“Smart,” Cam said, and she had to admire his ability to still look at the situation like a cop even though it had hit so close to home. “There’s no evidence pointing to Gordon in Selena’s death. He’ll never be tried for it, and he’ll plea his attempted murder sentence down to give up the mastermind behind the contract. He’ll be out in a few years and his brother won’t spend his life in prison.”
Eva nodded. “I don’t think Gordon meant to kill you. He wanted it to look good, but if you actually died, he wouldn’t be able to get a plea deal. That’s why he set the bomb off when Vaughn was half way across the parking lot. He really just wanted to save his brother from a life sentence.”
Cam looked over at the closed door of Vaughn’s room. “Yeah, I get that. The Dunphys both deserve to rot in hell, but I get it. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for my brothers.”
“And there’s nothing they wouldn’t do for you,” she said softly.
And silence.
Long, awkward, and chock full of I-don’t-wanna-have-this-conversation. At least from his end. And maybe a little from hers, but she wasn’t leaving without saying what she needed to say. She thought she’d nearly lost him for good yesterday, and every unspoken word had weighed so heavily on her, breathing had been a chore.
“Is that all you wanted?” he finally asked.
Why had this been so much easier when she thought he was lying injured in that hospital bed?
“No. I want to talk about us.” She removed her hand from her pocket. “When I saw—”
He straightened. “Like you said before, there is no us.”
All the air left her lungs as if he’d hauled off and sucker punched her. “I thought…when you gave me the ring…”
“A moment of foolishness. But I’m done. I can’t do this anymore. If you want to be with Preston, go ahead. I hope he makes you happy.”
“I don’t want Preston. I don’t think I ever have, not really.” She hesitated, searching for a way to say the things burning a hole in the center of her chest. “I’ve always wanted what I never got growing up. A real, steady family and—and it’s a stupid fantasy, but there was a time that I…” Christ, she was jumbling it all up. So much for her neat list.
“A time that you…what?”
She faltered. Cam didn’t lose his patience with anyone—wasn’t in his DNA—but irritation laced his tone now. She swallowed to wet her suddenly parched throat.
“Well, I met you several months before I met Preston.”
“Yes, your point?”
“And I spent those months hoping for…more. From you. But you never acted like you were interested in me in that way, and Preston worked so hard to win me over…” She blew out a breath. “Preston was convenient and didn’t challenge me. With him, I was always in control, and I thought that’s what I wanted but—”
“Stop,” Cam said, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Eva, just stop. You don’t know what you want.”
Outrage had her jaw falling open and burned away her self-doubt. “Excuse me? I know exactly what I want. I’m trying to tell you—”
“No, you don’t, and that’s the problem. You have this cookie-cutter ideal family in your head, and I don’t fit it. Hell, you don’t fit it, but you refuse to see that. And even if you don’t take Linz up on his offer, someone else will eventually come along who you think does fit it, and I’ll get regulated to best friend again. I’ll grow to hate you for it.” He shook his head, and every exhausting second of the past few days showed on his face. “I don’t want to hate you when I’ve spent so many of the past five years in love with you. It’ll be easier for everyone if we just end things now.”
Her throat tightened and burned. “Easier for everyone, or for you?”
He turned away without answering, but she yanked him around to face her again. “Wilde, dammit, you’re not listening to me. I lov—”
Down the hall, the elevator doors opened with a ding and several arguing voices boomeranged off the tile walls, drowning out her voice.
He gazed over her head toward the sound. “My brothers. I have to handle this.”
Of course he did.
A strange mix of anger and humiliation bloomed in her chest, and her cheeks heated, no doubt filling with color. At least her face was already so red from the explosion, he wouldn’t see the flush.
“Yeah, fine.” She dropped her hand from his arm. “Go ahead, indulge your superhero complex. Because everything’s absolutely hunky-fucking-dory in our personal life.”
“Eva—”
“No, don’t.” She backed away from him. “I just realized something. I’m not the only one with issues here. But, hey, at least I admit I have control issues, and I’m willing to work through them. You just throw yourself into everyone else’s problems and completely ignore your own.”
His jaw tightened. “What happened to Vaughn is my problem.”