by LJ Evans
You were whole. You were you. But you were also mine. I didn’t demand that I be the only thing in your life. I didn’t want that. Did I want you to miss me when I was gone like I missed you? Of course. But I didn’t want you to feel like you were going to drown if I wasn’t there. You wouldn’t. You couldn’t. You were Super Girl.
♫ ♫ ♫
Is it my fault or yours that you ended up pregnant before I’d even asked you to marry me? I say that with a small smile on my face. No, who am I kidding, it isn’t a small smile; it’s a huge smile.
We were always safe. Protected. I wanted you to know that I respected you and your life too much to have you end up pregnant before you’d finished college and your degree and got to do the things you wanted to do.
It wasn’t easy. There were times when I thought you or I or both of us would explode before we got to the condom drawer. I took to carrying one with me at all times, like I was some horny teen, hoping to get lucky.
You make love like you do almost everything else in your life. With full energy. With all of you. And I hope you know that it’s the same with me. When I am with you, there is nothing else on this planet. Just us, and our skin, and our hands, and our hearts beating like they’re dancing through the universe.
The day you became an official Licensed Professional Counselor (LCP), I was so damn happy for you. So happy that the life you’d lived before had given you the drive for the life we had now. You looked so damn beautiful in that dress that curved in at your waist and flared out to end way above your knees and the cowboy boots you had on beneath them. I didn’t mean for our kiss to turn from happiness, to demand, to out of control.
I was damn proud of the control I normally had around you—long enough for us to reach privacy and a condom. But that day, in the hallway, you were all force-of-nature Cam, demanding what you wanted.
The closet we ended up in was hilarious. The brooms falling, the mop bin splashing about. Your laugh. Your growl. Your moan. God. It was enough to push me over the edge. You reached for my wallet, and coming up empty, you tossed it aside and wrapped your legs around me, anyway.
“Cam,” I breathed out, and you swallowed my word with your kiss. Your moan.
I pulled my lips away from yours and looked down into your face and groaned, because holy hell, you looked like some goddamn painting. Poems and words that people write about people in the throes of passion. Your dark hair was spread out against the sleeve of my suit, your stormy eyes were so dark they were almost black, and your cheeks were pink with passion. Your lips…God, your lips were bright red from kissing me and the stubble that I hadn’t shaved that morning.
I started to protest, to slow us down, but you said, “Don’t you dare leave me like this,” and how the hell was I going to resist that? To a demand. To something I could give you. We’d both reached our climax so fast it was almost embarrassing. I liked taking my time with you. I liked being the one to slow things down until you begged, but that day in the broom closet, neither one of us could stop or slow down.
And still, when it was all done, neither one of us thought you’d wind up pregnant. Not from one time in a broom closet.
I rarely see you nervous. The sass and confidence you had as a teen is back in play in full force these days. As if shedding the veil of sadness has also allowed you to step back into the skin you’d left aside for so long. Yet, that day you brought me the pregnancy test, you were nervous. How could you possibly think I’d be anything but thrilled? I’d already claimed we were forever. I was already telling people you were my wife, even when you weren’t. You always laughed and slapped at me when I did it.
I also knew you weren’t ready. You weren’t ready for me to ask and to walk down the aisle to a man that wasn’t Jake. It didn’t mean you didn’t love me. It didn’t mean you wanted anything else, but I knew that you had to have more time for our future to be the only thing that was in your head when you did walk down the aisle. So, I hadn’t asked you yet, and I think you knew I was waiting for you to give me a sign.
Maybe the gods gave us the sign instead.
A little plus sign on a stick.
“Hey,” I said as you came in just as Wil left my office with the papers on our last deal in his hands. You shut the door, and I grinned because I could imagine lots of reasons you would shut the door.
You waved your finger at me, and I met you halfway. I grabbed your finger and kissed it. “Don’t wave your finger at me. You’re the one coming here in the middle of the day, surprising me. You know what I think when you surprise me,” I said.
I kissed you, rubbing my fingers under the T-shirt that had escaped your jeans, wrapping my hands around your waist until they met at the back, skin on skin, and pulling you up against me. You kissed me back. With love and passion but also sadness.
I didn’t see the sadness often.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“This is what got us into trouble,” you said, leaning your forehead on my chest.
“Cam?” I said, because you’d started to worry me just a little. Just a tiny, infinitesimal amount.
You pulled something out of the purse you had slung over your shoulder. Something in a plastic baggie. You shoved it at me, and it took a lot longer than it should have for me to register what it was and what you were telling me.
“We’re having a baby?” I asked, and I was already smiling.
“Technically, I’m going to have the thing, but I guess.” And you shrugged.
I picked you up and carried you to the couch in the office and sat you down on my lap and kissed you, thoroughly and absolutely thrilled. Thrilled that you were going to have our baby. That we were going to have a little piece of each of us running around in the world. That our love would be so goddamn obvious to everyone.
It was a long time before I could speak again, because you always meet my passion with your own. But you were right; it was what had gotten us into this predicament, and I had to stop and ask before I continued with my euphoria, “Are you okay with this?”
