“You didn’t have to. I saw your face when you pulled away from him.” She gave Cameron a knowing smile and fanned herself. “Oh Chéri, the way that man looks at you. It’s already too hot on this island.”
Cameron rolled her eyes, hoping her friend would stop. No such luck.
“Don’t be shy. You’ve been alone since Keso moved out. You’re a free woman. Do what you wish.” She waved her hand, as if already dismissing any possible arguments.
“It’s not that simple, Es.”
Her friend grunted. “’Tis that simple. He’s a man. You’re a woman. Your parts fit. Trust me.” She winked.
A laugh sprung from Cameron, almost catching her by surprise. “It’s not our parts I’m worried about. I’m not built for casual.”
Esme cocked her head to the side, then gave a small smile. “That’s what I told him.”
Cameron’s mouth dropped open. “You what? You talked about me with him?” She could just imagine how that conversation had gone. Ian tapping her friend for information. Luckily, no one on the island knew anything about her.
Esme lifted a shoulder, sending the thin strap of her worn sundress sliding down her tanned arm. She slipped the strap back into place, still silent.
“Well,” Cam urged.
“I told him if it wasn’t something real to leave you alone.”
Her eyes grew warm. “Oh Esme, you didn’t need to do that.” Still, her heart warmed at the thought of someone having her back. Too many times since leaving her old life, she’d felt alone. “He’s not for me,” she finished.
Esme’s dark eyes narrowed. “You didn’t see the way he looked at you. I know I joked before, Doc. But he looks at you like…” She searched the room as if looking for the right words. Her gaze landed on her husband, motionless in the bed. A small smile tipped her lips. “Like you’re the oxygen he needs to breathe, and he’s been underwater too long.”
Cameron looked away as her vision blurred. She’d once felt that way about Ian. As if with that first glimpse of him, she could finally breathe.
“It could be something. You deserve—”
“No.” She closed her eyes, gathering her composure. “Ian and I aren’t that simple.” Here goes. “I knew Ian before I came here. He’s the reason I’m here.”
Esme’s eyes widened. Her mouth hung open. “You love him.” Her whisper held no question, only stated what Cameron could no longer avoid.
Cameron dropped her gaze to the hands she now rang in front of her and nodded.
“Did he make your heart explode and your whole body fill with happiness?” A smile filled the other woman’s voice.
“The very first time I saw him.” And every time after. Even now, the sight of Ian made her heart pound and wings of anticipation flutter in her stomach.
Esme squeezed her hand. She looked up at her friend’s smiling face.
“Then you have to give him a chance. You owe—”
Cam jerked away. She didn’t owe Ian anything. “We’re not like you and Brodie. Ian didn’t save me from hell. He caused it.”
The other woman’s jaw tightened. “Did he—”
“No. No, Ian would never lay a hand on me. But there are other ways to crush someone.” And Ian had crushed her when she’d found him embracing Mallory. When she’d heard him declare he didn’t want a child. Even before the gunshot and the fire, she’d been destroyed.
Her friend lifted her hands, then dropped them in defeat. “I don’t know what happened, but I know a man in love. The way he looks at you, the way he talked about once being in love. You two are not finished, Doc.”
Yes, they were. They were over long before she walked away. She’d just been too blind to see.
“You’re haunted,” Esme told her, pulling her from her thoughts. “You know everything about us. You’ve seen me at my lowest, but you share yourself only with your ghosts.”
“That’s not true.”
The other woman raised a brow.
Maybe her friend had a point. She didn’t mean not to tell the others about herself. But one secret would lead to another and another. She couldn’t risk opening the box. She shrugged. “There isn’t much to share. I’m happier here. “
Esme narrowed her eyes. Cam fidgeted, straightening her already straight shirt.
“Then you must’ve been miserable before.”
Esme’s words stole the air from her lungs. Cameron hadn’t been miserable before. She’d been devastated and heartbroken. But more importantly . . . “I’m happy here. You make it sound—”
“You’re surviving here, Doc. That’s okay. You and me, we came here to survive. But sooner or later, you have to thrive. Arabella makes you happy, but you don’t truly live with anyone but her. You deserve to live.”
Tears filled Cameron’s eyes, blurring her vision. She turned away from her friend. All this time, she’d thought she’d hidden her unhappiness. No, not unhappiness. She wasn’t unhappy. She just wasn’t happy. God, did that even make sense?
