chapter 5

James's POV

I was in complete disarray. Camille in love with someone?! No! This reality woke me up to the fact that if I didn't fucking do something then I would never, ever have her! Never! If I let this go tonight, I would spend my entire life second guessing everything.

Dear God, please hear me now, please give me strength in this moment. Please save me from weakness. Please don't let me touch her.

My little prayer turned over in my head as I watched Camille twirl in front of me in her almost non existent pyjamas. What was the point of wearing them if they were so small?! Short sleeves, a T-shirt that ended at her bellybutton and shorts that revealed those round and perfect butt cheeks. Oh and I'm sorry, forgot to mention; material so thin that I could clearly see her nipples and how flawless her breasts were. Dear God, lead me not into temptation, but deliver me from evil.

Camille had never spoken to me in such a way and neither had I, but the secret that we were involved in, in her quiet and dark room, somehow broke down all barriers that I worked so hard at keeping up. I hadn't even realized I had built barriers until they were all smashed to pieces in this room tonight.

Fuck, she was a literal vixen, sent from the devil himself to tempt me and lead me into sin. Corrupting my best friend's little sister? Right here in her room? Right above her parents' heads? Not sure what the punishment for that in hell would be, but I was sure it involved some sort of fire burning me alive.

I so longed to do it. To place my lips on her soft and long neck, so hear her little gasp, to have her gentle hands in my hair, to take off those ridiculously small shorts...to taste her.

"Are you my girlfriend now? Wanting to know all about a boy I like?" She tried her best to avoid answering my question. The way she looked at me plunged me into fantasy of being that man who she was in love with. Oh, the luck of being on the receiving end of her love and affection.

"Not a boy. A man." I repeated her words back to her, sitting so close together on her unmade bed. "And you said love, not like." I corrected her on the details as my eyes roamed around her body, sitting cross legged on her bed.

Suddenly, Camille looked shy and a most endearing smile appeared on her face.

"Why do you care so much?" She whispered back. It was just us, in this little cocoon with the door closed. The only sounds around were the ticking of her wall clock and muffled voices of her parents from downstairs. I thought about how to respond to this question.

"Why is it unrequited? Does he not love you back? Do you want me to go rough him up?" I joked and she broke out into a little giggle, her long hair finally covering her nipples which I did my best not to stare at.

"He...doesn't know that I'm in love with him." Oh shit. This just got more convoluted! I bit my bottom lip, stopping myself from crashing my lips into hers.

"How long have you been in love with him?" I was digging deeper, praying to God and all the saints that she would deliver the biggest gift of my life and tell me it was me.

"A long time." She confessed gently and confetti littered my vision. Maybe she was in love with me?! If she had been in love for a long time, that meant longer than the time she's been away and I'd known her for a long time! I was grasping at straws.

"Mm." I filled the silence with a sound. From the curiosity in her eyes, it was blatantly obvious that she wanted this conversation to continue as much as me. "How old is he?" I was now deathly committed to finding out the details and get the confirmation of what I so desired.

"Older."

"By how much?" I shot out a question right away. Camille hesitated, but then reluctantly revealed the details.

"Four years."

Fuck! Was it me?! Oh God, please, God, let it be me!

Stunned by this information, I didn't dare look away from her and she too, confidently kept up this staring contest. "Are you satisfied? Can we stop talking about my non-existent love life now?" Camille asked in a whisper since her parents' voices died down and someone made their way up the stairs.

"Non-existent? Surely, you're getting some action while away at university?" Wow, I didn't believe the words that came out of my mouth and evidently, neither did she.

"Excuse me?! Do you think I'm someone who sleeps around with random guys?!" She looked incredibly offended at that and her reaction seemed over the top. I wondered why that bothered her so much...only reason it could have cut so deep...was if she'd never been with anyone.

"No. You look as pure as an angel..." I tried my best to reassure her and chase that frown off her face. "Are you an angel, Camille?" I breathed out, my voice barely audible.

We'd been in the dark so long now that my eyes got accustomed to it and I could make out a blush come on her face.

"Why are you so interested in me, James?"

That was a very valid question. I was completely past any line of normality with my interrogation. Do I dare? Tell her the truth? Hint at it?

"Because I'm also...in love with someone who doesn't know it." I revealed a small detail and watched how her eyes glued to mine all of a sudden. Oh, she was interested to find out.

"Y-you are? With whom?" She tried to make it sound as if she wasn't dying from curiosity.

"A woman. Who's younger than me. Who I really shouldn't be in love with." Yes, she was beginning to understand both who the woman was and why I was so dedicated to questioning her.

"Why don't you tell her?" She baited me.

"Why are you so interested in me, Camille?" I taunted her back with the same question she asked me and watched her jaw drop in shock. At this, I couldn't not laugh a little. Fuck, she was so wholesome.

"You! You should be a lawyer and not a cop!" She swatted at my shoulder and just this small touch alone left me with a burning desire for more.

"Are you a virgin?" I shot out the question that had been jumping around in my head for the last minute.

"What?! What has that got to do with anything?!" I swear, riling her up had now become a hobby.

"Why are you afraid to tell me? It's just me. James. You've known me forever." I did my best to convince her simply at first.

"So?! I don't discuss these details with my brother!"

"But I'm not your brother, Camille. Don't think of me that way." There, I fucking finally said what I hoped she wanted to hear. "I'm an older man...who you've known...for a long time," I placed the emphasis on those words and watched her reaction. She looked away, clearly torn between wanting to tell me everything and wanting to hide away, "and who you've trapped in your dark room tonight."

