WAVES STROKE THE RAGGED ROCKS OF THE SHORE, fizzling into a cacophony of white water. The early-evening weather is still muggy despite a layer of thick haze over the fiery sun which is now low on the horizon. Despite the ease with which Cameron is rowing the boat on the gentle ocean swells, his face and neck are glistening with perspiration; I can almost feel the heat radiating off his ridiculously hard body.
He unzips his lifejacket to reveal a white T-shirt clinging to the defined muscles of his chest. My lips part slightly and I swallow hard, stupidly mesmerized by the striations of his golden arms that flex with each tug of the oars. Unable to stop myself, I run my eyes over his flawless body and up to his face where I unexpectedly collide with his scorching gaze. Damn. I divert my eyes quickly, hoping he didn’t see me shamelessly checking out his body.
“I know we’re close to the shore, O’Neill, but you should really keep your life jacket zipped up.”
“Just keep yours on. I’ll hold onto you if the boat goes down.”
“Uh, okay.” I shake my head in admonishment. “But just remember what happened to Jack at the end of Titanic…”
“I’ll bear it in mind, Avery.”
I offer to help with the rowing, but he declines, continuing to make light work of it. Witnessing the potential of his powerful body leaves an ache pulsating between my legs which distracts me as I try to take in the beautifully brutal coastline and enthralling landscape behind it.
The boat stills as we pull into a cove. A sandy beach wild with seaweed and tufts of sea-bent reeds unfurls before us, reaching out to a lawn of tall grass framed on three sides by ancient lofty trees. Cameron jumps out of the boat and into the water which laps at his knees, then drags the skiff onto the pebbly sand and helps me get out. I’m still being plagued by this damn limp which my friend now seems to notice as soon as it starts. He offers me a hand, but I decline, mostly to avoid the surge of dizzying electricity that sears me to my core every time his fingertips come close to mine, and because of my fear—judging by the look in his eyes—that he may feel it too. I throw my life jacket into the boat as the flat soles of my sandals sink into the spongy sand.
Without asking, Cameron helps me climb up a reed-dotted dune which slopes up to meet a magnificent sheet of green. As my eyes pan forward to take in the exquisite emerald grass, the excitement at seeing this natural wonder dissolves in an instant as the sight of something knocks the wind out of me.
A lone tree, a king amongst trees, stands in the middle of the field, tall, thick, uniquely majestic and distinct from the wall of fat, dense spruces that line the edge of the grass and turn the field into a private enclave about three hundred foot wide by five hundred long. The sinewy eight-foot-wide tree trunk bends into a dozen thick, twisting branches that extend eighty feet in diameter and bear thick clouds of leaves that glisten like slivers of jade in the sun.
It is an oak, centuries old.
And it looks exactly like the wooden carving I saw at the Society.
A ripple of anxiety stops me in my tracks as I’m sent back to that mural and the sight, the smells and the sounds of the bodies gyrating below it.
“You okay?” Cameron asks softly, turning back to look at me. He takes a few steps towards me, pivoting me slightly so that I’m no longer facing the tree.
I pause, my mouth dry. “Yeah, I just…”
“I had the same feeling the first time I came here. The only way to get over that place is to face the things that remind you of it until it no longer has any power over you.”
“I just… I just saw that place yesterday… for the first time,” I stammer, peering into his eyes. “I’m not a psychiatrist, Cameron, but don’t you think it’s a bit early for exposure therapy? I mean I’ve barely assimilated…” My voice trails off as a thought crosses my mind. “That’s not the same oak from the mural is it?”
“Probably not.”
“Probably not?”
“The Society was started in New York State three centuries ago. There are similar fields and meadows in the area with similar solitary trees. Legend has it that Quercus Velutina started in fields like this, under trees. There were gatherings at night. Patrons wore cloaks and masks. At night, in the moonlight, the tree would look almost completely black. That’s what the name came from—it’s not about the species of oak, but about the color. With the age of technology and less privacy and all that, they eventually moved their operations indoors.”
Silence envelops us for a few moments as I become aware of the setting sun which casts a long, ominous shadow that falls behind the tree like a cloak.
