CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CAMERON had ditched his jacket and tie, his sleeves were rolled up past his elbows, his forearms leant against the cold stone of the ballroom balcony and he watched blue turn to pink as morning came round. had ditched his jacket and tie, his sleeves were rolled up past his elbows, his forearms leant against the cold stone of the ballroom balcony and he watched blue turn to pink as morning came round.
Venus was already up, steadfast in the sky. Unlike the other heavenly bodies that had set with the moon, there was no unsteady flickering, no distracting twinkling. She was constant, unwavering, enchanting and all alone.
Something hard and heavy thumped behind his ribs, and not for the first time in the past twelve hours. In fact, the thumping and heaviness had come over him the moment Rosalind had left him standing in this exact place.
The hours had pa.s.sed. He and his family had retired to the library once all the guests had gone, and he had told them all about Quinn"s heart attacks and stubborn refusal to seek treatment, and together they had fought, reconciled, laughed and cried-and he"d come to realise that he"d never in his life been really alone.
But Rosalind had-solitary in her work, isolated in her home, alone even in her family. And it didn"t matter any more that she might have done everything in her power to keep at arm"s length those things that could provide her the same easy comfort he"d enjoyed; he finally understood the reason.
Loving something, then losing it, hurt like h.e.l.l.
Was she out there hurting right now? Hurting and alone, because of him? Because he"d been too stubborn, too scrupulous, too disenchanted to take on the mess that came with the good in any real relationship?
A good man would suck up his pride, put himself in the unpleasant position at being rejected twice in twenty-four hours and do what he had to do to to make sure the person he cared about knew she would never have to be alone again.
He glanced at his watch. The hour was nearly polite enough. Home, a shower, a change of clothes; he pushed himself upright, stretched his tight arms over his head then felt in his pocket for his car keys.
If she slammed the door in his face afterwards, he"d never darken her door again. If her eyes confirmed how deeply he believed she cared, if she opened the door wide and let him in...
The rush of his next thought was stripped from him as a hard hand slapped down upon his shoulder. Dylan sidled in beside him, dressed much the same way as Cameron since none of them had yet been to sleep.
"So this is where you"ve been hiding since the big brouhaha?" Dylan said.
Cameron slapped a hand around his brother"s shoulder and turned them back inside. "You know as well as I do there are far better and darker places to hide in this monstrosity than on an open balcony."
Dylan grinned. "I"m thinking right about now Dad would pay good money to know just one."
They meandered through the upper level, gravitating towards the kitchen as they had a thousand times before. It didn"t feel like he"d spent years away from this place. It just felt like home.
And there was one person he had to thank for showing him the way back. He glanced at his watch again, restlessness beginning to take hold.
Dylan held open the swinging door of the ma.s.sive white-and-wood kitchen, but not quite so far that Cameron could slip through.
His dress shoes came to a squeaking halt, and he looked up at his brother in time for Dylan to say, "Thanks, mate."
"For what?"
"For opening our eyes. For not letting the old man twist your arm. For giving us all the chance to remind him that he was the one who always told us to put family first, and it"s about time he remembered that. It"s tense in there right now, but once everyone calms down they"ll realise the air in this place has never seemed so clear."
Dylan let the door swing closed to give him a hug. Cameron hugged back, wondering how the h.e.l.l he"d forsaken this all these years. Not for one more day would he forsake his own happiness for the sake of some cold, loveless principle.
When Dylan let him go and headed into the kitchen, Cameron looked to his watch again. It was nearly seven. She was a morning bird; she"d be up.
Not for one more day? He wasn"t going to deny himself the chance at happiness another minute. He wasn"t going to deny himself the chance at happiness another minute.
Dylan grabbed a slice of birthday cake and a gla.s.s of milk from the fridge. "You staying for breakfast?"
Cameron shook his head, his mind a million miles away from there already. "Not this time."
"d.a.m.n it. I was itching to find out what new bombsh.e.l.l you might drop over waffles-Brendan"s gay? Mum voted Labour? Meg"s adopted, as she always hoped? No? Fine; so what are are your plans for this fine day? Tell me they involve that fabulous young thing who accompanied you here last night and I might forgive you." your plans for this fine day? Tell me they involve that fabulous young thing who accompanied you here last night and I might forgive you."
Cameron took a swipe of icing. "I have high hopes."
