“Have you seen Cameron?”
“Actually, yes,” he said. “He just walked outside about two minutes ago.”
“Thanks,” I replied, picking up the bottom of my dress and racing for the door.
Carefully, I walked to the right, stepping inside the large footprints leading around to the courtyard. As I rounded the corner, I stopped, staring over at Cameron sitting comfortably on the bench. He was alone, and that alone made my heart skip a beat. Now, I just needed to make it through the hard part.
Chapter 27
New Year’s Eve
Cameron
I had put my tux on, even though I didn’t have a date to impress, and walked down to the lounge to get a drink. The crowd was already in the ballroom, but I didn’t feel like being surrounded by all of those people. I did a quick sweep of the room to make sure Bea wasn’t in there and then headed outside, figuring if she was going to find me anywhere, it was going to be where we first kissed.
I walked across the path, leaving large footprints in my wake. I sat down on the covered bench and stared out at the snow-covered slopes, lit up with bright colors. There was still twenty minutes until the countdown, but I had exhausted my anxiety, and I knew the best thing for me to do was to sit in one place and hope that if she came, Bea would find me. As I stared out at all the partygoers, my heart was starting to sink, feeling like I was destined for a night alone. However, as the thoughts passed through my mind, I felt a hand on my shoulder. I closed my eyes for a moment and smiled, making sure it was not just another dream.
Slowly, I turned in my seat and looked up at Bea, standing in the snow. She stepped back and placed her hands in front of her, her cheeks red from the cold. She looked absolutely stunning, and I felt like the words that I wanted to say were stuck in my throat. Her long, black, velvet gown moved over her hips and down into the snow. Wrapped around her shoulders was a fur shawl with a diamond snowflake pin stuck in the right corner. She grasped her hands tightly together in front of her, and I couldn’t tell if she was cold, nervous, or a bit of both. I looked up into her beautiful green eyes and smiled wide, standing up and taking her hands.
“Bea,” I whispered. “I didn’t think…”
“That I would come?” she finished for me. “I wasn’t sure that you would be here. In fact, I was terrified that I would find myself standing here all alone when the ball dropped. But I couldn’t believe you came. I have something I want to talk to you about. Something that has been in my life and on my mind for the last year.”
“Me too,” I said, taking her hands. “Come here. Sit down next to me.”
She smiled and allowed me to pull her over to the bench. Gracefully, she sat down and turned toward me, something different in her eyes. She looked almost scared to be there talking to me. I reached out and grabbed her arms, pulling her into me.
“Come here,” I said. “I am so happy to see you.”
“I am so happy that you feel that way,” she said.
“How have you been?”
“Busy, to say the least,” she said, smiling. “But I have to admit, a little lost.”
“I know how you feel,” I said, deciding that if I was going to tell her how I felt, it had to be then and there. Otherwise, I feared I would lose my nerve. “I’ve been looking for you.”
“You have?”
“Yes, for the entire last year,” I said. “In fact, when you came to look for me, I saw you, but I didn’t realize it was you until you had already left. We crossed in front of each other without even realizing it.”
“That is insane,” she said, shaking her head. “I thought everything was strange. When I checked in, Brian told me I was staying in the same room that you had stayed in during that month together.”
“That was you? The hotel couldn’t let me check in until the room was clean because they said a guest was staying there.” I laughed. “Talk about that little thing called fate.”
“Yeah,” she scoffed. “I’m starting to think that I may have been wrong about that whole thing. Maybe fate does have some sort of truth to it.”
“Look,” I said, taking her hands. “I want to tell you some things, and I need you to just listen. I am afraid if you talk back, I will lose my nerve.”
“All right,” she said with a worried look on her face.
“From the moment that I left you in your room and went to the airport, on that last morning together, I have felt completely lost,” I said. “There hasn’t been a day that has gone by that you haven’t been on my mind. There has been no one else since you, and I was starting to worry that I would never find anyone again. I searched and searched for you, but I didn’t have enough information to find you. So, I sat around, barely livin
g for the last year, counting down the days until New Year’s Eve. I didn’t know if you would actually come here today, or if you would still feel the same connection that we had back then, but I couldn’t go another day without at least finding out how this would end. Bea, you are the first woman to ever make me want to change who I am. No, more than that. You are the first woman to ever change my mind about the things I thought so strongly about in my life. You have made me want to stop, to settle down, and to embrace a beautiful life that I know that we could have together.”
“Cameron,” she said quietly, putting her hand on top of mine. “You can’t even know how happy I am to hear you say all of these things. There are so many personal things I want to say to you about the way I feel about you, but first, there is something I need to talk to you about.”
“All right,” I said, feeling nervous. “You can tell me anything.”