The bravado and the fury wore down considerably over the next two and a half hours. When her watch ticked over to nine and he still wasn’t home, she questioned whether he was coming at all. For all she knew, he could be drowning his idiocy in drink up at the Mudcat. When she confronted him, she wanted him sober.
Giving up for the night, she cranked the engine. On the second leg of her K-turn, headlights swept over her car. Cam’s truck. Nerves tangled in her belly at the sight of it. Had he been home before now? Seen her initial reaction? She parked her car again and got out, waiting as he did the same.
“Did you forget something?” Flat, expressionless tone. Oh yeah, he’d been home and he was pissed.
He’s worth the fight.
“Yes.”
Hush ran circles around her, and Norah paused to love on the dog.
“We can work out some kind of visitation for Hush while you’re here,” Cam said grudgingly.
How civilized of him. She didn’t wait for an invitation, just climbed the stairs. After a brief hesitation, Cam followed, unlocking the door. With a sarcastic wave, he gestured her inside. Norah stalked into the loft. Behind her, he shut the door and stood, limned in the lamplight, glowering.
“I came to tell you that this whole non-confrontational, learned helplessness bullshit is not going to work for me.”
“Excuse me?”
“I know you’ve had bad experiences with important people in the past just up and leaving you without you having a say, but you don’t come all the way after me in Chicago just to skulk away without a word.”
“What do you expect me to do?”
She stepped into his space, close enough to feel the heat of him. “Fight. With me. For me.” She laid a hand over his heart and found it pounding. “Because this is worth it. We’re worth it.”
“So…what?
Some grand gesture from me is supposed to outweigh your dream job?” He spun away from her to pace. “How long would that last? How long until you start blaming me for what you gave up?”
She’d planted this idea in his head. When he’d ridden roughshod over her reasons for not being with him. And she’d believed it then. But that wasn’t who she was anymore. “That’s exactly what I was thinking after I saw you this afternoon. That I gave up my entire world for you.”
Back to her, Cam’s head drooped, his broad shoulders slumped.
“I’ve had a really good reminder the last two weeks, of exactly what that world is like. And you know what? My world sucked.” He straightened, turning as she continued. “Seventy hour work weeks. Colleagues who are convinced I got to the top on my knees or on my back rather than through my intellectual capabilities. Professional connections who are more than willing to believe the lies Philip has spread about me. A city where people I saw every single day of the last two years don’t even know who I am.”
He frowned, confused. Score one for her for throwing him off balance.
“I got headhunted by Peyton Consolidated before I ever left for Chicago. Before I knew Philip had started a personal vendetta against me. Gerald Peyton offered me everything I ever wanted professionally. And I turned him down cold.”
“What?”
“I told him what I’d been on my way to tell you. That I’m committed to staying here in Wishful, to building something on the foundation I started.”
He looked like she’d just told him the sky was green. “But the lawsuit—”
“The lawsuit didn’t change anything. It’s true he left the door open in case I changed my mind. That’s what I was talking to Cecily about when you overheard us.”
“You said you’d be a fool not to take the job. Under the circumstances, even I agree with you.”
With a bracing breath, she took the leap. “Then I’m a fool because I’m not going anywhere.” The bloom of terrified hope on his face had her stepping closer, cupping his cheek. “You said you’d always choose me because I was worth the risk. Did you think I wouldn’t do the same?”
He reached for her, hands curving around her hips even as he said, “But…you went to Denver.”
“How do you even know that? You didn’t take a single one of my calls.” She hung on lest he decide to break the tenuous connection between them.
“I tracked your phone.”
“Seriously? You’ve based your entire freak out on a snippet of eavesdropped conversation and the GPS location of my phone?”