Your eyes filled with tears that we both know you rarely shed, and you smiled and nodded your head. “Yes. I’m surprised to say that, but yes. I really am.”
God, did you make—
Heart of the World
“Faith can still beat the odds
We're meant to be, baby hold on to me
You'll never not be my girl
'Cause love is the heart of the world.”
Performed by Lady Antebellum
Written by Carusoe / Douglas
We have a baby!!! A baby boy. A little piece of you and me. I know, I know they say all babies have blue eyes, but our boy will definitely have blue ones that stay. They may change slowly into a blue-gray that shows us both, but they’ll still be blue.
When they came to the waiting room and got me the other night, I panicked. My heart jumped into my throat and wouldn’t let go. They told me they were bringing you and the baby to the operating room for a C-section, and I was shaking. They asked if I wanted to come, as if I wanted to be anywhere else but with you.
You’re so unbelievably brave, Cam. You are so unbelievably beautiful, and strong, and courageous. YOU. ARE. SUPER GIRL. Not girl. No. You’re SUPER WOMAN. WONDER WOMAN. Every magically powered being that you can think of. That’s you.
Holding our son, rocking him next to you and letting him suckle on you…I just can’t get any of that out of my head. The beauty of it is more than anything I could ever have imagined. More than you streaking through the sky on a horse. More than you throwing your head back and moaning my name. More than…. You get the picture. I don’t know how I can explain it better. You. Our baby. Us.
I hadn’t gotten to finish my letter when they came to get me. This answer to your journal. This life with Cam. When they came and got me, I left it and almost ran to be at your side.
Now that our families have left, and you’ve fallen asleep with your hand
draped protectively over the side of the bassinet where our baby sleeps, I’m going to finish it. It’s going to take me a minute, though, because I just want to stare awhile at you. I just can’t get over how magnificent you both are. How perfect.
But if I want to finish it, I better do it now. Before the onslaught of visitors return. Your family, my family, Jake’s family. The people that love you more than anything. I wanted to finish this so that when you wake, and we take our baby home, you can see that I’ve loved you for so much longer than that day in the coffee shop.
I want you to see that I think I fell in love that first day I saw you with your lopsided ponytails and blue-stained lips. I didn’t know it. I didn’t see it like Jake did. And, in truth, we both know it wouldn’t have mattered then even if I had. But I love you. I love you with every single part of my past, present, and future. I want you to know that we have our own stars out there somewhere. Jake will just have to figure it out when we all die and go to heaven, because, even then, I’m not letting you go. You’re mine. For a short, brief period of time, you were his, but for the rest of eternity, you’re mine.
We have a family now to prove it. Our own little unit. Our own little piece of the universe. Thank you for that. Thank you for giving me all of you and letting me know, with your journal and your words, that you may once have been a girl named Cam who loved a boy named Jake, but that now you are a woman who loves this man even more.
Thank you for giving me the best gift. You.
♫ ♫ ♫
I hope you enjoyed this look into Blake’s version of his story with Cam. You really have author Kelsey Kingsley and blogger Rachel from Novelmomma to thank because they encouraged me to write it.
If you haven’t gotten enough of the Album series characters yet, you have two more chances to take a peek at them, if you’re so inclined.
First, you can download an EPIC series
BONUS EPILOGUE for FREE when you sign up for my newsletter. The epilogue checks in with all the main characters ten years later. Plus, when you sign up, you’re automatically entered every single month into a drawing for a chance to win a signed paperback of one of my books. So, it’s really a bunch of goodness all for one email address .
https://BookHip.com/WZVAFM
Next, I’m bouncing out of my chair with excitement to announce that this holiday (2020), I’m releasing a collection of short stories based on the children from the original characters.
MY LIFE AS A HOLIDAY ALBUM came to me the moment I realized I wanted to write a story inspired by Lady Antebellum’s “All I Want for Christmas Is You.”
Here’s the book description:
This holiday, all the children from the original cast of the album series come home with secrets that are sure to send their parents and their families into a frenzy. Will they be able to keep them hidden, or will they be exposed with a bang that isn’t at all the New Year’s Eve fireworks that are planned?
Edie is so pregnant she’s about to burst as she comes back to her small town in Tennessee without her Scottish, whiskey distillery owning husband. What she doesn’t tell anyone is that her marriage may be over before it’s had a chance to really begin. She hides her heart ache under a smile, making plans for a surprise birthday party for her parents, aunts, and uncles who are turning fifty.
Khiley and Stephen have been soulmates since they could crawl. They’ve grown up hip to hip in a way that reminds everyone of Cam’s once upon a time love with Jake. But the secret they’re keeping may be the one thing that tears them apart forever.
Ty is tired of being compared to his dead, football god of an uncle. For once, he wants to be recognized not because of how much he reminds everyone of Jake, but for his own talent and passion. The secret he’s keeping and the chip he’s wearing on his shoulder may just prevent him from getting the woman he loves and his future in the NFL.
