When You Are Mine (22 page)

“You know, maybe I’m missing something,” Cam said curtly. “Maybe there’s something else you want to stay in the States for. Or should I say
someone
.”

Kerris reached behind her to clutch the rim of the sink. She turned her back to him, rinsing out the dishes she had left there. The muscles of her back tightened under the unrelenting burn of his stare. They hadn’t spoken of that moment again since that first night. She realized that it was still between them. He was a wounded animal secretly nursing his hurt.

“Cam, do we need to talk about Walsh again?” Kerris bit her lip to keep it from trembling. “I’ve thought that we should. We can’t sweep it under the rug and pretend it didn’t happen.”

“Oh, I know it happened.” His voice frosted over with fresh bitterness. “Do you think I will ever forget seeing you in my best friend’s arms?”

“I told you it was only a kiss,” she whispered, knowing that he would hear it in the eerie silence surrounding them. “We got emotional talking about Haiti—”

“Don’t give me that shit again!” His voice erupting into the quiet made her jump. “Do you think I don’t see how Walsh looks at you?”

Kerris, the way my son looks at you is like a starved man. It’s like he can’t bring himself to look at anything else in the room.

Kristeene’s words whispered back to her. Kerris tunneled her hands into the hair on either side of her head before turning to look directly at her husband. She clasped her hands together over the fear in her belly, tightly coiled like a cobra ready to strike.

“And how do I look at him?” She braved the question, refusing to even blink until he had answered; she was determined to be as honest as he would allow.

“Most of the time you don’t, which I think says just as much as the way he eats you up every time he looks at you. The two of you—”

“There is no two of us!” The volume of her own voice surprised her, reverberating in the solitude of their cottage.

“I’m out.” He didn’t acknowledge her statement, unfolding from his deceptively indolent stance against the counter and left the kitchen. “I’m gonna be late for this shitty job you want me to stay stuck in for the next eighteen months.”

“There is no two of us.” Kerris charged out after him into the living room, ignoring the gibe about his job.

“You think I’m stupid?” Cam stopped at the door to face her. “Is that it? You think I don’t know how you feel about him?”

“What do you want me to say?” The words heated up in her mouth and boiled over. “I’ve told you that I love you. That it was a mistake. That I’m not going anywhere. We’re having a baby together.”

“It
is
mine, right? Maybe that should’ve been my first question.”

She swallowed the outrage and hurt that rolled through her. “You know that’s not even possible.” She waved her hand in front of him. “I’ve never…I can’t believe you’d even say that to me. You know you’re the only man I’ve ever been with.”

“The only man unless we count—” Cam stopped short, eyes widening in horror. Kerris flinched at what he’d almost said.

TJ.

She drew in quick, choppy breaths, wounded so deeply by that poison-tipped barb. He started toward her, but she held up a staying hand.

“Maybe you should just get to that shitty job of yours before we do any more damage to each other.” Her voice pain-hushed, she fixed her gaze on her still-bare feet.

“Kerris, I—”

“I’ll see you tonight.” She turned and shuffled toward the kitchen.

She went back to the sink, biting her lip when she heard him finally leave, the door closing in a controlled whisper signaling his careful exit. She tried to ignore the pain that burned like a heated stone in her belly, but she couldn’t. She doubled over the sink. How could he have even considered throwing TJ in her face? She knew she’d hurt him, but she couldn’t ever imagine using any of the pains he had shared with her against him, to wound him in an argument.

The air around her reeked of his accusations, polluted by his mistrust. She felt like he had chopped several inches off her, diminished her and smudged her. She longed for Walsh to clean her up again as he had before in a night-darkened gazebo, but that would never happen. She had made her choice, and she would have to live with it.