“Come on. Let’s go,” he says, taking hold of my hand and easing me gently in the direction of the oak.
I pull back, releasing my hand from his.
“Stop. Just give me a minute. Jesus, Cameron, you should have asked me before bringing me here. I’m still trying to get over what I saw last night—”
He shakes his head in frustration and then leans over and lifts me up into his arms effortlessly, carrying me across them as easily as if I were a child.
“Hey, put me down!”
He keeps walking, holding onto me tightly.
“I told you that I’ve had enough of people dictating what happens to me. Put me down, damn it!”
“We can do this the easy way or the hard way,” he responds firmly. “Just let me know what you prefer.”
As we approach the tree, he sets me down onto the soil around its thick base and I yank my hand away from him in irritation.
“You know, I seriously need to take self-defense classes once I sort my life out! And that’s just to protect me from the men who are supposed to care about me!”
“Yeah, well, I doubt it would do you much good against me, I’m afraid.”
Aware of how slim and feeble I felt in his dense arms, I know he is right, but the arrogance of the man and the knowledge we both have of his total physical dominance over me leave me fuming.
“You know, you can’t just use your strength and height and money to do whatever you want to people. Jesus! What is it with men like you?!” I shout.
“Men like me? I’m not sure I’ve figured out what that type is yet.”
“Well, I’m happy to enlighten—”
“Jesus Christ!” he exclaims, taking a fierce step towards me. “You are the single most infuriating woman I’ve ever met in my entire life!”
“Really? Well, I’m sorry I’m not one of those vacuous, cerebrally defective groupies that flock around you and let you do whatever you want to them. I guess it must be a major irritation to have a woman not capitulate to your every whi—”
“Oh, believe me, I know you’re not one of those.”
With a tip of the head, he signals towards the tree that had filled me with so much trepidation. I’m so incensed at Cameron that I barely register that I’m just feet away from the very thing that filled me with so much dread.
Taking my glare off the man in front of me, I take in the oak for a few moments before tentatively walking up to the colossal trunk on Cameron’s urging and edging my hands onto its rough bark. The massive dark-green foliage forms a tent around us, allowing thin glimmers of pale-orange light to poke through the canopy. A fluttering of unseen birds sheltering in the branches above has me closing my eyes for a moment, trying to absorb the pure energy of the tree, to ground myself to the Earth through this ancient conduit as I’ve done with trees so many times in the past, and as I showed Cameron how to do many times at college. I run my fingertips up the fibrous wood, feeling the lines and grooves of the trunk before sitting down on the tangled roots of the giant, my back leaning against its coarse shaft.
Cameron sits down opposite me as I close my eyes and take a few quiet breaths. Several minutes pass before I open my eyes to find him watching me as the dying light starts to fade around us.
“Look, I’m sorry,” he concedes, “about bringing you here like this. I know I’m an insensitive asshole and it’s a shitty thing to do.”
“Well, as long as you know. That’s useful. Do you have a time machine so we can apply that knowledge to half an hour ago?”
“It’s just that I know what that place can do to people. Some people love it, go back for years, and come out unscathed. I’ve seen other people become poisoned by it, torn apart. I do not want that for you. I don’t want you to go through what I went through. I don’t want that place to ever have power over you again. I need to be sure it’s not going to haunt you like it’s done to others.”
His caring words melt my rancor and I let out a long sigh, releasing murky energy from me. “I’m sorry too,” I breathe. “Honestly, I recommend ignoring me as much as possible right now. I’m not exactly emotionally stable at the moment.”
His soft eyes find my lips as we sit in silence punctuated by the distant whisper of ocean waves and the occasional cry of a bird overhead. I’m used to sitting in silence with Cameron. We would do it a lot at college. It always felt so comfortable for some reason. Cameron isn’t afraid of silence the way that self-conscious or shy people can be. He’s confident and self-possessed and doesn’t feel the need to jump through hoops to fill gaps in conversation. Sometimes we would just share a look and sense what the other was feeling. It felt so good to be able to feel safe and relaxed around someone else without having to talk. I guess it still feels good.
