Total pages in book: 99
Estimated words: 96612 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 483(@200wpm)___ 386(@250wpm)___ 322(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 96612 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 483(@200wpm)___ 386(@250wpm)___ 322(@300wpm)
The close quarters and darkened room had created an intimacy during my doctor’s appointment, but when we’d walked out into the sunshine, it had vanished again. It had been so long since we’d connected, I wasn’t even sure that our jagged pieces would fit together anymore. I wasn’t sure that he’d even want them to.
“Why are you here?” I asked hoarsely, dropping my hands to the bottom of my belly.
“I missed you,” he answered.
“I’ve missed you every day,” I said back, tears filling my eyes. “What makes tonight any different?”
Cam cleared his throat, then tentatively reached out to set one hand on my bare belly. “Some shit went down tonight,” he murmured, glancing up at me. When I didn’t ask any questions, his head tilted back down to look at where his skin met mine. “I was ridin’ home, and I couldn’t stop thinkin’ about all that I’ve been missin’.”
“You know you can come and see—”
“All I been missin’ with you, Sweetbea,” he interrupted gently. “All your smiles and your complainin’ and trippin’ over your shit, and tryin’ to wake you up in the mornin’ when you’re actin’ like a hibernatin’ bear.”
My laugh turned into a small sob, and I pressed my lips tightly together.
“I love you, Bea. Always have. Not sure where we went wrong, but I don’t wanna be away from you no more.”
“Are you sure this isn’t because of the boys?” I asked softly. “Because you can come see them—feel them—whenever you want. I’d never stop you.”
“The boys,” Cam said in soft wonder. “Shoulda thanked you at the appointment for them, but I was so fuckin’ floored, I was just tryin’ to not pass out.”
I giggled, making my belly jump.
“The boys are a bonus, baby. Don’t you know that?” His hand left my belly and reached up to cup my cheek. “I loved you before the boys, and I’ll love you after they’re grown and makin’ their own families. It’s always been me and you, Trix.”
I searched his face, cataloguing every freckle and eyelash that were as familiar to me as my own. The beard was new, but the jawline wasn’t. The short hair on the top of his head was the same, his blue eyes were the same, the small scar near his mouth was the same. It had always been me and Cam—I’d loved him from some of my earliest memories.
“Me and you,” I murmured finally, my eyes overflowing. “Okay.”
“Yeah?” he asked, his voice so hopeful that I had to push back the sob caught in my throat.
“Yeah,” I agreed.
The rest of my words were lost when he shot up the last two stairs and possessively pressed his mouth to mine. His kiss still held that same first shock and then became so powerful that I was completely lost to it.
“I love you so much,” he whispered, pulling away before kissing me again. “Don’t leave me again. Promise you won’t.”
“I won’t,” I whispered back, pressing my forehead to his.
“Even if bad shit happens, you stay with me.”
“Okay.”
“Don’t care what it is—you stick it out.”
“Okay.”
“I mean it, Trix. Can’t take that shit again.”
“I promise.”
We stood there kissing for a long time, our hands roaming leisurely, but never to arouse. We just needed to feel each other.
Cam finally pulled away when I began to shift on my feet.
“You tired, Sweetbea?” he asked, framing my face with his hands.
“Yeah,” I groaned. I wanted to stay out there with him forever, but my back had begun to ache, I was shivering from the cool night air, and I knew my feet were swelling from standing for so long.
“Let’s get you to bed,” he said sweetly, bending down to grip me behind my knees and lift me into his arms.
“I’m a lot heavier now,” I said in apology as I opened the screen for us.
“Still light as a feather.”
“You’re such a liar,” I whispered as I shut the front door.
“Yeah, if I didn’t know better, I’d think you had two kids in there or somethin’,” he teased, his eyes twinkling.
We were silent as he moved down the hallway, past Leo and my parents’ bedrooms, to my room at the end of the hall. The house was shaped weird because my pop had to add on when Leo was a baby. It wasn’t meant for so many people, but my parents had made it work by adding on a bedroom for me that stuck out the side of the square house like a sore thumb. Literally. If you looked straight down at the house, it looked like a pixelated thumbs-up sign.
Cam set me on my feet in my bedroom, closing the door behind us without saying a word.
Then we crawled into my tiny bed and he tucked his front up tight against my back.
“I’m sorry for all the—”
“Told you not to apologize,” he cut me off, kissing the side of my neck.