Esme patted her back. “I didn’t mean to upset you. I just think you deserve some happiness and maybe a little closure.”
She nodded. Yes, she needed closure. Walking away from Ian had been necessary but hadn’t given her the closure either of them needed. Maybe his being here was a blessing. Perhaps if they finally talked, she could move on without him. Maybe she could finally awaken from her own coma.
“I’ll think about it,” she promised her friend.
Yawning, Esme kneaded her back.
“How long have you been here?” Cameron asked. “You should head home and get some rest. I’ll be here all night. Brodie’s in good hands.”
The pregnant woman gazed down at her husband. “You’ll talk to him? Let him know you’re here during the night?”
“Absolutely. And if anything changes, I’ll send someone for you. I promise.”
Sighing, Esme took her husband’s hand. “Can I just have another minute to say goodbye?”
“Of course.” Cameron offered a smile, rubbing her hand over her friend’s back. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Esme returned her smile, then waited for her to retreat. As Cameron made her way back to her office, Esme’s voice started again. A fresh wave of determination swept through Cameron. Brodie would be okay. He would wake up. He would adjust to his new physical limitations and get back to life with his family. Anything else would be unacceptable.
She stepped into her office. The box still set atop her desk. Thank God Keso hadn’t shown up. Not that he’d recognize the box, but he’d only have to open the lid to know what it meant to her. And be upset.
She dropped into her desk chair and slid the box closer. With a trembling hand, she lifted the lid. Her past stared back at her. On top laid the picture she’d taken from the nursery the day she left. Tears filled her eyes. She took the picture in her hands. The edges were worn from too much handling. She’d have to be more careful, or the picture would eventually tear. Already there were places where, over the years, her tears had dropped on the image and smeared the film. Pressing the photograph to her chest, she leaned her head back and closed her eyes. Letting her mind wander, she traveled back to before, to a time when she’d felt her life was complete and certain. Could she have really been so wrong?
* * *
Ian released a sigh of relief when he spotted Cam in her desk chair with her head laid back and her eyes closed. From what he could tell, she hadn’t slept more than a few hours since he’d landed on the island. Even that rest had been in short, stolen naps throughout the clinic. A smile tipped the corners of his mouth. Finally, with her defenses down, he could just admire her. Watching Cameron sleep had once been a favorite pastime of his. Since he rarely slept more than a few hours at a time, he often woke at night. When Cameron had shared his bed, he’d lie there, holding her and watching her sleep. Even after her accident, when she no longer welcomed his touch, he’d sometimes slip into their room and watch over her.
His gaze drifted from her serene face to the object lying in her lap. He crept closer to get a better look. When he did, his breath caught in his lungs and his heart squeezed in his chest. With a trembling hand, he picked up the snapshot. Wes had taken the photo just days before their world had exploded. His friend had captured them mid-laugh, leaning toward each other. Ian’s hand rested on the small mound of their daughter pressing against Cameron’s tank top. He swallowed, focusing on the wide grin on Cameron’s lovely face. Her blue eyes squinted with her laughter. She looked at him as though he were all she could see, all she wanted to see. He’d felt the same way. In that moment, Cameron and their daughter had been his entire world.
Why had she kept this? After she left, he’d been sure he’d imagined the picture, the moment, everything. Now, in his hands, he held proof he’d once made her happy. He surveyed the desk. A spark of recognition flared to life when he spotted the small wooden box.
Cameron’s keepsake box.
She’d kept the box in the bottom drawer of her bedside table when they lived together. He’d never looked inside, though she’d never kept its contents hidden. There had been no secrets between the two of them. Or so he’d thought.
“What are you doing here?”
Startled by the sudden sound in the silent clinic, he jumped, letting go of the picture. The image fluttered to the desk. Cameron’s blue gaze flickered to the snapshot. Her jaw tightened, but otherwise she didn’t react.
“Sometimes I think I imagined it,” he confessed.
She turned her attention to him, taking him in with her stare. “What?”
“You, the baby, how happy we were. I think that’s part of why I still have all your things. It’s proof that you and our life existed.”
Her lips twisted as she turned her head away.
He stepped closer, taking the picture in his hand again. Telltale smears along the image showed she’d cried when looking at it. Hope sprang in his chest. He didn’t want her sad, but maybe this meant she still cared. “Do you remember why we were smiling?”
