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The apartment still smells faintly of her perfume.
Tony notices it the second he walks in.
Something floral underneath cigarette smoke and expensive powder. Cameron never smelled sweet exactly. She smelled sharp. Intentional. Like stepping too close to a flame because the warmth outweighed the danger.
The flat is dark except for the kitchen light he leaves on behind him. Rutshire glows wetly beyond the windows, all rain-streaked amber and blurred streetlights. Somewhere outside a taxi splashes through standing water.
He stands motionless in the middle of the sitting room.
Ginger is keeping an eye on the other founders of Venturer. Finding dirt on them so Tony can destroy them.
He’s looking forward to getting back at Cameron more than the others.
Her throw is still over the armchair.
One of her books lies face-down on the coffee table where she must have abandoned it before she hit his head. There is a wineglass in the sink with the faded crescent of lipstick still staining the rim because neither of them has been back here since everything happened.
Since blood.
Since her horrified face above him.
Tony closes his eyes briefly.
This was a mistake.
He should sell the place. Clear it out. Burn every trace of her from his life and cauterize the wound properly instead of reopening it night after night like a man pressing on a bruise to prove it still hurts after his revenge.
The moment he left the hospital he went to get her from where Rupert had hidden her away for a month.
Flew her back to Rutshire in his helicopter and asked her to come back to Corrinium. Told her he still loves her, that he understands she was merely defending herself against him and his temper that night.
She played along until she got his lie that he didn’t remember what happened that night on camera and she strided right into Rupert Campbell-Black’s arms with a kiss.
That stung and is why he has to be the one to destroy her.
Instead he finds himself opening drawers.
Looking for scraps.
A scarf.
A blouse.
Anything touched by her.
‘Pathetic.’
The word arrives in Cameron’s voice.
Tony exhales sharply through his nose and opens the bedroom door.
And freezes.
She is standing there.
For one impossible second neither of them moves.
Cameron looks equally startled, keys still dangling from her fingers. Her hair is damp from the rain, curls weighing heavy from the rain. Rupert’s jumper covers her upper body. The sight of it strikes Tony somewhere ugly and immediate.
But not as ugly as the relief.
God.
The relief.
It rushes through him so violently he nearly feels sick with it.
Cameron recovers first.
“You’re not supposed to be here.”
Her voice is quieter than usual. Less polished. The edges rubbed raw.
Tony shuts the bedroom door behind him with deliberate calm.
“I could say the same to you seeing as I own this place.”
“I still have a key.”
“Clearly an oversight from me.”
Silence stretches.
It used to be easy between them, once. Not kind, perhaps, but easy in the way storms are easy. Predictable in their destruction.
Now every inch feels uncertain.
Tony watches her dark brown eyes flick toward the scar near his temple before darting away again.
There it is.
The thing neither of them wants to touch.
He wonders if she sees it every time she closes her eyes.
He certainly does.
Sometimes he wakes in the middle of the night with phantom wetness running down his face, blood pooling warm against his collar while Cameron kneels beside him shaking violently.
Please live.
Please, Tony.
Please.
Then she ran.
Left him bleeding across his office floor after nearly killing him.
And still he told no one.
Still he protected her.
Because loving Cameron Cook had always resembled a terminal illness more than anything healthy.
“You look like shit,” she says finally.
Tony laughs softly at that. A tired, broken sound.
“Darling, you fractured my skull if you forgot.”
Her full lips purse
Immediately guilt flashes across her expression so nakedly that Tony almost looks away.
Almost.
“I know.”
No bite.
No performance.
Just truth.
The bedroom suddenly feels too small.
Cameron sets her keys down carefully on the dresser as though abrupt movement might shatter something fragile between them.
“I only came for a few things,” she says. “I didn’t know you’d be here.”
Tony studies her.
A mark from lips bruising at her throat.
His jaw tightens.
“And how is Campbell-Black?”
The question lands precisely as intended.
Cameron’s expression shutters at once.
Interesting.
Very interesting.
Tony steps closer before he can stop himself.
Not touching.
Never touching first with her anymore.
“Is the grass not greener on the backstabbing side,” he asks quietly. Almost cruel
Her eyes snap toward his.
What gave her away?
Or perhaps Tony simply knows her too well. There had been something in every newspaper photograph these past weeks. Something brittle beneath the glamour.
Cameron folds her arms defensively.
“That’s none of your business.”
“How did he disappoint you?”
Cruel.
Cruel and immediate.
She flinches anyway.
“I told him I love him. He said he adores me, kissed my forehead and went to walk the dogs.”
