Chapter Nine
Getting her mom’s approval was difficult, but it wasn’t impossible. Seeing how happy her daughter was, Morganna couldn’t keep fighting against them, and she grumbled about them less.
Camila got to spend more time at Samuel’s place than ever before, and there were no more nightmares.
Their idyll life continued, and when she stopped to think about it, Camila still felt dazed from it, because it felt too good to be true. She went to work, went back home, went out with Samuel and Brianna, then back to their place. All of it went so smoothly that, when she really stopped to think, was kind of amazing.
Life was too blissful. But that didn’t mean it was without problems.
Adrien was still in prison, because he had been refused bail in his court hearing. He was still a part of the Kane family, which had a lot of money and influence behind it that even Samuel couldn’t stop. Adrien appealed his denial of bail, however, he was refused twice. He was still trying.
This bit worried Camila, but Samuel didn’t look worried at all, which made her think he had plans of his own in the motion that she wasn’t in on. She could allow him a few of his secrets, and she really didn’t want to know anyway, so she didn’t bother him about it.
She wanted to completely forget she’d ever had Adrien in her life. If only news of him would stop popping up every once in a while, everything would be perfect.
“You’ve been looking really happy these days,” Sandra at work said when she stopped by to collect her new project. “Your relationship with the new guy seems to be going well?”
“Oh, yeah,” she said, unconsciously smiling. “He’s actually waiting outside for me right now, which is why I’m in such a hurry,” she added, glaring at her boss who was doing his own thing and ignoring her standing right there.
Sandra chuckled as she went back to working on her computer. “Boss, cut her some slack. She’s been producing real good work recently, you know.”
“You still took a few days off without so much as a word,” he grumbled, finally looking at her, even though he was frowning.
“It was an emergency,” Camila said quickly. “I can't explain the specifics, but you know I’m serious about work. If you don’t have a project for me this week, I can come back later, though?”
She didn’t come here to engage in power plays with her boss, after all. She, Samuel and Brianna were going out to buy a few things, then they’d be going back to the mansion.
Her boss still looked unhappy, but he wasn’t an unreasonable person, so he gave her the new project and waved her away.
“You can work on it, finish, and send the work through email. Your next couple projects will be done online, too, so you won’t need to stop by here for the rest of the month.”
He acted all gruff, but Camila felt grateful, because she knew it was his way of giving her a break.
“Thanks, boss,” she chirped. “And don’t worry, you’ll get the work in record time and perfectly done.”
Just because she was in a relationship, didn’t mean she forgot about her work, after all. Though she had to admit, she’d done more writing work than anything lately, even though she was originally a photographer. Of course, she still took plenty of pictures when she and the Kane siblings went out, and as long as neither of them was in the picture and it wasn’t something she shouldn’t showcase, she’d sold a lot of photos, too.
He was probably doing this because of her article on Samuel, though. She didn’t keep up with the numbers, but she knew it still got plenty of visits every day, bringing traffic to the blog, which was why everyone was super-busy recently, taking advantage of the free publicity.
Camila left the office and headed out of the building. Parked against the curb was Samuel and Brianna in his car. The windows were, of course, tinted, or people passing by the streets would have seen and noticed him already. He wasn’t exactly a celebrity, but he was still pretty famous and made appearances on TV, and of course his face was all over the internet. Her article with his pictures was only one of many in existence, though her article was particularly popular because she had an up close, unguarded picture of him on it.
Actually, she’d been surprised when that passed with his people. It was the first picture she had taken of him when she first saw him, before he caught sight of her. There were several pictures like that from when he made public appearances, and a picture could be blown up, but hers was still one of the best out there. And of course, since then, she’d managed to take plenty more. But they were all only for her personal collection.
She opened the front passenger door and jumped inside, then turned to Samuel with a grin.
“So, where are we going today?”
Brianna leaned forward in between the seats eagerly, as if to remind the two of them that she was still there, and Samuel chuckled.
“Brianna let me know she wanted to go shopping for some dresses and other things today. I thought I might as well indulge her since I have the time off.”
His little sister stuck her tongue out at him for his wording, but her enjoyment didn’t seem to lessen at all.
A lot of girls around her age would be asking for the same thing. She was at the edge of becoming an adult, but was still a teenage girl. Only, for Brianna, this was progress. According to Samuel, she rarely ever asked for things, and she’d never cared about her appearance before. As long as her dresses were loose and long, she never cared what they looked like before and ignored anything else he ever bought for her.
She was acting like a girl her age, and when Camila shared a glance with Samuel, she could tell he was happy about it.
“We can get as many as you’d like,” he said to her, then turned to Camila. “You can come stay with us, or would you rather go home and get started on your work?”