by Tracy Wolff
Then again, maybe he was just seeing what he wanted to see. Looking for blame where there wasn’t any. Maybe Camille was exactly what he’d originally thought her to be—a capricious butterfly, flitting from one adventure to the next without thought to the destruction she left in her wake.
Completely disgusted with himself—with his inability to resist Camille and with the self-pity he was all but drowning in—Matt popped open a can of beer and drained it in two long gulps. Then he stumbled, exhausted, into his bedroom and fell facedown onto the bed. Better to sleep than to try to figure out what made Camille tick. The latter was a waste of time, particularly as it wouldn’t change anything. She was still gone and the house still felt sad and empty without her.
CAMILLE WALKED SLOWLY through the old iron gates, a small bouquet of violets clutched in her hand and a chip on her shoulder a mile wide. What the hell was she doing here? Why had she bothered to come, now, when she’d spent so long running from just this confrontation?
She took a few steps up the stone path, started to turn around nearly a dozen times before she made it to the huge magnolia tree at the fork in the trail. She had no business being here after all this time, should just turn around and go back to the B and B or the French Quarter. Should be anywhere else but where she was at this moment, standing here with her loneliness and fear clutched around her like a cloak.After a two-day stay that had become five, she’d told the manager of the little bed-and-breakfast that she would be checking out in the morning. It wasn’t too late to change her mind, to turn back and check out now. To continue on her road trip, far away from this city and all of its bad memories.
She’d actually turned around, had actually taken a few steps back the way she’d come, before common sense had reasserted itself. She was here now and if she left before doing what she’d come to do, it would always feel like she’d lost, not just the countless battles of her youth, but the overarching war, as well.
No, if she didn’t do this now then she never would.
But as she stood in the shade of the giant tree, suddenly she couldn’t get her bearings. It had been seven years since she’d last been here, seven years since her father had buried her mother in a funeral so pathetically small that the mourners hadn’t even been able to ring the grave, one deep. He’d since died, was now buried beside her mother—or so the letter from her aunt had said. She hadn’t made it back for the funeral, hadn’t cared to mark his passing with anything more than a nod of acceptance—and relief that the bastard was finally gone and couldn’t torment her anymore.
It was funny, really, how he’d never had time for her as a child, had never wanted anything to do with her when her mother was alive to bow and scrape for him. But the second he’d buried her mother—in the cheapest cement-block tomb he could find—he’d come looking for her. Had expected her to fall all over herself in adoration for him, as her mother had.
He’d left disappointed. After years of watching him mistreat her mother and ignore her, all Camille had wanted was for him to disappear.
Closing her eyes, she tried to recall her mother’s funeral and the location of the grave. Was she supposed to go right or left? Stay on the path or take a turn through the grass toward the rows and rows of cement crypts at the back of the cemetery?
She turned to the right, stopped about halfway up the trail, and started sifting through the markers on the long brick wall. By the time she’d gotten through about half of them, her hand was shaking and panic was a wild thing inside of her. Her already shaky stomach fisted into knots and sweat dripped, cold and unforgiving, down her back.
Where was her mother? How had she lost her? Turning in circles as her breath came in giant gasps, Camille tried to calm down. To get control of herself.
But it was as if someone else had invaded her body—someone with more emotions than she had ever claimed to have. Trembling, breathing harshly, she ran her fingers over the remaining tombstones, only to be disappointed when she got to the end.
Where was her mother?
Standing in the middle of the cemetery, feeling as if she was the only person left on earth, Camille tried desperately to gain some control over her crazed emotions. But she was too far gone—there was a ringing in her ears, a roaring in her blood, a weakness in her limbs that she couldn’t counteract.
With a plaintive cry, she fell to her knees on the hard rocks, her clutch of flowers scattering around her as she cried and cried and cried.
After the emotional storm had passed, and her tears dried up, she made no move to get up. Instead, she stretched out on the path and stared up at the overcast sky.
What had she been trying to prove by coming here, anyway? That her relationship with her mother hadn’t been a total bust? That she wasn’t completely alone in the world? That at some point, somewhere, someone had actually loved her?
How stupid could she get? she wondered, as disgust rolled through her. From the time she’d been old enough to understand what a family was supposed to be, she’d figured out that she didn’t have one. Not really. Not like so many of the kids she went to school with.
Oh, her parents still lived together and she lived with them, but that didn’t mean they’d had time for her, any more than it meant that they had loved her. For seventeen years she’d been expected to be seen and not heard—and not really seen, either, if she could avoid it. She’d made the unpardonable mistake of being born a girl and for that she would suffer interminably.
She’d worn rags, ill-fitted clothes her mother had found at the Salvation Army while her father dressed from the most exclusive stores. Had survived holiday after holiday, waiting for a present that never came while her father splurged on professional golf clubs. She’d waited and waited for him to notice her, to speak to her, to buy her a present—not because she wanted the things so much, but because she wanted some tangible proof that she mattered. That she existed.
That proof had never come—and it was a kick in the teeth to realize she was still waiting for it. That she was still that little girl who wanted nothing more than to belong to someone. To matter to someone.
