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A Pound of Flesh
  • Текст добавлен: 3 октября 2016, 21:55

Текст книги "A Pound of Flesh"


Автор книги: Sophie Jackson



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Текущая страница: 22 (всего у книги 27 страниц)

“He will in time, Kat. If he hears it enough, he’ll see it.” Nana Boo smiled to herself. “He reminds me so much of …” She shook her head.

Kat rested her chin in her palm. “Who?”

“Your father,” Nana Boo replied. “He’s just like Danny was when your mother first brought him into the house, all jittery and aching for a cigarette.”

“Dad smoked?” Kat coughed into her wineglass.

“He quit when your mother became pregnant with you.”

Kat looked at the table, smiling. “I never knew that.”

“There’s a lot I could tell you about your father.”

“Please,” Kat encouraged.

“Your grandfather never approved of your mother’s choice of husband.” Nana Boo smiled reminiscently. “No one was ever good enough for his Eva.”

Kat exhaled a gust of sardonic breath. “Yeah, it must be a family thing.”

This made Nana Boo chuckle. “Yes, your mother is very much like her father.”

Kat thought for a moment, considering all the ways in which her mother had made her feel so entirely disgraceful for choosing Carter, for choosing Arthur Kill.

“She’s protective because she loves you, Angel,” Nana Boo murmured, seemingly reading Kat’s thoughts. “She’s terrified of losing you.”

“She already has.”

“You don’t mean that, Kat,” Nana Boo chided, making Kat feel instantly remorseful. She swirled the wine in her glass. “So, you have an interview for a new job,” Nana Boo stated, seamlessly changing the subject.

“For a juvenile detention facility in Brooklyn,” Kat confirmed. “It’s to start in the new year.”

The job had been one of the first that she’d come across in Beth’s folder and, although Kat hated to admit it, the job sounded perfect. They’d accepted her application immediately. Despite the parts of her that were sad about leaving Kill, Kat was excited.

“And this is what you want?” Nana Boo asked.

“I want Carter.”

Nana Boo’s eyes sparkled with the romance of it all. “As long as you’re happy. That’s all that I care about. Your mother’ll come around.” There was so much conviction in Nana Boo’s voice, Kat almost believed it.

Despite her hurtful words, and the animosity still between them, Kat would have given anything for her mother to be sitting at the table, having a glass of wine, being understanding and happy. Weeks had passed and still the two of them were at loggerheads. For Kat anger had given way to sadness and acceptance. Things between them would never be the same.

She dipped a Dorito into the sour cream with a weary hand, needing a distraction. “So, tell me more about why Grandpa didn’t like Dad.”

Nana Boo chuckled. “Danny had a few skeletons in his closet, just like your Carter.” She eyed Kat carefully. “He’d done things before he met your mom that he wasn’t exactly proud of, and your grandfather always had a bee in his bonnet about it. I have some things upstairs you can look at. I think it would be easier to explain that way.”

“It’s nothing bad, is it?”

“No. It’s nothing bad.” Nana Boo hesitated. “Unlike your mother, who thinks it unnecessary, I believe it’s time you learned more about what they went through to be together.” She placed her hand on top of Kat’s. “I assure you it’s nothing scary, and it’ll make sense when you see what I have.” She glanced toward the back door. “Just know that Carter and your father are very alike in many ways.”

Before Kat could ask any more, the back door reopened and Carter hurried back in with lumps of snow covering his dark hair, followed by a very cold-looking Reggie.

“Jesus Christ, it’s fucking freezing out there,” Carter grumbled. He rubbed at his scalp, splattering water onto the floor. “I can’t feel my damned fingers!” He stopped abruptly, clearly realizing what he’d said and in whose company. “Shit.” He blinked. “Dammit, I mean, sorry.”

Nana Boo snorted loudly and cupped her hands to her mouth to stifle her giggles. “It’s quite all right,” she managed through her fingers. “I’ve heard a lot worse. I was married to Kat’s grandfather for nearly forty years.”

