Page 72 of What He Always Knew

Why now?

Cameron took a long breath, scrubbing his hands back through his hair before he clasped them together between his knees again. His eyes were on those hands as he began to speak.

“Natalia and I have worked together for a long time… for years.”

“I know,” I deadpanned.

Cameron’s lips pressed together, a frustrated breath sounding through his nose, but he continued.

“I respect her. She’s intelligent, driven, and she always balanced me out well. When we worked on projects, I was the numbers guy, and she was the presentation. She was the closer.”

Another flash of her in his lap, her long blonde hair, her skirt around her hips.

“Everything between us was strictly professional, Charlie. I need you to understand and believe that. There were never any lines crossed, not even so much as an innocent flirt between us. Not until the boys died.”

My emotions were too sensitive, like an exposed nerve, and just that sentence leaving his mouth pricked my eyes. I sniffed, crossing my arms tighter and looking away.

“Something changed in her, then. It felt almost like I was her… her prey. She hunted me, looking for opportunities to get inside my head, to comfort me, to make me happy when I wasn’t. She tried to find a way in. And I’m ashamed to say that sometimes, on the weak days,” he said, his voice trailing. “I let her.”

I shook my head. “Yeah. I caught that.”

“I’m so sorry I did that,” Cameron said, reaching for my hands again. I let him peel them away from my middle, but they were limp in his grasp. “I’m sorry I let her comfort me, that I let her be the one I leaned on. I know I’ve told you before that I thought I was doing the right thing by giving you space, by letting you heal on your own time, but I was wrong. I see that now. I should have been there for you, and I should have opened up to you about how I was feeling, too. I failed you in that,” he admitted, voice breaking as he squeezed my hands tighter. “But I swear to you, on everything that I am, I did not sleep with her, Charlie. Not once.”

My heart leapt into my throat, the beat of it strong enough to block my next breath.

“You didn’t?”

He shook his head. “I never even kissed her.”

My mouth fell open, heart dropping back into my chest before it took off in a full gallop. I shook my head, searching his eyes for a sign of him lying, but I came up empty.

“No,” I said, still shaking my head. “No, I saw her. I saw her skirt… and she was straddling you, and…” I tried to remember if his hands were on her. Were they grabbing her hips? Were they in her hair? But I couldn’t remember.

Maybe they were on the chair. Maybe he wasn’t touching her at all.

“You saw her sitting on me,” he agreed. “She had come into my office right before you, and she straddled me like that before I could even register what she was doing. It was late, we were the only ones there, and I guess she thought it was the right time to pounce. She told me she was looking for trouble,” Cameron said, shrugging. “And I told her to get off me. But it was too late, because before she could even argue with me, you walked in.”

Suddenly, his hands were too warm, the aviary too small, and I ripped away from his grasp before jumping up to stand. Cameron remained seated as I paced, waking Scarlett and Rhett with my quick movements.

“This doesn’t make any sense,” I said, running a hand through my hair. “Why didn’t you tell me this? Why wouldn’t you say anything until now?”

“I didn’t think it mattered.”

“You didn’t think itmattered?” I repeated. “You didn’t think it was worth it to mention to me that what I’ve thought for the past four years was completely wrong? That you never cheated on me like I thought you did?”

“But I did,” he said. “In a way, in the only way that matters. Sex is just that — sex. To me, that was never true intimacy. At least, not until I met you. Sex has only been more withyou. So, no, I didn’t have sex with her.” Cameron swallowed. “But what Ididdo was worse. I leaned on her. I let her in, I gave her access to my thoughts and feelings. So when I chased you down that night to plead my case, and I saw your tears, I knew there was nothing I could say that could make you feel any better. I couldn’t defend my actions, because I’d hurt you. I’d betrayed you. You looked at me like a piece of shit that night, Charlie, and I was.”

“But that was because I thought you slept with her!”

“I know,” Cameron said, finally standing, too. “I see that now. Talking to Patrick, he helped me see that even if I still feel guilty for what I’ve done, even if I feel like there is no difference in what I did and what you thought, that I still owed you the truth.” Cameron shook his head. “He said you needed to have all the facts, and that it wasyourdecision whether it was the same or not.”

Black invaded my vision, the same nauseous feeling from Wednesday’s food poisoning stint creeping up on me. I moved back to the hammock, flopping down in it as I tried to steady my breaths.

“I can’t believe this,” I whispered, shaking my head. “You never slept with her.”

Cameron dropped to his knees in front of me, taking my hand in his. He pressed a kiss to my knuckle before holding my gaze.

“Charlie, you are the only woman I have ever loved, and I would never dream of touching another woman the way I touch you. You are my wife,” he reminded me, and my heart cracked with the word. “I made vows to you, and though I may have broken some of those along the way, I would never break the most sacred one. I am yours and only yours,” he promised. “And I’m sorry I ever made you doubt that.”