by Melissa West
“Hey…are you all right? You look pale,” Alexa said.
I swallowed hard. “Yeah. Absolutely. I was just thinking about a project creative is working on this morning for me. I need to go check on it. Want to do lunch?”
“For sure. See you in a few,” she said as she rushed off.
My phone buzzed from beside my computer, and I peered down to find a new text from Aidan. Meetings all day, but I want to talk. Call you tonight?
Right, meetings to discuss you moving there, I wanted to text back, but I didn’t want to ask him about it over text or on the phone. For now, I had to hold this in until we could talk about it in person. The sad thing was that he’d been gone all of a day, and I already missed him terribly. Three days was going to feel like an eternity, but then, I’d have to prepare myself for the hard fact that our relationship was hitting its expiration date. Stupidly, I convinced myself that Aidan’s fears about us were his way of trying to protect me. But now I learned that Aidan was moving to London. Would he wait to break it off, or give me the news over the phone tonight?
The thought made my heart clench tight, bracing itself for the pain to come. I read the text again, unsure of how to respond without giving away my thoughts. This wasn’t supposed to happen. This was supposed to be fun and easy—casual. When did my heart get involved?
And that was the real issue. My heart had always been involved, because I wasn’t a casual kind of girl. I wanted what my parents had, what my mom had with Eric. I wanted love and commitment and willingness to push through the hard stuff. The problem was, I also wanted Aidan, and he didn’t want those things. So what did that mean for us?
I pressed the phone to my forehead, frustrated that I had to wait to talk to him. I wanted to hash this out now. But now wasn’t an option, so I simply typed back, Tonight , and clicked send.
Never had one word held so much dread.
…
Lauren and Alexa were already seated at the restaurant when I arrived for lunch. With Aidan out of the office and Gayle leaving early for the day, I felt more at ease taking a proper, hour-long lunch without feeling guilty.
I sat down and tried to listen in to their conversation.
“You should totally apply,” Lauren said before taking a drink of her water.
“I can’t. There are no open positions.”
A waitress came by to take my drink order, and as soon as she walked away I asked, “What position? Where?”
Alexa sank back into her chair. “It’s stupid. But I really want to move up at Sanderson-Lowe. I want to be an account manager, but there are no open positions right now.”
“Oh. Well, what about other positions? I saw something open up in creative a few weeks ago.”
She shook her head. “I know nothing about design, but I think I’m good with clients. I’ve been trying to pay attention to the latest campaigns, to learn. Do you think you could put in a good word for me with Gayle? Oh! Or better yet, Aidan? He seems to really like you.”
At that Lauren began to choke on her drink, sputtering. I shot her a look that said zip it or else, and then focused back on Alexa. “Definitely. I’m sure they’d consider you if a position opened up.”
“I hope so,” she said. “I don’t want to be an administrative assistant forever. I know I can do more. I just need to focus on finding a way.”
My eyebrows drew together. “What do you mean ‘a way’?”
She shrugged. “Well, Peyton, that new AM under Brody, is always late. I bet Brody would have an issue with it if a little birdie told him.” She grinned wickedly, and I shook my head.
“You can’t out her like that. It wouldn’t be right.”
Lauren and I both stared at Alexa, waiting for her to agree, but she simply shrugged again, her look distant, and I wondered if she was planning that very thing in hopes of scoring Peyton’s job. The thought sent a chill over me as I realized how little I knew of Alexa or what she was capable of. I’d have to be much, much more careful.
Chapter Twenty-Four
That night I slipped into my apartment and set down my keys and purse, exhausted from the stress of the day—and none of it technically had anything to do with work. I contemplated calling Aidan a thousand times, texting him, anything to relieve the urge in me to know. But each time, I set my phone back down, my eyes returning to the word “tonight,” and the sinking feeling would start all over again.
The apartment was empty, Lauren out on another date with Patrick, and in the quiet I found myself spiraling faster into my misery. When did this happen to me? When did my happiness become linked to a guy? Even with Blaine, I kept myself focused, centered. But this was different. Aidan was different. I felt so unbelievably happy around him, so at peace. I didn’t want to give that up. At first, I thought my comfort was because he understood my goals—his being so similar—but it was never about the job. It was him. The easy way he looked at me, the way he willingly opened up about his life, the way he listened to me talk about my dad without the smallest hint of pity on his face. I didn’t want to lose that.
I didn’t want to lose him.
Tears clouded my vision, and I started for my bathroom for a tissue just as my phone vibrated against the counter. It was just after seven, after midnight in London. He’d stayed awake for me.
Grabbing my phone, I curled up on the couch, hitting answer even before I looked at the screen. “Hey…”
“Hey, yourself,” he said, his voice low, tired.
“Busy day?” I asked. “You sound exhausted.”
“Just a day of difficult decisions. Always the toughest to get through. Listen, I wanted to talk about—”
“I know.”
He hesitated on the other end, the sounds of him breathing making it hard for me to keep from blurting out every thought I had about London and him and us. But again, it wasn’t my conversation.
“Cameron…”
“It’s okay.”
“It is?”