Dylan paused. Then said, "How high, exactly?"
"Ridiculously, I"m afraid."
"Do tell."
"She accused me lately of having no staying power, and I am of a mind to prove her wrong."
"Wow. Don"t tell me you"re in need of the little blue pills yet? You"re younger than me."
Cameron elbowed his brother neatly in the solar plexus and was rewarded with a satisfying, "Oomph!"
He slipped the icing into his mouth, and the sweetness exploded on his tongue. Then he said, "Rosalind knew I was making excuses. What I didn"t realise was that with her I didn"t need to."
"She"s figured you out, then?"
Cameron breathed in deep through his nose. Then he pushed away from the island to head to the door leading outside, to his car, to her. "That she has."
"Excellent," Dylan said with a chummy grin. "It seems I may have a bombsh.e.l.l to drop over breakfast after all."
Rosie sat on Adele"s couch, staring unseeingly at the shifting yellow stripes on the wall left by the early-morning sun spilling through the wooden blinds behind her. Her feet were tucked beneath her, her legs covered in the blanket beneath which she"d slept-kind of. A bit. Not really.
In fact she"d been awake pretty much all night having deep and meaningful conversations with herself across a range of matters that had all led back to the one crucial fact: that she had gone and done the most stupid thing she could ever do and fallen for Cameron Kelly.
About three minutes after the cab had pulled out of the Kelly Manor driveway, the words, "Turn this cab around right now!" had crowded her throat. Shouldn"t she at least have allowed herself the chance to be loved back?
A deep breath, a sharp tug of the hair at the back of her neck and an extra five kilometres distance, and she"d been certain that she"d been on the verge of unashamedly setting herself up for heartache again, and again, and again...
Repeat one-hundred times, and that had been her night.
Adele came into the lounge with a tray of coffee, cake, chocolate, salt-and-vinegar chips, and lollies in the shape of milk bottles.
"How you doing, snook?" Adele asked, pouring her a strong cup of coffee.
"Better." She uncurled her legs before they got stuck that way, and let her toes scrunch into the coa.r.s.e, woven rug at her feet.
Adele"s eyebrows rose. "All better?"
Actually she felt like a walking bruise. She wrapped her hands around the hot mug and glanced at Adele over the top. "Thanks for letting me stay."
Adele blinked down at her several times before saying, "Thank me later."
Then the doorbell rang.
Adele jumped. She glanced at the door, back at Rosie, then back at the door. She said, "I think I left the iron on. Can you get that?" And then shot from the room.
The doorbell rang again.
Rosie dragged herself from the couch, ran fingers through her thicket of hair, rubbed her hands hard over her face to make sure all the bits were where they were meant to be and trudged to the door in her borrowed pyjama bottoms, T-shirt and bare feet. The delivery guy would just have to suck it up and pretend she didn"t look like a one-woman freak show.
She hauled open the door and found herself face to face with a crumpled khaki shirt with rolled up sleeves, revealing the greatest pair of forearms G.o.d had ever created. And on the end of them...
"Cameron!"
"Hi," he said.
She swallowed. It seemed his name was the most she could hope to say.
His hand reached up to cup the doorframe, as though she might be about to slam the door in his face-like he couldn"t see that her irrational heart was trying its best to leap from her chest and into his beautiful arms.
"Can I...?" He cleared his throat. "Rosie, can I come in?"
Rosie... Had he just called her Rosie? Had he just called her Rosie?
She curled her toes into the hard wood and, no matter how hard she tried to resist, all the stagnant, decided places inside her began to flutter back to life. Which was ridiculous. He was likely there because she"d left something behind, and he was so d.a.m.ned civilised he was returning it by hand.
Needing an anchor, someone on her side, she glanced over her shoulder but there was no sign of Adele.
Then he said, "I tried calling you last night. Many, many times."
She closed her eyes, swallowed hard then looked back to him. His hair was mussed. His jeans unironed. Stubble shadowed his jaw. She"d never seen him so s.e.xily rumpled.
She licked her dry lips and tugged at her T-shirt, and amidst the fidgeting it occurred to her that beneath the s.e.x-G.o.d rumples he also looked tired, grey around the eyes, like he hadn"t had much in the way of sleep either.
Her hand shook and she gripped her T-shirt tight. "I left my mobile at home."
