Hot Water (23 page)

The silence that follows is probably the longest of my life. Bernard Williams is not used to being told no. Especially by me. He leans forward, cupping his hand around his ear to hear it better. “What?”

“It’s my life. I need her. I’m going insane without her. I can’t focus.” I exhale. “I will do whatever you want. I will run this business and make it more successful than ever. I promise you that. But in order to do that . . . I need her. That’s not negotiable.”

He stares at me for the longest time, his face reddening. “I do not believe what I’m hearing.”

“I’m sorry, but—“

“You know, Caden. There have been many times in my life that I’ve been disappointed in you. That I wondered what the hell you were thinking. Many times I wished we were never related. All those times I bailed you out of trouble, I wondered what I’d done as a father to have such a fuck-up as a son. But all those things you did before—I forgave you for them, because I attributed them to youth. But you’re not a kid anymore. You have no excuse now.” He throws up his hands. “So that’s just fucking great. The company’s fucked. And I can’t call you my son anymore.”

 He begins to roll himself out the room, pushing the nurse aside when she attempts to help him. The rest of his entourage file out behind him. When he gets to the elevator, he turns and glares at me, his face redder and angrier than ever.

I just bite my lip. “Did you ever?”

“What?”

“It was always Cameron this, and Cameron that. You never once gave a shit about me. I’ve spent a lot of my life trying to impress you. And you’re never impressed. Cameron always did it better,” I mutter. “So I give up. I don’t want to be your son anymore.”

The elevator doors open. He just stares at me, so hard I have to look away.

“I’m your only living relative, Dad. And you treat me like I’m
nothing
,” I mumble softly, tears starting to sting my eyes. Shit, why am I crying now? I should be used to being told I’m shit by him, since it’s happened every day of my life. I play it off like I’m wiping sleep out of my eyes, but I know he sees what they really are. Those tears will make him mad, will make him think that all of his work toughening me up was for naught.

He stares at me for a moment, nodding thoughtfully, and for a second I think that
maybe
I’ve gotten through to him. But that all disappears the second he opens his mouth, his hands already planted on the wheels of the wheelchair. “That’s what you are. You’ve never proven yourself to be anything else,” he mumbles.

All the insults he’s tossed at me, all the time I knew how he saw me, and somehow, it still manages to sting like hell when the words are out in the open. “Why do I have to
prove
anything to you?” I counter, but he’s already in the elevator. The doors close before he can turn around and face me, those eyes of his still full of rage.

Stumbling back, I squeeze the tears from my eyes and lay into the wall with my fist. I punch it once, twice, a third time, until my fist hurts just as much as that gaping hole in my chest, where my heart once was.
Why can’t I just be? Why isn’t that enough
?

The answer is, it
is
enough. With one person.

The only person who ever thought it was enough.

The only person who matters.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Cicily

Saturday evening, as the sun is setting, I wait for the perfect wave.

Sitting with my chin on the board, I know that this is where I should have been all along. I never belonged there. Oh, at times I thought I knew where I belonged, but I was wrong. And I’d hurt someone I cared about, someone I loved.

It was love, despite what he thought. There can be no other word for something this big, something that has destroyed me so utterly.

No, I belong here, I think with a sigh.

The perfect wave comes. I paddle so I am in position, stand, and drop in. I ride it until it peters out, feeling right, feeling what my summer was supposed to be, if only for a few seconds. Then I arch my back and go under, getting my hair under control.

When I surface, he is there.

At first I think that I wanted him so much, I’m imagining him in places where he can’t be. He hates me. And he has every reason to.

But I blink back the saltwater and rub my eyes. And he is still standing there, framed in the sunset. Oh, he looks different, in board shorts and a t-shirt, but there’s no way I can mistake the intensity in his gaze. Nobody can match that.

I stuff my board under my arm and stalk toward the place where the water meets the sand, my head down.

“You’re here,” I whisper.

He scans the shoreline, and that perfect Angry Guy sneer turns into something different. He looks . . . nervous. It’s something I’ve never seen on him. “You owe me a surfing lesson,” he says, his voice soft.

“A surfing lesson?”

“You promised.”

