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My voice echoes through the nearly empty house.
Carter goes taut. “I hope you’re not being serious, dove. If you want me to lie to you, then I will, but I’m not going to bullshit my way through this disagreement and pretend that your best friend isn’t feeding lies into your ear about cheating.”
My heart drops suddenly into my stomach. “Don’t bring Sam into this.”
“Why not? You brought her into this relationship, dove. She thinks I’m a lousy cheat now, and you were going to believe it, too. I could see it in your eyes. You don’t believe me in the slightest, and I can’t do anything to change that!”
I step back, tears pushing to the rim of my eyelids. “That’s not fair,” I whisper. “I don’t know what to believe, Carter. You can’t sit here and deny your past. I already know about it. I know that if you and I weren’t together, you would be in bed with someone just like Lilian.”
“No, I wouldn’t!”
“Yes, you would! It’s so obvious, Carter! You would still be working past your trauma with Brooke, the family, me, the world, your own fucking heart—all of it! You just want to deny the past ever happened, but I know that if Lilian was in your life before, then you did something with her. The resemblance is uncanny. I just don’t see why you can’t admit that you—”
“That I did what?” he roars, his voice the most ungodly sound I’ve ever heard in my life. I back down, watching him race to the foyer, where I’m frozen in place. “So, what if I fucked her? I fucked a lot of people, Isabella. It’s sex. It didn’t mean anything until I started doing it with you!”
My back presses flush with the wall, and his arm caves me into his domain by resting on the wall over my head. He’s massive in muscle but throbbing with anger. I can’t help but feel trapped and secure in the same breath, something so unnerving about that realization.
“I want you,” he breathes. “That’s why I don’t think it matters what I’ve done in the past. It was all before I met you, okay? So, why can’t you just be on my side about this? I’m not hiding anything, Bella. I’m trying to keep you safe and keep you in my realm. Seeing Rich with his arm around you when I come home after a fight with you isn’t what I need to see.”
“I understand that, but it was innocent. I burned my wrist. He was just trying to help.”
“I don’t want him to help you,” he adds.
I swallow hard, wishing I could understand his reasoning here, but I can’t. Still, I have to give in. Arguing with Carter is the last thing I need right now, and it’s the worst way to spend our time together. I give in at last, leaning against his fiery hot chest and kissing the hollow of his throat. He purrs with delight, the tension withering out of his body at last.
“Okay, then,” he whispers. “Let’s go upstairs. I need to shower and catch up on sleep.”
My brows furrow. “That’s all?”
He rests his hand on the top of his pants, toying with the buckle of his belt. “No, that’s not all.”
“I figured as much.”
I kiss him on the lips once, then slide out of his possession before making my way to the stairs. He follows closely, watching his feet rather than me. He’s wounded, and that’s clear, but why should we be arguing? The worst we could ever go through is finally over. We should be happy.
When we make it to the doorway of the bedroom, he pulls me back by my arm, tucking me into his side.
“I love you, dove. We have to stop being like this.”
“I know that we do,” I admit. “I don’t want to argue, either. I love you, Carter.”
“Then let’s take a break. Once this morning is over, and I get some rest, then I think we should go shopping, okay? Maybe find some things to fill this house with.”
I nod, hopeful. “I’ll wait in bed then.”
He yanks me back when I nearly walk away. “Go kneel first.”
I swallow hard, knowing it’s coming but still hopeful my wide eyes will get me out of this punishment. He doesn’t care, nudging me toward the bed. I garner the courage to shimmy out of my shorts so I can kneel. He flicks my shirt off my back while I do so, tossing it aside so I’m left only in my panties.
I keep my head down, pressed into the side of the bed, while I hear his belt slide through the loops on his pants.
I hate that damn belt, and he knows it.
“Sit up straight, dove.”
My body moves with rigid action, managing to sit up straight while he comes around to sit on the edge of the bed where my face was just resting. He spreads his legs out past my shoulders, caging me in his thighs and leaning forward so I can feel the belt lick gently against the plane of my ass.
“When we’re done here, you can come shower with me, dove.”
