Page 34 of Guarded Knight (Echo Valley #3)

He’s unarmed. He looks truly terrified. He’s not the stalker I built up in my mind. Right now, he’s nothing more than just some grown-up frat boy, sprawled on the floor, whining about his rights. Just like the Cameron I knew. The one I broke up with.

Seeing him like that doesn’t match the terror still thrumming in my blood. Doesn’t match the monster I was prepared for; the one who photographed me in my sleep and planted a smoke bomb in my apartment.

There’s no anger in Cameron’s face, just… horrified confusion.

He pants. “What the fuck is this?”

Cameron turns his head to the side to question me, but Gabriel bends down fast and grabs the sides of his cheeks firmly.

“Look at her and what this is will get a hell of a lot worse.”

Cameron averts his gaze like his life depends on it. It probably does.

“Dude,” Cameron says, his cheeks still smushed. “I know I shouldn’t have walked in here uninvited, but we’ve known each other a long time…”

Anton grabs Cameron’s arm and hoists him into the seated position. “Thanks for the confession… dude.”

Gabriel lets go of his face violently.

“Confession?” Cameron’s features blast open with fear. “What do you mean?”

Gabriel is full of venom. “This isn’t the first time you’re trespassing. Is it?”

“Trespassing? What the…? The door was open…”

“Was it open the three times you went into Lara’s house in Santa Fe?”

“What? I never went into her house unless she was there…”

“Like when she was sleeping?” Gabriel reaches into an inside pocket of his bulletproof vest and pulls out his cell. He swipes a few times and then shoves the screen in Cameron’s face, showing him the photos of me sleeping.

“Wait…” He darts his gaze to me, and it’s full of something unexpected, the kind of shock that’s only possible the first time you see something gross.

But he remembers Gabriel’s promise and quickly places his gaze back at the screen. “Wait… no… you think I took those?”

Cameron is breathing like he just ran a marathon. Gabriel now stands over him, muscles tight, face dangerously unreadable. I stay where I am. My pulse is still a snare drum in my throat. The danger’s passed, but my body hasn’t caught up.

“I’m not that freaking creepy…” Cameron blurts out, wild-eyed.

Gabriel crouches beside him, studying every twitch of Cameron’s body.

“And yet you came in here, uninvited, through a closed door, on private property to talk to a woman who made it clear she doesn’t want you near her.

” His eyes narrow like a dragon ready to incinerate its next victim. “It’s not a good look, is it?”

Cameron blinks. “I… I used to walk into Lara’s apartment all the time. I mean…”

Gabriel grabs Cameron’s neck. He doesn’t squeeze but I can tell he wants to. “And you think that’s okay? To let yourself in? Like you did when you left the smoke bomb?”

“Smoke bomb?” Cameron swallows hard. Shakes his head.

Gabriel lets go of him harshly, whether in disgust or because he doesn’t trust himself not to break Cameron’s neck, I’m not sure.

“I didn’t do anything that far. Yes, I sent too many texts, but not even all of those were mine. My buddy got a hold of my phone one night.”

Anton scoffs. “Likely fucking excuse.”

He pleads. “Seriously, I went too far. I admit it.”

Anton walks a few steps closer, arms crossed. “Admit to the rest of ‘too far’ and we might go easy on you.”

Cameron stares at us, his mouth opening and closing. “I don’t know what you’re talking about with those photos. That’s sick… she was sleeping…” He’s genuinely aghast.

Gabriel clutches his fist tightly, and Cameron’s eyes blast open.

“I never… I swear… what the fuck?” He’s ready to cry.

Anton crouches this time. I think he’s the good cop in this routine, but he’s still scary as hell.

“We’re looking for the truth, Cameron. You already got six months’ jail time for misdemeanor trespassing. You want to drag this out for more? The judge might go easy on you if you show some remorse. You know what a moral conscience is?”

“Jail time?” He’s mortified. “I didn’t take those pictures. Yes, I texted. I followed her once or twice,” he stammers. “I… I know that was wrong. I just… I thought maybe she’d see I still cared. I found out about her… her problem… and felt extra bad…”

Every muscle in my body tightens. He only felt bad about the lies and screwing around because he found out about my CF? Like a normal girl deserved the cheating but I don’t because I’m weak? My fist clenches beside me.

“…But I never broke into her house. I never did that shit.”

He glances at me. “La…”

Gabriel steps between us. “I told you not to look at her,” he growls.

“I’m not the guy you want,” Cameron says quickly, panicked now. “I know I came on too strong. I just wanted to explain myself because it didn’t end well.”

It ended with him lying about everything.

Constantly assuring me he wasn’t with anyone else even though he was with several.

He was a sick gaslighter to say the least. He did me dirty because even though I never thought he was the one, he should have been honest. He has no respect for women.

I bet he didn’t tell them about me either.

But despite it all, considering him now, in this state, I… believe him.

“Cameron.” I finally step up from the chair, but my legs are admittedly wobbly. “The night I called you and asked why you left the note in my house, the one with the all-too-kind suggestion that I was a prostitute, you said you were at work.”

“I was! I never went to your house! I swear on my life. I swear it.” A bead of sweat trickles down his forehead despite the fire being out and the temperature dropping since I’ve arrived here.

The room goes quiet. The kind of quiet that makes every breath feel like a decision.

“I didn’t take those pictures,” Cameron says, voice cracking. “And I never left a smoke bomb or the note you thought I left in Santa Fe. It wasn’t me.”

I glance at Gabriel. His jaw is tight.

“A week ago on Saturday,” Anton presses. “That’s when these pictures were found on the wall at Lara’s old apartment. You had a shift, but you left early. Do you have an alibi?”

