Page 60 of A Matter of Time
“I’ve still got another two weeks of working with y’all there,” I reminded him as we lay on my bed, naked, on Sunday afternoon. “Are we going public with this, or would you rather keep it quiet until we’re not working together anymore?”
“It’s not only up to me,” he pointed out. “But if it were, I’d be shouting it from the rooftops, Sugar. I want everyone to know that you’re mine.”
The possessive growl in his voice sent another wave of desire through me, even though he’d just satisfied me completely. “And you don’t think it’ll be a problem for anyone else?”
Cam grinned at me. “Jason can’t really be upset about it when he’s got his own romance brewing.”
He told me about how he’d found Jason and Marianne looking cozy in Jason’s office on Friday morning and I shared what had happened at the bar on Thursday. For their sake, I hoped they’d had a weekend much like ours. Now that I’d fallen back in love again, I wanted everyone else to be happy too.
We agreed we weren’t going to hide anything, and we spent the rest of the day looking at houses online for my parents. Cam had always had an interest in real estate too, it would have been his second choice of career, and he had a few real estate agent friends. He had no doubt we’d find my parents the perfect place soon.
“We should start thinking about where we want to buy too, Tonia. These downtown apartments are great when we’re single, but when we’ve got kids, we’re going to want more space.”
He sounded so sure of us, just like always. Though some things had changed a lot, other things never would.
On Monday morning, we walked into the Barnly Oil office hand-in-hand, and though there were a few curious looks, no one made a big deal of it. My first appointment of the day was with Jason, and he asked Marianne to join us so that she could adjust her organization of his work to match the new systems I suggested. He must have thought I didn’t notice how his hand slipped onto her knee under the desk, but I gave Marianne a wink when he looked away, and she blushed furiously, her face beaming in happiness as she tried to hide her smile.
“I’m so glad you came to work here,” she whispered to me as we both headed out of his office at the end of our meeting.
I glanced over to Cam’s office, where I could see him on the phone at his own desk, looking confident and in control. I couldn’t be much happier about having come there to work too, but rather than talking about me, I focused back on Marianne. “You know, you really picked up quickly on everything I was talking about in there. Have you ever thought about being a consultant and teaching people about this kind of stuff?”
She blinked at me in surprise as we reached her desk. “You really think I could do something like that?”
“I do,” I told her honestly. “With a little training and a touch more self-confidence, you’d be an amazing addition to A Matter of Time. I’m hoping to expand soon and take on some new staff, so think it over. After all, if things between you and Jason get serious, you might not want to be reporting to him forever.”
My last sentence was teasing, and she smiled at it, but I could see the wheels in her head turning, letting me know she would definitely be thinking it over. When I told Cam about it later that night, back in his apartment, he gave his approval. “You should start expanding as soon as possible. I know Jason’s got nothing but good things to say about you and he’ll be spreading the word. You’re going to be flooded with work soon. Plus, you’ll want to be able to leave the business in good hands when you go on maternity leave.”
His arms wrapped around me, pulling me tight to his already growing erection.
“So damn sure of yourself,” I admonished him, rolling my eyes even as his certainty sent a thrill of excitement and warmth through me.
He leaned in closer. “You mark my words, Sugar. A couple of years from now, you’ll be running your empire from home while our little ones run circles around you.”
Those deep brown eyes had never looked so confident. “You’ve got it all planned out, haven’t you?”
He gave me that grin that had somehow gone from charming to infuriating all the way back to charming again. “I always have, Tonia. It took a little longer than I thought, but in the end, it was always just a matter of time.”
~Cam~
I proposed to Tonia one month after the party at Dex’s gallery, a month after the day we decided to give our relationship another chance.
That month hadn’t been all sunshine and roses; we still fought like cats and dogs whenever we had opposing views on something, but deep down, I wouldn’t have it any other way, and I knew she wouldn’t either. We didn’t want someone who would blindly agree with whatever we said. That had never been what our relationship was about. We were both stubborn and passionate about things, but the one thing that always took precedence was our passion for each other. Every argument ended with us making up, which always satisfied me so completely, it made me want to pick a fight with her again just so we could make up again.
On that Friday afternoon, she seemed distracted when I picked her up from work at the end of the day. Her time at Barnly Oil had ended in triumph, as we both expected, and she was already on a new assignment and interviewing potential recruits at the same time. Between all that and still trying to pin down the perfect house for her parents to move into and the two of us shuttling back and forth between our two apartments, she’d been a little stressed, and it showed in the tight smile she gave me as she hopped into my truck.
“I’m happy to see you too,” I teased, leaning over to give her a quick kiss before pulling back out into traffic. We had another appointment with a realtor so we had no time to waste.
“It’s not you,” she assured me. “I just feel disorganized, and I hate it. Organization is my thing. If we can get this house issue settled this weekend, I’ll feel a lot better.”
I smiled sympathetically but kept my mouth shut. I had a secret I was keeping from her that I planned to share with her later tonight, and if I didn’t give too much away now, she couldn’t ask me any direct questions and I wouldn’t have to lie to her.
The busy downtown traffic gave way to quieter streets as we drove into a residential neighbourhood with wide, ranch-style homes, huge lawns and neat flowerbeds, with kids playing outside several of the houses.
“This is nice,” Tonia murmured as she looked out the window curiously. “But the demographic might be a bit young for my parents. I was picturing more of a retirement community.”
“Your dad doesn’t want to feel like he’s retiring,” I reminded her with a laugh. “This might help to keep him feeling young.”
The house we were there to see sat at the end of a quiet cul-de-sac, on a large plot with trees in the front and a huge backyard. The house dated from the 1950s but the kitchen and bathrooms had been recently redone and overall, it looked well-kept and inviting. After showing us around, the realtor left us alone to talk things over.
