lip curled up. “Because I’ve seen the way you look at me, the way you smile at me…and I like it.”
I shook my head. My body trembled. My fingertips began buzzing.
“I don’t understand.” He made my mom laugh and he brought us take-out food. My belly had never been so full and I was finally gaining weight. I liked him and I was thankful. How was I supposed to show him that without smiling at him?
“Camden,” he said, and reached out, running his hand through my hair that fell below my shoulders. I froze under his touch. I didn’t like his eyes. The way they narrowed and fell just past my hair.
I covered my chest with my arms. I was one of the first girls in my school to start wearing a bra and I hated my boobs.
“What, Evan?”
“I like you.”
I tried to step back, but his hand wrapped around my arm, stopping me. He stepped forward. Closer and closer, until I craned my neck back to look up at him.