Tony inhales sharply through his nose because that tiny reaction feels less like victory and more like discovering an open wound. He thought he’d be happy to hear she was as hurt as he is.
He’s not. Not really.
For a moment neither speaks.
Rain taps softly against the windows.
Then Cameron laughs once. Bitterly.
“You know the worst thing?” she says, looking somewhere over his shoulder instead of at him. “I can’t even tell whether I meant it romantically. Maybe I just…” Her throat works. “Maybe I just wanted someone to choose me.”
Something inside Tony twists viciously.
Because despite everything, despite blood and betrayal and humiliation, the answer to that has always been him.
Always.
He crosses the room before sense can intervene.
Cameron looks up just as he stops in front of her.
Too close now.
Her breathing changes first.
Then his.
“You nearly killed me,” he says softly.
She goes still.
Tony watches guilt and defiance flood her face again. That unbearable guilt and unrepentant energy she carries like wet silk wrapped around her throat.
“I know.”
“And I still couldn’t give you to the police.”
Her eyes close briefly.
That hurts her too.
Of course it does.
Because there is no escaping the enormity of that kind of love. It is grotesque. Devotional. Humiliating.
When Cameron opens her eyes again they shine dangerously bright.
“Why?”
The question comes out almost angry.
Tony stares at her in disbelief.
“Because it was you.”
Her breath catches.
And suddenly they are back there again:
his blood on her hands,
her knees hitting the floor,
her voice breaking apart as she begged him not to die.
There’s a reason his wife said something about this affair.
It’s different from the others he’s had.
Tony reaches up slowly.
Carefully.
He brushes damp hair back from her face with the backs of his fingers.
Cameron leans into the touch before she can stop herself.
That tiny unconscious movement nearly destroys him.
“You should hate me,” she whispers.
“I’ve tried.”
“I hate you.”
“I know.”
The honesty of it lands between them with frightening weight.
Cameron makes a soft broken sound in the back of her throat and abruptly presses her forehead against his chest like the act pains her.
Tony’s eyes close instantly.
God.
There she is.
There’s his girl.
Ruined and furious and impossible.
His arms come around her automatically, hesitation arriving far too late to matter. Cameron grips fistfuls of his shirt like she’s drowning.
Neither mentions Rupert.
Neither mentions the blood.
Nor the betrayal.
But both of them feel it standing in the room with them anyway.
“He’ll never love you back. Not the way you want or need.”
The words settle into her skin like poison.
Tony says them quietly against her hair, not triumphant enough for cruelty and not gentle enough for comfort. The low rasp of his voice vibrates through her where she’s pressed against him, his chest warm beneath her cheek despite everything.
Cameron goes rigid in his arms.
Immediately rigid.
Tony feels it happen.
But he continues anyway because he cannot stop himself now that he’s found the bruise.
“He’s too busy chasing Declan’s daughter,” he murmurs into her curls. “No part of that exposé was a lie.”
“No.”
The denial tears out of her instantly. Sharp. Angry. Almost feral.
She pulls back enough to look at him properly, dark eyes blazing. Rainwater still clings to her lashes. Her mouth is slightly swollen where she’s been biting at it.
“No,” she says again, quieter this time.
But the awful thing is she can feel the possibility of truth moving underneath her ribs.
Rupert invited her to Venturer.
Rupert protected her.
When Tony woke from surgery furious and bleeding vengeance from every pore, Rupert had hidden her away for a month like something precious smuggled across enemy lines. He had flown her to beautiful places and touched her like she was delicate instead of dangerous. He’d asked her to stay. Asked her to live with him.
People did not do those things unless they cared.
Did they?
Cameron suddenly feels very young.
Not outwardly. Never outwardly. Outwardly Cameron Cook has carried herself like she was twenty-five since she was about sixteen. Polished. Clever. Sharp enough to draw blood.
But somewhere deep beneath all that polish lives the girl who packed bags too quickly after her mother chose another man over her comfort in her own home. The girl who learned love could look like being tolerated. Sheltered. Kept nearby when convenient.
Care means protection.
Care means being invited to stay.
Care means not being abandoned.
Doesn’t it?
Tony watches the realization flicker behind her eyes and immediately hates himself for putting it there.
Not enough to stop.
Never enough to stop.
“Darling,” he says softly, brushing his thumb against her wrist where her pulse jumps violently beneath the skin, “Rupert Campbell-Black adores being adored. That’s not the same thing as loving someone.”
“Shut up.”
But there’s no heat behind it now.
Only hurt.
Tony’s gaze drops briefly to her mouth.
Rupert’s mouth had been there.
The thought curdles something black inside him.
“And you know I’m right,” he says.