My heart plummeted into my stomach. He sounded only marginally disappointed, nothing more. My pride wouldn’t allow me to tell him how much I wanted him to stay if he wasn’t thinking the same thing. If he wasn’t just as desperate to be with me. Here I’d stupidly thought he’d take a chance on me, drop the no-dating thing for me, but now I saw I’d been as foolish as all the women before me.
“I get that it’s a great opportunity. You’d be crazy to turn it down. And besides, we were just having fun, right?” My voice shook with emotion, and I wondered if he could hear it, if he knew how much this was breaking me.
“I’m not sure—”
“Really. I’m fine with it.” Lies. All lies.
“What exactly are you talking about?”
I sat up and crossed my legs. What was his game? He knew exactly what I was talking about. Did he want to hear me say it? “London,” I spit out.
“Right… And I get why you might be disappointed, but why are you so angry?”
Disappointed? The nerve. Poor little Cameron, disappointed that the Aidan Truitt is dumping her. “Look, I’m really tired. I’ll talk to you—”
“I swear to God if you hang up this phone, I will fly home and come knock on your door. I don’t avoid things, Cameron. And I don’t appreciate being left in the dark. What is—”
“You’re moving to London.”
“I’m what?”
“Alexa told me at the office today. They offered you an amazing job and an amazing salary and now you’re moving. And I get it. I do. I just…” I trailed off, unable to say what I was truly thinking, feeling.
He started to laugh, and for the first time ever, I contemplated dipping into Dad’s money just so I could buy a private flight over to his hotel so I could kick his ass.
“It’s not funny.”
“No, you’re right. You believing gossip at the office instead of coming to me directly isn’t funny.”
I swallowed hard. “I was waiting for you to tell me, but you weren’t admitting it.�
��
“That’s because there’s nothing to admit. I called to tell you that I’d be here two more days, arriving back to New York on Friday. I know things have been off between us, so I didn’t want you to think I was staying to avoid you. The opposite, actually. I’m dying to get back home.”
I jerked upright, my heart beginning to dance and cheer in excitement. “It’s not true?”
“No. They’ve offered. But they’ve been offering for a year now. My life is in New York.”
Relief swarmed through me, relaxing the tension in my shoulders. “I would kiss you right now if I could.”
“I would do a lot more than kiss you. I miss you.”
“But what about the rules, the complications?”
“I don’t know. I just know that I’m sitting here alone in my hotel room, and all I want in the world is for you to be here, too.”
My bottom lip trembled, and I swallowed hard to try to push away my emotions so I could speak. “So what should we do now?”
“No clue. You?”
“No clue,” I whispered.
Chapter Twenty-Five
My legs jumped as my fingers tapped against the bar in time to the music. Lauren, Alexa, and Grace insisted we go out. After all, it was a Friday and we were young twentysomethings, each of us single, though Lauren had dated Patrick pretty exclusively for the past few weeks.
I tapped my nails harder against the wood of the bar, and Lauren reached for my hand, stopping me. She glanced around to make sure we were alone—the other girls were already on the dance floor. “When does he arrive?”
“What? Who?”
She cocked her head. “You know who. You’re doing that nervous tap thing you do, where your mind is a million miles away, and you can’t sit still. When does he get in?”
I shrugged. “His flight landed a half hour ago.”
“Then why are you here?”
“I’m waiting on him to call me.”
She eyed the dance floor. “You don’t have to wait on him.”
“But, what if—?”
“Cameron, he cares about you. I know it’s complicated, but he does care about you. You don’t have to wait on him to call. This isn’t all on him. You have to tell him what you want, and if you care about him, too, you have to be willing to work things out.”
“He doesn’t want to commit.”
“Yeah, but he’s not with anyone else, either.”
I stared at Lauren, who cocked her head in that see-I-know-all way. But she was right. He wasn’t seeing anyone else. And despite everything, I didn’t want to be with just anyone. I wanted Aidan. And though he wasn’t ready for the whole forever thing, maybe if I pointed out to him that we were already exclusive, that it wasn’t scary, and that I wasn’t brokenhearted, then he would see that he could have a healthy relationship. It might require patience, but Aidan was capable of commitment. I knew it in my heart, and if Dad had taught me anything, it was that I needed to trust my heart.
I smiled as I focused on Lauren. “I’m going to go see him.”
She smiled back. “I’d already be gone.”
…
I called Aidan from outside his apartment, my nerves still coiled tight from the decisions I’d made. It never occurred to me before that I needed to help Aidan through this. If I cared about him, then I had to care about him enough to wait. We may not be in a strict, committed relationship, but we were something. I could feel it, and I wasn’t ready to let go.
He answered on the first ring. “I was hoping you would come,” he said, his voice low as he buzzed me in, and then I was rushing into his building and onto the elevator, my foot tapping the entire way. It wasn’t until the elevator doors opened that I realized what I’d done. I’d just ridden on an elevator, without freaking out, without singing, without even a second thought. The realization that my desperation to see him had overcome my fear was enough to send me running down the hall.
Aidan pulled me into his arms the moment I crossed the threshold into his apartment. It had been five days with him in London, me here, and in that time, one thing became abundantly clear: I didn’t want this to end. I was ready to fight for what I wanted.