She wasn’t sure how long she lay there, working out the truth of her past and her present. Long enough, certainly, to figure out what she’d always known but somehow forgotten—that love was a gift and not to be taken lightly.
You couldn’t make someone love you, but if they did, you should accept that love, hold on to it tightly, not throw it back in their faces like so much garbage.
Twilight was setting in when she finally climbed to her feet, the trees and rows of tombs casting long shadows on the fertile ground. With the panic gone and reason restored, the cemetery didn’t look nearly as large as it had when she’d first arrived.
As she gathered the violets up, the location of her mother’s grave came to her and she walked toward it with quick, sure steps. And when she found it, tucked modestly amid a row of five tombs, second from the bottom of the fourth column, she slid the violets into the small vase built into the stone marker. The flowers were a little ragged, a little worse for wear after her little meltdown, but she wanted to leave them anyway. A token for the mother who had never been able to see her in the shadow cast by her father.
They were her final goodbye—she wouldn’t be coming back. Not to this cemetery and not to New Orleans.
Turning away, she hurried back to her car as fast as her pregnant body would let her. It was getting dark and she wanted to go home.
Home to Austin.
Home to Matt.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
IT WAS EARLY MORNING and Matt was sitting on his couch, watching an early morning news show when he heard the electric garage door opener start to hum. He’d been home two days and hadn’t been able to shake himself out of the morass of self-pity he’d been mired in since his last conversation with Camille, when he was in Tokyo.
He’d tried to call her a couple of times, but she hadn’t answered—like that was a big surprise. Part of him was worrie
d that something had happened to her, while the more cynical side of him said she was just being true to form.Which is why when he heard the garage door go up, his first thought was that he was imagining things. Camille had only been gone for six days by his calculations, not nearly as long as she’d led him to believe. But when the garage door into the house crashed open and she called, “Matt?” he was up and heading toward the laundry room at a pace that was far from dignified.
“You’re here!” she said, and her face was alight with such joy that it stopped him in his tracks. “I didn’t think you’d have made it back from Tokyo yet.”
“I got back two days ago.” His voice was huskier than usual, but she looked so damned beautiful and he was so glad to see her that he couldn’t stop emotion from clogging his throat, just a little.
“Why didn’t you tell me when we talked? I wouldn’t have taken off like that if I’d known you were coming back so soon.” She threw her arms around him, pulled him into a warm, welcoming hug that had every inch of his body coming alive.
He pressed his face against her neck, reveled in the sweet scent of her and the feel of her safe and soft in his arms. “I thought you had restless feet.”
“Only because it was lonely here without you. This house is too big for one person—I was freaking myself out rattling around in here by myself.”
“I’m glad you came back.” He squeezed her tighter and got a swift kick against his stomach for the effort.
“What was that?” he pulled back, astounded, stared at the hard lump of her stomach that had grown exponentially in the month since he’d seen her last.
“I told you, this baby is a future soccer star. It kicks really hard.” She rubbed her belly for emphasis.
“Can I feel?”
“I thought you just did.”
“You know what I mean.” He placed a hand on her stomach, was shocked at how much harder it was than the last time he’d touched her. “Wow, you’re really growing.”
“Tell me about it. I feel like a beached whale half the time—I don’t know how I’m going to make it three more months.”
“You look absolutely beautiful.”
“Yeah, right.” She ran a hand over her hair self-consciously. “I’ve been driving your convertible for the past nine hours—‘beautiful’ isn’t exactly what I’d call me.”
“Well, then, you’d be wrong.” He pressed on her stomach lightly, one finger at a time, as if he was playing the piano. “The baby doesn’t seem to want to play with me.” He was oddly disappointed.
“Give it a second. I can feel it moving a little—maybe it’s just getting comfortable.”
Just as she finished the sentence, he felt a powerful bump against his hand—followed by a second, then a third. “It’s kicking me!”
“Of course it is. You think you’re so special you don’t deserve to share the wealth? Believe me, my bladder could use the break.”
“It’s so strong.” He marveled for the second time. “I can’t believe it.”
“And only getting stronger, or so Rick says.”
He glanced up at her and their gazes locked. Heat sizzled between them, turned his already aroused body into a seething mass of need. “I want to kiss you, Camille.”
She grinned, a sassy little upturn of her lips that shot right to his heart. “I thought you’d never ask.”
She tilted her head for his kiss, but he took his time getting there. If he was finally going to get her into bed after seven long months without her, he was going to make sure she was as hot as he was. And he was going to make it last.
Sliding his hands over her stomach to her hips, he glided them slowly up her ribs, pausing to let his thumbs toy with the soft undersides of her breasts. She gasped, her crazy violet eyes going huge and dark as he stroked her in a rhythm meant to soothe—and arouse.
“Matt.” She whispered his name, but it could have been a shout the way it echoed in his head. “Camille.”
He moved his hands up a little farther, brushed his index fingers over her nipples. Once, twice.
Her skin flushed a delicate, rosy pink and her head lolled back, as if it had suddenly gotten too heavy for her to hold up. But when her eyes started to close, he cupped a hand under her chin and ordered, “Look at me.”
