EIGHTEEN
Cammie
Duke knocks on the door as I settle in bed with my back against the headboard. “You decent?”
“Yeah. Come in.”
He opens the door cautiously, his gaze averted anyway. “I brought you something that might help with the eyes.” He circles the index finger on his free hand at my face.
I watch with keen interest as he sets a coffee mug wrapped in a tea towel down on the nightstand. Four spoon handles protrude from the ice-chilled water that fills the mug.
“What do I do with it?”
He grins, tipping his head slightly. “You’ve never done this before?”
“Would I ask if I had?”
He huffs out his nose, picking out two ice-cold teaspoons. “Lean your head back and shut your eyes.”
I do as I’m told, grumbling, “This sounds like the start of a bad prank.”
Arctic metal encases my eyelids. “Fuck me, Duke! You could have warned me.” My hands shoot up in front of me, colliding with one very warm, very hard body.
“Trust me, it works to reduce the puffiness. My mum used to do it all the time when we were kids.”
“All the time?” I can barely stand doing it once. “Did she enjoy it that much?” I joke.
“No,” he states in such a tone that I can imagine his blank face as he does. “Dad enjoyed making her cry that often, though.”
Damn … Didn’t see that coming. “I’m sorry, I didn’t—”
“It’s fine.” His weight shifts onto the edge of the bed. “Take these off me, yeah?”
I reach up, a little more cautious this time, and fumble around until I have the handles in my grasp. Duke’s hands slide out from under mine, yet his weight stays on my bed. Interesting.
“When they warm up, swap them for the other ones, and then repeat until the water isn’t cold enough to cool them down anymore.”
“And this will get rid of my red eyes?”
“Mm-hmm. Stops the swelling so you don’t wake up tomorrow looking like you’re allergic to bees.”
“Gee, thanks,” I deadpan.
He sits silently for a while, so quiet that I edge one of my legs across until it bumps into what I assume is his butt.
“I’m still here,” he murmurs.
Three little words, and he seals the hole in my heart. I barely know this guy from Adam, and yet he’s managed to make more progress towards helping me get closure than my family has in the past three years.
The spoons warm, and I peel them off to change them over, blinking as the light hits my adjusted retinas. Duke reaches out and takes the spoons from me, exchanging them for the cold ones.
“You can hit the hay, if you like,” I say. “I’ll be okay now.”
He seems as though he’s about to take the subtle hint, yet instead he places his hands over mine and gently guides the spoons to my eyes. “Ten more minutes to be sure can’t hurt.”
Why the hell couldn’t Jared have been this awesome? Maybe there’s truth to the saying that anything worth having is also worth waiting for? Because I feel as though I’ve waited a lifetime for a man like Duke.
“You know, I was thinking while I got changed that we could rearrange the living room,” I say.
“Why?” His weight shifts a little farther onto the mattress, his leg pressed against mine.
“I thought if I shifted the sofa by the window around to face the other one, and then shunted them both to the wall, it would make a little cave for you to sleep in. A safe space.”
He doesn’t say a thing.
My heart thunders in my ears, my other senses heightened while my sight is trapped in the dark. Panic engulfs me when I wonder if I made him mad. But then again, he hasn’t left. His leg still presses on mine, his weight still causing the mattress to dip and me to lean toward him.
I swallow, the spoons warm, and yet the fear of what I’ll find if I take them away forces me to keep them in place. My tongue sweeps across my lips, words failing me as I fight for what to say to accept I probably overstepped the mark making his problem mine like that.
Turns out I don’t need to say a thing at all.
The bed rolls as he moves. I prepare for him to leave, for the click of the door as he goes.
I don’t prepare for warm lips to press against my own. I sure as hell don’t prepare for the way his gentle caress makes my heart skip a beat, or how I lean forward to keep the connection a little longer as he pulls away.
Wow. Totally didn’t predict that.
The spoons hit the bed as I blink rapidly, willing my eyes to stop their ridiculous burn at the sudden intrusion of light.
