As the lifeguard tells everyone how to tip the victim’s head back, pinch their nose closed, and cover the victim’s mouth with your own to create an airtight seal, I hold my breath, waiting to feel Everett’s mouth on mine.
I crack my eyes open, staring up to see Everett looming over me, his eyes glued to my mouth and his head slowly lowering to mine. My lips part when his are a centimeter from mine. His fingers are still resting against my chin, tipping it back as his mouth gets closer and closer to me. I can feel his breath on my face, the anticipation making my stomach flip-flop and my skin tingle. His lips are hovering right above mine. All I have to do is tilt my head back a little farther and I’ll finally have his mouth on me. I’ve never wanted anything more. I’ve never needed anything more.
“And that’s how CPR is done!” the lifeguard suddenly announces, making my eyes fly the rest of the way open.
I watch Everett quickly lean back away from me, running one hand through his wet hair as he smiles at the group of kids, who are now clapping and cheering.
He pushes himself up from the sand and starts helping the lifeguard put the kids into pairs so they can practice pulling each other out of the water and going through the CPR motions. My heart is still thumping wildly in my chest, and my lips still tingle with the need to feel Everett’s against them. I can’t make myself move from lying flat on my back on the sand, watching him give the kids instructions like it’s no big deal. Like he didn’t just almost put his mouth on mine.
“Is it hot out here, or is it just me?” Amelia asks, squatting down next to me in the sand. “I thought for a second there you were going to wrap your hand around his neck and yank him down to you. I almost came up behind him and shoved his head down for you.”
She grabs my arm and hauls me up to sitting.
“See? Messy and complicated,” I mutter, pushing myself up from the ground as Amelia stands up with me. “I almost forgot there were other people here. I almost forgot there were kids here.”
I swipe my hands angrily against my arms and legs to try and brush off the sand, more than a little irritated that Everett can make me lose my mind just by doing a CPR demonstration.
“Sorry, try again. The only thing messy right now is your ass, covered in sand. And relationships are always complicated. You don’t get a free pass. It’s how you handle the complications that matter. So how are you going to handle it, Cameron?” Amelia asks.
I look back over my shoulder at Everett, all of my irritation melting away when I see him talking and joking with a few of the kids, and the cracks in the wall around my heart start to splinter off in a thousand different directions.
He’s always been a complication worth fighting for; I just never had the guts to do it. I don’t know if this fight will be worth it in the end, but I’ll never know if I don’t try.
Chapter 26
Everett
I’ve never been so tied up in knots or on the verge of practically coming out of my skin as I have been this week. Every time Cameron looks at me, every time she touches me, every time she’s close to me, I want to cross every line I’ve ever drawn with her.
I almost kissed her in front of everyone out on that dock earlier. I didn’t plan on pushing her in the water. As stubborn as she was being, I was just teasing her, wanting to get a rise out of her. Wanting to watch her chest heave with angry breaths and her cheeks flush with irritation. I had every intention of diving into that water and letting her rescue me. Then I put my hands on her and made a comment about watching her take her clothes off, and she leaned into me, closed her eyes, and tilted her chin up, and I almost forgot where we were. I almost slammed my lips against hers and finally tasted her. I came to my senses with my mouth hovering over hers and shoved her in the water before I did something stupid.
And now I’m paying for it. She’s been avoiding me since the CPR demonstration out on the beach. I want to tell her I’m sorry for shoving her in the water and pissing her off, but a part of me isn’t sorry. Jumping into the cold water after her cooled me off enough that I was able to concentrate on something other than kissing her.
Sitting at one of the round tables under the tent that was set up earlier this morning for the charity dinner, I stare across the room at Cameron as she talks to one of the workers in charge of getting everything ready for tomorrow night. She’s so goddamn beautiful I want to stalk across the room and wrap my arms around her, tell her that all of this teasing and touching the last couple of days is driving me insane. I don’t know what’s happening between us, but something has changed. Something has shifted. It thrills me and it scares the shit out of me at the same time. We’ve stopped putting on a show for Stratford and everything has suddenly become real. I can see it in her eyes and I can feel it when she’s close to me. I want to tell her how I feel. How I’ve always felt. I want to throw caution to the wind and make her see that it’s always been her, and always will be, but I don’t even know what I’m feeling right now to try and articulate it. I shut off my feelings for her and buried my love for her so far down so long ago, that I knew I’d never be able to reach it again and be tempted by it again. Spending all this time with her, getting closer to her, seeing something similar in her eyes when she looks at me…all of those old feelings are slowly starting to work their way to the surface no matter how hard I try to keep them down.
I continue staring at Cameron across the tent as she points around and tells the worker where to put things. After our dip in the lake, she went back to the guest house and changed into dry clothes. In a casual strapless light blue cotton sundress that hugs her curves and falls down around her legs to the floor, her long blond hair full of waves from air-drying, and not a stitch of makeup on, she’s stunning. Looking at her makes my chest feel tight. It makes me wonder why in the hell I’ve waited so long to say something to her. She’s the most important person in my life and I never wanted to risk our friendship, but I can’t keep going on like this. I can’t keep pretending like the flirting and the teasing are just fun and games.
