"Yes, what time?"
"An hour or thereabouts," Nate said.
"What can I bring?" Cam asked.
"Nothing. I got it covered. I"m a married man now," Nate said.
"Good. It"s great to hear you so happy," Cam said.
"I think so, too. I can"t believe how much I love my wife," Nate said.
Cam just chuckled. "That is good to know, but you should tell her."
"I will. In fact I have to go and find her and tell her right now."
Cam hung up the phone and walked back to Becca. "Is everything set?" she asked.
"Yes, it is. But I need ten more minutes on the site. I have to do some more negotiating with Tomas to get the sidewalk fixed in front of his grocery store, and he can be stubborn."
"Can he be?"
"Yes. Normally I make Justin do this kind of thing but since he"s still flying back and forth from New York..."
"You have to do it. Can I help? Tomas and I got along pretty well."
"Of course you did. You are a beautiful woman, something that Tomas can"t resist," he said. Which was a good argument for using her to help get Tomas to agree to close one door of the store early. "Actually, if you don"t mind just standing next to me and smiling at him I think it would help."
Becca laughed. "I"m arm candy?"
"Yes, you are, and very distracting arm candy, too," he said, bending down to kiss her. He didn"t want to admit it to himself but having Becca by his side made him happier than he"d ever been in his life.
Eleven.
Becca changed Ty into his cutest outfit and then sat on the bed. What the heck was she doing? She knew it was past time to tell Cam that she was tired of living in limbo and wanted to stay here with him forever.
Ty babbled his sweet baby talk at her and she looked down at him. The resemblance to Cam was striking.
"Hungee, mama."
"Hungry," she said, gently correcting him. She opened a package of baby carrots and handed him one to chew on. Then she finished getting his bag ready for their trip to Nate"s house tonight.
When she was done, she smiled at Ty. "Are you ready to go?"
"Go," he said, nodding at her.
She slung his bag over her shoulder and then bent over to pick him up. She"d dressed carefully for tonight, wearing a pretty sundress and leaving her hair to hang around her shoulders in soft waves. She"d applied her makeup with the precision and care of a runway model. She wanted to look good for Cam.
In the hallway she caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror. She looked the way she always did. Confident and average. Her son was cute as a b.u.t.ton, though. In the mirror she didn"t seem like the type of person that had always been alone and was afraid to spend the rest of her life that way. But did the mirror reflect her true self?
Cam had pulled the SUV up in the circular drive and waved when he saw them. He was on the phone, probably talking business. Was taking time out of his day for dinner with Nate going to mean he had to work later?
She hoped not. He"d promised her some time together alone. And she was going to insist that he keep that promise.
Yeah, right. That was never going to happen. She didn"t have the kind of courage it would take to blurt out something like that. She"d told Cam she loved him before, and it had backfired...big time. She was going to just keep biding her time until she couldn"t keep quiet any longer.
And it was torture. Because when Cam smiled at her, she hoped that he would always look at her that way. And realizing he might not hurt worse than anything she"d experienced since her mom died.
Once they"d strapped Ty into the car seat, Cam turned to her. "You okay?" he asked.
"Yes, why?"
"You looked sad just then," he said.
"I was just thinking about my mom."
He gave her a hug. "I"m sorry. Do you worry about leaving Ty alone?"
He had no idea how big a worry that was. "I...I really don"t have any close friends."
"You have me," he said, gently stroking her cheek.
"We have to talk, Cam," she said.
"I know that we do, but that was Nate telling me not to be late."
"I guess family comes first," she said.
"Yes, it does," he replied. "Oh."
"Becca?"
"Yes?"
"You and Ty are family, too." He closed Ty"s door and rested his arms on the SUV, trapping her between his body and the vehicle.
He leaned in and kissed her firmly on the mouth, his chest rubbing over hers. She shivered with awareness as his mouth moved to her ear.
"I can"t wait until we are alone later tonight," he said in his low, raspy voice.
"Me either," she admitted. He kissed her again before opening her door and helping her into the car.
She watched him walk around to the driver"s side. The bond between them was growing much stronger, and she couldn"t help but hope that this time Cam was going to be hers forever.
Being with Cam felt like home. It was a warm feeling, and she hadn"t experienced anything this wonderful since she"d given birth to Ty.
Dinner was a lot of fun and kind of relaxing. They"d ended up playing Dance Dance Revolution. Which may not have been fair, considering that Jen was a professional dancer. But it had been a riot watching Nate, a former baseball player, trying to keep up with his wife and, surprisingly, with Cam. Jen shouldn"t have been surprised that Cam knew how to move his body, but she was. She kept learning more about him, and sometimes it made her feel a little silly that she"d told him she loved him back before she"d had Ty when it was so clear now that she"d never known him.