I rose onto my toes and kissed him with urgency, unable to stop myself, and then he lifted me into his arms and began walking toward his bedroom, his thoughts in line with mine. He set me down on the edge of the king-size bed and peered down and dear God, that simple look, so full of want, was my undoing.
“I care about you, and I know you care for me, too. We don’t have to follow any rules at all. We can take our time and let this, whatever it is, become whatever we want it to become. We don’t have to know right now. And maybe it ends anyway, but how can we let it end without trying?”
Aidan tilted my chin up and ran his thumb slowly over my bottom lip, his gaze following his thumb before locking on my eyes. “We can’t.”
Warmth spread through me. Forget talking. Forget kissing. I wanted to feel connected to him in every way, body and mind. I wanted to forget about what Alexa had said, forget about my job, forget about how it felt like I was walking in the middle of the street, bound to get hit any moment. For that second, I just wanted Aidan. And he wasn’t nearly close enough.
I stood up and ran my fingers down his tie. It was the red one I loved, and I smiled at my memory of the first time I’d seen it—the things I’d pictured him doing with it.
“I love this tie,” I said, my voice sultry.
Aidan’s eyes grew dark, drinking me in. “Oh yeah?” He shook out of his suit jacket and loosened the tie, then he leaned down and pressed his lips to my neck and whispered, “I’d rather see you wearing it…and nothing else.”
Desire raged through me, settling low in my core. “I think I can arrange that.”
I stepped away from him and took my time pulling off my sweater and slinking out of my leggings, careful to keep my eyes on him the entire time. His gaze swept over me as I unfastened my bra and let it fall to the floor, so I was before him in only a thong, him still fully dressed in business attire. I walked slowly toward him and reached for the tie, but he shook his head.
“Lie down.”
The fire simmering low in my belly burst into wild flames at the command in his voice. I lay back on his bed, enjoying the feel of his eyes on me. I expected him to undress and join me, but instead he sat beside me and ran a hand over my face, down my breasts, and then finally cupping my heat, allowing his fingers to glide over me again and again until I was ready to explode.
“Lift your arms and cross them at the wrist.”
I hesitated for a moment, unsure where this was going, but I was far too turned on to ask questions. I did as he asked, and then he leaned over me and began threading the tie around my wrists, binding them above my head. Dear God…
Aidan walked to the end of his bed and peered down at me. “So beautiful. I can’t get enough of you. No amount of time with you will ever be enough.” Then he crawled up the bed, still fully clothed, and I could see that he intended to take his time. The feel of his smooth duvet below my nearly naked body and Aidan over me was enough to make me writhe with each touch, but he didn’t give in. Instead, he trailed his hands slowly over me, careful to show attention to every inch of my skin. His tongue swept up my left calf, inside my thigh. His fingers delicately trailed down my abdomen, over the edges of my thong. I started to drop my arms down and he pulled away, letting me know that to get what I wanted, what I craved, I had to follow his rules.
My arms dropped back down above my head and I arched my back, eager to feel his touch again. He didn’t disappoint. His mouth dipped down, taking one nipple, then the other, the kisses slow, careful—agonizing.
“Your skin is so soft,” he said, caressing my breast, then tracing the dip of my waist with his tongue, then his hand slipped inside my thong, and every sensible thought in my mind was replaced with yes, yes, yes. His fingers moved over my mound, across my slick folds, and then he pulled his hand away q
uickly, and I started to beg him to continue when he slowly slid my thong off, kissing my hip, then thigh, then foot, before tossing it aside, exposing me fully and driving me to a place of passion I’d never been before.
“Aidan…”
And then his clothes were off and he was reaching for his nightstand for protection and then with one rough thrust he was inside me, filling me completely. He grabbed my bound hands with one hand, anchoring me down with his strength and sending my insides spiraling out of control. Our bodies moved together as he thrust still deeper and deeper, knowing just where I needed him, and I screamed out, unable to remain quiet. My body buzzed with desire, desperate for a release, and then Aidan’s mouth clamped down over mine, the kiss full of all the emotions I longed to say, and I exploded, fireworks everywhere, body gone, mind gone, everything in me lost to this man above me.
Aidan untied my wrists and relaxed beside me, pulling me close, and I felt my bottom lip quiver for reasons I couldn’t understand, tears threatening to fall. An overwhelming sensation moved over me, my emotions and body pushed to their max. I drew a shaky breath, and he rose up to look at me. “Are you okay? Did I hurt you?”
I shook my head, not trusting myself to speak just yet.
His expression twisted as he scanned my face for answers. “Cameron, what is it?”
I stared back at him, at the care in his eyes, and the words were right there, on the tip of my tongue, ready to put myself out there. Ready to take a chance on this, on Aidan. “I…” But then I thought of how horrible I’d felt when I thought he was leaving me, and how much worse that would have been if he’d known the truth. If he’d known that I loved him. “Did you mean what you said before? That you’re willing to try?” I finally asked, taking a small step. A chance. Not the word “love,” but a chance all the same. A declaration toward what I wanted out of this relationship and out of my life. It was okay for me to want a serious relationship, and it was okay for me to want that with Aidan.
