Page 73 of Unleashed By Eden

I laugh again, forced this time. “Maybe I’m just embarrassed that I wasted years thinking he was my friend.”

Liam comes to stand in front of me. I can smell laundry powder and the cold outside still clinging to his jacket.

“He’s my best mate,” he says carefully. “I love him. You know that.”

I nod once.

“But he’s also a mess. He always has been. He drinks too much. Sleeps around. He doesn’t think before he does shit and then acts surprised when people get hurt.” His jaw works. “You deserve better than being one more girl he leaves confused.”

I stare at him.

“He’s not a villain,” Liam says. “But he’s not safe, either.”

“I’m not one of his girls.”

“I know that.”

For a moment we just stand there, looking at each other across the wreckage of what I’m not saying.

He gets it. Not all of it, but enough. Enough to know Carter hurt me and I’m not going to tell him how. To decide silently, right here, right now, that we are not doing this. We are not talking about Carter anymore.

Liam steps back first and picks up his beer. “Okay.”

“Okay,” I echo.

The agreement settles between us without ever being spoken aloud. No more Carter. Not from him or from me. Unless I crack first.

He glances around my apartment. “You still need a job?”

The shift is obvious and I love him for it.

“Yeah,” I say. “Turns out landlords are really old-fashioned about wanting money.”

He snorts. “There’s a café around the corner from my place looking for waitress.”

“Nah, I’m good. I already got a waitress job lined up at a club.”

He stays another hour, helping me put together a table that came with instructions written by Satan, then leaves just after dark with a promise to visit soon.

When the door shuts behind him, the apartment goes quiet again.

I stand in the middle of it, and look around at the boxes, the cheap furniture, the stuff I took from Jeanine’s and the life I’m trying to build with both hands while pretending I’m not bleeding out from somewhere no one can see.

I wander over to the window, the neon from the kebab shop flashing red across the glass.

My phone sits on the sill where I left it.

No new messages.

I pick it up anyway. Unlock it and stare at the thread. My last text still sitting there, unanswered and increasingly humiliating.

I think about sending one more. Something cruel and final. Something that would cauterize whatever is left of this.

I don’t.

Locking the screen, I set the phone face down, and get back to unpacking.

If Carter wants me gone, fine.