Then reality hits. That was all in past tense.
“Do you still hope for that?” I ask, biting back a rush of emotion that will only complicate things.
“Can I? Really?” His shoulders lift, almost touching his ears, before falling. “Your family is everything to you. Here I am, about to meet them, and look at what I’m walking in to. They say you can’t make a first impression twice. You’ve just taken my ability to make a decent one.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Yes, you did,” he insists. “You’ve linked my fate with Nate’s. If something happens with that loan . . .”
My fingers itch to hug him, to wrap around his middle and press my face against his chest. To stop the anger that’s flowing back to the surface before it spills over.
“As soon as they find out, and they will, their perception of me and you, will be linked with Nate,” he gruffs. “They’ll assume I’m from a family of freeloaders and tell you to get the fuck away before I really damage you.”
“That’s not true,” I sniffle. “Besides, I’ll do whatever and whoever I want.”
For that, I get another half-smile. “That’s not true. You do whatever they tell you, whenever they tell you to do it. You don’t do jack shit without them telling you it’s okay.”
“I do you, don’t I?” I fire back.
He clenches his teeth once more. “Careful,” he warns. After a pointed glance, he takes a step back. “You stay in this little box they’ve put you in and go through the motions of your life. I think doing me is the first thing you’ve ever done that’s against status quo. You’ve hidden me to the point that you have to—”
“I haven’t hidden you!” I interject. “And you haven’t wanted to meet them. You’ve been downright against it, so don’t even shove that all on me.”
The burn is quick and hot as it uncurls from the base of my throat. The tears I blink back are scalding and he sees them. It forces him to look away.
“Okay. That’s true.” When he speaks again, his voice is a touch softer. “You are so capable, Camilla. You’re ridiculously smart, stunningly beautiful, the sweetest heart. It drives me insane watching you jump through hoops they’ve set for you. You do the charity work you think you should do but don’t love—”
“That’s not true! I love working with the Landry Holdings charities.”
He lifts brow. “You love it? You jump out of bed in the morning raring to go? When is the last time you found something you loved to do? And I don’t mean shopping or skiing. I mean something for you. Like what fighting is for me—when I’m doing it, I feel like me. Nothing else feels that way.”
I don’t respond.
“Answer me, Cam.”
“I don’t know.”
Heaving a breath, he paces a circle, knotting his hands through his hair again. “The point is, you’re gonna have a mess on your hands.”
“Well, I guess it’s my mess, isn’t it?”
“Oh, it’s your mess. It’s just not contained to you.”
A heaviness descends on me, and suddenly, I feel exhausted. My head hurts, my eyes are blurry, and my legs just want to collapse me into a chair.
“Are you going to tell them about the money?” he asks.
“It’s none of their business.”
“While I agree with that probably more than you even do, that’s not going to keep them from finding out.”
My hands go to my hips. “Aren’t you the one that tells me I need to start standing on my own two feet?”
“Sweetheart,” he says with more saltiness than sweetness, “you’re the one that’s set the precedent that they can look in your accounts and monitor your every movement. If you think that’s going to miraculously not happen with this, you’re wrong.”
“Doesn’t mean I have to explain it.”
“Nah, you’re right. Just let them think you handle money like a child and I’m some kind of low life that just wants you for your cash. If that’s the case, I can’t even blame them this time.”