Cameron finally turns away from the worker, and our eyes meet across the tent. I see her take a deep breath and slowly rise from my chair as she moves toward me. I force my feet to move, meeting her halfway until we’re standing toe to toe.
“Things look like they’re coming along nicely,” I say, seeing the anxiety and nervousness written all over her face as her eyes dart around under the tent, watching workers move about, setting up tables and chairs, not wanting to do anything right now to add to her stress.
“There’s still so much to do that my head is spinning,” she says with a sigh, her face finally coming back to mine. “I got an e-mail from Stratford while I was changing. He wants to meet us here in a little bit. I think he made his decision. And I think I might throw up.”
I smile down at her, placing my hands against either side of her neck and using my thumbs to tilt her chin up higher so I can see her eyes.
“Everything will be fine. I promise. If he decides not to give the camp his money, we’ll find another way. I’m not gonna let you lose this place,” I reassure her softy.
“Everett.”
She whispers my name and closes her eyes for a few seconds before opening them again, locking them right on to mine. She opens her mouth to say something else, but is quickly cut off by the appearance of Amelia at our sides.
“All right, you two, the sound system is all hooked up and I’ve wirelessly connected my phone to it so I can play some music and test it out, which will require your assistance,” she announces.
I keep my eyes on Cameron as she turns her head to look at Amelia.
“I need to call the caterer. I don’t think you need my assistance to listen to music,” Cameron tells her as I drop my hands from the soft skin of her neck.
“Oh, I don’t need your help with that. I need your help testing out the dance floor you’re currently standing on,” Amelia states with a smile.
Cameron and I both look down and I
realize we are indeed standing in the middle of the hardwood floor that I watched the workers snap together like puzzle pieces over the last hour.
Amelia pulls her phone out of the pocket of her shorts, presses a few buttons, and within seconds, the straining sounds of a guitar echo around the room, along with the voice of Niall Horan singing “This Town.”
She couldn’t have picked a more appropriate song, and going by the wink Amelia gives me before she turns and walks away, she knows it. Cameron still makes me nervous when she walks in the room, just like when we were teenagers. I want to tell her everything I never said when we were younger. Just like the song says, I know it’s wrong, but I can’t move on. Everything always comes back to her.
Holding my hand out between us, Cameron looks down at it quickly, then back up at me. Her small, soft hand slides against my palm and I pull her against me, bringing our joined hands up and pressing them against my chest. Her free hand goes up to my shoulder and I wrap my arm around her waist.
She fits so perfectly in my arms, her body sliding against mine as she pushes herself up on her toes and her face nestles into the crook of my neck. I feel her warm breath puffing out against my skin as I slowly start swaying us to the music, never wanting to let her go.
“I haven’t been happy here,” she suddenly blurts out, her cheek sliding against mine as she pulls her head back to look at me.
She closes her eyes for a few seconds as I stare down at her in confusion. When she opens them again, they dart between my own eyes and my mouth, and I watch her wet her lips with the tip of her tongue before she continues speaking.
“I love this camp, more than anything else in the world, but it stopped making me happy,” she whispers. “I started to wonder if this is what I was really supposed to do with my life. I started to question everything I always thought I wanted.”
Her hand slides across my shoulder to the back of my neck, and my arm tightens around her waist, holding her as close to me as possible, our bodies barely moving now, as the song continues to play and every word this guy sings is like he’s reaching into my chest and pulling them right out of my heart.
“I realized something since you’ve been back here,” she continues, moving her head to the side of mine until her lips are right by my ear. “Everything was wrong when you were gone. Nothing made sense without you here. I didn’t know how to be happy without you. I didn’t know how to live without you.”
I flatten the hand that’s still holding hers between us against my chest, moving it to rest right over my heart. I want her to feel how fast it’s beating. I want her to know it’s beating for her and the things she’s saying to me.
She turns her face into the side of mine, her nose brushing against my cheek as she pulls back until she’s looking up at me. Her eyes are shining with the truth of her words. They sparkle with wanting and a hint of worry. I don’t know if she’s worried about what I’m thinking after what she just said, or if she’s worried because she knows we’re crossing a line we can never turn back from, and I don’t care. All I care about is the desire I see shining underneath all of that worry, how tightly she’s clinging to me, and how everything around us seems to fade away. There aren’t any workers milling about; there isn’t the chaos of a party being set up. There’s just the two of us, standing here in the middle of this dance floor.
It makes me feel alive and scared at the same time. I don’t know if I’m ready to dig up all of those old feelings again, examine them and let them loose, give them a chance to grow back into what they once were, but I think it’s already too late for that. At this point, it’s pretty clear that those feelings never really went away. I just don’t know if I’m strong enough to walk away from her a second time if she changes her mind or realizes this could be a huge mistake.