Kat’s shoulders shook from holding in her own giggles. Carter exhaled and shuffled back to his seat, where he took an enormous gulp from his bottle of beer.

“Don’t you worry any.” Nana Boo snickered, patting his knee. “You just be yourself. You’re perfect as you are.”

* * *

“Are you sure it’s okay?” Carter watched Kat roll her small weekend suitcase into their room, the room they were sharing under her grandmother’s roof, with her grandmother down the hall.

“You know,” Kat singsonged from her spot across the room, “for a convicted felon, you sure have prudish ideas about our relationship.”

He rolled his eyes. She skipped into the en suite, pulling her sweater off. Prudish? Sure, that’s why he had a semi on just from seeing her naked back.

“I’m not being a prude,” he griped. “I– It’s Nana Boo’s house.” He dropped his ass down onto the edge of the huge bed, ripping off his boots and socks.

He was rubbing the tiredness from his face when Kat reemerged from the bathroom, leaning against the doorjamb with a peculiar expression on her face.

“You called her Nana Boo,” Kat whispered, fingering the hem of the Harley T-shirt she’d changed into. His T-shirt. The edge of it skimmed her creamy thighs, while the V-neck dipped between her breasts.

“Yeah,” Carter replied. His eyes devoured her.

Kat walked toward him. She nudged his knees apart with her own, and placed her hands on his shoulders while he placed his on her hips.

She bent down and rubbed her nose against the side of his. “I love that you call her that.”

Carter hummed when their lips met, gentle and warm.

“Are you feeling better?” She placed a knee on either side of his thighs on the bed.

Carter smiled against her throat. “I do feel better.” He sat back a little, focusing on the way Kat’s hair curled at the tips. “I feel good.” He tilted his chin toward the door. “She’s amazing.” He shook his head in wonder. “She’s just so– I mean, the woman made me an Oreo cheesecake! How cool is that?” He kissed her jaw.

Carter trailed his hands down her sides and tickled the back of her thighs. “For the first time, in a long time,” he murmured, “I don’t feel like I’m missing anything.” He placed his lips at the side of her mouth. “I feel like I belong.”

“You do belong,” Kat soothed. “You belong with me.”

Her words made Carter’s body soft and malleable. He held Kat nearer and kissed her. He jumped back, however, as though caught doing something unforgivable when there was a light knock on the door. Kat crawled off him after kissing the tip of his nose, and walked to open it.

“I’m sorry to disturb you, dear,” Nana Boo said from the other side. “But I wanted to give you this before you went to sleep. It’s the details about your father.”

Carter craned his neck to see around Kat, but could only make out a large, brown, crumpled envelope clasped in Kat’s hand.

“Thanks, Nana,” Kat said before kissing her grandmother’s cheek.

“Good night, Angel,” she hummed. “Good night, Carter,” she called, with a smile lacing her words.

“G’night,” he called back. She reminded him so much of his own grandmother it was, at times, a little overwhelming. Even her smell made him feel nostalgic, all sweet and floral, with large green eyes he saw every time he looked at his Peaches.

He whipped his sweater over his head and pushed his jeans down. Kat closed the door and tapped the envelope against her knuckles.

“What’s up?” He pushed the covers of the bed back and slipped in between them.

“Nothing.” She lifted the envelope. “It’s just some stuff about my dad. Nana Boo wanted me to look at it.”

“What stuff?”

“I don’t know.” She held it in both hands.

Carter sat forward and lowered his voice. “You, um, you want to look at it together?”

A look of intense love and gratitude lightened her face.

Carter pushed the duvet aside, patting the mattress. “Get over here.”

Kat skipped over to the bed and got in next to him. He wrapped his arm around her shoulder, kissed her hair, and watched her open the envelope. He rubbed the top of her arm, watching her pull out a shitload of newspaper clippings and lay them carefully across her lap. She fanned them out, stopping at a few that detailed her father’s death, his funeral, and the subsequent memorials and remembrance events that had taken place.

Carter squeezed Kat to his side when he saw a picture of her, taken the night of the murder. She was wide-eyed, clearly terrified, wrapped in a police-issue blanket that drowned her tiny frame.

