She felt her heart go a little squishy.
“Rowan wanted me to fill the role for his baby that he knew he wouldn’t be able to.” He shook his head. “And even then, I wasn’t having it. He was bleeding out, dying, and I told him to stop saying goddamn good-bye to me, that he was going to make it, that he’d live to drive me out of my mind another day.”
Piper smiled through unshed tears. “And what did he say to that?”
Cam’s mouth curved in a grief-filled smile. “For the first time in our lives, he got royally pissed off at me. He grabbed me by my shirt with his bloody fists and shook me. He yelled, ‘I need you to listen to me, for once!’”
“Did you?”
“Yeah. I finally stopped reacting instead of listening.” He closed his eyes. “And you know the rest.”
She tried to hold on to her anger. But in spite of her best efforts, some of it was fading. Actually, a lot of it. “So that’s why it’s so important to you to listen. It’s one of your best qualities.”
His smile was wry. “But see, I don’t always listen. I didn’t listen to you, or my heart. I’ve got a long history of letting those I care about down. My mom, Rowan, you.”
Dammit, there went some more of her bad temper. “No,” she said. “Promises mean something to you. I get that. It’s . . . noble. You were trying to help Winnie and you’d given her your word. I do that on the job, I keep people’s medical secrets, so my sister asking you not to tell me . . . well, I have to accept and understand that. It was her story to tell and she thought I’d overreact or tell her what to do rather than listen. Same with Gavin. That’s between me and them, and no matter what I might want, I can’t control them.”
He gave her a small smile. “You letting me off the hook, Piper?”
“No.” She paused and shook her head. “Well, maybe just a little. I really do know you were trying to help. Logically. But . . . emotionally? I’m still hurt and angry at being left out.”
“Understood.”
She nodded, relieved to have gotten that out. He let a companionable silence fill the space between them, along with the small waves slapping rhythmically against the dock. She could hear the wind and a bird squawking at something. The buzz of insects. Her own thoughts . . .
“Everything feels so complicated,” she whispered.
“It doesn’t have to be.”
She looked at him.
“No one meant to hurt anyone,” he said. “Least of all me. The loan . . . I came here to Wildstone intending to check on Winnie, you know that now. What you don’t know is that I wasn’t in a great place. I was . . . needing a connection. Something to ground me, to make me feel. I met you on my second night here, and I knew right then at the bar, Piper. I knew I’d found the connection I was looking for. I wanted to tell you everything, but Winnie needed to do it, in her own time. It was before . . . us.” He paused and met her gaze. “But then I started to fall for you, and there I was, holding back from you while asking you not to hold back from me. That’s what I’m most sorry about. With the loan, I was just trying to help, trying to give you something you needed. You needed to be free to go. Now you are. You can go find the next good-time guy.”
She winced. “You’re not just that to me,” she said softly. “And I’m sorry I let you think that. You’re more. You’re . . .”
“Too much more?” he asked wryly.
No, you’re everything, she wanted to say, but just shook her head.
“Piper, you’re one of the strongest people I know. You’ve had to be. But that’s the thing. Now you don’t. You can let go of everyone else’s problems for once, and just live your own life.”
“But what if I don’t know who I am if I’m not the mom, the sister, the caretaker . . .”
“You know exactly who you are, Piper. Yes, you’re those things, but you’re also so much more. You’re intelligent, resourceful, fiercely independent. You’re also beautiful, but that’s actually the least interesting thing about you.” He looked amused when she blinked. “You make me feel things I didn’t think I could feel.”
A little overwhelmed and maybe also embarrassed at the compliments, she squirmed. “Yeah, well, aroused doesn’t count.”
He flashed a quick grin that affected her pulse. “Yes, it does. But it’s more than that. You make me—”
“Crazy?”
“I wasn’t going to list that first,” he said diplomatically.
“Haha.” It took her a minute to find the right words. “I’m not the kind of person who believes people are inherently good. I don’t trust easily. Or at all. But . . . I trusted you, Cam.”
He grimaced. “I know. I—”
She put her fingers to his mouth. “So yeah, when you lied to me, I got angry. But I was angry at myself for not knowing. I should have. I should have seen all of it, but I was too busy and distracted, and didn’t take the time for my own brother and sister. So, see, I let myself down. And I want you to know, I still trust you. If anything, I’ve learned that life’s about the little things.” She paused, met his gaze. “Like keeping promises.”
“Like keeping promises,” he agreed, with a serious look on his face as he lightly touched her. “You’re too hard on yourself.”
Maybe. Okay, yes. She was. She thought about her work, and all she’d seen. How sometimes the simplest choices could have such far-reaching impacts. Like her parents sending their kids to safety, planning to join them soon, but instead being killed before they could. Or someone driving drunk because he lived right around the corner, but in that two-minute drive he hit a car and killed one of two brothers. “Life’s too short,” she murmured out loud.
“Yes.”
She stared at the water and not at Cam. Because looking directly at Cam was oftentimes like looking at a whole pan of buttery soft double-chocolate brownies. Oh so good, and . . . oh so bad for her. “Which is why I’ve decided to give up my crutch.” She lifted her journal.
“Okay. How?”
She bit her lower lip because if he laughed at her, she might have to hurt him.
But his gaze was sympathetic. “You could start slow. Maybe leave it at home once in a while. Or start over and keep journaling without making it a road map of your life that you have to live by.”
“Or I could go cold turkey and literally toss it.” She eyed the lake.
He arched a brow, and she realized she was clutching it to her chest. But the thought of being free of the incessant list-making had her feeling good about her next choice. “I’m serious about this.” She slapped the journal against his chest. “But you’re going to have to do it.”
“Piper—”
“Do it!”
He tossed the journal into the lake. There was a splash, and then it sank beneath the surface of the glassy water, vanishing from view. Piper leapt to her feet. “Oh my God!” She kicked off her shoes. “I can’t believe you actually did it!”
“You said—”
That was the last thing she heard because she jumped into the lake, and it wasn’t until her body got sucked into the cold water that she remembered.