We both start leaning in closer to each other, her eyes trailing down to my mouth, to where her lips are heading straight for, and I forget how to breathe. I forget all the hundred and one things I should be saying to her right now and all the reasons I’m afraid; all I can think about is kissing her. Finally doing what I’ve been dreaming about and aching for, for years.
A loud banging sound from the far side of the tent makes both of us jump and our faces pull apart. I come crashing back down to earth as she pulls away from me and quickly turns to see what happened. My arms feel empty without her in them and I remember where we are and what’s happening around us.
“Sorry, I have to go see what the hell that was,” Cameron says. “Can we continue this later?”
I forget how to speak and just nod my head instead. I thought for sure she would pretend like we didn’t just have a moment and we weren’t about to kiss, but the smile she gives me proves me wrong. Watching her quickly walk away from me, picking up the skirt of her sundress so she doesn’t trip over it as she moves, I smile to myself and shove my hands into the front pockets of my shorts.
We’re definitely going to continue this later. I’m done hiding how I feel about her, and it’s time she knew the truth about all those wishes I’ve been making for all these years.
Chapter 27
Cameron
Stratford, Everett, and I are all standing on the wraparound porch of the main house as the sun starts to set. He and Everett have been chatting casually about the weather and a few of the campers Stratford met during his time here, and I want to scream at both of them to stop talking so we can get on with this.
My palms are sweating and my foot hasn’t stopped tapping against the wood floor ever since Stratford met us here twenty minutes ago. He holds the fate of this camp and my future in his hands, and he won’t stop talking about the damn clouds in the sky.
Everett has been holding my hand through this entire conversation, giving it a squeeze every few minutes to try and calm me down since he knows I’m about ready to come out of my skin wanting to know what Stratford’s decision is. It works for a few seconds, feeling his warm, strong hand wrapped around mine as well as leaning against the side of his body. And then I start second-guessing everything we did while Stratford was here. Were we convincing enough as husband and wife? Does he think we’re madly in love? Have all of the confusing thoughts and emotions I’ve been having thrown a wrench into everything? Could he see that every time I looked at Everett, I was equal parts scared to death and excited about what might be happening between us?
“So I’m sure you’d like to know what my decision is since I know you have a million other things you need to do to get ready for the charity dinner tomorrow. I’m sorry to say something has come up and I won’t be able to attend,” Stratford says, finally looking away from Everett to give me a regretful smile.
“Oh, I’m so sorry you won’t be here,” I tell him, even though I want to let out a relieved breath that we’ll no longer be under a microscope.
Not to mention that my parents will be back from vacation and that will bring on a whole other list of problems I wouldn’t be able to deal with if Stratford were still around.
He reaches into the inside pocket of his bright orange suit coat and pulls out an envelope, handing it over to me.
With one hand still clinging tightly to Everett, the other one reaches out, shaking like a leaf as I take the envelope from him.
“No need to open that now. I had my accountant crunch some numbers after I went through your books, and that should be more than enough to keep you up and running for the next five years. We can meet again at that time to reevaluate things, but I’m sure I won’t have a problem writing another check for you.”
My eyes immediately fill with tears, and I can’t stop my chin and my lips from quivering with emotion as I stare down at my future, the future of this camp and everyone who works here and everyone who attends it, held in between my fingers. I want to thank him, but a simple thank-you just doesn’t seem like enough.
“I applaud what you’re doing here, Cameron. It’s selfless and it’s amazing, and like your husband said to me one day, this place has t
o continue existing,” Stratford tells me. “You two remind me so much of my wife and I, that some days, it was almost hard to watch the two of you together. But something tells me you’re holding back. Not giving each other everything you could. Don’t make that mistake because, one day, it might be too late. Love each other with everything you have. Trust each other with everything inside of you. And never, ever let the other one go. I wish every day that things were different. That my wife was still here by my side and I could tell her everything I should have said when she was still alive. Don’t leave things unsaid. Don’t waste one minute of the time you have together. I hope the two of you, as well as Camp Rylan, have a very long and happy life together.”
With that, Stratford tips his head to us and heads down the front steps to his waiting limo. We watch his driver open the back door, and he gives us a wave before he disappears inside. As soon as the limo starts to take off down the driveway, I finally look up at Everett as the tears I’ve been holding back fall down my cheeks.
“We did it,” I whisper, still unable to believe what just happened.
“No, you did it. I just showed up at the right time and made things interesting.” Everett smiles.
We stare at each other silently for a few seconds when Everett suddenly lets out a whoop, scoops me up into his arms, and spins me around. I cry, I laugh, and I cling to Everett, never wanting this feeling to end. I feel relief, I feel excitement, and I let every word Stratford said to us sink into my soul and take it to heart. I don’t want to leave things unsaid. I don’t want to waste another minute with Everett. I thought I could let him back into my life and be his friend again, while keeping the walls up around me and protecting my heart, but I was a fool. He tore through those walls the minute he walked back into my life and smiled at me.