Page 26 of Sophia & Cameron

“Don’t I?” he bit out. “You can’t tell me that you didn’t feel it. We had something good going on. There was a connection?—”

“Get out of my way, Cameron. It’s late, and I’m tired.” She tried to block out the words he’d just said, tried to stitch up the emotional damage they were causing in her soul. Yes, they’d had a connection, but she wasn’t the type of girl to go for a guy who didn’t want to go all in with the girl he was chasing.

Cameron still blocked her path, and she had half a mind to scream bloody murder just so one of her brothers would come out and cart Cameron away for her. She scowled at him still, her eyes shooting daggers at him as best as they could. He scowled right back. Did he seriously not know what he’d done? Did henot see what kind of person he was? He lifted a hand to reach for her, but she jerked out of his grasp. His mouth set into a hard line before he heaved a sigh. “Do you know how frustrating it is to see the person you’re interested in come home with a different guy every weekend?”

Her jaw dropped. The hypocrisy of it all! “That’s rich, coming from you.”

“What?” he said, his brows furrowed.

She poked him hard in the chest as she prowled closer to him this time. She emphasized each word with the touch of her finger. “Don’t. Dish. It. Out. If. You. Can’t. Take. It.”

In a split second, he captured her finger in his hand and pulled so she stumbled forward a step. “What are you talking about, Sophia?” he growled. “I’m not the one going out every weekend with people I barely know.”

“Who says I don’t know them?” Sophia’s heated whisper faltered, and she prayed he didn’t see what his proximity was doing to her. She could smell his clean, woodsy scent, and it floated to her on the breeze between them. If she wasn’t careful, she was going to lose her head and end up having her heart broken all over again.

Cameron scoffed. “What did I say about lying to me?” When she didn’t answer, he adjusted his hold on her so he was no longer holding her finger but both of her hands. His voice softened, and that pain he’d been hiding seeped into his words. “What happened five years ago, Red? It never added up. I deserve to know.”

All the pain and suffering she’d experienced after letting her guard down came rushing to the surface, and she hated him for his ability to seek it out like a hound dog. Mingled with that pain was a distinct sense of anger that she couldn’t shake. He deserved to hurt—a lot more than he was hurting right now.

“Fine,” she said, tugging on her hands but unable to escape his clutches. “You want to know what happened? I’ll tell you what happened.” She finally freed herself and folded her arms tight across her chest. “You made such a show of chasing me—of making me feel like I was the very moon that hung in the sky.Special.” Her voice cracked. “You made me feel like there was still a chance that I could find happiness with someone after all the heartache I’d experienced in the past. I didn’t want to let you in. I knew it wouldn’t be smart to open up to someone I barely knew, and surprise, surprise. I was right.”

His scowl remained fixed on his face, not giving her any indication of what he was feeling, so she trudged onward.

“You finally convinced me to give you a chance, and what did you do? You squandered it.”

“I did no such thing. You were the one who ran off with another date that night,” he ground out.

“Really? And who was that girl at your hotel room door?”

He frowned, the anger fading fast as confusion replaced it. His eyes shifted to the side while he returned to his own memories.

She barked out a laugh. “Why am I not surprised that you can’t even remember her? Tall. Leggy. Blonde.” She spat the words like venom. “You two were talking, and she was laughing, then she got a goodbye kiss from you. How many women, exactly, did you chase that week, huh?” Sophia shook her head with another huff and took a step to the side to finally escape Cameron. He had the answers he had wanted, and she needed to escape him before the first tear fell.

His hand grasped her wrist, stopping her escape.

“Cameron,” she snapped, “let go of me or I’ll?—”

“There wasn’t anyone else,” Cameron whispered.

She stilled at the pleading in his tone as she slowly lifted her eyes to meet his. There was a new sort of ache in them that halted her decision to bolt.

His hold on her tightened. “You have to believe me.”

“Why should I?” she asked, hating the desperation in her voice. Why was she so willing to get reeled back into his clutches? He was a spider, and she was the fly. At this point it wouldn’t take much for her to become trapped in his web, and she wasn’t sure if she hated that idea all that much.

Cameron tugged her closer to him before securing her at her waist. Sophia’s hands landed on his chest as she stared up at him. What was it about the way he looked at her that made her wish he actually had a reasonable explanation?

“You came to my room early, didn’t you?” he rasped.

She blinked, heat flushing her cheeks in an intolerable way.

“That girl was drunk. She’d come to the wrong room.”

Sophia blinked again, not daring to believe what he was saying as much as she wanted to.

Cameron shut his eyes briefly, then shook his head with a wry sort of chuckle. “She’d thrown herself at me without looking too closely. I think she thought she was kissing the guy who had told her to meet him at his room that night.” He opened his eyes, pleading with her. “You have to believe me, Red. I have no idea who that woman was. I pushed her away as soon as she kissed me. I ended up helping her find that room, too.”

Sophia’s stomach dropped, and her heart raced at his words. As much as she didn’t want to believe him or give him the benefit of the doubt, she couldn’t deny that the story made sense. She hadn’t stuck around after the kiss to see if he’d done what he’d said. A groan escaped her chest, and the blush she knew had taken root in her cheeks grew hotter.

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