Page 3 of Lucky Star

Chapter Two

Cameron

“Fuck, fuck, fuck!” I slammed my fists against the steering wheel and dropped my head forward as my knuckles throbbed.

A week ago, I’d made the worst mistake of my life. It wasn’t touching Sarah the way I’d wanted to for so long, nor was it that I’d stopped. My biggest mistake was callously walking away from her.

And now I didn't have the balls to make amends.

Normally, I made a point of not drinking too much in front of her because I couldn't trust myself not to tell her how I felt while under the influence of hard alcohol. And yet, even though I'd known it might lead to trouble, I’d downed those margaritas and then the shots of tequila anyhow.

That night had been one big mistake after another.

When the bartender had said we needed to leave, a voice in the back of my head told me to put my ass in a cab and go home. But then Sarah grabbed my arm and said there was no way I was driving home in my inebriated state. I was drunk, but not so far gone that my brain hadn’t been blasting warning signals.

Even though I told myself the entire walk back to her place that I needed to turn back around, the second we stumbled through her front door, I asked if she had any more tequila instead. Once we’d had that first shot, another followed, and for the next two hours, she made me practice the scene for the audition she’d talked me into.

While the part would have been a coup for any actor to land, the way my luck had been going, I didn’t think I stood a shot in hell. Things had gotten so bad that I was considering giving up acting altogether. My dad’s step-brother was a contractor-turned-developer who built custom homes about an hour outside of Los Angeles, and he’d offered to give me a job on one of his crews. I’d learned the basics of construction helping my dad with renovations on my family’s farmhouse while growing up, so going into construction wasn’t totally outside the realm of possibility. Not to mention, the pay was better than what I currently brought in through bit parts in poorly produced made-for-TV movies.

Skeptical though I was, I humored Sarah and read the monologue aloud until I’d memorized the lines, and then I acted them out in earnest—or at least tried to. The scene was supposed to be a dramatic one, full of loss and longing, but every time I’d get to the part about avenging the woman I loved, Sarah would burst out laughing and I’d have to start over.

Eventually, our laughter turned to stifled giggles, and then we fell silent. While I should have been exhausted, I’d felt a strange sort of energy come over me as we sat quietly together in the pre-dawn light. Sarah’s eyes had fallen closed a few minutes before, but I knew she was still awake when a sweet, innocent smile tugged at her lips.

Lips that I wanted to taste. Lips I couldn’t stop staring at. Lips I needed to make mine.

I scooted closer, all the while fighting my instincts to touch her the way I wanted to.

Fighting and failing.

Because the next thing I knew, I held her face reverently in my hands, and her eyes opened and locked on mine. When her name left my lips on a strangled whisper, I almost didn’t recognize my own voice. Sarah’s gaze grew heated, and when she licked her lips, I couldn't hold back my desire any longer.

I caressed her cheek with my thumb, and she leaned into my palm, a quiet moan escaping.

My cock twitched in my jeans and any rational thought I might have had fled.

That had been my next mistake.

One bad decision after the next my transgressions mounted, but I couldn’t stop myself from compounding the problem. My mind said that if I walked away before I did anything truly irreparable, tomorrow we could pretend none of it had happened. That one day, far down the road, we’d both laugh about that time we’d gotten shit faced on tequila and had kissed.

But my heart? Well, it had had other ideas. It wanted Sarah with a force I’d never known before, and as my mind fought to control my body, my heart told it to shut the fuck up and stop distracting me.

Drunk on tequila and intoxicated with desire, I kissed her. And I put my hands on her. And I tasted her, and then finally, I claimed her … and the best part was she’d been right there with me.

When she’d confessed that she’d wanted this for so long, I thought all of my prayers had finally been answered. When she came all over my mouth, I thought I’d died and gone to heaven. Then, when she demanded that I fuck her, it felt like all my dreams had come true. When her pussy clenched around my cock in the most beautiful orgasm I’d ever known, and I was seconds from coming myself, that’s when she realized I’d done the unthinkable: I’d fucked her without protection.

The moment her words registered, I froze with fear.

It wasn’t that I was scared. Sarah hadn’t been with anyone for at least a year, and I knew she was clean. In fact, as some sort of crazy pact of solidarity, several of us had gotten tested at the same time. Some had done it as a lark (her), while others (me) needed to be tested anyway.

But that didn’t mean I couldn’t get her pregnant. Seducing her might negatively impact our friendship but knocking her up would have destroyed it.

Destroyed her.

And so I made another terrible mistake.

I got dressed, mumbled a half-hearted apology, and stumbled back down the hill to my truck. I wish I could say that had been the end of it, but no. Instead of talking to her like a rational, reasonable adult, I’d texted her another stupid apology ... and then I stayed away. The truth was, I was ashamed that I’d taken advantage of her.

I had every intention of calling her with a real apology … just as soon as I could remember what it was like not to desperately want to taste her on my lips again.

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