But the more he drank, the darker of a mood Smith seemed to find himself in. Drunk or sober, thoughts of Cameron kept pulling him under, as if he were some sort of masochist that enjoyed torturing himself with things he couldn’t have.
And who says you can’t have her? his mind goaded. It’s your own stupid rule. So what if you break it?
Smith pondered the appeal of that possibility for a moment, idly twirling his empty glass on the bar top as mental images of Cameron’s writhing naked body assaulted him.
So what, indeed.
“Hello? Smith?” Jake gave his shoulder a little shake. “Are you even listening to me, man?”
Smith shook his head, clearing his wayward thoughts. Apparently Jake had been talking to him while he’d silently weighed the pros and cons of fucking his assistant.
No matter, it was time he got going anyway.
“Yeah, sure. Listen, mate, I’m gonna go on and head out now,” he said, taking a step back so that Jake’s hand fell from his shoulder. Smith threw down a couple of bills to cover their drinks before turning to leave. “I’ll catch you later.”
Jake rolled his eyes and shook his head in response, but Smith was already halfway to the door by that point.
Smith spilled out of Ninth Circle and onto the street, where other drunken clubgoers loitered, smoking cigarettes or just talking. He got his phone back out, with the intent of calling an Uber driver, before suddenly changing his mind and shoving both hands in the pockets of his jacket as he looked around, thinking.
Cameron’s flat was only three blocks up and a handful of blocks over from here, if Smith recalled the one time he’d been there correctly. He could easily walk there from here...
And do what? Knock on her door in the middle of the night, drunk and off company time? Ask her to explain where, exactly, they stood with each other now?
Or maybe he just needed to know if Cameron thought as much about fucking him again, as he did about her?
Whatever the reason, Smith found himself crossing the street, headed in her direction.
Cameron’s flat was located in... well, Smith wouldn’t call it the city’s underbelly necessarily, but it was right well close to that. He hated to think of her walking around here alone at night. It didn’t seem like the safest place for a woman like Cameron to live.
Any good employer would be concerned about their employee’s safety outside of work, Smith reassured himself, rationalizing his current train of thought. It’s not just because it’s Cameron.
Smith walked for about fifteen minutes, before stumbling across a somewhat familiar stretch of refurbished warehouses. He recognized the one that was Cameron’s loft only three buildings down from him, and felt himself hesitate as he instantly stopped walking.
What the hell am I even doing here? Smith thought, suddenly appalled with himself. I can’t do this. This is completely mental, is what this is.
But still, I’m already here. What’s the harm in just seeing if she’s still awake?
Smith would never know for certain which side of reasoning would have eventually won out.
Because, in that moment, a car pulled up to the curb outside her place and parked…
And then a man got out and walked up to her door.
Smith quickly hid himself in the shadows outside the halo of the nearest streetlight as he watched, his intrigue quickly morphing into bitter rage as Cameron greeted the unknown man at her door by embracing him.
Smith turned away before he was forced to witness any more of their exchange. He started walking in the opposite direction, not knowing where he was going anymore, just knowing he needed to get as far from her as possible.
Smith turned a corner, stopping so that he could lean against the alley wall and regain some sense of composure over himself. The sound of blood rushing in his ears was all he could hear as he closed his eyes, taking a deep calming breath as he resisted the urge to punch the brick wall behind him.
Cameron had a fucking boyfriend, it seemed. And Smith had been a big enough of a git to not realize it until now.
Underneath his anger, Smith was surprised by the sheer amount of jealousy--and what’s more, betrayal--that he felt at her little deception. He’d agonized over the morality and nature of his relationship with Cameron for the past two weeks, only to find out now that she wasn’t even single to begin with.
Even if she’d only hooked up with this guy after he’d first met her at Circle Bar, she’d still flirted with him outside that cafe, still kissed him back when he had kissed her on the bridge.
Hell, she’d been the one to kiss him first when she’d fallen into his lap on the plane ride to Paris.
Smith shook his head roughly, pulling his phone out again so that he could call an Uber home, for real this time.
He was done with whatever game this was that he’d been playing with Cameron over the past couple weeks. So fucking done.
8
Cameron closed the door to the filing cabinet and hustled out of the file room, heading around the corner to her desk. She sat down in her chair, considering what she should do next. She turned her chair toward the floor to ceiling window, looking out at the city.
The sun was just setting. It reminded her of her time in Paris, how twilight was such a magical time there, with the lights just beginning to come on.
She sighed and turned her back on the sight. There was no use thinking about what might have been.
Her phone buzzed on the desk next to her computer. She typed in her passcode and read the new text.
Sources inside Calloway Corp say that any money mismanagement has to come from the top 3 or 4 ppl. Focus on the two Calloways. — E
Cameron frowned. She knew that The Daily News had multiple sources digging into the company, but she had no idea who those sources were. Nor did she have any idea who might be responsible for the missing money.
Could it really be Smith or his father? Smith seemed so financially comfortable. Not to mention the fact that he was generally forthright about his issues.
Spencer Calloway seemed more capable of a guise, yet he had even less reason to do so. If Smith was financially comfortable, Spencer was living the high life.
Cam erased Erika’s message. She wished she had some answers for her boss. She’d been the recipient of Smith’s cold shoulder all week, which meant all her spare time went to looking into the company’s finances.
All of her covert research was made a thousand times easier by the fact that the company was running its own audit. Stacks and stacks of binders were piled in the file room, all containing sensitive financial information.
She’d secretly filched three or four binders at a time, taking them home to study. She had gotten deep enough into the stacks to be reassured that The Daily News was right.
Someone was definitely doing more than mismanaging funds. Someone was outright stealing, but they were clever enough to cover their tracks. It was frustrating for Cam.
She drummed her fingertips on her desk, her thoughts shifting to what she should do next. If she found nothing specific in the next two loads of binders, what would she do then?
She looked up when Smith came out of his office, dressed in a tux for a fundraising event he was going to later. His expression was annoyed, which didn’t bode well for her.
“Where’s the paperwork for the Paris deal?” he asked.