“You were so damned small,” he whispered, trailing his finger over her black-and-white face. He tucked a stray piece of hair behind her ear. “But so strong.”

They spent a few minutes looking over the clippings before Kat suddenly gasped and cursed.

“What?” he asked with a smile. Her dirty mouth was all sorts of hot. He liked that he was rubbing off on her.

“Look at this.” She handed him the paper, ignoring his lascivious glances.

The picture on the article was of Kat’s mother and father, dressed to impress and looking like every other political couple Carter had ever seen. However, the headline caught Carter’s attention: Senator Lane Served Time for Misdemeanors.

Holy shit.

His eyes flicked up to Kat’s before he stared back at the clipping and began to read. The misdemeanors ranged from graffiti, being drunk and disorderly, dope possession, and, most impressively, car boosting. The penalties he’d been given were tame, due to the senator’s age when the offenses were committed, and it was clear from the tone of the article that the senator’s past had only been brought up in an attempt to blacken his name, but still, Carter didn’t know whether to be exceptionally smug or stunned.

Either way, he was definitely intrigued.

“I can’t believe Mom didn’t fucking tell me,” Kat fumed at his side. “After everything.” Kat dropped back against the pillows. Her voice climbed in pitch. “After everything she said about my job, about you.”

Carter picked up all the clippings and carefully placed them on the side table.

“How can she be such a hypocrite?” she asked through her teeth. “How could she say such awful things about my choices, when she made exactly the same ones?”

“They’re not exactly the same,” Carter countered.

Kat cocked an eyebrow.

Carter shifted. “Look, I’m not defending the fact she didn’t tell you. That shit’s not fair, but your dad boosted a couple of cars and sprayed a few walls with paint.” He shrugged. “Compared to me, he’s as clean as they come.”

Kat’s eyes darkened. “That’s not the point, Carter. She omitted that information and made me feel like crap because I wanted to be with you and I wanted to do a job that would help me overcome my fears and make me stronger. She’s done nothing but belittle me, you, and the decisions I’ve made, and all the while, she knew my father had a criminal record.”

Carter cupped her face in an attempt to soothe her.

“It’s not a competition based on who did the worst thing or did the longest time,” she continued, disgusted. “In the eyes of the prejudiced assholes walking around with their judgmental noses in the air, you and my father are the same.” She shook her head. “My mother knew that. That’s why she didn’t say anything.” She moved closer, curling her body around his.

He ran his index finger down the center of her nose, following the outline of her top lip he knew tasted like raspberries. “Are you mad at your dad?”

“No,” she whispered, trailing a finger around his nipple. “How could I be? He made some bad choices when he was a kid. So what? He’s still one of the best men I’ve ever known.” She hesitated. “Like you.”

Carter couldn’t pull his eyes away from her. Her words ruined him. There was no denying it. Christ, she was so damned beautiful, draped across him, with her fervor and fire heating the room around them both.

Unexpectedly, his chest stirred, as though a rope wound tightly around his insides, tugging them hard. He moved, trying to ease the pressure rising within him, up from his stomach, to his throat. Everything inside immediately was too big, as if some unknown force was making his organs swell and push together, overwhelming him. It whipped his breath away and set every nerve ending in his spine alight. His skin erupted in gooseflesh and his toes curled in supplication to whatever the fuck it was.

“What’s wrong?” Kat asked, noticing his alarm.

Carter rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands. “Just indigestion, I think.”

Kat placed a soft kiss below his belly button. “Better?”

Carter grabbed the tops of her arms, pulling her closer, up his body. “No. You’re too far away.” He kissed her, needing her above him, below him, covering him, engulfing him.

He kissed her hard, breathing in the rush of life that came from her lips, the heat, and the color she’d brought into his miserably gray life. She kissed him back, concern evident in the gentle brushes of her lips. She pulled away, her gaze dancing, searchingly, over his face.

Carter swallowed. “I’m fine.”