Oh fuck, Camille's chest rose quickly with every shaking breath she took and I too, could barely catch my breath.

"That's not my fault." She retorted. "Why did you want to meet me in the backyard? So you could interrogate me about my virginity and love life?" She said the words but then suddenly shut her eyes closed, realizing that she unwittingly answered the question. "Fuck!" She swore at her own self and refused to look at me again.

"Why are you so shy about it? It's not a bad thing." I tried to reassure her as some kind of warm feeling spread through me, the opposite of jealousy that I felt earlier. Admiration?

"This conversation completely went off the rails! Get out!" She pointed at her door, doing her best not to burst out laughing.

"I can't...someone is still downstairs and...do you really want me to leave, Camille?" I pushed it further, but she found her courage again.

"Yes." She spoke louder than a whisper again. "You're a manipulator. You deserve a promotion at work. You're ready to be an investigator." She spoke as if she didn't care in the slightest, but I was about to rope her back in.

Leaning on my hand and closer to her, Camille slightly leaned back, anticipation written all over her face.

"I may be a good interrogator, but you're a very skillful tease. You're still not wearing any clothes...and my eyes hurt from ripping them away from your chest."

"Why are you looking at my body like that, James?" She taunted back, leaning closer to me too, now mere inches away from my face. Fuck, this was unbearable. I knew I had amazing self control but clearly, I was no match for Camille. "Can't resist a virgin?"

"Stop..." I pleaded, in complete submission now.

"No, no...tell me James...why are you so suddenly glued to me, hm?" With graceful movements, she swiped her hair away from her chest and onto her back, slightly throwing her head back, giving me a front row seat to her perky tits, right in my face, still completely out of bounds.

I didn't want to lose. I didn't want to admit I was in love with her...until I knew who she was in love with.

With all the last self-restraint that I possessed, I closed my eyes and breathed through my intense arousal, but she woke me up with her whisper once more. "Why is it suddenly so difficult for you not to drool over a woman...who's younger than you...who you really shouldn't look at that way?" Fucking hell, was she actually a virgin or was she a femme fatale? The fire in her eyes and the way she shrugged her shoulders translated to me all her desires.

"You really...shouldn't play with me like that, Camille." I threw out a genuine warning, literally salivating at the sight of her so close to me.

"Am I? Playing with you? I thought you were in love with someone, why does anything I do have an effect on you if you're hung up on someone?" She challenged me and batted her eyelashes in a most innocent way, moving even closer. That's it, two more inches and our bodies would be pressed against each other, but neither one of us wanted to admit anything. With her last words, she put me in checkmate that I was so desperately trying to trap her in myself. There was no escaping this.

"Because Camille..." my eyes were closed and I was in literal pain from having lost the battle and having to admit it first. "I'm hung up on...and in love with...you." At this, my eyes shot open into hers, wet with sudden tears.

"W-what?" She whispered back, searching my eyes for any hint of a lie.

"I'm in love with you. And if you're in love with another man...I'm going to make you fall out of love with him. So who is it? Who are you in love with?" Our game was finished and now both of us were in our fully vulnerable position, no longer able to run away from the truth.

Camille slowly nodded her head, big tears racing down her sweet cheeks. "You." She whispered and plunged me into heaven. "You're that older man...who has no idea...that I've been in love with him...for a long time." She confessed her feelings and didn't dare look at me.

I imagined that I didn't text her tonight. I imagined that I did nothing, hiding away like a coward. I imagined that this conversation didn't happen, and the best night of my life didn't transpire. And I felt such strong relief and joy that I finally grew a pair and confronted her.

"How come...you didn't tell me?" I posed the question and landed my hand on her wet cheek, jolting her body from that simple touch.

"Tell you," Camille sniffled, "that I'm in love with you? While you're dating Becky? And living your life with me not in it?" She asked so genuinely and I understood that...she was right. There was never a time when she could have told me.

The feeling of her skin on mine was a thousand times better than I had ever imagined. "Why are you crying, Millie?" At this, Camille wiped her tears, tenderly taking my hand into hers and bringing it to her lap, still being an incredible tease even in this vulnerable moment.

"Because James. I've kept it inside...for a long time. And no one ever knew. I've never told anyone. Not my mom, not my friends, not my diary. For fear of you somehow finding out." She calmed down, but her confession was drenched in notes of pain. Fuck. How long had she kept this secret and why was I such a fucking idiot to never pick up on it?!

"How long?" I urgently wanted to know how long I'd been an oblivious tool.

Camille hesitated and we listened to the wall clock ticking away while she built up enough courage to tell me the truth. "Since I was fifteen."

Oh, fuck.

"Damn, Camille. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry I...I didn't know." Five years was, indeed, a long time, but Camille only chuckled in response.

"And what would you have done if you'd known? You were just my teenage crush, but then...I was no longer a teenager. And here I am. Sitting with you in my room, at three am...breaking all house rules." All previous hints of Camille's sadness suddenly vanished without a trace and a small mischievous smile showed up on her face. She straightened out her shoulders, and asked me a question that completely obliterated all my logical thinking.

"So? What happens to good girls when they've been teased?" She whispered so sensually, biting her bottom lip and coming up a mere inch away from my lips. "I don't know...can you show me?"