Her lids flew open and her eyes were dreamy, unfocused. Leaning close to her, so close that he could feel her breath against his cheek, he demanded, “Tell me you want this, that you want me.”
“I want you, Matt. That’s never been in question.”
He skimmed his lips over her collarbone to the curve of her neck. Inhaled her, trying to draw her so deep inside of him that he would never have to be without her again.
But as her words sunk in, he pulled back a little. “What does that mean?”
“What?” Her voice was little more than a rasp and her hands moved up his neck to clutch desperately at his hair. “Don’t tease me.”
“Sweetheart, you don’t even know what teasing is yet. But you will, before tonight is over.”
She moaned, arching so that her breasts brushed against his chest, and he nearly said to hell with it. Why was he drawing this out when he wanted nothing more than to be inside of her? Now.
Still, something about her last statement niggled at the back of his brain, wouldn’t let him move on until he clarified it. “What did you mean, when you said that your wanting me had never been the question?”
She shrugged, looked away. “Can’t we just make love?”
“Oh, we’ll make love, Camille. That much I promise you. But I want to know what you meant, why you looked so sad when you said it.”
She pulled away, wrapped her arms around her burgeoning stomach in a way that showed just how vulnerable she was feeling. “Camille? Sweetheart? What’s wrong?”
For long seconds she didn’t answer, just stared at him with those heartbreaking eyes of hers. But just when he was about to give up, to pull her into his arms and tell her that it didn’t matter, she whispered, “Why do you want me?”
For a second he was sure he had misheard the question, then nearly laughed when he realized she was serious. “How could I not?” he asked.
“Because no one ever has.”
He did laugh then. “Somehow I don’t think you’ve been paying attention. From the moment I first laid eyes on you, I wanted you, Camille.”
Her mouth turned downward. “You wanted my body.”
“Of course I wanted your body.” He reached for her, ran his hands down her long, graceful back. “What’s not to want? But it’s more than that. It was more than that then and it’s definitely more than that now.”
“Because of the baby?”
For the second time in as many minutes he tilted her chin up so that she was forced to look him in the eye. “Because of you. Camille, I want you because you’re the most exciting woman I’ve ever met. You’re talented and capricious and so beautiful that sometimes it hurts just to look at you.
“You make me crazy, but you also make me laugh. You make me smile on days when nothing else can. And you shake me up, pull me out of my plodding, plotting ways—show me that there’s more to the world than schedules and plans. I have to work for every smile I get from you, but that’s how I know they’re genuine.
“Why do I want you?” he echoed her question. “Why on earth wouldn’t I want you?”
For long seconds, she didn’t do anything but stare at him with her amethyst eyes. Then, just as he’d decided she wouldn’t respond, she whipped her tank top over her head and stood in front of him, in nothing but a lacy bra and maternity shorts.
Heat exploded inside of him, both at the sight of her and at the vulnerability she was showing. He knew she was uncomfortable with the changes in her body—he could see the uncertainty where before there had only been confidence, frivolity. But to him, she was just as lovely as she’d ever been—more so, really, with his baby growing inside of her.
Things had started as a game between th
em six months ago, but that had changed when he’d fallen for her. Changed again when she’d gotten pregnant. The game had taken on a life of its own, and now they were both more exposed—more emotionally naked—than he’d ever expected them to be.
And still it wasn’t enough for him. He wanted all of her exposed to him—every inch of her gorgeous, feminine body.
Every emotion in her guarded, generous heart.
Every thought in her agile, interesting mind.
He wanted it all. And now, for this one moment, knew he would do whatever it took to get it.
Without taking his eyes from hers, he pulled his shirt over his head. Unfastened his jeans and let them—and his boxers—fall to the ground at his feet. He stood before her more vulnerable than he’d ever been in his life, and hoped she understood what he was offering.
Camille walked toward him slowly, her arm outstretched as if she couldn’t wait to touch him. But then, when she was mere inches from him, she stopped. Let her hand drop back to her side. Slowly shrugged out of her bra, then shimmied her shorts and panties down her legs until she, too, was completely nude.
The sun had risen fully at some point during their little game, and her skin shone like fire in its sparkling rays. Her wild, crazy curls tumbled over her shoulders in ebony waves and her ripe, rounded body urged him forward like a siren’s call.
Hunger rose in him—sharp, hot, all-encompassing—and he wanted nothing more than to take her with all the pent-up need he had inside him. But after so long, she deserved more than that—and so did he. He would take it slow with her—savor her. Then maybe, just maybe, it would be enough to calm the fire raging within him.
Pulling her into his arms, he kissed her until he was drowning in her.
Kissed her until he didn’t know where she left off and he began.
Kissed her until she felt the same way.
He wanted her on fire, wanted her burning with the same need that threatened to eat him alive. He wanted to slip past her defenses, to see every secret part of her. He wanted—just once—for her to trust him enough to lose control. He needed her to lose control, to let him inside of her. As he skimmed his lips over her razor-sharp cheekbones and down the delicate skin of her jaw, the world around him began caving in. He wanted her arms around him, her body beneath him, wanted to take over every part of her so that he knew that she was his.