“Cam, I wish you’d told me what you were dealing with when we first met. I could have helped you more. I wish you could have trusted me.”
“I wanted to. But telling you about Q.N. would have meant putting you in danger.”
“But still—”
“It wasn’t just about the Society. There was a lot of… bad energy around me—Alex, Markov, Jack, other friends of theirs. The network is large. My father was also going through some stuff. And then Evie… It was just a difficult time.”
“What Jack did to Evie and your father was so wrong.”
He wraps his strong arms around his bent knees, one ankle crossed over the other. “Yeah. My father saw Jack as a second son almost. And then seducing my sister on Alex Frost’s command… I can never forgive him for that. Especially with how cruel he was to her. She was a fucking mess for months. When you told me that you’d started to date him, I couldn’t believe it. I’d seen you shoot down every bad-boy investment banker asshole who’d ever hit on you. I thought it’d be short-lived like most of Jack’s relationships,” he says, sneering at the word. “I thought you’d see how unpredictable he is, how dangerous. When I saw you falling in love with him, I thought I could make you wake up. That’s why I kept on about it so much. I thought I could make you snap out of it.”
“Jack pursued me for a long time before we finally got together,” I respond. “I didn’t talk about it because I knew there was some bad blood between you two. I had no idea how strongly you felt about him or what he’d done with Evie and your father. If I’d known, I would never have allowed him near me.”
“You did everything you could have done to try to make things work.”
A sharp gust of wind hits us, leaving a dozen fat leaves falling from the branches like tears.
“If I had known the full story, I would never have tried to force you to accept him. I thought you were just being difficult.”
“No. I believe Jack has a heart deep down somewhere. I know he can be caring and protective and loving. But the reason I tried so hard to get you to leave him is because he’s also ruthless and dangerous and I was scared that he’d hurt you badly one day. That’s why I told you about some of the other women he’d seduced and cast aside, about some of the people he’d extorted, about the professor he’d been blackmailing. I thought it would—”
“I confronted Jack about all the stuff you told me. Every single thing that you told me, he admitted it. He told me he was ashamed of a lot of things he’d done when he was younger. He said it had been a bad time in his life. The fact that he could admit to those things was one of the reasons I was able to trust him. He seemed so sincere.”
“He probably was. A couple of months after you came back from London together, I found out that he’d cut off all contact with Vallen, Gravier and Alex. Evie called me one day to say that Jack had been to see her. She told me he’d been very upset and that he’d apologized for what he did to her and asked her to forgive him.”
I shake my head in disbelief, wishing Evie could have confided in me.
“A couple of weeks later, he called me and asked me to meet him,” Cameron continues. “We met at Mason’s house. He was a mess. I’d never seen him like that. He told me about some of the things he’d been through with Alex. He said he was madly in love with you and would never do anything to hurt you. He tried to make peace with me.” Cameron’s voice is stiff and slow, his breathing measured, as though trying to keep his emotions contained. “I was still so angry with him for everything—you, Evelyn, my father. I wanted to forgive him, but… I couldn’t. I told him that if he ever hurt you, I would tell you everything I knew about him, including Alex and Evie. Things turned ugly. Mason had to get between us.”
“Oh, God, Cam. I’m sorry.”
He breathes deeply, observing the ground below him for long moments.
“There’s something else,” he utters after what feels like an age as the sun starts to disappear behind the horizon in a blazing shower of amber flames.
Nervous energy makes my insides buzz as his words come out. I’ve seen and heard so many things in the last two days that I didn’t want to hear. I don’t know if I want to know anything else.
“Okay,” I respond.
“When you got back and I realized I couldn’t stop what you felt for him, I did something that… I shouldn’t have.”
“What did you do?”
“I wasn’t thinking rationally at the time,” he responds, that familiar haunted veil over his face. “I thought if I could keep Jack away from Alex, that maybe there was a chance it could work between you and him. I thought if I could keep her out of his life, there would be less chance of him hurting you.”
“Tell me,” I urge, a whirlwind of trepidation spinning in my belly.
