Page 16 of Cam
“No. Tonight was… more. Usually he yells. A lot.”
“Yells?”
She glanced my way, then out the window again. There wasn’t anything to see since it was late.
“Tells me to make him dinner. Wonders why I never washed a shirt of his. Tells me I can’t do anything right. That I’m worthless. A waste of space. Different days, different shit.”
I gripped the steering wheel so hard it was a surprise it didn’t crack.
“Red, you arenotworthless.”
“Yeah, well, if I remember correctly, you told me to get out of your sight. I wasn’t even worth looking at.” She sighed again and with every word, her voice got even more dejected. “Look, Cam, the Sip N’ Serv’s open still. Just drop me off there, okay. You’ve done your good deed for the night, especially since you hate me so much.”
I deserved that. Every word. But she wasn’t saying any of it to be malicious or make me feel like shit. I did that to myself. She was saying it because she believed it. Of course, I validated the emotional wounds her father inflicted on her on a daily basis. If her mother died when she was six, then that had been maybe fifteen years of assholery on his part.
Which made me just like him.
I used my blinker and pulled off the road, put the truck in park so I could turn to face her. The only light came from my dash. She looked to me, her eyes wide, but filled with hurt.
She wanted me to drop her at the diner to… spare me?
“I have never been more wrong about anything in my life than what I said to you in the stable earlier. You are not the reason my father got hurt at the rodeo. You are not at fault. No one in my family blames youor is mad at you. In fact, the only person they’re mad at right now is me.”
“Cam–”
“No. I want you to hear this and then if you want to be rid ofme,I’ll take you to the diner or a friend’s or wherever the hell you want to go. But I want, no need, you to come home with me. Because you’re mine. I knew it the second I saw you with your friends at The Roadside. Knew it when you approached my table all nervous and bold at the same time. When I heard your voice for the first time. Breathed in your scent. Tasted you. Took your fucking cherry as you came.”
My voice got more potent as I spoke. I had to make her see that I’d been wrong and I’d spend my life proving to her that I’d been a dumbass.
I couldn’t tell in the dark, but I’d bet my left nut she was blushing.
“My dad is fine,” I continued. “He’s gonna be fine. But I obviously have some lingering… anger about him getting hurt.”
“I don’t blame you. For any of it. It is my–”
“Don’t finish that sentence, red. It’s not your fault.”
A tear slid down her cheek. Fuck me, this wasmyfault.
I pulled her across the center console so she satsideways in my lap. Her calves were across the console because there wasn’t that much room.
“Cam! What are you doing?”
Reaching up, I gently swiped the tear away with my thumb. “Repeat after me.”
“What?”
“It’s not my fault.” When she didn’t do as I said, I added, “Say it.”
“It’s not my fault,” she whispered.
“That’s right, red. It’s not your fault. You dated an asshole. Say it.”
“I dated an asshole.”
An asshole who she clearly didn’t fuck.
“Cam Wilder is a dumbass,” I said next.