He tried to keep his voice calm, tried to show in his face that all was peachy fucking keen, but inside, a goddamn festival was taking place, and, for the love of God, Carter had no idea how to stop it, or if he even wanted to.

30

Kat awoke to the sound of banging that sounded like it was coming from Nana Boo’s front door. Carter moved with a loud sigh, his arm wrapped protectively around her waist. He hadn’t let her go all night. They’d done nothing but cuddle and spoon, even though his hard body had told her he’d wanted a lot more. There was something different. He was different. Something had appeared in his eyes. Something irrevocable and too big to deal with at—

With her face half covered by the pillow, Kat glanced at the clock to see it was a little after ten in the morning. How had that happened? Christ, she didn’t even remember falling asleep.

“Who the fuck is making that noise?” Carter grumbled into the nape of her neck, pressing his delicious morning wood against Kat’s ass. “They need to shut the fuck up and let me get back to sleep.” He yawned. “I was having awesome dreams.”

Kat snorted and rolled over to look at him, smiling at his adorable sleepy eyes and brushing her palm over his crotch. “I can feel how good they were.”

Carter sighed and lifted his hips from the bed, chasing her hand. “Don’t pretend that you don’t love it.”

Kat frowned when the banging stopped abruptly and raised voices, spouting inaudible words, echoed up to the room.

A concerned frown slashed between Carter’s brows. He lifted himself up onto his forearms. “What the hell’s going on?”

Kat shook her head, hating the heavy dread snaking up her back. “I have no idea.”

Carter was swiftly on point, protective and cautious. “I’ll go and check it out.”

“No,” Kat said, touching his shoulder as he pushed back the sheets. “I’ll go.”

“Peaches,” he murmured with an annoyed glint in his eye.

“It’s fine, I’ll—”

“KATHERINE!”

The bubble around herself and Carter burst apocalyptically as the voice pummeled at the bedroom door. Kat’s skin prickled in cold terror, while tears sprang to her eyes, forced to the ducts by fear and absolute fury.

“Mom.”

“What?” Carter coughed, shooting to his feet at the side of the bed, eyes wide. “Your—your mom?”

Kat nodded slowly, robotically, gripping the blankets in her fist.

“Katherine, come out here! I know you’re in there with him!”

Kat closed her eyes, unable to look at Carter for fear that she would fly out of the room and slap her mother senseless.

“Eva, calm down.” Nana Boo’s voice crept under the wood.

“No, I will not calm down. How could you have him in your house? How could you allow this to go on under your roof?”

“Because it is my roof, Eva, and I am your mother. I don’t answer to you.”

There was a beat of silence; the acidic tone of Nana Boo’s words fizzled into the air.

“I should go,” Carter muttered, making his way around the end of the bed.

Kat’s heart dropped to her stomach. “NO!” she called out, scrabbling from the bed toward him, catching her foot in the sheet. “No, you don’t have to go anywhere. Please. Don’t go.”

He avoided her eyes, looking past her, alarm making the muscle in his jaw jump. “I can’t be here.”

“Yes, you can,” Kat urged, grabbing at his biceps. “You have as much right to be here as I do.”

“Kat—”

“If you go, then I’m coming with you.”

Before Carter could answer, the door of the bedroom swung open, smacking the back wall of the room with the momentum with which it was forced. Kat turned to see her mother glaring at the two of them: Kat in Carter’s T-shirt, and he, bare but for his ink and a pair of black boxer briefs.

“Get out,” Kat growled.

“I’m not going anywhere.” Eva’s eyes trailed down Kat’s state of undress.

“Eva,” Nana Boo chastised. “That’s enough.”

“Get some clothes on and come downstairs,” Eva insisted through thin lips, ignoring Nana Boo. She shot daggers at Carter, causing Kat to move protectively in front of him. “Alone.”

“I’m not doing a thing—”

“Now, young lady,” Eva interrupted. She whirled like a dervish and marched out of the room, thumping down the stairway.

“What does she want, Nana?” Kat asked, desperate to feel Carter’s arms around her. He didn’t move.