He drops his head and slumps his shoulders as if he’s fucked, as if he realizes only now that karma is a bitch. “I tampered with the time clocks at work…” He doesn’t want to admit the rest but does. “I stamped out early to… meet with someone.”

Anton asks, “Is it someone who will make a statement that you couldn’t have been at Lara’s that night?”

“I think so.” He’s hesitant, as if needing to tell a truth that was meant to be a secret. “She probably would. If we can find her. She’s in Albuquerque.”

“You snuck out of work early and drove to Albuquerque?”

Cameron swallows his admission, appearing ashamed of it.

Anton cracks his knuckles. He’s so damn burly, I’m sure Cam is pissing himself. “What’s the name…”

Cameron lowers his gaze. “Angel America.”

A bitter scoff escapes me. This guy is a top-notch prick. I asked him about strip clubs, and he denied it.

“Angel America?” Anton’s features twist.

Cameron’s eyes beg Anton to help because after one more glance at Gabriel, seething, he knows Anton is his only lifeline.

“I don’t know her real name. She works at the Dice. The Paradise. A strip club in Albuquerque.”

Anton laughs, amused. “You couldn’t write this shit.”

Cameron spews the details of his rock-star evening.

“I told her my name was Rocco. I spent sixty bucks in the sky room on dances and bought her two vodka sodas and stayed till closing at twelve, then we hung out at a twenty-four-hour diner. I couldn’t have gotten back to Santa Fe until maybe ten a.m.”

I cross my arms. “Wow, you two must have been stuffed from all that food.”

Anton peers up at Gabriel, now standing, looming over Cam.

“G, the new owners of Lara’s place found the photos around eight in the morning.”

“Some of the guys or dancers on the floor might recognize me, too.” Cameron is desperate now. “I messed up, okay? I shouldn’t have texted her that much. I shouldn’t have shown up here. But I swear I never did any of this shit. It’s disgusting. It’s…”

I deadpan, “Beyond even you?”

Cameron pleads, “I just… I knew she didn’t deserve what I did and I didn’t want her to get sick or something and think of me badly. I thought maybe…”

I cross my arms and knit my eyebrows, trying to protect myself from his words that tear at my confidence. He feels sorry for me…

Gabriel grits his teeth and forces Cameron by the chin to look at me.

“You thought maybe that angel over there would forgive you?” G speaks through gritted teeth as if he can barely hold back tearing Cameron apart.

“You’re lucky I have things to live for or I’d happily drag you to Hell with me.

” He lets Cameron’s head go with a snap.

“Alibi or not, you’re a fucking entitled piece of shit.

And you better hope your story checks out. ”

Relief at being alive washes over Cameron. “I didn’t think it would get this far.”

The silence that follows stretches too long.

Gabriel stands. Walks toward me. His eyes scan my face, like he’s trying to decide if this changes anything.

“What do you think?” he asks.

It’s so obvious now. “The same thing I’ve thought all along. He’s not smart enough to pull all this off.”

My gut tells me it isn’t Cameron, and if it is… then he’s better at hiding the truth than I ever gave him credit for. But the disgust in his eyes when Gabriel showed him those photos? That wasn’t smugness. Or pride. They made him almost as sick as they did me.

Gabriel puts his hand on my arm, and a wave of chaos rips through me.

He’d die for me. Kill for me. But we’re saying we can’t be together? That somehow, we’d hurt each other? His gaze is intense, like I’m the only thing in the world and he’s happy to keep it that way.

He said he had things to live for… me?

Gabriel slides his hand down my arm and squeezes my hand. “You say the word and we’ll stop the interrogation. Or you give us the nod…” He darts his eyes down to where Cameron is still on the floor. “And we’ll make sure he confesses.”

Cameron gulps.

My gut says it’s not him. But if Cameron’s not lying, this could be even worse than I thought it was.

I never thought Cameron was capable of truly hurting me.

Scaring me, yes. Hurting me, no. But if someone else is out there, someone I don’t even know of…

they might be preparing to dish out worse than photos, a nasty note, and a smoke bomb.

Gabriel lowers his voice beside me, taking action for me when the new revelation has paralyzed me.

“We’ll put him in custody until we figure it out,” he says reassuringly. “He trespassed. We’ve got that.”

I nod, but it’s a mechanical feeling, my body’s still operating on backup power.

Behind him, Anton keys the radio. “Suspect secured. Ready for transport.”

And just like that, the trap is closed.

And my mind wanders back to the silence and that long, empty pause outside the cabin when I thought Cameron had disappeared. When I thought I was alone.

When maybe… it wasn’t just Cameron out there.

Tonight was supposed to be the end. The answer. The closure.

But all it gave me was a new kind of fear. A new question. And the terrible, skin-prickling truth.

This isn’t over. My stalker is still out there, and he has an invisibility cloak. Who would do this? What could I have done to get the attention of someone capable of following me, breaking in multiple times without a trace… threatening to put me in a hospital bed?

Anton lifts Cameron off the floor and heads to the door where two officers, one being the guy Penelope knows, read Cameron his rights.

I’m seeing spots… I feel like passing out.

Gabriel threads his fingers through my hair and cups my jaw with his hands. “Come back to me.”

I blink. Swallow. Anything to bring back that awareness of being here and not in some black hole where nothing makes sense.

“Firefly…”

I give a faint smile. “I’m fine.”

“I’ll find out who this is. I won’t let anything happen to you… I promise. We’re in this together. Me and you.”

I believe him.

But that’s the problem, isn’t it? I believe him too much. He’s woven into me.

And if this doesn’t kill me, loving him just might.