“Your house?” she said, her stomach tightening. “I don’t know if we should do that.”
Red flags waved and loud sirens clanged inside her mind.
“Come on, Grace. I don’t want you changing your mind in the time it will take to reach your place,” he said with a laugh. “I promise not to bite you the minute we walk in the door.”
And with that, he gave her no other choice. Without even letting her say good-bye to her hostess and best friend, he led her around the front of the house and practically stuffed her into his car. The motor was revving and they were heading down some tree-lined back road she’d never been on before. Within minutes were pulling up to Cam’s place.
She’d never been to his place before, and as the beautiful three-story log home rose before her, Grace felt her insides stir. She wasn’t strong enough to be alone with Cam here.
When she’d left New York, she vowed to quit making mistakes. And she kept making them. So after Cam opened her car door and helped her climb out, she was berating herself all the way up the path to his front steps. Grace had zero doubt that she was making the mistake of her life by coming to her onetime lover’s home—where they’d be all alone.
Cam saw a stern-looking man staring back at him in the bathroom mirror. He had to play this one carefully. No, play wasn’t the word he wanted. He’d finally managed to win a modicum of Grace’s trust, and he wasn’t going to blow it because he couldn’t keep his pants zipped and his constant erection where it belonged.
Dammit! It really sucked being a man. A little romance, a little wine, and the right words—that was probably all it would take, and he’d get her into his bed in no time flat. But that would make him just as big an asshole as the people who’d treated her so poorly that she was afraid to be open and honest anymore. And what if he was one of those people—one of the many who had made her feel that she needed to hide who she really was? He couldn’t be sure that he wasn’t one of them, and it scared the hell out of him.
Yes, they had both messed up when they were teenagers, but she shouldn’t bear this much hostility toward him—not after ten years. He would hear her story. After that, he would be open and honest with her. He would tell her that he would be taking her to his bed soon. Very soon!
“Business first,” he mumbled, shifting where he stood, hoping like hell he could get his body to listen to his mind. “Nope. Apparently not going to happen,” he mumbled as he shifted again, so he gave up and left the bathroom.
He hoped she wasn’t asleep.
“What took you so long?” she asked when he stepped into the living room.
“Did you miss me?”
“Hardly. I’ve grown quite accustomed to you disappearing, Cam.” The words came out like a joke, but there was an underlying pain to her tone that made him stop for a moment where he was.
“I never meant to disappear on you, Grace.”
“It doesn’t really matter, though, does it?”
“It matters if, after all this time, you’re still holding on to your resentment.”
“It was a long time ago. But you know what they say . . .” She gave a bitter laugh.
“No. Not really. What do they say?” He couldn’t help bracing himself for her answer.
“You never forget your first love. Your next lovers will never be privileged enough to get your entire heart, because you’ve already given a piece away.”
How in the world had they gotten to this place so quickly?
Before he could respond, she laughed. “Lighten up, Cam. You want to talk business, so let’s talk business.”
Cam was almost unable to keep up with her. One second she displayed a sliver of vulnerability, and the next she was hiding behind dark humor and the shutters were over her eyes. This wasn’t getting them anywhere.
“Good. Let’s talk business,” he said. He might as well go along with her on this, he told himself, so he switched gears.
“What do you need to know?”
“I need to know it all, Grace, even the stuff you might not think is relevant. You need to walk me, step by step, through the past ten years, especially the time you were gone from Sterling. Someone in your past used you, and it’s my job to figure out who that was.”
Cam sat down and put a small laptop on his knees. He wanted to pull Grace to him, show her just how sorry he was for breaking her heart and prove how he could love her the right way if she would let him. But he knew the only way to truly help her was to give her some space, allow her time to dig deep within herself to call up details and divulge her story.
“I guess I’ll start from the time I left, then.” She paused for a moment and he could see she was thinking.
“Why don’t you start right before you left,” he suggested. “Weren’t you involved with Jimmy Wells, my father’s ranch hand?”
A shudder went through her. She really didn’t want to talk about what had happened with Jimmy. She couldn’t tell Cam the entire truth. She still felt too much shame about the situation, even though she knew she shouldn’t.
“Grace. I know this isn’t ideal, speaking with your ex-boyfriend about another boyfriend, but he could be the guy setting you up, so I need to know the truth.”
“The truth?” Grace laughed a humorless sound that echoed in his large living room.
“Yes, the truth,” he said quietly. Grace couldn’t look him in the eyes, couldn’t know what he was thinking or feeling about this. She decided to give the modified version of the story she had rehearsed for years.