Disclaimer: I own nothing – all rights go to Ally Carter
I don't know how long I cried for but I was glad that Zach was there with me. It felt nice to depend on someone else for a change.
Once I finally got my tears under control I turned my head around to look into Zach's eyes.
He smiled weakly at me and I tried to do the same back but I have to admit it was a pretty pathetic excuse for a smile. I sighed and he wiped my tears away gently.
"What's wrong Gallagher Girl?" Zach said breaking the comfortable silence. "What happened back there?"
I readjusted myself on his lap but he held me in place. "Cammie, stop stalling, talk to me?"
I nodded and closed my eyes to take a deep breath, "I found a letter." I said, gesturing to the table. My breath caught in my throat but I managed to choke out; "from my dad." I tried to quickly wipe a stray tear away before Zach could see but - being a spy and all - he beat me to it.
He didn't remove his hand from my cheek straight away, but left it there as more of a caress. Zach didn't say anything so I took it as a sign to carry on.
"You can read it if you like, I'm not sure if I can again..." as I trailed off he removed his hand from my cheek and reached for the letter.
His eyes scanned over it quickly, only getting the sense of what had me so torn up. Zach put the letter down and looked at me with sympathy.
In that moment I had a thought: I'd never realised how beautiful his eyes were before. Come to think of it, I'd never given Zach much thought; after all he was just another cocky, arrogant boy who thought he could beat me when I first came here.
Now I saw a different side of him, the wonderful and caring side. Oh my god I thought to myself, I think I'm falling in love with Zachary Goode!
"Do you want to talk about it Cam?" I snapped out of it and realised that he was talking about the letter from my dad and not the silent eye conversation that we may or may not have been having. I tried to focus on what he had said.
"I was eight; I was in France with my mom and my dad. My dad and I were sitting in a cafe when two men came through the window... They aimed the gun at me, but my dad jumped in front of me just as they pulled the trigger. He's dead because of me Zach. It's my fault that he's dead..."
Zach was shaking his head before I'd even finished, "It's not your fault Cammie, and you can't blame yourself for what happened."
I felt the tears brim in my eyes again, "But I do Zach, the COC were trying to kill me, me not him."
"It's still not your fault Gallagher Girl, anyone would've done it. If this was happening now, you would jump in front of a bullet for anyone, so don't blame yourself." He sounded so emotional about this.
It made me think that I wasn't the only one the COC had affected. I made a mental note to talk to him about it at another time, the way he'd spoken so powerfully made it clear that he didn't want talk about it at the moment.
We looked into each other's eyes again and I leaned in at the same time as he did; we both hesitated before he closed the gap between us and kissed me. I'd been kissed before but I'd never felt like this. It felt... so natural.
We pulled back and looked in each other's eyes. I smiled and he did the same. Then he smirked and I rolled my eyes.
He continued to smirk for the next seven seconds, which was when I leaned in and kissed him again, wiping the smirk off of his face completely.
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