He gives me a quick kiss. And then another.
“Did you take another test?” he asks me and I can hear the playfulness in his voice. He thinks I’m odd for taking a pregnancy test every day, but I have my reasons. The line is supposed to stay strong and dark, because then it means the baby is still there and until the six-week mark is here, I need the tests for my sanity.
“Yes,” I tell him. I almost mention how Addison’s the one who told me. She said the line gets weaker if you lose the baby. She’s waiting like I am.
Instead, I’m distracted by a kiss on my neck. A languid one that makes my nipples pebble. His rough stubble runs along my skin, instantly making me wanting.
“You need to heal.” I practically hiss the words with longing as his lips move to the dip just below my collar and his right hand reaches up to my breast. Plucking my nipple between his fingers, he finally raises his gaze to my eyes and tells me, “All I need is you.”
He’s wrong though. There’s so much more he needs. Much more than I could ever give him.
He’s a wounded man, with scars so deep he can’t help but to be weighed down by them.
I’m still waiting on edge for something to come between us, but Carter seems hellbent on keeping us together. And so am I. I won’t allow for love not to be enough.
Carter’s fingertips glide easily up my neck, leaving goosebumps in their wake until he wraps his hands around my throat. His thumb runs down the underside of my chin and then lower, down to the center of my throat. His lips are parted just slightly, his breathing ragged as he hardens under me, his thick length pressing against me.
“I will do anything for you.” He utters the words with such an intensity before slowly raising his gaze to meet mine.
My damn heart belongs to him. It only starts beating when he looks at me like that. I swear it’s true. Whatever else it does when he’s not around isn’t what it’s doing now.
“You’re so intense,” I whisper, not knowing what else to say, but my words are lost in the haze of lust that lingers between us.
I don’t know if it’s the fact that I’m obviously hot for him or some other reason, but Carter gives me a lazy smirk before moving the back of his fingers up my silk shirt and gently pinching my nipple.
My natural instinct is to playfully smack him away, but he’s too quick, grabbing my wrist and pinning it behind me.
Even while I straddle him, he commands me.
“You make me this way,” he tells me with a deep voice and leans forward to kiss me at the same time as he pinches my hardened peak. I have to gasp as he does, breaking the kiss and arching my neck. He takes the moment to lightly run his teeth along my sensitized skin, and I know I’m done for. Any authority I had over him is gone.
Carter is an untamable beast. But I’ll be damned if I’d have him any other way.
“It all feels better when I’m with you,” he murmurs against my skin and his tone sounds raw and hints at the pain that will forever scar who we are. With both hands on his jaw, I stare deep into his eyes, bright with sincerity. “All of it,” he tells me.
“It’s going to be okay.” I offer him words I pray are true. I’d do anything for this man and without anything between us, nothing will keep us apart.
“Better than okay,” he says before kissing me sweetly, only breaking away to add, “I promise.”
Chapter 25
Jase
It was supposed to be me.
The car moves over a speed bump a little too fast, and my hard body sways in the sedan. My grip tightens on the wheel, and I try to swallow the hard lump that’s been suffocating me since I learned the truth about Tyler’s death.
It was a hit… on me. A fucking hoodie is the reason he’s ten feet in the ground and I’m still here, taking every day for granted.
Slowing at the stop sign, I let a deep breath calm the anxiety running through me. With a war raging and an unknown enemy taking pieces of us as he pleases, I don’t have time to get lost in the unfortunate past. No matter how much I long to go back. If only we could go back.
The hum of the engine as I roll over another speed bump keeps me in the present.
I shouldn’t have come out right now. Spending the afternoon in the burbs isn’t exactly on my normal to-do list.
But I had to get out of the house and away from my brothers. The regret and guilt and mourning that lingers in their eyes haunts me day and night. It was supposed to be me. It wasn’t.