“But we . . . can’t. I know why you hate me. You have every reason to. And I know why you said you had to stay away. You were right.”

He nods. “Look. I don’t really know why I’m here. I thought about turning around and going home about four-hundred times on the way here. That’s what I
should
do. But what I
want
is completely different. The world will probably think I’m a dirty old man. My father thinks I’m insane. And you know what? It is insane. It’s fucking batshit. The stupidest thing I’ve ever done. But the funny thing is . . . I don’t care, Cicily. I don’t care what
New York Today
writes about me. I don’t care if I get thrown in the mental institution or if our clients pull out by the hundreds. If I can be with you,
I don’t care
.”

I stand there, his words reverberating in my head, wanting to laugh and cry and scream all at once. We just stand there, taking each other in for the longest time. Finally, I spit out the first thing that comes to my mind. “You don’t care? But you said—“

“I know what I said. But it all means shit. All I’ve done is try to be someone I’m not, so that Andrea, my father, everyone would accept me. And I thought it would make my life better, but it only fucked it up more. And then you came along, and showed me that I didn’t have to be perfect. You’re the first person I’ve ever met who I don’t have to pretend for. Who just accepts me. And I’d be a total asshole if I didn’t do the same with you.” He chews on his bottom lip, the most adorably sexy and vulnerable look I’ve ever seen on him.

“Addendum,” he says after a moment, digging the hands into the pockets of his shorts. “When I think of the possibility of never kissing you again, I can’t breathe. I know it’s crazy.”

 It’s not crazy, not at all. It’s exactly right. There’s more madness in the idea of us being apart than together. I’d been going out of my mind wondering why he couldn’t see that. And now . . . now I want to fall to my knees and weep.

Instead, I say, “Well. I never thought you had it all there.”

He lets out a short laugh, then without warning, charges at me, grabbing me from the knees so that I topple in half, over his shoulder. He carries me toward the ocean, and I know exactly what’s on his mind.

“Don’t you dare!” I shout at him, pounding my fists upon his broad back. His shirt smells clean, like detergent. I’m upside down, though in the haze, it might as well be right-side-up.

He turns me over and gently sets me down on the sand. “Throw you in the water? What kind of heartless guy do you think I am?”

“I’m still not convinced you have a heart. You’re just like all those robots in New York,” I say. “All you think about is money.”

He laughs. “Oh, really?”

I nod.

He stares out into the ocean. “Talk about heartless. You won’t even teach me how to surf.”

“I would if I thought you’d be able to learn.”

“Ouch,” he says, stuffing his hands into his pockets and looking hurt. “I’ll have you know I’m a very good snowboarder.”

“Huh,” I say, not impressed. “Lame.”

“He comes beside me and grabs my hand. “Come on, teach me.”

He shrugs, reaches down, and pulls off his shirt. Immediately, that gorgeous set of abs greets me. In the dying light, he looks like a god. He’s built, with thick arms and shoulders. His broad chest tapers down to a perfect V above his waist, and there’s just a small amount of curly dark hair there. It’s beautiful.

“What?” he asks.

He must know what it means, the way I’m looking at him. He must have had a million girls look at him that way. It isn’t possible to be that perfect and not attract a crowd. I try to look away, but his smile tells me that it’s too late to pretend I don’t want what I see in front of me. “Just . . . it’s one of life’s great tragedies that someone with that—“ I wave a finger in front of his body—“prefers
winter
sports.”

“I have no idea what you mean,” he says with a grin. He takes a couple of steps toward the water. “Last one in . . .” he taunts me. He runs toward the ocean, ready to attack, then tenderly dips one toe in an approaching wave, and hops like he stubbed it. “It’s freezing,” he says.

Freezing-schmeezing. He obviously has never been on an early June dawn patrol, when the water temps are barely in the fifties. I adjust my bikini, rush past him, and dive head-first into the water. Then, I come up, grin, and splash him.

He yells for a while, then ducks under a wave. I wonder where he is for a moment when I feel something latch onto my thigh, pulling me down. “Jerk!” I scream, when I come back up. I stand up, wipe the water out of my eyes, and say, “Can you swim?”

He nods.

