Page 67 of Be Mine Forever

And maybe he did. Maybe he always had. Maybe that was why Jo had never felt urgent for anyone else. Even at the heights with other men, she’d never felt the fire Cam was stoking with just the barest, most subtle movements inside of her with his fingers.

“I want this.” He withdrew his fingers, palming her, pressing into her with his whole hand. “I want us tonight.”

The edges of Jo’s sanity peeled off like paper burning in a flame. She held on just enough to pull away.Remember the lady garden.

“Cam, not tonight. Baby, please, not tonight.”

Cam’s hand went still and he pulled back, a frown over his eyes.

“You don’t want…Are you scared?” He scooted back an inch or two on the bed, still on his knees. “I get it. A few less nightmares doesn’t make me safe. I’m not safe. You’re right. I don’t even trust myself.” He bounded off the bed, walking over to the mantel and gathering his keys. “I’m sorry. I assumed…I shouldn’t have.”

“Cam, what…Are you leaving?” Jo couldn’t have disguised the dismay and disappointment in her voice if she’d tried. “I’ve missed you. I want to be with you.”

“I’m sorry, baby.” He tossed his keys back onto the mantel, sliding his hands into his pockets. “I just…I guess there’s been all this lead-up to us being together. And I felt like on this trip, I got there. You know?”

Jo climbed off the bed and crossed over to him. She chased after the hands in his pockets, palming his clenched fists.

“Got where? Tell me.”

His eyes, stormy with all the emotions she could see roiling beneath the surface, grew a little calmer every second he looked at her. And she loved that because the simple contact of holding his hand, of sharing his air again after the time they’d been apart, was doing that for her, too. She stepped closer, until their bodies were flush.

“Tell me,” she whispered against his neck.

He pulled their hands from his pockets so he could rub sparks along the sides of her thighs through the yoga pants.

“I kept replaying our conversation by the river before I left. How you laid all these weak moments out for me.”

“Cam, they were nothing compared to what you’ve been living with.” Jo dipped her head, crossing one chipped-nail-polished toe over the other. “I can’t believe I even thought mine were anything like yours.”

“Everybody’s shit is just that, babe.” He lifted her chin, forcing a collision between their eyes. “Theirs. It takes a lot for you to show your weaknesses.”

Jo nodded. There were more fingers on her hand than people alive she’d be vulnerable with.

“But you’ve always been that with me. Open. Ready.” He pushed her wild hair back. “I want to be open and ready for you. I’m gonna fuck up. I’m warning you now. I’m hardwired to ruin things.”

“Don’t say that.” Jo traced her fingers over his lips, rubbing away the harsh words.

“It’s true.” He grabbed her fingers on his mouth, kissing each one. “It’s why I never pursued you, even when I suspected…how you felt.”

“Suspected?” Jo maneuvered her lips into a wry twist. “You damn well knew how I felt. I was the sure thing you never wanted.”

“That’s where you’re wrong, Jo. I’ve wanted you for a long time, but the girls I messed with knew the score. If I had hurt you, and believe me, especially back then, I would have…It was too much to risk.”

He enfolded her face with his hands, caressing the wide bow of her mouth.

“I’d never been accepted just for me. Loved just for me. Not even by my own mother, Jo. You can’t understand what that’s like.”

He was right. Sometimes people called her the Walsh princess, and she had been. She’d lived at the adored, privileged center of a wealthy, loving family her entire life. Cam had been born on the opposite pole and had frozen there alone the first years of his life.

“Ms. Kris gave me that for the first time, and maybe because she raised you, you had that same capacity almost from the beginning. To see past the fights and the anger and the shitheadedness. Somehow, you saw past all that. Saw something worth letting into your life. You think I’d jeopardize that just so I could screw you? Never.”

Cam swallowed, his thumbs making loving trails under her eyes and across her cheekbones.

“I’m still afraid I’ll hurt you.” He silenced her with a look and a quick shake of his head when she started to protest. “Not intentionally. I could never do that and I would kill anyone who hurt you. I’ve always been that way about you, and you know it.”

She nodded, leaning into the gentle touch of his roughened palm.

“I’m afraid of what I’ll do to you when I’m there.” He looked down at the floor. “With him. In my dreams. Out of my head. Or when I lose control.”

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