Jen and Nate waved goodbye to Cam and Becca as they walked down the circle drive to their car. Ty was nestled on her shoulder, happily sleeping. He"d played hard with Riley, Jen"s nephew, until Ty suddenly just sat down next to the couch and fell asleep.
She rubbed her hand over her little boy"s sleeping head as Cam opened the back door for her to put him in his car seat. The last thing she wanted was to set him in the seat, but she knew safety came first.
She buckled him in and then turned to look at Cam. The resemblance between him and Nate was uncanny, but more than that the bond between the brothers was very strong. Family was such a huge part of who these men were.
And tonight had brought into sharp relief how selfish she"d been to keep Ty to herself for so long. But when Nate had held her little boy, she knew that he was happy to have Ty as his nephew, and that she would be forgiven.
A warm spring breeze stirred the air as Cam gave her a hug. "Thank you for a great night."
"It was pretty special for me, too. Riley was so good with Ty. I was worried about that."
"Me, too," Cam admitted. "I think I watched them like hawks for the first hour we were there before I finally relaxed."
"Cam, there is something I have to tell you."
"Good, because there is something I want to ask you. I hope we are on the same track," he said.
Becca wrapped her arms around his lean waist and rested her head over his heart for a really long minute. She wanted to stay right here in his arms for the rest of her life. Too bad that wasn"t a possibility.
She inhaled deeply so that the masculine scent of him was imbedded in her senses and then stepped back. "I can"t wait to hear what you have to say. I think that you and I are so much stronger this time."
"Me, too," he said. He closed Ty"s door and opened hers. "We can talk more when we get home."
Home. She hadn"t felt that way about anyplace but Garden City before, and now she was coming to realize that Ty and Cam were her home.
She sighed.
If everything worked out the way she secretly hoped, one day soon she"d be sharing major decisions with Cam about everything, not just Ty. And if it didn"t-well, she"d continue moving along making choices. Some of them would be really good ones and others would be mistakes. And some of the mistakes, she thought, glancing back to make sure Ty was okay, would turn out to be the best choices she ever could have made.
"That was a big sigh," Cam said. "Are you worried because you didn"t keep up with me during the game?"
"Not at all," she said. "I"m worried about where we are heading."
"Why?" he asked. "We"re getting on well. Ty is adjusting. I think things are fine the way they are."
She shrugged, then realized he couldn"t see her gesture, since he was driving. She had to respond but what would she say? "The more stuff we do together as a family...the more I wish we were a real one."
"We are a real one. You"re Ty"s mom and I"m his dad. Doesn"t get more real than that," Cam said.
"That"s not what I meant," she said. "I want us to be more than that. I think I told you I never knew my dad, but I created this image in my head of what would be the perfect family."
"What was it like?" he asked.
Like us, she thought, but didn"t say that out loud. "It was a mom and dad who cared about each other and who loved me." she thought, but didn"t say that out loud. "It was a mom and dad who cared about each other and who loved me."
"I wanted that, too."
"Didn"t you have it?" she asked.
"Not from my mom. She might have loved me, but I always felt that I was wanting in her eyes."
"I"m sorry, Cam."
"Don"t be. Childhood isn"t perfect for anyone. Haven"t you found that out?"
She nodded. "But I want to do whatever I can to make sure that Ty"s is."
He glanced over at her. "Me, too."
"I think you are a very good mother," he said, smiling over at her. He pulled into the garage at their home. He parked the car and got Ty out of the back. He was sleeping as usual, and Becca followed behind Cam as he took Ty inside and put him to bed.
She was glad he thought she was a good mom but realized she wanted him to think about her as a woman.
She went into the kitchen and took down two snifters from the shelf. She put in a couple of ice cubes and filled them with Baileys before heading back into the living room.
"I"m glad you got us drinks."
"No problem. I have something I want to talk to you about," she said.
"Okay. I wanted to speak to you, too."
She took a deep breath and a big sip of her drink. It burned because she"d swallowed too much, and she felt like an idiot when she started coughing.
Cam patted her on the back. "Are you okay?"
"Yes. I am okay. In fact, I"m better than okay. Cam, I..."
She put her gla.s.s down and then put her hand on his knee. "I love you and I want us to live together as man and wife."
Cam didn"t know what to say. Love. Of course she"d have to say the one thing that he couldn"t give her. She couldn"t ask for diamonds or pearls or priceless works of art. She had to ask for something ephemeral.
"I"m flattered, Becca. I think this time you really do love me," he said.
"I do, too," she said. "I"ve known it for a while now."
"I"m so glad. I think we are making a very fine family with you and me and Ty. I was planning to ask you to make this move permanent and to live with me for the rest of our lives."