Page 97 of I Loved You First

As she sat in the quiet of her pretty room, she was terribly afraid that her Seattle safe haven wouldn’t be enough to help her move forward when she’d left her heart in Maple Ridge.

She startled when her phone began to ring on the bedside table. Picking it up, she stared at Cam’s name on her screen, hovering her thumb over her phone’s prompt to swipe right to answer.

It was so tempting to do just that and listen to the voice she craved to hear. But what good would that do any of them?

Her life was here. Brady’s and Cam’s were in Vermont. Soon, Brady would start school and create a bond with his mother. He would be busy with his family and friends and hopefully the summer she had come to town would become a happy memory. Cam would get back to his life and everything would be as it had always been meant. Because some stories didn’t get a happily ever after. Her parents certainly hadn’t.

Turning her phone over, she set it down, waiting for the silence again. Covering her face with her hands, she gave in to her sobs.

Cam got out of his truck at the YMCA, searching among the group of twenty or so kids for the one who belonged to him. His gaze stopped on the small wading pool on the outskirts of the playground, where Brady used a pretend fishing pole to fish for plastic toys with Owen and Davis.

It did his heart good when Brady laughed as he pulled a magnetized purple dolphin from the water.

“I got one!” Looking up, Brady dropped the pole when their eyes met. “Dad!” Brady yelled, running across the grass.

Cam grinned as Brady plowed into him, hugging his legs. “Hey, buddy.”

“I’ve been fishing. But just the pretend kind.”

“I see that.” He tossed a nod to Craig and Dana, the camp counselors who looked after Brady five days a week. “I’m going to take this kiddo home with me.”

Craig nodded as he smiled. “We’ll see you tomorrow, Brady.”

“Okay. Bye.” Brady took Cam’s hand, pulling him as they started toward the truck. “Let’s hurry. We have to go home so Fiona can come over. I need to give her my picture.”

Steaming out a breath, Cam clenched his jaw. It hadn’t even been five minutes, and Brady was already asking for Fi. “How about we go home and talk about a couple of things.”

Brady sighed as his shoulders slumped. “Okay.”

Getting in their seats, Cam waited to hear Brady’s seat belt click as he buckled his own. Turning over the engine, they headed toward the house in the early afternoon traffic.

Brady rolled down his window halfway. “Fiona can come over after we talk?”

Cam scratched at his jaw. “Why don’t you tell me about your day? And the air conditioner’s on, bud.”

Brady rolled the window back up. “This morning, a nature guy brought in tadpoles for us to look at.”

“That must have been cool,” Cam said as he took the turn for the quieter back roads, stalling for more time on their already short drive home.

Brady smiled as he nodded enthusiastically. “The tadpoles live in the pond, but the guy brought them in a white bucket.”

Cam nodded. “Bringing them in the bucket was probably easier than bringing the whole pond.”

“Dad,” Brady said as he laughed.

Cam chuckled, thrilled that Brady was still young enough to think his dad jokes were funny.

“We got to touch one,” Brady continued. “But we had to be gentle since it’s a baby frog.”

“That makes sense.”

“Yup. The tadpole was slimy. But he was still cute.”

“A little slime never hurt anyone.”

“Nope. And I fished for pretend fish, and I saw Dominic eating his boogers when we were playing outside.”

Cam’s shoulders relaxed a little as their conversation continued. Never in his life had he been more excited to talk about snot. “That’s pretty gross.”