His stillness and silence were terrifying.

“I don’t know,” Nana Boo replied with a despondent shake of her head. “I’m so sorry to both of you. She called asking if I’d spoken to you. I told her you were here together. I had no idea she planned on coming … I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t apologize,” Kat urged. “It’s her, not you.”

Glancing over her shoulder at Carter, Kat’s stomach rolled violently when she saw his face: angry, barricaded, and closed off from everyone around him.

Even her.

“I’ll give you a moment.” Nana Boo sloped out of the room, closing the door behind her.

Kat sniffed and moved toward her suitcase, ignoring the waves of dangerous calm rolling off Carter. When she started talking, the words came out quickly, bumping into one another.

“We’ll go. We’ll get out of here. I don’t want to be here with her. Nana can lend us the car again and I’ll grab my bag; you can grab yours—”

“No,” Carter interrupted.

She stopped, stock-still in the center of the room.

“Go downstairs and see what she has to say.” His voice was intense and direct, but his eyes flitted around the place, searching for a way out.

“But we can leave together,” she insisted.

Carter bent to grab his sweater. “No, you need to speak to her, Kat.”

Hurt gripped Kat’s heart. She folded her arms, holding herself together. “Why? Why do you want me to talk to her?”

“Because it’s time you did.”

She watched him sit and pull on his socks. “You … can’t leave,” she whispered. Her voice broke. “I need you here.”

“Kat.”

“Please, Carter. Don’t listen to her. Everything she says—it’s not true. It’s not. Please.”

Her breathing started to accelerate, as the thought of him walking out of the door grew more vivid in her mind. Unable to move from her spot for fear that she would shatter, she gasped, “Please. I’ll talk to her if you promise you’ll stay.”

They remained silent for an age, staring at each other, neither of them seemingly wanting to speak. The atmosphere around them was charged but uncomfortably different from how it normally was.

“Peaches, I can’t—”

“You can.”

“I’m no good for yo—”

“Don’t you fucking dare say that!” Sadness gave way to anger. “You are good enough! Christ, you have to know that!”

Carter didn’t answer and continued to look down at the floor. Kat’s heart fractured painfully. Jesus, they were back at square one.

Kat took a tentative step toward him. “Promise me you’ll stay. Promise me you won’t leave.”

He scrunched his eyes shut and bit his bottom lip, but she didn’t care. She needed to hear the words. At that moment, it was the most important thing. Nothing else mattered.

“Carter.”

“Okay,” he answered in a lifeless voice. “I promise.”

“Promise that you won’t leave. Say it.”

He lifted his head and looked at her, but something deep in Kat’s heart told her he was seeing straight through her, and it hurt. It hurt so much.

“I promise I won’t leave.”

He was so crushed, so broken, and Kat hated that she was helpless in putting him back together. “Okay,” she whispered. “Okay.”

Silently, she moved around the room, pulling on a pair of jeans and sneakers. She tied his T-shirt at her right hip and pulled her hair up into a loose ponytail.

“I’ll be right back.” She stood at the doorway with the crumpled brown envelope in her fist. “And then we’re out of here.”

“Kat, I—” She waited for him to continue but, instead, he cracked the knuckles of his right hand and shook his head. “It doesn’t matter.”

With a lead weight in her stomach and a splintering heart, Kat opened the bedroom door. “I’ll be right back.”

* * *

She walked with purpose and dignity into the sitting room, unable to make out any of the words of the obviously heated conversation taking place between Harrison and her mother by a large bay window. The snow had fallen hard overnight, covering the gardens in a winter blanket.

Nana Boo was absent, which pleased Kat. Nana Boo didn’t deserve to see or hear what was about to happen. The fact that her mother had come into Nana Boo’s the way she had, and on Thanksgiving, made Kat’s teeth grind. Seriously, who was the parent here?

Kat stopped with a straight back, arms folded, when Eva caught her eye. “I thought you were at Harrison’s parents’? What are you doing here?”

Eva stared back. “Do not speak to me that way, Katherine.”

