Risky Pleasures - Brenda Jackson [36]
Vanessa glanced over at Cameron from across the kitchen and wondered if he was serious. After the rendezvous on the beach that had left them both naked and covered in sand, he had carried her to his place where they had used his outside shower. He had shampooed her hair and she had washed his back, then they had made love all over again, right there in the shower. Afterwards, he made her promise never to wear the outfit again and had given her one of his T-shirts to put on. They had decided they were hungry and now were in the kitchen.
“I’m going to have to pass on the movie, but I would like you to tell me who taught you how to cook.”
He leaned back against the counter, holding a cup of coffee in his hand. He had thrown together an omelet and biscuits. “My grandfather. After my grandmother died it was just the two of us.”
She nodded. “Is he still living?”
He shook his head and she could see the sadness reflected in his deep-set eyes. “No, he died when I turned eighteen. Right before I entered college.”
“The two of you were close. I can tell,” she said softly. She could hear the special love in his voice.
She watched a smile touch his lips. “Yes, we were very close. He was the best.”
She didn’t say anything for the longest time until finally she admitted, “My dad was the best, too. He never had sons but it didn’t matter to him. My mom, Taylor, Cheyenne and I were the apples of his eye and he always let us know it. I only wish…”
“What?”
“That I could have convinced him to stop smoking. He died of lung cancer, and a part of me wished I could have done something, hidden his cigarettes, anything.”
“That wouldn’t have helped, Vanessa. The person smoking is the one who has to want to stop. Your father would have continued to smoke until it was his decision to quit.”
What Cameron was telling her was no different from what her family and Sienna had told her. But when she remembered her father in his last days, how the cancer had left a robust man barely recognizable, a part of her still believed there was something she could have done.
Not wanting to discuss her father any longer, she decided to ask Cameron more about his childhood. In all the media releases she’d read on him, very little had been mentioned about it, except that he’d dropped out of school at sixteen.
“Was your grandfather your mom’s father or your dad’s?”
She watched him take a sip of his coffee before glancing over at her. “He was my father’s father. My parents were killed in a fire at our apartment complex when I was six. My dad was able to get me out but when he went back in for my mother, the building collapsed.”
Vanessa gasped and she immediately felt a tug on her heart. “Oh, how awful that must have been for you.”
Cameron stared down into his coffee cup a long moment before finally lifting his head and meeting her gaze. “It was. And for the longest time, like you, I was on a guilt trip. I would often ask myself, What if Dad had gotten Mom out first? What if I had awakened and smelled the smoke first? What if I had convinced them to have a fire-escape plan like they had taught us in school? There were so many what-ifs, but I soon realized that none of them would bring my parents back.”
Vanessa’s heartstrings tugged tighter. She could just imagine the guilt that had consumed his young mind. “Is that when you went to live with your grandparents?” she asked.
“Yes, and they were great. It was as if they knew exactly what I needed.” He chuckled. “My grandparents were pretty big on hugs. The warm and cuddly kind.”
Vanessa smiled. She wondered how a man with such a warm and cuddly childhood with his grandparents could grow up to be the hard and controlled man that he was.
She opened her mouth to ask him another question when his cell phone rang. “Excuse me.” He picked it up off the counter. “Yes, X.”
Vanessa could tell from the expression on Cameron’s face and the tenseness of his body that he didn’t like whatever the person was telling him.
“Tell Kurt that I want this person found before he does any more damage.” He snapped the phone shut.