Cameron laughs then, but it comes out cracked around the edges.
“You’re unbelievable.”
“Mm.”
“You destroy everything you touch.”
Tony’s eyes flick toward the scar reflected faintly in the bedroom mirror behind her.
A souvenir from her hands.
“Yes,” he says simply.
Cameron hates that answer most of all.
Because there is no defense in it.
No pretending.
No manipulation.
Just truth sitting naked between them.
“You’re the worst kind of monster, Tony,” she whispers, staring directly into him now. “Because you believe you’re not one.”
Something flickers across his face then.
Not anger.
Something sadder.
More exhausted.
Cameron becomes suddenly aware that her hand has tightened around his without her noticing. Her fingers curled hard against his like some traitorous part of her body reached for him before her mind could object.
Tony looks down at their joined hands.
Very slowly, he brings their knuckles between them.
Not kissing them.
Just holding them there.
Like evidence.
Then he leans forward until his forehead rests against hers.
The intimacy of it feels almost unbearable.
His voice drops lower when he speaks again.
“I know.”
And God, that is the problem, isn’t it?
Tony Baddingham knows exactly what he is.
Knows he manipulated her after New Years.
Knows part of him wants revenge more than forgiveness.
Knows he should let her go.
Knows loving him has hollowed her out, could ruin her.
Yet here he is anyway.
Breathing her air.
Holding her hand like it matters more than his pride.
Cameron’s eyes sting unexpectedly.
She hates him.
Hates his temper.
His control.
His endless need to possess.
The way he always finds the softest part of her and presses until it bruises.
Hates how she left the States with trust in nothing but herself and in him.
But standing here with Rupert’s jumper on her body and Tony’s forehead against hers, she realizes something horrifying:
Rupert makes her feel protected.
Tony makes her feel invincible.
And perhaps that is worse.
“I wish I never met you,” she says quietly.
The confession barely exists between them before her mouth brushes his.
Not quite a kiss yet.
A wound.
Tony exhales against her lips, unsteady for the first time all evening. His hand tightens around hers hard enough to feel the pulse jumping there.
“And I will destroy you,” he says softly, terribly softly, “the same way I’m going to destroy everyone at Venturer because I am so fucking stupid for you Monica was threatening me minutes before you swung that award at my head and I still…”
The rest disappears.
Cameron kisses him.
It happens with the violence of something long-denied finally snapping under pressure.
Tony makes a rough sound against her mouth, halfway between anger and relief, and then they are pushing into each other desperately, all sharp breaths and collision. His hands find her waist instantly like memory. Cameron grips the front of his shirt hard enough to wrinkle it between her fists.
It feels catastrophic.
It feels like coming home.
That is the horror of it.
Outside, rain lashes against the windows in silver streaks. Somewhere below, Rutshire continues breathing through wet streets and headlights and late-night laughter, oblivious to the implosion occurring in this bedroom.
Cameron didn’t know Monica knew.
Not really.
Not in the way Tony just admitted.
She knew Monica suspected. Knew Monica saw through the boss/employee facade quicker than most people did. But this?
Monica had tried to stop him.
The realization slides coldly through her even as Tony kisses her like he’s starving.
How long had they looked obvious to everyone else?
How far gone had Tony been that his wife had stepped in front of the disaster and still failed to stop it?
Cameron’s thoughts blur apart when Tony’s hand comes up into her damp curls, careful for a moment before losing restraint completely. The kiss turns deeper, messier. Months of betrayal and fury and wanting crash together until she can barely separate one emotion from the next.
Tony kisses like a man arguing with fate.
Like if he can get close enough he can undo what happened between them.
Cameron hates that it works.
Hates the dizzy warmth unraveling through her chest.
Hates the little broken noise that leaves her throat when his forehead bumps against hers between kisses.
Hates that some ugly, traitorous part of her still fits against him perfectly.
Because this is the man she nearly killed.
This is the man who wants revenge.
This is the man who would burn Rupert Campbell-Black’s world to ash if it meant dragging her back into his chaos.
And still she kisses him harder.
Somewhere through the hurricane of it, a thought surfaces unexpectedly:
Did he mean it?
That night.
The night everything shattered.
Tony standing in his office with his temper flaring hot and vicious, saying he would leave Monica for her. Saying it with enough conviction that Cameron had almost believed him.
Would he actually have done it?
Would he have torn apart his marriage, his image, his carefully built life for her?
She will never know now.
The answer drowned in blood on carpeted floors.
Tony’s shorter hair slips through her fingers as she clutches at him instinctively, and before she can stop herself the words fall out against his mouth:
“I prefer it longer.”
