Chapter thirty-nine
PERSON OF INTEREST
Silencestretchesbetweenusas I try to figure out why the police only needmeto return for more questioning.
They must have a suspect, and they need to dig deeper into something I saw to confirm a timeline or location. If that were the case, though, why wouldn’t they ask Cameron to come too? We were together almost the entire time during Delaney’s window of death. What could I have possibly seen that Cameron didn’t? Unless he just gave a better account during his statement so they don’t need him to clarify anything further. Or, even better, he gave all his information and isn’t even a suspect, so he is off the hook altogether.
My shoulders relax a little, and I turn my attention back to the menu. We need to put our orders in as soon as possible since I have to leave with Jalen in an hour. I wasn’t lying earlier when I said that everything looked good, so I pick one of the more affordable dishes and walk the menu over to Cameron, but I stopshort at the sight of him rubbing the back of his neck again. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” He lowers his hand to take the menu from me. “Just hungry.”
I cross my arms over my chest and narrow my eyes up at him.
He surveys me for a moment, then sighs. “I just wish you didn’t have to go back to the station right now. It’s not fair for you to be put under that kind of stress after you were just so vulnerable with me.”
My heart clenches at his concern, even though my feelings are clearly not the only thing that’s bothering him right now. “Don’t worry about me, I’m okay. I don’t feel vulnerable at all. If anything, I feel stronger now.”
My cheeks heat at how cliché my words sound, but it’s the truth. The weight of the guilt that I’ve been carrying for the last eight years has considerably lessened since telling him everything, especially the darkest parts of the story that I usually keep to myself for other people’s benefit.
If I’m being honest with myself, though, this lightness that I am feeling started earlier than when I finished telling him my story five minutes ago. Its origin can probably be traced back to the first time I heard his voice on the phone at the airport.
He smiles ruefully. “I understand completely how you feel.”
I smile back because of course he does. He understands everything I am thinking, all the time. Sometimes it feels like he even understands me more than I understand myself, and the reality that I am going to lose this connection that we have, that I am about to losehim, hits me square in the chest like a ton of bricks. It’s just my luck that I would meet someone who gets me and makes me feel alive again, just to be forced to give him right back up.
In fact, the more I think about it, the more convinced I am that this entire tragic situation was concocted by my cursefrom the very beginning to secure a hefty payment upfront for the concession of letting me be an aunt. The entire thing is bittersweet because even though I’m heartbroken, I would still choose to meet him, fall for him, and be forced to walk away a thousand times over if it meant that I could at least keep the memory of this moment, where my soul is not only seen by him, but completely known.
Cameron’s jaw flexes as I meet his eyes to convey the gratitude that I am unable to express to him in words. He lifts one hand to my cheek, then the other, and cradles my face like I am a precious treasure. His gaze dips down to my lips, and the air in the room thins out as my body responds by sending a flood of heat to my belly, even though my brain is flashing a big red stop sign as a reminder of the promises I made to my curse.
He searches my eyes, trying to decipher the chaotic thoughts I am struggling to untangle myself. After a few moments, he slowly leans in, having found the answer. I close my eyes, recklessly desperate to experience the all-consuming feel of his lips on mine one last time, but startle when I feel the scratch of his stubble on my eyelids as his lips press gently against my forehead instead. He lingers there as tears sting my eyes, and I am again reminded of just how perfect he is for me, and how impossible it’s going to be to give him up.
He pulls back and clears his throat. “I am going to come with you to your interview.”
I blink, stunned. “Can you do that?”
His eyes flash with an emotion somewhere between anger and determination. “I’d like to see someone try to stop me.”
After he places our order with room service, he steps onto the balcony to call Reggie, so I go back to my room to put some more physical distance between us. He showed incredible restraint in there by only kissing my forehead, and I’m not sure that I wouldbe strong enough to let him do the honorable thing again now that he has vowed to come to the police station with me.
I sit on my bed with my back to the headboard and pull my knees into my chest, then scroll through my phone for updates on the baby to distract myself. The phone rings in my hand, but my heart falls just as quickly as it jumped when I see that it is not Scott, Gabe, or Monika.
“Hey, Leah, how are you?”
“I’ve been better,” she says, just loud enough to be heard over the familiar cadence of news reporters giving a daily report on her end of the line. “I wanted to check on you and see where you ended up. Are you back in L.A. yet?”
“No, I stayed in Charlotte. I can’t remember if I told you, but my brother and his husband are having a baby, and it’s due literally any time now, so I figured I’d stick it out until then since I am already all the way out here.”
“That is so exciting, congratulations! Did they use a surrogate?”
“No, adoption through an agency. My brother-in-law is adopted, so he was adamant about that.”
“That’s incredible. I already know that you are going to be the best aunt ever.”
I swallow down the guilt that her declaration gives me and turn the conversation back towards her. “How’s everything going with you? How’s your baby?”
“Baby is good, moving a lot. I am still a little nervous from all of the stress this entire thing has caused, so I have been calling around to those 4-D ultrasound places to see if I can make an appointment to take an extra look, just to be safe.”
I smile. “You’ll have to send me those pictures if you go.”