“And don’t tell me what to do,” she retorted. “How dare you come into my room, into Nana’s house that way?”

An edge of remorse stole across Eva’s mouth. “Nana is fine. It’s you I’m worried about, furious with, actually.”

“Why?”

“Why? Because my daughter doesn’t speak to me, answer my calls. My daughter, who not only works in a damned prison but is running around town with—with that—”

“Be careful,” Kat warned when Eva waved toward the doorway.

Eva blanched and a flash of hurt lit her eyes. “I am here to put a stop to this.”

Kat scoffed. “Do you know how ridiculous you’re being?”

“What is ridiculous is you’re putting your entire career, your reputation, and maybe even your life on the line for some delinquent waste of space—”

Kat flew toward her mother, stopping only inches away from her. “You do not speak about him that way!”

Kat’s proximity and the ferocity emanating from her every pore made Eva pause.

“Calm down,” Harrison said at her side. He raised his hand toward Kat’s shoulder but dropped it. “Just both of you, please, calm down.”

Eva swallowed. “You may not believe it, but I’m doing this because I love you, Katherine. The prison is no good for you. He’s no good for you.”

“You don’t even know him,” Kat spat. “You never even gave him a chance.”

Eva was incredulous. “And how was I supposed to do that when you carried on behind my back? I had to find out from Beth, from Nana!”

“And it’s such a big mystery why I didn’t tell you!”

“Because you knew it was wrong!” Eva countered. “For God’s sake, you could get into so much trouble.”

“You think I don’t know that?”

Eva’s face grimaced in puzzlement. “Then why are you—?”

“You have done nothing but make me feel like a disappointment ever since I started working at Arthur Kill. Nothing I’ve done since I took that job has been good enough for you; even the man I love is a disappointment in your eyes.”

Eva scoffed. “Oh, please, you don’t love him.”

“With everything that I am,” Kat said imploringly. “You have no idea what I’ve been through these past few months, Mom. How hard it was to face my biggest fears at Kill, to confront what has kept me awake for the past sixteen years.”

Eva’s face pinched.

“But Carter’s been there for me, with me, helping me and caring for me when no one else would.” Kat turned her face toward the ceiling, furious that her mother would even dare to cry. “When I left here that night, it was Carter who took care of me, and never once has he said or done anything to me that warrants such narrow-mindedness from you.”

“He’s a criminal.”

“Like Dad?”

Eva took an unsteady step backward. Her face held an expression of complete shock, but her glistening eyes told Kat it was checkmate. Kat pushed the crumpled envelope against her mother’s chest.

“I wonder,” Kat mused. “Did Grandpa’s hatred make you want to walk away from the man you loved, or did it push you further into his arms?”

Eva stared at the envelope in her hands.

“You should have told me, Mom. It wasn’t Nana’s job to tell me about Dad’s past,” Kat said angrily. “Instead of judging me, instead of judging Carter; you should have been honest with me first.” She willed her tears back. “How could you lie? How could you make me feel so alone?”

“I never wanted that,” Eva answered. “I just … I want you protected, Katherine. You’re all I—I didn’t tell you because I want what’s best for you.”

“Carter is what’s best for me. He may have made bad choices, but he’s a good man and I love him.”

Eva closed her eyes. “It doesn’t matter. I can’t lose my daughter, too. I won’t. You’re risking too much!”

“Carter isn’t dangerous!” Kat exploded. “Jesus, Mom. He protects me. He’s protected me since I was nine years old!”

Eva’s face changed to one of perplexity. “What do you mean?”

“You wouldn’t believe me even if I told you. You don’t trust a thing I do or say.”

“That’s not true,” Eva argued. “I just—”

“What, Mom?” Kat huffed in exasperation. “Worry? Get scared? Guess what? So do I.”

Eva moved closer. “Listen to me, Katherine. Come home with me. Let’s talk. I can’t keep fighting with you like this. I want us to go back to how we were before all this.” She wrung her hands together. “Don’t you see? This is all because of that damned job, because of him.”

