Page 154 of Already At Risk
His lips quirked to the side, his dimples making an appearance. “That’s what I thought.”
So smug, but I didn’t even care.
“That’s one of the best parts about this.” I smiled at him while he pulled out of his parking spot, and like he could sense my smile, his grin grew bigger, too.
“What is, baby?”
“That we don’t have to hold back or pretend that this isn’t…something.”
He chuckled darkly in that way that made all my hairs stand on end. “Oh, it’s something, alright.”
Cameron slid his hand further up my leg while driving one-handed, not taking his eyes off the road, and I struggled to form coherent thoughts, let alone sentences.
“But you should know not everything has changed,” he added. “The rules are the same, Natalie.”
He gave my inner thigh a little pat, like a command to open further, and I obeyed without thinking.
“The rules?” I gasped when I felt his fingertips tracing a path upward. “Like that you’re in charge?”
Cameron shook his head. “First of all, I’m only in charge when you want me to be. Understood?”
I glanced over at him. “You mean, in the bedroom?”
He drew lazy circles on my inner thigh, drifting his touch back toward my knee and then back up again, making me squirm.
“I mean anywhere or anytime you need me to be,” Cameron answered, as calmly as ever. “Whenever you want, I’ve got you.”
I stared at the road in front of us, blinking.
I’ve got you.
What a strange concept.
“But even then, you can tell me no,” Cameron added. “That’s the rule I want you to know. That you can always tell me no. Us being together,this—” He squeezed my thigh again, as though to make sure I was listening. “—doesn’t mean you can’t.”
I shook my head because the thought of that seemed foreign to me. “I’ve never wanted to tell you no, Cameron.”
“I know,” he acknowledged, his tone patient and honest. Like it was just a simple truth that I’d always wanted him, in every scenario. “But I want this for the long haul, baby. And one day, you might want to tell me no. And I’m trusting you to do that.” When I continued to stare at him, slightly mystified by this entire conversation and where it was coming from, Cameron lowered his voice. “I know you did things with that man you didn’t want to, and that’s never you and me, got it? That’sneveryou and me.”
Emotion rammed into me like a freight train, his words colliding in my brain and finally making sense. Because he was right. Korey never physically forced me to do things I didn’t want to, but he emotionally manipulated me into it, making me think that maybe if I did what he wanted, I’d finally feel some semblance of love.
It never worked, never made me feel any different. And finally, I learned to say no. And I said it a lot, finally ending with the resounding no that ended our marriage.
Cameron was right. Him and me? We were different than that. So very, very different. And I had no problem promising him that. I’d found my voice, and he only ever encouraged me to use it.
I cleared my throat. “I’ll say no, Cameron. I promise.”
“Yeah?” he checked, glancing over at me with a glittering gaze that made my pulse triple in rate as I nodded in response. His hand then slowly slid back up my inner thigh, teasing as it inched higher. “So if I wanted to pull your skirt up and play with this pussy in traffic, what would you say?”
I didn’t look away from him when I answered, “Nothing.”
Cameron’s hand flexed on my thigh, a low groan coming out of him.
And I couldn’t help but smirk. “You couldn’t wait until later?”
“No,” he admitted, and the hoarseness in his voice made me believe him. “What about our entire relationship has given you the impression that I’m good at resisting you, Natalie London? I risked my entire career just for a taste of you.”
“I think you got more than a taste,” I laughed, ignoring that little twinge of guilt that I still felt whenever I thought of what could have gone wrong. Instead, I focused on my current flood of feelings, brought on by his wandering touch. I canted my hips, wanting,needingmore of it. “And I’m no better.”
