Getting a car here.
“What?” she snaps.
“How’d you get home?”
She scoffs and goes to slam the door in my face, but I stop it with an open palm.
Those brown eyes glare up at me, angry and full of steam. “Go home.”
“How, Arden?” I ask, and I hate the desperationin my voice. If he brought her home, did he kiss her? Did he try? Did he ask to see her again? Did she agree? Did he get to kiss her for real, before I’ve gotten to kiss her for real?
I can’t do this. I need to know if he’s here.
“It’s none of your business.”
“If people see you leave with him, it’s my business!” I shout. She flinches and I hate myself. No yelling. Calm down, Carter. Calm the hell down. “We have a deal. I keep my end of the bargain everyfuckingday, and yet here you are.”
Rein. It. In.
“Here I am?” she asks, crossing her arms in front of her chest. “Doingwhatexactly?”
“Flirting with Declan’s friends in front of me!” I seethe. I clock how bad that sounds, what it might insinuate, so I change my attitude before it registers with her. “In a room full of people who can piece together what the fuck we’re doing!”
“I thought you weren’t mad about that?” she asks calmly, angling her head.
I’m starting to realize how bad of an arrangement this is, me and her. She knows not to rise to my baiting. When I freak out, she stays eerily quiet and collected, which the anger in mehates.She’s the soil thrown on top of my roaring flames, extinguishing me before I get a chance to really burn.
I reach up to pinch the bridge of my nose. “Red.”
“Say it.”
She’s doing my head in. That’s what I want to say to her.
“Howdid you get home?”
“Say it, Carter.”
“Yes!” I yell, but she doesn’t flinch this time, just glares at me harder. “Yes, it pissed me off, alright? I just need your head in the game for a few more weeks and then you can flirt with whoever the fuck you want!”
She winces a bit. Tasted weird in my mouth, too, if I’mhonest. Wouldn’t like her flirting with anyone else, ever. But I can only control so much.
“Goodnight,” she whispers, and moves to shut the door again.
I stop it with my hand. Again.
“Arden, let me come in,” I plead with a long breath. It comes out desperately and that’s fine, because I’m ready to get on my fucking knees if I have to. “Please.”
Her eyes burn into mine. Chin juts out like the stubborn little shit she is. “You’re only allowed in if you’re going to own your shit, Carter. Once you pass this threshold,” she gestures to the door, “you’re going to be a man and you’re going to tell me the truth.”
I stare down at her. Hate the sound of that. Hate that look on her face even more.
“Fine.”
She thinks about it for another second but then moves aside, nodding inside her apartment. I slide in before she can change her mind, running my hands over my face, not remotely ready for this conversation.
When I turn back to her, she’s still by the door, arms in front of her chest.
“He didn’t drive me home.”
