Page 44 of His to Seduce
Chapter 14
Camden
After I paid the cab driver, I trudged up my driveway.
Exhaustion pressed down on my shoulders and from outside I could hear my bed calling my name. After catching the last plane out of Jamaica at one thirty in the morning, I’d flown standby and gotten a direct flight from Miami to Detroit that left at eightA.M.Unable to sleep for a single minute on either plane, I’d been awake for over twenty-four hours.
My eyes felt like sandpaper from the tears I’d shed on my flight home. David hadliedto me. I still couldn’t comprehend it. I couldn’t understand why he’d do it. Why he’d tried so hard and so long to get me beneath him when the entire time, he had been lying to me. And Trina had known. All the comments she’d made, the disappointment in her eyes when I’d said I wouldn’t date a bartender, when he wasn’t one.
The anger that had been burning in my veins all day only boiled hotter as I slid the key into my door and pushed it open.
“Ugh,” I groaned. Ten stairs until I could collapse into bed. My knees wobbled at the thought.
I shut the door behind me and turned, stopping just short of stumbling over my suitcase. My lime-green one. The one I’d taken to, and then left in, Jamaica.
“What the hell?” A light turned on, and I screamed. My hand flew to my chest and I jumped back, bumping into the wall behind me.
“Welcome home,” David said, sitting in my living room chair.
He was in my living room.
My boiling rage flew from my lips, instantly overcoming my exhaustion. “What in the hell are you doing here? You scared the shit out of me.”
“I came to talk to you. And I wanted to make sure you got home safely.”
The exhaustion in his eyes mirrored what I knew mine held. I could barely look at him. Still so handsome in the same outfit he’d been wearing the last time I saw him, except now his blue polo shirt was wrinkled.
My breath came in short, quickened pants. I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t yell. I couldn’t do all the screaming and accusing I wanted to do. For the last several hours, I’d replayed that moment on the pier. He hadn’t even tried to stop me.
“I don’t even want to know how in the hell you got into my house, but you need to go.”
“I need to explain. Everything. Camden, please—”
“No.” I shook my head violently and lifted a hand to stop him. “No. You lied, and you misled me intentionally. I don’t even want to hear it.” But God…how I did. I wanted to know everything, and why it was always so fucking easy for men to take advantage of me. I was so…so freaking sick and tired of it.
He stood, pushing himself slowly off the chair as if the motion caused him pain. My back pressed into the wall behind me.
Tears burned my eyes, and my nose stung as he walked toward me.
“God, David. Just go.”
“I’m sorry I hurt you.”
I couldn’t hear this. Not when I was so close to collapsing. “Go home, David. I don’t care. It was all fun for you, wasn’t it?” And God, why was I still talking? “Seduce the uptight bitch. Get her to loosen up and get her beneath you.” Wet tears filled my eyes and fell down my cheeks. He flinched and then went blurry in front of me. “Lucky you. I mean, you got me to let my hair down, trust you, and you got laid whenever you wanted. Bet that was a great vacation for you, huh?”
“That’s not what it was like, and I’ll explain.”
“No.”
“Please…”
“No!” I couldn’t do this. Not with him. Not with pain searing my chest. To hell with it, and him. “Go! Get out of my house!” My voice went shrill as I screamed so loud it echoed in my ears.
All my limbs trembled, and it took everything I had to hold myself up.
“Camden.” He sounded broken. Wretched. I couldn’t trust it. I squeezed my eyes closed to avoid seeing him. He’d done this to me, after all the years I’d spent protecting myself from men, from this kind of man, who would lie and seduce and play with a woman only to have it be one big fucking joke. “I’m so sorry.”
I wiped my cheeks and turned away from the sound of his voice, closer to me now. I couldn’t look at him. Opening my eyes, I stared at my carpet. “Please, God, David. Just leave me alone.”
