long moment, fighting the overwhelming urge to hurl it into the mirror on the wall. It might make me feel better and I probably would have done it if I was in my own apartment instead of Cam's house. I knew she'd painstakingly chosen each piece in her little house and I didn't want to ruin any of them with a tantrum.
Instead, I settled for stomping my feet and calling Barnes every ugly curse word I could think of. He wasn't the cause of all of my anger, but it sure as hell felt good to use him as an excuse to vent.
I felt marginally better, but considering the situation, that's all I could ask for.
I put my phone on the counter and gripped the edges of the sink hard. One deep breath in, hold, let it out as slowly as possible. Then another. And another.
It took five breaths for my anger to fade enough that I wouldn't scream if I tried to speak.
When Cam tapped on my door, I had myself mostly under control.
Or I thought I did.
I opened the bedroom door and Cam's eyebrows lifted almost to her hairline. "Uh, what happened?"
"What do you mean?" I asked. Hmm, I sounded sort of growly.
"Well, you look like you could chew up rocks and shit bricks after, so..."
That description was just about spot-on to how I was feeling at the moment.
"Did Ben call or something?" she asked, her voice gentle, soft, as though she were afraid I'd explode if she spoke too loudly.
"Nope. No, he didn't. Nope." I shook my head.
Cam took a careful step back.
"My boss called. Apparently, I have to go back immediately because there's a problem they absolutely cannot solve without me even though I could name at least two other people who could handle just about any complications in my place. So, tomorrow, I have to go back to Dallas for this meeting on Monday. I have no idea how long I'll be gone and I'm pretty sure Ben will decide I'm not worth the trouble before I can get back and he'll hook up with a hot blonde from two towns over who can cook and doesn't have any body fat except in her rack."
Cam blinked rapidly as she took another step back. "Please remember murder is illegal. I'll bail you out, but I can't go to jail. J.J. would never let me hear the end of it."
I scowled. "I'm not going to murder anyone, but I am considering hacking into Barnes' computer and changing all his passwords. And maybe signing him up for some porn sites through his desktop at work."
She tilted her head to the side. "But would you really do that?"
"I won't," I said with a sigh.
"Glad you're going to use your powers for good." She hesitated. "What can I do to help you?" she asked.
Any other time, I would have told her that there was nothing she could do. But that wasn't true. She was my best friend. She understood me better than anyone else.
"Will you feed me and give me wine?" I asked.
She smiled. "Of course. But not too much, you have to go back to Dallas tomorrow morning."
"Oh, yeah. Surely they won't care if I'm too hungover to drive home," I said.
Cam laughed and rolled her eyes. "Of course they won't!"
"Fine, just go make me dinner," I demanded. "And I'll settle for two glasses of wine."
Cam laughed again but did as I asked.
When I was alone in the hall, I rubbed a hand over the ache in my heart. Sure, some of the pain was for Ben, but another part, one just as big, was over the fact that I would be leaving Farley, and Cam. I hated that.
Almost as much as I hated leaving before I could figure out how to fix things with Ben. Or if I would even be able to fix it.
And that's what worried me most of all.
17
In the end, Cam tried to teach me to cook and it failed spectacularly. Especially when I dropped the pan of spaghetti on the floor. Just enough to feed us stayed in the pan but the rest was, well, everywhere. It was even on the ceiling. And the noodles were sticky like glue.
By the time we cleaned up and ate, it was nearly eleven and too late to call Ben.
But I didn't want to leave him hanging because that wasn't something a decent human would do.
I settled on texting him. I doubted it would wake him if