Yet she could never have told Sutter how it felt to watch Cameron die. Or about the men who killed him. Or the terrible things that came after. Instead, she’d dropped off Louis on Sutter’s doorstep and ignored her friend’s phone calls.
She would never talk about what happened that night. “You need to talk with someone, Max.”
“Please drop it. Sutter’s part of the past.”
Cameron sighed, a faintly fed-up sound. “Whatever you say, Max.” He’d bring it up again. He always did. “Doesn’t that cat’s pathetic cry break your heart?”
The little mewl sounded weaker than it had in the middle of the night. She rose and dusted off the seat of her black pants. She had four pairs in her limited wardrobe. “I’m only doing this because you’re making me.”
Cameron snorted softly. “Since when have I ever been able to make you do anything?”
“That time in the Dodge Ram truck.” She climbed the stairs to her studio.
“That was a dream I gave you, Max.”
She shrugged and smiled with the memory. Just as he spoke to her in her mind, Cameron could make love to her in her dreams. She could feel his touch on her simply by closing her eyes. “It felt real.”
“Yeah, and you loved it. Especially with the black and red flannel shirt I was wearing.”
“Hated it.” Loved it, just like he said. One of the best damn orgasms she’d ever had. Seeing a black Dodge Ram with red-lettered emblems on the street never failed to remind her.
But a dream wasn’t reality. In the worst of times, she ached for a real touch. Ached so badly that she did things she wasn’t proud of. Things she and Cameron didn’t talk about. Sometimes, dreams just weren’t enough.
She retrieved the can from the dorm-size fridge. The tuna was a little crisp and aged around the edges. Sort of like her life.
“Come here and get your din-din, you little buzzard,” she called, setting the tin on the window sill.
The black cat, with a sudden burst of energy, leaped the three feet from limb to ledge, devoured the tuna in four bites, then rubbed the length of its emaciated body against the sleeve of Max’s white turtleneck.
It did look a little like Louis. Louis, whom she’d abandoned, along with everything else, the day Cameron died.
She stroked the cat’s rumpled fur.
Night had fallen. She always felt most alone at night, the time when married couples were settling in for the evening, maybe sharing a glass of wine, snuggling on the couch, breath mingling, pulses quickening, the heady scent of arousal perfuming the air...
She prowled her small room, feeling itchy and on edge. Was it Wendy Gregory’s need trembling inside her? That intensely erotic sense of anticipation that had buzzed inside Wendy on the night she was killed?
Opening the closet door, Max stared inside. She’d thrown out all her skirts. All but one. Now she reached out to finger the material. Short, sexy, seductive. A skirt to turn a man’s head.
As much as she loved and needed Cameron, she longed for a man’s touch. She longed to feel a man’s hand on her skin, calluses, a work-roughened finger. Real hands, real fingers. Sometimes she thought she’d go mad she needed it so badly.
She felt Cameron in the air around her, the gentle glide of atmosphere against skin. “One day you’ll find a man worthy of you, Max, I swear it.”
A worthy man wasn’t what she wanted. A worthy man would want some sort of relationship, and any man she let into her life for more than a night would preclude Cameron. She couldn’t stand letting him go.
“You will. When the right man comes along.”
Her heart ached. He was preparing her for that day. “So you want to palm me off on someone else?”
“I want you to start living again. You can’t do that with me.”
“I can, Cameron. I have. For two years.”
“You buried yourself right along with me, baby.” She felt his essence wrap around her, his voice entreating. “It can’t go on forever.”
Instead of comforting, his words chilled her. She couldn’t go on without him. Please don’t ever leave me.
“You will go on. You’re strong enough. You’re just too scared right now.”
Strong yet scared. The words seemed poles apart. Cameron had a far greater estimation of her strength than she did, but he had her fear pegged exactly. “Please,” she whispered, “stop it.”
She closed her eyes and actually felt his body against her, his breath wafting the hair at her temples. “All right, baby. For now.”
He’d agreed, but the ache wouldn’t go away. “Touch me tonight, Cameron. Like you did in the Dodge Ram.”
She could still feel the lingering impressions. She loved the dreams he gave her, yet in the morning, she knew that’s all they were. Just dreams. She knew deep inside, in the pit where her deepest fears resided, that he was right; they couldn’t go on this way forever. But for this moment, she didn’t want to think about that. She needed him now. Badly.