Chapter 30: Smoke and Mirrors
Kelvin
Camilla made it easy.
She never asked questions about the past. Never demanded more than I was willing to give. She looked damn good on my arm, laughed at all the right times, and didn't flinch when she found herself walking into a room full of corporate wolves.
She was smart. Sexy. Sharp-tongued when she needed to be.
But she wasn't Anna.
And she knew it.
The first time she saw Anna in the office, her gaze lingered longer than mine. I watched the way her expression shifted—curious, calculating—and when Anna looked up and immediately looked away, Camilla smiled like she'd found the crack in my armor.
"You didn't mention how pretty your assistant is," she said that evening over drinks.
"She's not my assistant," I replied too quickly.
Camilla's smile widened. "Even better."
She leaned in across the bar, her dark eyes glinting. "Is she the one?"
I didn't answer.
I didn't need to.
Camilla knew. Maybe she saw it in the way I tensed whenever Anna walked by. Or how I pretended not to look for her at meetings. Or maybe it was the silence I fell into every time she asked something that veered too close to real.
But Camilla… she was dangerous in a different way.
She never asked for my heart—only my time. My attention. A seat at my table. And maybe, just maybe, the satisfaction of watching Anna squirm when she saw us together.
"She's the reason, isn't she?" Camilla said one night, slipping on her dress in the mirror. "Why you never sleep after I stay over."
I didn't answer.
I never do when the truth is too close.
That weekend, she showed up at Cavendish & Blake with lunch. Smiling. Radiant. Leaving lipstick marks on my coffee mug and calling me babe in a voice loud enough to echo down the hallway.
And Anna?
Anna froze when she saw us. Just a flicker—a split second—but it was enough. Her hand hesitated on the door, her expression schooled itself into something polite and detached, and she walked away without a word.
Camilla watched her go, smug. "I think she hates me."
"She doesn't hate you," I muttered.
"She wants to." Her voice dropped, soft and lethal. "But she's not the one in your bed."
I didn't answer that either.
Because even if Camilla was in my bed, it wasn't her I was touching in my head.
It was Anna.
Still Anna.
Always Anna.
But I let it happen.
Because I needed something—someone—to remind me that I still had control. That I could choose someone else. That I could bury Anna under business and sex and cold ambition.
Camilla made sure to keep me close in public.
And I let her.
Even when I knew what she was doing. Even when I realized she was using me the same way I was using her—to get under someone else's skin.
But Anna wouldn't say a word. Wouldn't even look at me for longer than a second.
And I was starting to wonder:
Was Camilla winning?
Or was I just losing myself?