“Okay. I’ll teach you how to bodysurf, okay?” I look toward the horizon until I see the swell of a wave coming toward us. It’s the perfect size, not too big or small, ready to break just beyond us. “Okay. Get ready. When I say go, paddle as fast as you can toward the shore. And once you’re caught in the wave, put your arms at your sides, tuck your chin in, and let the wave pull you.”

“Got it.” He stands next to me, a very serious pupil.

“Okay . . . go!” I say, and we both begin paddling furiously. A second later, I’m caught in the wave, surrounded by a mane of foam, being propelled toward the shore. For a moment, when I leave the wave, I tumble in the water, then come up for air in knee-high water. Caden is right beside me. We’d ridden the wave a decent fifty feet.

“That was awesome,” he says, whipping his head back and throwing a ribbon of water into the air.

I wipe a strand of salty hair out of my face. “Decent for your first time. Your technique could use some work, but . . .”

His eyes narrow. “Oh, really?”

He lunges toward me, grabbing me and pushing me into the water. I push him off me and race onto the shore, where he tackles me, throwing me down on the sand.

“Watch it!” I shout, throwing handfuls of sand on his back. “The sand . . . it’s everywhere! It’s going to get you! Run away! Save yourself!”

He starts throwing sand on me, and we roll around, getting covered in the stuff, the stuff he supposedly hates, but we’re laughing so hard, it doesn’t matter that it’s on our skin, in our hair, everywhere. Then he grabs my wrists and pushes them over my head. We struggle for a few seconds until he pins me down, but then I’m helplessly aware that this gorgeous guy is staring into my eyes, surrounded by the night sky and a halo of stars. All I can hear is our hearts, beating together, in pace with the crashing waves. I stop squirming, but he doesn’t let go.

His kiss is salty and soft, almost like he doesn’t want to . . .like there’s some undeniable force pressing his lips against mine. But eventually, once I’ve snaked my arms around his neck and pulled his body with full power to mine, it becomes harder, stronger, more impossible to pull us apart. And I don’t want to. The touch of his lips sends a wave of electricity through my body, unlike any kiss I’ve ever felt. This past week, I’ve constantly felt like I didn’t belong. But now, I don’t think I’ve ever felt more like I’m in the right place.

But that only lasts a minute.

In the next thirty seconds, he scoots away, to a safe distance where physical contact would be impossible. He stares at the ocean, quietly, winnowing sand through his fingers like an hourglass. “All those games you played. Are you a virgin?”

“No.” Reluctantly, I say, “I’ve done it once.”

“Just once? You mean, in school? You never . . . had a boyfriend?”

“No. Not really. I was more interested in surfing than boys. The guys at my school are kind of . . . not my type. My first boyfriend was Trevor. I met him at the end of last summer. And then this summer, he . . .” I’m so embarrassed by my complete lack of experience, my mouth won’t form the words.
He dumped me for a bunch of fish. Mammals. Whatever
.

“Right,” he says. “It’s been a long time for me . . . are high school guys that dumb? Because I am pretty sure only an idiot would want to do it
just once
with you.”

I know he’s trying to put me at ease, but I can’t help feeling stupid. I look away. “I’m sorry.”

He takes my hand and pulls me so that I’m staring into his eyes. “No. Don’t be sorry about it. I can’t believe that you would ever think you didn’t deserve me, Cicily. Don’t you see? I don’t deserve you. I am not worthy of you. I never will be. I’ve fucked way too many girls. It doesn’t mean anything to me anymore. You deserve to be with someone else. Someone your age . . .”

“Don’t tell me this would mean nothing to you. That’s a lie.”

He sucks in his lips, then exhales. “Okay. I can tell you with absolute certainty that in all my life, I’ve never wanted anything more. But are
you
sure, Cicily?”

“Just because you were a fuck-up who didn’t know what he wanted at nineteen doesn’t mean I’m one. I know what I want.” Taking a deep breath, I stand up, walk over to him, and straddle him, then ease myself onto his lap so that are noses our touching. “I want to be with you.”

He shakes his head, and for a moment, just looks out, past me, at the horizon. “But why me?” he murmurs into my hair. “I . . . we should take this slow. I don’t want you to do anything you’ll regret.”