Kat bit her tongue, halting the vitriol that threatened to spill. “I need to be with Carter.” She turned on her heel and made for the door.

“Katherine, wait!”

Kat stopped, took a breath, and turned slowly.

“Talk to me,” her mother urged, pain lacing her features. “I … I want to make this better. I want to make us better.” Frustration and hurt were clear in the sharpness of her shoulders. “I hate that we’re like this. I want … I want my daughter back. Please. I love you.”

Kat fought back the urge to go to her mother and find comfort in her arms. God, she was tired. They’d never fought this way before, never been so far removed from each other. Even after Kat’s father had died and Eva had fallen into herself, there were still moments of affection and hope. A part of Kat’s heart wanted there to be a resolution to the bullshit separating them now, but she knew that wasn’t going to happen. Too much had been said. There was no bridge big enough to cross the divide gaping between them.

“Until you accept that Carter is going to be in my life, I can’t do that, Mom.”

Without waiting for Eva to respond, Kat hurried back up the stairway, needing to get back to Carter, to have him tell her everything would be all right. She needed him around her, needed his scent in her nose and his skin under her hands. She needed his lips on her mouth and his voice in her ear.

The hallway to reach him suddenly seemed a mile long. She rubbed at a dead ache settling above her heart and pushed the bedroom door open, pausing in the doorway, holding her breath.

Empty.

She called his name.

“Katherine, please,” her mother continued from the hallway, having followed her up the stairs.

But Kat didn’t respond. Hastily, she stormed into the en suite.

Empty.

With her heart slamming into her ribs, she dashed back into the bedroom, calling his name.

His bag was gone.

She pushed past her mother, who was still muttering words such as “amends” and “love,” and threw herself down the steps, running in a full sprint to the back door.

Cigarette. He’s having a cigarette. He promised.

“Carter?” The back door flew open, showing only a thick layer of snow across the vast gardens.

Empty.

“Kat?”

Kat spun around, almost collapsing in on herself when she saw her grandmother’s soft, concerned face. “Nana, where is he?”

She shook her head in bewilderment. “I don’t know, sweetheart. I thought he was in your room.”

“No. He isn’t there.” Kat gasped. “He promised me, Nana.”

Kat grappled for her cell phone from her pocket and burst out of the kitchen toward the front door.

“Please pick up,” she whimpered before the voice mail kicked in.

Her panic reached epic proportions when she threw open the front door to find only more cold stillness. Her breath erupted from her mouth in large gray plumes against the frigid air, while her gaze desperately sought Carter’s tall, broad form against the white.

Yet, looking through eyes releasing frightened, angry tears, all Kat could see was a single set of large footprints leading down the driveway, away from the house.

Away from her.

* * *

The screen of Kat’s cell phone lit the entire room as she pressed redial once again.

Voice mail.

She blinked heavy lids over weary, wet eyes.

She’d heard nothing from Carter for twelve hours. Not a text message and no phone call. Silence.

Her head throbbed, her heart was shattered, and her body was exhausted with worry. Every part of her body ached. The hollowness was paradoxically overwhelming.

Still, after many tears cried and hundreds of steps paced, she knew she didn’t blame Carter for any of it. How could she? She couldn’t blame him for finding a way out, an escape route. It had taken six hours, repeated hysterical calls, and numerous texts to him for her to recognize that. But she had.

Carter may have come across as impenetrable, unemotional, and indifferent, but Kat knew he was anything but. He was hopelessly open and fragile.

If anything, Kat was at fault for placing him in a situation in which he was clearly uncomfortable. She should have listened to her instincts and read the anxiety in Carter’s eyes. She’d wanted to show him he was enough, prove to herself that she could help him, that she was strong enough to support him.

She had been so selfish.

Yes, he had promised, Nana Boo said when Kat had laid her head in her lap. Yes, she had trusted him to mean it, but the truth was he hadn’t. He’d said it because she’d made him. He knew she’d needed it, and he’d given it to her. She wouldn’t have spoken to her mother if he hadn’t, and, in many ways, Kat was glad she had.


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