Duke sits still as a statue, watching me as I re-join the room.
“Are you going to say something?” I whisper.
“I don’t know what to say.” His brow furrows, his eyes almost alarmed.
“Shit, Duke. You sure know how to make a girl feel awkward.”
I look away as he falters for words, and focus on the inane task of swapping the spoons over. If he’s not sure how he feels about what he just did, then why did he? I didn’t ask him to kiss me. I don’t think I did anything to instigate that kind of situation. What the hell is his deal?
“Cam,” he says, strong and sure.
“What, Duke?” I spin my heated gaze to him, maddened that he’s gone and made what was already a tense night worse.
“You didn’t stop me.” He frowns. “You should have stopped me.”
“I should have stopped you?” I roll my eyes, slapping the cold spoons over them immediately after. “Is that all you’re thinking right now?” I snap, aware I probably look like a lunatic going off my chain at him with spoons over my eyes. “You think it was up to me to stop you?” I huff, growing madder by the second. “Newsflash, buddy. It’s the twenty-first century. Men should be able to control themselves without blaming their lust on the girl involved.”
He ignores my rambling, and continues with his lame protest. “Why didn’t you push me off?”
Heat rushes through my body, settling low in my abdomen at the thought of why. “Because”—I swallow— “I liked it.”
He doesn’t say anything, simply hums as though the idea interests him.
“Let me guess,” I say. “That makes me a hussy, allowing some stranger to come on to me in my own bedroom.” I laugh, feeling the need to steer this somewhere a little more light-hearted. “Jeez, Duke. If you wanted a comfier place to sleep, you could have just said you changed your mind about swapping for the bed.”
He doesn’t laugh with me, not even a snort. Think I’ll stay behind these spoons forever.
“You talk too much. You know that?”
Well aware, buddy.
“You keep shit in weird places,” he continues, “and you eat rat-shit kids food that has no real nutritional value for you.”
“Anything else?” I drone.
“You hold on to ghosts that keep you isolated from everyone who loves you, and you drive like a fucking maniac.”
I sigh, resting my head against the headboard. “You know, this isn’t doing anything to help make me feel better about myself.”
“I know,” he says as though exasperated by the train of thought tumbling from his lips. “I’m not trying to be an arsehole, Cam.”
I drop the spoons, yet keep my eyes shut for one more blissful minute. “Then what are you trying to do, Duke?”
He sighs, getting off the bed. I set the spoons aside and open my eyes. He stands with his back to me, as though he’s ready to walk out but for some unknown reason, he can’t find it in himself to physically do so. His head drops, and he looks to the floor as he admits the reason for this detailing of my faults. “You drive me crazy with your annoying habits, Cam, and yet …”
Yet? I scoot up in the bed, holding on for his next words.
“And yet that piece-of-shit car breaking down was the best thing that’s happened to me in a hell of a long time.”
I fold the covers back and move to the edge of the bed, hanging my legs over the side as an amused smile curls my lips up on one side. “Why, Duke. Would that be a compliment you just gave me?”
His laugh is low and throaty, supressed. “I guess.”
What is it about this man that he can’t let himself loosen up? I get that he’s angry about what happened to him, but damn, live a little, laugh.
He drops a frustrated sigh as he runs a hand through his hair. “I put those pictures on top of your sideboard. Figured you could reframe them when you felt the time was right.” He takes a step toward the door and hesitates, looking back at me over his shoulder. “Get some sleep, okay?”
“Sure. Thank you for the spoons.” I give him a soft smile and let him go, more for his own relief than mine.
I could have kept him close for longer, picked his brain and possibly, maybe, got him to kiss me again. But I’m not blind; he needs space to think things through. He needs to work out exactly how he feels about what just went down.
As do I.
Sleep. Yeah, I won’t be doing much of that. Taylah’s death cemented two things for me: one, endless sleepless nights where, if I’m lucky, I snatch a few rough hours, and two, that I will never ever take medication to aid my insomnia again.
After all, why should I sleep when my baby is doing enough for the both of us?