She shook her head. “I don’t remember before,” she whispered so quietly he barely heard her, “just after. You…”
Taking her hand, he drew her out of her seat. “I pulled you against me. I leaned down, and I said ‘God, I love you so much’”
His lips brushed over hers as he spoke, just as they had that day long ago. She bit her bottom lip and looked up at him. The nervousness in her gaze confirmed his suspicions that she hadn’t understood how much he’d meant those words. Or how much he still did.
He gripped her hips, then pulled her flush against him. A small sound escaped her parted lips as her breasts melded to his chest and her hips met his.
“And what did you do, Cam? Do you remember?”
Slowly, she nodded.
“Show me,” he urged. “Please, baby.”
She slipped her arms around his neck, lifting to her toes. “I said, ‘And I love you, more than you know.’”
And whether because they’d done this before or because neither of them could help it, Ian found his lips against hers as he pulled her body closer to his, until there wasn’t even a breath separating them.
He slid his hands down her back, over her hips to rest on her backside. She moaned against his lips. Her hands tunneled into his hair, holding him to her as if to keep him from escaping. Crazy woman. Didn’t she realize he didn’t want to be anywhere else? He nipped at her jaw and then her neck. A small cry escaped her lips as he released her skin. He kissed the small red mark left behind.
“Ian.” The low sound took him back to a thousand memories of their bodies coming together, her warmth surrounding him.
He pushed his hand under her tank top. The muscles of her abdomen tightened beneath his palm. Pausing, his fingers rubbed lazily at the underside of her breast. Her hips arched closer to him. Her softness seeking his hardness.
“God, Cam, I love you,” he managed between kisses.
Her body went rigid against his.
“Cam?” He leaned back to search her face.
Pushing against his chest, she shook her head. “Don’t . . . don’t say that to me.”
His hand slipped from beneath her shirt, but he didn’t back away. Afraid if he let her go, she’d never let him touch her again.
“Cam. Please.”
He wasn’t above begging. Not when it came to Cam and his happiness. “Talk to me. I’ve missed you, mourned you for five years. You and our daughter.”
This time, she shoved him away from her. He stumbled back, all contact lost.
“Don’t you talk about her to me.”
Anger warred with the desire churning inside him. “Why? Do I not get to mourn her too? Have you cornered the market on grief?”
“I was the only one who wanted her, so yes,” she yelled. “You made it clear when I told you I was pregnant that you weren’t ready for a baby, you—”
“Do you forget the way I held you at night and talked about her? Do you forget that I felt her moving beneath my hand, that I named her? Did none of that mean anything?” Tears filled his eyes as he remembered those moments of hope and love they’d shared. How could she think he hadn’t wanted their daughter?
“You didn’t even cry when she died.” Her soft voice broke.
She had no idea. While she’d lain unconscious in her hospital bed, he’d held their daughter and wept. Wes had finally pried the child from his arms. By the time Cam woke up, he’d thought he had no tears left to shed. Then he’d seen her devastation and his already shattered heart had somehow broken into even smaller fragments. Cam wouldn’t eat, wouldn’t speak. She blamed herself for their daughter’s death. What kind of man would he have been to lay his own pain on her, when every ounce of her energy needed to focus on survival?
“You’re right. I didn’t cry, not in front of you.”
She snickered. “You say that.”
“I mean that. You were barely keeping it together. I couldn’t add to your pain by making you comfort me.”
“So, who did comfort you then?”
Would she believe no one? He’d sat by her side, he’d watched her suffer, and he’d told himself he deserved every bit of his own pain.
When he remained silent, she raised a dark brow.
“No one. I waited for you to get better, for us to eventually comfort each other. Then you left.”
Her glare softened, before she seemed to remember something and straightened. “No. You—”
The door to the clinic burst open. “Doc. Doc C, please,” a girl’s voice called, followed by the slapping of bare feet on the cement floor.
Cameron’s eyes widened. Before Ian could ask who the voice belonged to, Cameron had turned and ran from the room. He followed her, stopping in his tracks when he saw the problem.
Two small girls held the door open as Luci and the woman he remembered from his first night, half carried, half dragged Esmerelda Hunte inside.
“You have to help her,” Luci gasped. “It’s the baby. It’s ready.”