Eliza may be the youngest of the entire Abbott, Waters, and Brennan clan, but she’s ready to step into a future with the one man who’s seen and loved her for who she is—depression and all. The secret she shares with her Air Force bound boyfriend is sure to knock everyone for a loop.
Mayson comes from a long line of athletes, but he’s always been more music than sports. Joining Uncle Derek’s band has been an experience most musicians would give a right eye to have, so he’s guiltily keeping his secret to himself. But with Grace coming into town with her stormy dad, Seth, and her cousin, Cole, he’s going to be forced to come clean with everyone. He only hopes it won’t break the family in half.
Last but not least, Ginny is the sister and cousin who keeps everyone in check and on course. She’s the shoulder to cry own and the conscience to guide the way, not unlike her mama, Mia. Ginny’s love life and personal goals have always been put on the back burner. But when Cole Hensley walks into the room, she finally sees something she wants for herself. Can she have him without sacrificing her family’s happiness along the way?
They all might be smiling at the start of the holiday, but the secrets that have come home with them might just ruin the entire season for everyone!
And guess what? It’s available on Amazon at special pre-order price that’ll last until it releases on December 7th, 2020. So, if you want, you could take advantage of that now.
https://amzn.to/330h3bm
Okay, one last thing before I go, if you enjoyed this series and my words, I think you might like my next set of standalone books—the Anchor Novels. I’ve included a snippet of the first book, GUARDED DREAMS, for you here. I hope you like it enough to follow Ava and Eli’s story of how dreams are broken and remade, and how love can guide you through all the way to the end.
Chapter One
Eli
GIRL LIKE YOU
“Turn out the lights and let me breathe you in,
Your eyes are so diamond, body so gold,
And I don't want to let you go,
I've never met a girl like you.”
—Performed by Jason Aldean
—Written by Boyer / Mirenda / Tyler
The heat and humidity assaulted me as I stepped out of the rented truck and looked up at the house on the shore of Aransas Bay. I groaned inwardly. I was so screwed. The guys weren’t going to let me live this down.
Somehow, the house had escaped Hurricane Harvey with only a few dents and bruises, but there’d been some reconstruction needed. The remnants of that renovation were obvious in the oversized trash container full of debris outside the two-car garage that took up the bottom floor of the home.
The house desperately needed a paint job. The color was, at the moment, a crazy mix of beaten yellow, raw wood, and left-over white. That was what the guys and I were here to do: paint the house.
I heard Mac and Truck grumble as they slammed the doors behind me.
“Holy fuck, Els-worth, what have you gotten us into?” Mac threw out. He only broke out the Els-worth when he wanted to make a point. He knew I hated it. Call me Eli, or Wyatt, or hell, even my full name of Elijah James Wyatt, but just don’t call me what the asshole lieutenant had our freshman year.
I turned to both of them. Mac was built like a linebacker. He barely fit in the cargo shorts and T-shirt he was wearing, looking as if he might go all Hulk any moment and tear the things apart. You could barely see his normally black hair under the crew cut he sported. His muscles flexed as he reached into the bed of the truck to pull out the military-style bag that we all had with us.
Truck—well, really Travis, but no one had called him that since freshman year—just shook his head at me. But his brown eyes were already flashing with mischief beneath the shaved head that made his ice-blonde hair practically invisible. His square frame was just as built as Mac’s, but he’d earned the name Truck for a reason. He blew through anyone and everyone that challenged him…just like a semi-truck. Together, they were Mac Truck. No one messed with them.
Except me. I couldn’t help it. I’d been born to razz t
hem. Especially with their “ship-like” nickname that everyone called them when they were definitely not in a relationship.
If I harassed them too much, they’d try to give me shit back, and my frame might not be as thick as theirs, but I had enough of my own muscles to more than hold my own. For some reason, neither of them felt it a requirement to challenge me very often. But this…this house was going to make them challenge me for the entire eight days we were there.
“You said you wanted to stay on the beach as cheap as possible. Free is as cheap as it gets,” I retorted.
“But I didn’t say I wanted to work my ass off for eight days. We’ll be doing enough of that on the Kennedy,” Mac said.
He was right that the cadet cruise on the TS Kennedy that Texas A&M’s Maritime Academy made mandatory during the summers was nonstop work. I loved it, but not everyone did. For me, it was a glimpse at what I’d been striving and hoping for since I was a kid…to be on a boat, with a unit, making a difference.
I shrugged. “It’s a little paint. We’ll do a couple hours in the mornings and then take the afternoons off.”
“You think eight mornings are going to get this job done?” Travis stared at me incredulously.
I had to admit, now that I saw the house, I had my own doubts. Two stories. Two thousand square feet on the top floor where three bedrooms and two baths stared out at the bay. But the supplies were already here, including a spray gun, so I thought we could manage it.
Professor Abrams had insisted we could do the job in the days we were here while still having time to decompress before the summer “cruise” took off. It was debatable if he was right, but if I needed to put in some extra hours while the guys played, I didn’t really mind. I’d rather keep myself busy than sit at a bar drinking and eyeing the local girls, anyway.
