Page 35 of Best Laid Plans (Rock Harbor #1)

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CAM

C am’s lungs heaved as he and Wyatt careened down the gravel path that ran flush with the ocean. If he could keep his best friend out of breath enough, maybe he could stave off the conversation that he knew was coming.

The specifics of what Wyatt wanted to talk about weren’t important, just that every sentence would be a minefield of different ways that Cam could blow himself up.

How’s it been at the apartment? Great. I fucked your sister.

Have you and Elle been getting along? Yeah, sometimes she looks at me and I forget how to breathe.

Liking being back in town? So much that I don’t know if I’ll ever leave, especially if Elle’s here.

Not that he’d admit any of those things to his best friend, under duress or otherwise.

And he definitely wasn’t going to admit that the more he tried to stay away from Elle, the more he was drawn to her. That she was unlike any woman he’d ever met. That after last night, even with what was on the line, he still couldn’t keep his distance.

If Wyatt almost catching them in bed together this morning hadn’t been enough to scare him straight, then all he could really do was bulk up his body against Wyatt’s fists and bulk up his heart against whatever the hell it was that Elle was doing to it.

While Wyatt and Elle had been out, he’d found a motel about twenty minutes away from the restaurant.

He could get a room there for the next few weeks, just until Mr. Pierce got back on his feet.

Thinking about anything beyond that was a fool’s errand.

He hadn’t made it this far in life by having big hopes about anything more than what was right in front of him.

The sun was still high in the sky as the bits of rock ricocheted off his calves, but he wouldn’t focus on anything except keeping enough energy up so that he didn’t need to stop moving.

Finally, he felt Wyatt slap his shoulder. “Okay, man. I give,” he said breathlessly. “Guess I shouldn’t have skipped so many cardio days.”

Cam slowed to a jog before easing into a walk that still kept him a few feet ahead. They’d almost made it back to downtown, but Cam felt like he could have gone for at least a few more miles.

He hated lying. Especially to Wyatt. Actually, he couldn’t remember a time when he’d ever lied to his best friend. With the exception of letting him think that things in Cam’s life were more okay than they were through his adolescence.

But this was different.

“How’s your Dad doing?” Cam asked, hoping he could steer them into something safe to talk about.

When Elle and Wyatt had gotten back from lunch, Elle had immediately scampered off to the shower.

Asking if Wyatt had wanted to go on a run had seemed like the safest bet to minimize any unwanted conversation topics.

Wyatt took a labored breath and squinted into the sun. “He knows that he’s on my shit list for taking the earlier surgery date while I was away, but my hands are sort of tied with the whole ‘open heart surgery’ thing.”

Cam stretched his back. “Waiting for him to get better before he gets the Wyatt Pierce treatment?”

Wyatt scowled, intense and serious when he said, “What if something had gone wrong? I was two hours away.”

Cam considered the question for a minute. “Well, given that ‘surgeon’ is not one of your many talents, I’d have to say you couldn’t have done a whole hell of a lot from here or there.”

“You know what I mean. My mom. Elle. I’d have never forgiven myself if I couldn’t be there for them.”

Cam nodded, Wyatt’s tone underscoring the seriousness of his words. He knew the feeling. When Elle had found out about her dad’s heart issue, it had felt like someone had taken a baseball bat to his own heart, too. The feeling of powerlessness had been awful.

Cam clasped Wyatt on the shoulder before giving him a quick punch.

“But it all worked out. He got the surgery a week early. Everything was fine. And…” He debated saying the next words, but he couldn’t stop himself.

“Elle was great. Very Elle, at times, but she was right there with your parents every step of the way.”

Wyatt laughed then, the moment lightening. “Oh, I heard all about it today. She tried to put my dad’s socks on for him.”

Cam grinned, clearly able to imagine the scene playing out. “Is that what officially got her banned from the house?”

“No, that was when she rearranged the furniture for maximum ‘ease of movement through the home,’ as she put it.” And Cam had no doubt that if Wyatt had been there, he’d have done the same thing.

“So what I’m hearing is that it seems like the overly protective nature runs in the family?” Cam chanced, taking a quick step backward just in case Wyatt took a swipe at him.

But Wyatt was taking the question in a more thoughtful direction. “I’m in a place to help. I live close by. I have a stable job. I don’t-”

“Have anything else going on?” Cam interjected with a smirk.

