"I was on the dance floor," Mia replied and refused to let Carrie off easy. "Why didn't you tell me you were coming tonight?"
"Oh, it was a last-minute thing. I wasn't going to come, then changed my mind, and because it was all so spur of the moment, I figured I'd find you here," she said, speaking in a fast, nervous rush. "Come on, let's go back out and get a drink." She stepped toward Mia in an attempt to usher her out of the bathroom.
Mia turned to go, but something on the mirror caught her eye. At first she thought it was a reflection of something in the bathroom, but when she stepped back to get a better look, she realized someone had written on the mirror itself-in what appeared to be bright red lipstick.
Mia Wilde is a slut.
The slur, coming from someone she'd once believed was a friend, hurt. Badly. She glanced back at Carrie, who now looked panicked because she knew she'd been caught red-handed.
And the only thing Mia could think of to ask in that moment was, "Why? Why write this about me? Why the pictures? The stuff you did to my car? The panties you sent? Why, Carrie?"
Mia expected Carrie to initially deny everything, but instead she lifted her chin scornfully. "Because I wanted you to see the way you act around men. The trampy way you dress. You want attention? Well, I made sure you got it."
A woman walked into the bathroom area, and Mia ignored her, knowing she couldn't let Carrie walk away now. "God, Carrie, what did I ever do to you?"
"You're a tramp," she said, as if that explained everything.
Mia thought back to her conversation with Cameron and his own explanation for Carrie's possible behavior. "Is this because of your mother?"
Carrie stiffened defensively. "Of course not. It's all about you. You're like a bitch in heat around men."
Mia tried not to flinch at Carrie's cruel words, though she couldn't deny they did sting. "I think this does have to do with your mother, whether you realize it or not," she said with more calm than she felt. "You can't control your mother's actions when it comes to the men who come and go from her life and the way she acts around them. And you blame your mother for your parents' divorce, so you've focused all that anger my way."
"My mother is, and always will be, a whore," Carrie said bitterly. "Just like you."
Although Mia was still hurt and angry, she could no longer take it as personally as she once had. She could only feel sorry for Carrie, that she was so wrapped up in her mother's life that somewhere along the way she'd lost control of her own. And until she disengaged herself from her mother and the situation at home, it would always continue.
But before she let Carrie go, she wanted her to know one thing. "In a lot of ways, you did me a huge favor. Those pictures you sent did make me see how my actions and behavior made me appear to other people. It made me think and change certain things, like how I dress and act. So if that was your intent, it worked."
The corner of Carrie's mouth curled in a malicious smile. "Just remember, once a tramp, always a tramp."
Carrie pushed around her, and Mia let her go. There was nothing left to say, and this was one friendship Mia didn't care to salvage. With a tired sigh, Mia followed her out of the lounge just in time to see Cameron catch Carrie by the arm and stop her mid-stride.
"Can I have the camera, please?" he asked politely and held out his free hand to confiscate the item.
Carrie yanked her arm from Cameron's grasp and narrowed her gaze at him. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"Oh, I think you do." He smiled, though the look in his eyes spoke volumes and told Carrie just how serious he was.
"I saw you taking pictures of Mia while she was dancing with Rick, and unless you want Mia to press charges against you for all the other crap you've pulled, then I suggest you hand over that disposable camera you used tonight."
"Fine," she huffed. She dug through her purse, found the disposable camera, and shoved it into his hand. "You don't need pictures to know she's a slut."
Cameron's jaw clenched in anger, but he maintained a cool composure when he replied to Carrie's rude comment. "If you ever use the word slut, whore, or tramp in the same sentence as Mia again, I can guarantee you'll be slapped with a lawsuit for slander so fast your head will spin."
Carrie stormed off, and Mia glanced at Cameron. "Thanks format."
"Of course." His fingers flexed around the camera he still held in his hand as if he had to resist the urge to crush it into tiny pieces right then and there. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah, I'm good." She offered him a smile, because she was so grateful she no longer had to worry about when the next assault was going to happen. "It's finally over. Let's go home."
Her case was over. And after tonight, they would be, too.
Chapter Sixteen
AS soon as they arrived back at his place, Cameron noticed an immediate change in Mia, as if she were already withdrawing emotionally from him because she sensed the end for them was near. By the time they reached his bedroom, he was determined to break through that reserve of hers and make Mia his in every way that mattered-heart, body, and soul. Tonight, he wanted it all and would give no less to her in return.
But before he could make the first move, she slid her arms around his neck, pulled his mouth to hers, and initiated a hot, deep, take-charge kiss. The kind that tasted like sex and sin and desire, and promised erotic, anything-goes pleasure. The kind that could drive a man crazy with the need to get inside of her as soon as possible.
His body responded to the soft warmth of her breasts pressed against his chest and the seductive way she rolled her hips against his. But for as much as she aroused him, he recognized her assertive approach as an attempt to be in control of tonight's encounter, and to keep a wealth of fears and insecurities at bay… to keep what they were about to do within the confines of pure, mindless, fuck-me sex so she didn't have to think or feel about anything beyond the moment of self-indulgence and physical satisfaction.
Her hands tugged the hem of his shirt from the waistband of his jeans in an attempt to get him naked. Complying, he raised his arms so she could strip off the shirt, but when her fingers dropped eagerly to the button fly securing the front of his pants, he grasped her wrists and pulled her hands away. He knew, just as she obviously did, that he couldn't think straight when she touched him intimately. He had no doubt she'd been counting on exactly that, but he wasn't about to let go that way… not until his fingers were on her, not until his cock was buried deep inside her, not until he felt her come.
He broke their kiss, and before she could issue a protest, he turned her around so she was facing his dresser mirror and he stood behind her. In the reflection, their gazes met, hers a dark shade of smoky gray as he lowered the zipper of her dress down her back. His fingers touched the soft, smooth skin he exposed, and he felt her shiver from his caress.
A slow, sensual smile curved her lips. "I didn't realize you liked to watch," she murmured.
He pushed the sleeves of her dress off her shoulders and down her arms, then skimmed the body-hugging material over the curve of her hips until it finally dropped to the floor. His mouth went dry as he took in her provocative, black, sheer lace bra and matching G-string panties that made her look as though she'd just stepped from the centerfold of a men's magazine. Except she was all his. His fantasy. His desire. His future.
He unfastened her bra and tossed it aside as well. Her breasts spilled forward, full and voluptuous and perfectly proportioned to her slender waist and the swell of her hips. "Watching adds an element of excitement, don't you think?" he whispered in her ear.
She dampened her bottom lip with her tongue. "I don't need a mirror to make me hot for you."