Page 61 of Lust & Lollipops

I sighed. “It feels like an attack to vote out Chris just because he made me laugh once. It’s not like we were close. He just made a decent argument.”

“My jealousy aside,” Cam said, and my eyebrows lifted. “I don’t trust Chris.”

Jealousy?

He was admitting to jealousy?

He added, “As much as you dislike Kyle, Reid, and Travis, and as difficult as they are, I’d much sooner put my life and yours in their hands. I would trust them to keep you safe.”

“Kyle doesn’t even plan on letting his mate work,” I argued.

“Kyle wants to stay alive, and knows as well as any fae male that if his mate says run, he’ll ask her how far.”

“So I should choose him?” I drawled.

Cam laughed humorlessly. “If you want me to kill him.”

I rolled my eyes. “I’ve never seen you violent before. Every other guy on this island is more aggressive than you.”

“Every other guy on this island has the freedom to play the game however he wants. For me, there was only one path to victory. I played the role I had to play to get here, first as your guard, and then as a man you despised.”

“Are you telling me that I don’t know you? Because that doesn’t exactly make me want to choose you, Cam.”

His thumbs grew rougher against my back, and the feeling was incredible. “In a choice between me, Travis, and Kyle, we both know I’m your only logical option.”

He was right.

It pissed me off that he was, but that didn’t change the truth.

“So?” I finally asked.

“So, we’re going to be mates. There’s no point in hoping for another outcome anymore.”

I’d never hoped for another outcome.

I just hadn’t wrapped my mind around the one I now had to deal with.

Cameron Cassette was going to be my mate, for better or worse.

And I knew even less about him than I’d thought.

thirteen

MOLLY

When my shoulders had officially turned to mush under Cam’s skilled hands, I rolled to my back again and grabbed the TV remote off the nightstand beside the bed. There was a television on the wall, and watching a movie seemed safer than talking to Cameron anymore.

He didn’t exactly have anything comforting to say.

I turned a movie on, and he didn’t protest against it as I did.

When I scooted back to lean against the bed’s wooden headboard, however, I discovered my conundrum.

There were only two pillows, and Cam had already tucked both of them behind his back.

“You’re an asshole,” I said, slumping against the rough, hard wood as the movie started.

“A clever asshole.”

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