This is your chance to prove that he doesn’t affect you. Do it. Show him who’s got the upper hand. If you can control yourself, that is. Or you can keep making a fool of yourself by blowing up on him again. See if he doesn’t ignore you and leave again.
I need you to shut your piehole right now. I don’t need you in my head.
Nothing really happened between you two. There were no promises. Why are you so hurt about it?
Because I had let him in. I wouldn’t have opened up to him if he hadn’t pursued me, told me all those lies. I wasn’t dreaming. I wasn’t making it all up.
This time, the inner voice in my head was quiet. Might as well let Cameron in then. I would prove to him how much he didn’t affect me.
I unlocked the door and got out of my car.
“You’re driving, Bigfoot.”
“Bigfoot, huh?”
“If you don’t want to, then forget about—”
“All right,” he said quickly, looking surprised and pleased that I’d agreed.
He went to talk to the truck driver first, and of course, the eighteen-wheeler moved right away. He seemed to be used to getting his way here. He was the prince. The dark-haired, taciturn golden boy.
He was helpful and somehow approachable with his men—when he chose to be, but I also noticed from his conversations how he kept everyone at arm’s length. He didn’t seem to hang out with them after work hours. I remembered the man said he never went out for beers with them. What the hell did he do when he wasn’t at school and working?
He slid into the driver’s seat. I refused to acknowledge the twinge in my chest when he adjusted the seat to accommodate his long legs. It was all so familiar.
The reaction I had watching him do this that first week was so different from my reaction this time. Now I was…sad.
He cranked the window open a little, then started the car and reversed. A few seconds later, we were on the road. He drove one-handed.
His chiseled jawline. His big hand on the steering wheel. The scrapes on his knuckles. His long fingers. A lock of his dark hair against his skin. The movement of his leg as he stepped on the gas.
I looked away, gritting my teeth.
I turned the radio on, noted the time, and blasted the volume. It didn’t dispel the tension in the car completely, but it made it easier.
Just like when he drove me around The Yard, I faced the window so I didn’t have to look at him. I turned off the radio, noted the time again. I lasted eight minutes.
“You lied to me,” I blurted out.
I saw his body go on full alert. “What’s the lie?” he asked quietly.
“Your vehicle, you jerk. You told me you don’t have a vehicle.”
His body visibly relaxed. A small smile was even flirting on his pretty mouth. “I never said that.”
“Yes, you did.”
“You asked me if I owned the truck. I said it wasn’t mine.”
Was that what he really said?
“How could you even remember that conversation?”
I couldn’t even remember what I ate yesterday.
“I remember,” he said softly. “Because I remember every conversation we’ve had.”
Oh no. No, no.