“Dick,” Wyatt batted back with a laugh. “I am single by choice.”

“And as Rock Harbor’s ‘2024 Most Eligible Bachelor,’ the town seems to love to remind you about it.” The true fucking elation that Cam had felt when Mrs. Pierce had told him that last year had made him laugh so hard that he’d almost pulled a muscle.

Wyatt glared. “It was for a good cause. And don’t think I don’t know what’s going on in my town. Cam Devers, the prodigal son returning to Rock Harbor as a celebrity chef for the country club of all places.”

Cam felt like he’d been punched in the gut, air in short supply as he tried to take a labored breath.

There was no way that Wyatt knew about what he’d been getting up to with Elle.

More importantly, his best friend couldn’t lie for shit either.

He hoped. It was almost impossible that Wyatt could have made it through their run, let alone through the doorway of the apartment, without tackling him.

Cam’s plan was to stay the course. It had to be.

He laughed awkwardly and twisted his torso into a stretch to look away.

“They asked me at the chowder fest. It seemed like an interesting option to explore.”

He was greeted with a dubious eyebrow raise when he twisted again. “What’s up with that anyway? You’re welcome here as long as you want, but you’ve never taken more than like a day off of work. What the hell happened?”

It was crazy to think about all that had transpired in the last few weeks, but at least this was something that he could talk to Wyatt about.

His hands clenched into fists just thinking about it.

“At the afterparty at the restaurant to celebrate my win, I caught my boss in a very compromising and unwanted position with one of the waitstaff. And I, in no uncertain terms, made it clear to him what I thought about it.”

A dark look flashed across Wyatt’s face, as he stood up to his full height. “As you fucking should have. Did he get any good hits in?”

Cam rubbed at his healed jaw. “One or two.”

“Did you get fired?”

Cam shrugged. “I’m not exactly sure who fired the first shot, but Michael wasn’t backing down and neither was I. I’d already been thinking about what comes next, and there was no way I was going back to work for that asshole.”

“Makes complete sense to me. So what does come next?” Wyatt asked, lifting his leg into a quad stretch and holding it perfectly balanced.

Cam didn’t use his fists all that often anymore, but it meant something that Wyatt was on his side. But what came next? Well, wasn’t that a great fucking question. “I’m not sure. I was planning to stay around for a few weeks and help your dad with the restaurant.”

Wyatt’s face sobered, even more than it already had from talking about Michael. “I really appreciate that, man. Things have been tough at the restaurant lately, and it’s one area that I can’t be of much help to them.”

Cam smiled. “How are the Pierce children both so inept in the kitchen?”

“Because we had a far better cook than either of us could ever be feeding us. Not a lot of incentive there.” Wyatt stilled then, looking at Cam intently. “Plus, you loved cooking, so Dad still had an outlet to pass on his love of food to the next generation.”

“Ready to head back?” Cam asked, not sure how to respond given the ball that had lodged itself in his throat. He started walking, Wyatt quickly falling into step beside him. Back toward the closest thing to a real home he’d ever had .

Growing up, Wyatt had never made Cam feel badly for how much he’d been around.

Or that he’d started working in the kitchen with Mr. Pierce and sometimes wouldn’t even make it upstairs to hang out in the apartment.

He’d just accepted Cam into his life, harboring zero resentment that in their teenage years, Cam had probably spent more time with Mr. Pierce than Wyatt had.

Whatever he was doing with Elle was a slippery fucking slope that led down to a pit filled with vipers.

Bound to end in disaster. Assured to implode his carefully crafted world.

And even though Cam knew that, he didn’t want to stop.

But more than that, he couldn’t stop. She was equal parts spitfire and softness, and Cam loved every second of it.

He was discovering that he wanted to be the one that Elle turned to for help.

The man she depended on to support her. To make things happen.

And while Elle was one of the most competent people that Cam had ever met, it still didn’t change his desire to be the body that she leaned into for comfort.

The one who held her up when she wasn’t strong enough to do it herself.

And even if Elle was eventually going to return to her life in Boston and fulfill all of her dreams–Cam wanted that for her, too. Even if that didn’t include him. Even if it chipped away at another piece of his already broken-down heart.

Because walking away didn’t seem like a possibility, either, not as long as Elle still wanted him around.