The silence that follows lasts less than a second.
Then Tony laughs.
Actually laughs.
A startled, wrecked sound against her lips like she has just cracked something open in him unexpectedly.
“There she is,” he murmurs.
Cameron frowns slightly, breathless and disoriented.
“What?”
“That terrifying little dictator I fell in love with.” His thumb strokes once along her jaw, travelling to her neck where Rupert’s hickey rests and so does a chain that holds the ring Tony promised to replace with an engagement ring if Corinium won against Venturer just three months ago. “Only you could critique my hair after being the reason it’s different.” He continues.
Despite herself, despite everything, Cameron lets out a helpless laugh that dissolves almost immediately when Tony looks at her afterward.
Too openly.
Too lovingly.
It terrifies her more than his anger ever did.
“…I know Sarah Stratton is carrying your baby, Tony.”
The words land between them like a blade slid carefully between ribs.
Tony goes utterly still.
Cameron feels it instantly. The pause in his breathing. The sudden tension in the hand at her waist.
Rain hisses softly against the windows.
“She slept in Rupert’s guest room for two nights,” Cameron continues quietly, their mouths still dangerously close. “And after the tenth time I caught her crying in the kitchen, she finally told me.”
Tony says nothing.
For the first time since she walked into this apartment, he looks cornered.
Not angry.
Not manipulative.
Caught.
Brown eyes search his face mercilessly now.
“You slapped me because I wouldn’t let you get one over on Rupert,” she whispers. “Meanwhile you fucked Sarah and got her pregnant.”
Each word is careful.
Precise.
A punishment.
Tony closes his eyes briefly.
Of all the ways he imagined this night going, he had not imagined this. Not Cameron finding out like this. Not through Sarah weeping over tea in Rupert Campbell-Black’s kitchen like some tragic girl in a BBC period drama.
When he opens his eyes again, there is something exhausted in them.
“I told her to get rid of it.”
The confession falls flatly into the room.
Brutal in its simplicity.
For one horrible second Cameron thinks he might be saying it for absolution. As if proving the child means nothing might somehow lessen the betrayal between them.
Or perhaps he wants to cauterize this thing between them once and for all. Burn it down completely.
But Cameron knows Tony too well now.
The truth is uglier than either.
Tony simply cannot imagine his life rearranging itself around anyone except himself and the people he chooses obsessively. Monica. Cameron. Corrinium. Power. Revenge.
A baby conceived in carelessness has no place in that architecture.
“It’s Sarah and her husband’s problem,” he says finally, jaw tight. “Not mine.”
Cameron stares at him.
And there he is again.
The monster.
Not because he lies about what he is.
Because he tells the truth so plainly.
Something inside her cracks quietly.
“My life was supposed to revolve around you,” she says, voice suddenly fragile in a way she despises. “And you couldn’t even be faithful to both your wife and me.”
Tony flinches almost imperceptibly.
“The mistress you couldn’t handle the idea of not having,” she finishes.
Silence.
Heavy.
Airless.
Tony’s hand slides from her waist slowly, reluctantly, like the movement physically pains him.
Cameron suddenly understands something devastating:
Tony loved her.
Perhaps more than he had ever loved anyone.
But loving someone and being good for them had never once been the same thing to him.
And Rupert…
Rupert might never love her the way she aches to be loved. Might spend years with one eye turned unconsciously toward Taggie like a man staring at sunlight he cannot quite stop chasing. But Rupert had hidden her when she was frightened. Held her when she shook. Given her softness instead of possession.
Perhaps that would have to be enough.
Perhaps it always had been.
Tony looks at her like he already knows what she’s decided.
That is the unbearable thing about them.
They know each other too well.
Outside, thunder rolls low across Rutshire.
Cameron presses one final kiss briefly to the corner of his mouth, more grief than affection now, before pulling away.
Tony lets her go.
Not because he wants to.
Because some ruined part of him understands that if he reaches for her again, he may never stop.
And later, long after Cameron returns to Rupert Campbell-Black’s bed and Tony returns to the Baddingham’s cold ancestral halls, they will continue anyway.
Tony will destroy Venturer piece by piece with Cameron’s name burning like a brand beneath every act of vengeance.
Cameron will stand beside Rupert smiling beautifully at parties while occasionally catching him watching Taggie with that helpless softness he never quite gives her.
And neither of them will ever fully leave the other behind.
That is the tragedy.
Not the blood.
Not the betrayal.
Not even the violence.
The tragedy is that after everything, after all the damage and humiliation and ruin, some part of Tony Baddingham will always belong to Cameron Cook.
And some part of Cameron, however unwillingly, will always answer back.