Untouchable (Untouchables, 1)

“You don’t trust me anyway,” he states. “Even when I do things right, it doesn’t matter.”

“That’s not true,” I say, my stomach sinking at his words.

“Yes, it is. If you want to hold a grudge, Zoey, at least be honest about it. I’m not blaming you. It’s normal. I thought you were giving me a chance, but hey, maybe I was wrong. Maybe you were just holding onto ammunition so you could use it against me when the right opportunity presented itself. Maybe you’re just like everyone else.”

Ouch. “Don’t say that. You don’t believe that.”

“Maybe I do. Everyone wants something, Zoey,” he says, trailing the back of his hand along my jaw line. “What do you want from me?”

I hate that I feel my insides collapsing under the chill of his response, but there’s danger in what he’s saying. Not real, physical danger, but his words highlight the risk of extinguishing his main interest in me—and extinguishing it wrongly, because I am what he thinks I am. It’s not self-interest that compels me to try to reach him or to put up with his shit, but he’s already pretty convinced most people are users. Once he puts me in that category, I have a feeling there’s no getting back out of it.

“You want to be the special one?” he asks, his gaze raking over me before returning back to my face. “I’ve given you that, haven’t I? You wanted people to leave you alone about Jake, so I stopped it. I helped you with your stupid church fundraiser. I introduced you to my family so you’d know I was serious. I think it’s unfair to say I never give, Zoey. I think I do, just in a different way than you do.”

I want to mutter that the fundraiser wasn’t stupid, but that’s not the right thing to be defensive about right now. “I wasn’t implying you never do anything nice for me,” I tell him. “But you pick and choose. You give when it doesn’t cost you anything. I give when the cost is high. This is the first thing that’s ever seemed like it cost you anything, and you don’t want to talk to me about it.”

He doesn’t bother to disagree. “That’s right, I don’t. I respect your boundaries when you tell me I have to, so respect mine.”

“When, Carter? When have you really respected my boundaries because I said no? Certainly not in the classroom.”

“That doesn’t count. It was before.”

“Fine. Not when I told you I didn’t want to go to a party at your ex’s house and you vaguely threatened to rape my best friend if I didn’t show up to take her place. Not when I said ‘I don’t want to lose my virginity tonight’ and you said ‘fuck this’ and took it anyway. Definitely not when I asked you not to come inside me and you did, twice. I can come up with more examples if you need me to.”

Instead of looking remotely ashamed, Carter says, “I never threatened to rape Grace.”

“Yes, you did. After that, and what you did to me, and what you said you wanted to do to me, how am I supposed to just… not worry about this skeleton in your closet? What did you do to that girl? What happened to her? Why is she not around anymore? Why do you have Chloe and no concerns that her mom might resurface? Is she not able to resurface? We make jokes about where your moral line is, but to be honest, I have no idea. I don’t know if you have one. You’re a slippery slope, and I do look for the best in you, but I’m not going to close my eyes to reality in order to lie to myself.”

His voice drops, a hint of menace creeping in as he snaps, “Don’t pussyfoot around the question, Ellis. If you’re trying to ask me something, go ahead and fucking ask.”

Every cell in my body shrieks at me to drop it and extract myself from this situation as peacefully as I’m able, but the part of my brain that has become familiar with Carter is less afraid, despite his tone. “Did you hurt her?” I ask, my voice wobbling. I don’t know if I want the answer, but I need it. “You told me you had never done anything like that to someone before, but you also told me Chloe was your sister, so… it’s not true that you’ve never lied to me, and if this is one of the things you’ve lied about, maybe that was, too.”

Now I’ve pissed him off. I can see it in the tenseness of his muscles, in the clenched jaw and flaring of his nostrils as he breathes. Judging by appearances, not throttling me is taking intense physical restraint on his part, and while I find it a little worrying, apparently not enough, because instead of running, I remain plastered against the wall and wait for him to answer my question.