A crease came and went in his cheek. "I managed to somehow convince myself of that after the first dozen times you didn"t answer. So I called Adele. She told me you were here. That you were still...upset. And that I should give you time."
Rosie glanced at the angle of the sunlight on the porch outside. "It can"t yet be eight o"clock."
He didn"t even need to look to his watch before he said, "It"s not."
She blinked at him once, then turned and walked inside. The soft click of the door told her far less than her next breath, which was filled with his clean, male scent.
Her knees wobbled plenty before she plopped back onto the couch. Cameron sat next to her. Close. Her scrunched-up blanket had the other third all to itself.
"Rosie-"
"Coffee?" she asked, her voice overly loud. She as yet needed time to collect herself. To protect herself.
He nodded. She poured.
"I"m not sure where Adele has gone; she was here a minute ago."
"She gave me a goodbye wave over your shoulder when I first arrived. I"m a.s.suming this place has a back door."
Rosie swallowed hard. And nodded. They were alone. She would have no choice but to anchor herself.
He said, "I"ll get straight to the point, then, shall I? Which would be a first, I"m sure. We do seem to have an uncanny ability to lay things on the line without ever really getting to the point of what we are trying to say."
Her hand shook. She stopped pouring halfway, lest she end up with more scars for her troubles. Then she pushed a mug in front of him, but his hands remained clasped on top of his thighs.
He waited til she looked him in the eyes, those deep, dark-blue eyes, now so solemn, so serious. She nodded. She was as ready as she"d ever be.
"So, last night on the balcony, you accused me of not appreciating what I had. And I want you to know that I think you were absolutely right."
Rosie swallowed. This was not what she had expected at all.
He went on, "I"ve put so much time and effort into my work, and my home, the parts of my life that don"t offer any form of opposition. And not because it was right, but because it was easier than facing the truth-that I have been taking for granted those things which should have been more important the whole time."
As he spoke, as he confessed, his stunning, searching, blue eyes never once left hers, not a for a second. If she had an ounce of faith left in her judgement she might have fancied he was talking about her. But that boat had sailed the minute she"d said yes to a date with a guy no sane woman could know and not love.
Needing a distraction, she grabbed a handful of milk-bottle lollies and nibbled on the end of one. His gaze finally left her eyes and rested on her lips before they slid back up.
He rolled his shoulders once, then continued. "I thought my life was good. But now I see that it was completely untethered, all the separate parts unconnected, because I was afraid that I might one day slip up, word would get back and my family would be hurt. Then you came along, and I slipped. Over and over again. And you know what?"
"What?" she asked, her chest lifting as she breathed in deep.
"The world didn"t end. And last night I began the process of joining the dots. I have reconnected with old friends. I have spoken with my father. I have my family back."
She smiled a wobbly smile. Because she was happy for him. She really was. Not so happy for herself...
Until a hand reached out and took hers, its fingers curling around hers until they were indelibly knotted together. Reconnected.
"Rosie," he said, and her heart beat so hard she heard it in her ears. She lifted her eyes to see that he was smiling too. "Sweetheart, the glue that brought it all together was you."
Her heart rate had nothing on the blood rush to her head. She shook it to try to clear the haze, to pick out the truth from the hope that was blurring everything. "I"m not glue," she said. "I"m the opposite of glue. I don"t even have any dots to join. You said it yourself-I work freelance, I live in a van, there is nothing in my life I couldn"t walk away from given a moment"s notice. I know nothing about being glue. All I do know is that the easiest way to break a person"s spirit is to take away the things they love. I didn"t want that to happen to you."
"You were too late. It already had. But look at me. I"m still here."
Cameron was still there, the strength of his spirit radiating from every pore. "So here"s what I think about all that-a spirit can be broken only if it"s p.r.o.ne to breaking in the first place. And Rosie, honey, you are a force of nature. Your spirit is so vibrant, so fresh, so honest, I am certain there is nothing in this world that could ever break you."
She blinked hard, then down at their entwined hands. It was true, her spirit still raged inside her even after the night she"d had. She felt sorry for her mum, angry at her dad, proud of Cameron. So she might not be broken. But that didn"t mean that the cracks didn"t feel like they were being held together with old gum.
"Cameron-"
"Cam," he said, cutting her off. "Those closest to me call me Cam."