Page 71 of Lucky Star

“Okay, maybe I do. But you didn’t know how I felt, so I can’t have expected you lived like a monk this whole time.”

His brows furrowed, and he looked away guiltily.

Okay, so he hadn’t been a monk.

I really didn’t want to know—but I also kind of did. I plopped down on the edge of the bed with a loud exhale. “How many?”

He ran his hand through his hair and then sat down next to me. “Three in three years. And only one this past year. The actress.”

Right, the actress. The one who’d necessitated his STD test, while I’d gone along with the group to get tested because … well, who knew why? Maybe I hadn’t wanted anyone to know I wasn’t getting any?

Cameron nudged my chin, forcing me to look up at him. His face was somber as his eyes flicked between mine. “The first time was because I thought that if I fucked someone else, it’d help get you out of my mind. The second time was because it didn’t work, and because I couldn’t have you, I needed someone else.”

“And then Melanie,” I finished.

“And then Melanie.”

Honestly, while the whole Shayna thing had annoyed me, Melanie was the only one who had worried me. It had been clear to everyone that his feelings for her went beyond the superfluous. They’d had so much in common, and from the moment he’d introduced her, we could all see she was different from any other women he’d brought around over the years.

Mike had commented once that he thought Cameron tried too hard with Melanie, while I silently thought his trying meant he was invested in her and wanted their relationship to work. When Cameron found out she’d been cheating on him for the entirety of their relationship, he’d been gutted. No one saw him for three weeks, and he wouldn’t answer any of our calls or emails. Then, as if he hadn’t gone missing, he turned up one day and was perfectly fine. Since then, we’d all tried not to talk about her, but if we did, she was simply referred to as The Actress. As far as I knew, this was the first time he’d spoken her name aloud to anyone.

“You loved her,” I acknowledged, feeling my stomach lurch.

Cameron exhaled loudly. “I thought I could.”

He slid off the bed and dropped down in front of me. Moving his hands to my face, he held my cheeks in his palms while his eyes bored into mine. He leaned forward then, his fingers sliding into my hair to cradle my skull. “I wanted to love her because if I did, it would mean I could stop loving you. But no,” he shook his head and our lips brushed “I never loved her.”

“Did you ever tell her?”

“That I loved her?” he asked, quietly.

I nodded my head, and he shook his. “No. And I think she knew why.”

“What do you mean?” I asked, just as quietly.

Cameron hesitated, and then seeming to decide something, dropped back on his heels and rested his palms on my knees. “She told me I had to give you up, and I told her that was non-negotiable. Two weeks later, Mike showed me a picture of her sucking off some guy.”

“We all thought …”

“I know what you guys thought,” Cameron said, his voice going hard.

“Why’d you disappear?”

He sighed and looked away. “Mostly because I was embarrassed, but also because I’d failed, and I needed to figure some things out.”

“Like what?”

“Like how I was going to move beyond my feelings for you.”

“At any point …” I started to ask if at any point he thought about telling me, but then stopped because I’d been in the same position.

“It doesn’t matter anymore,” he said, echoing my earlier statement as he rose from his crouched position. “We’re here now.”

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