“You remember the fight we had right before Thanksgiving—the last time we spoke to each other?”
“Of course.”
“I called Alex that night, told her I wanted to talk. She invited me over. We talked for a while, had a couple of drinks. Before I had a chance to tell her to stay away from Jack, she made a move on me and I pushed her away. She didn’t take it well. She brought up Jack… and you. Things got… unpleasant.”
“What happened?”
“I made it clear to her that if she ever went near Jack ever again, I would ruin her. I would expose her, her husband and everyone around her, go to the police if need be. When I got home and sobered up, I realized that Alex knew how bad things were between me and Jack and that she may figure out that it wasn’t Jack that I was trying to protect—it was you. And that she may make it her mission to try to hurt you for it…”
“I wish you didn’t do that,” I mutter. “You may have just spurred her on to get Jack back.”
“If he cheated on you, it’s not because of Alex. It’s because of him. It was his choice to do that, no one else’s.”
He’s right, of course, but that doesn’t stop shards of fury from penetrating my mind. “Cameron, you knew Jack had gone to the Society after we got married. Why didn’t you at least tell me that?”
“I wanted to. That’s the only reason I went to that gala in June—to see you. To see if you were okay. I had security people watch you on the security cameras as soon as you arrived so that I could get you alone and talk to you. That’s how I ended up on the roof.”
“Yeah, and you did see me. You spent time with me alone and you didn’t say anything. Why didn’t you tell me?! You saw me upset. You must have known something was wrong. What were you waiting for?”
“We hadn’t spoken for two and a half years, Jessynia. After everything that had happened between us, I knew I’d be the last person in the world you’d want to hear it from. I wanted to try to reconnect so that we could at least be friends and I could work out a way to tell you. I tried.”
“No. No, you didn’t. You didn’t tell me about Alex, or Evie, or your father, or the Society. Why didn’t you tell me about everything before we got married? You just let me go ahead with it. You knew how much I loved Evie. I would never have told anyone. You should have told me what he did to her!”
“I tried to, many times. Evie made it clear that if I ever told anyone, she’d never forgive me. It would have put you in danger to know about the Society, and about Alex Frost’s proclivities for that matter. And damn it, Jessynia, seeing you with the man I grew up with was one of the most painful fucking things I’ve ever been through in my life. I didn’t handle the situation like I should have done. The day I found out you were getting married to him was… unbearable. I ended up getting on a plane and flying out of the country. I was falling ill by the end of it. I had to walk away. From him. From you. From everything.” The twilight and tangled limbs of the tree cast shadows under Cameron’s eyes which plead with mine desperately. “I don’t expect you to forgive me for everything that I’ve done—or not done. I’ve made a mess out of everything. I don’t blame you if you hate me.”
“I don’t hate you.”
Seeing the pain haunting his face makes me feel hollow. I want to tell him I forgive him. I want to say sorry too for all the pain he went through. I want to hug him and tell him it will be alright. But right now, I can’t get past all the things Cameron should have told me but didn’t.
“It’s getting dark,” I whisper. “Can you take me back?”
As the last glimmers of daylight begin to fade, we sit in strained silence as Cameron rows us back across the now-gloomy waters of the bay, the full moon heavy, witness to the tension between us. A cool evening breeze leaves a spattering of goosebumps on my skin and I wrap my arms around my waist as sharp sprays of cool water strike us. I sense Cameron’s gaze on my face as I attempt to look everywhere but at him, though not looking at him does little to dampen my awareness of the glow emanating from the man and the lilac twilight bouncing off his contracting muscles.
As we reach the jetty in front of Redwood, he jumps out and holds the boat against the side. He offers his hand to help me out, but I don’t take it, but instead step out clumsily onto the damp wood which sends a sharp jolt into my leg.
Smart, Jess.
I leave him to tie up the boat and walk up the garden, limping as I reach the stairs leading up to the back door which I negotiate with difficulty.
The only thing I want right now is to lie down and forget that the person I thought was one of my closest friends in the world could stand by and watch me marry Jack without telling me everything I needed to know, and then stay silent when he knew my husband was cheating on me over and over again.
