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“She wants Carter.”
I should be jealous, but I tamp any sign of jealousy down. “Yeah, who doesn’t? He’s rich and handsome. I know he’s had his past and all, but it’s nothing he can’t get over. He wants me, and he has made that explicitly clear.”
He shakes his head, handing me a small tablet with the screen dimmed. I wonder how I didn’t notice this in his pocket before, the screen a little bigger than a phone but still capable of being stowed away in a pocket. Still, the screen brightens to display a photo of sorts.
It’s grainy and taken from a distance, but I can make out three very explicit silhouettes in the picture.
Carter. His hands are in his pockets as he stands in our room at the lifestyle club.
A woman. She’s wearing my lingerie, but I know my body, and that one in the photo isn’t mine.
A stripper pole. The one I’ve danced on for Carter in the sanctity of our room.
My breath hitches, and I push the tablet away, fighting back an uncontrollable shudder down my spine. “That could be an old photo, Rich. He… he’s had a sordid past, okay? I don’t need a reminder.”
“It’s time-stamped, Isabella,” he whispers, pushing the photo back into my lap.
My breath is hitched now as I weep, reading the photo almost as clear as day. It’s not like this was taken a week ago or two.
It was yesterday.
“Wait… what? I don’t understand this. He was… he waswithme last night and… When he got home, he was… I don’t… Rich, I don’t understand.”
He gives me a pitying look that I know reads like I’m some poor, hapless woman being cheated on. But I’m not. Carter wouldn’t cheat on me! I don’t understand why he would even watch a woman dance on the pole I’ve been on before, but my thoughts are running too fast for me to make sense of them.
The timestamp is correct because he came home right after this, and he fucked me until I couldn’t take it anymore. Is this why? Did he just go see a stripper and get horny to take it out on me? Or is Rich trying to say that he was turned on by some woman and had a piece of us both?
I lurch forward slightly, feeling sick.
Suddenly, though, my mind clicks on something. The woman looks like me. It couldn’t be, could it? I grab the tablet from Rich’s hand and stare closely at the picture.
“It’s… oh God, it’s her, isn’t it? It’s that journalist?”
Rich pushes my shoulders down into the soft, white bedding. “Relax, Isabella. I’m going to handle this.”
I shake my head, not sure what the hell he’s talking about. But I can’t argue. I can’t even if I want to because my wet, leaking eyelids begin to shut softly. I hiss an inhale, choke on the exhale, and cry myself into the deepest sleep imaginable.
Part of me wants to stay here forever just so I don’t have to go back home with the man who’s been lying to me. The man who has been hurting me.
And why? For what purpose? He could let me go and find another lookalike in an hour.
He’s done it before.
***
Carter
I pound on the door so hard I think I may send my fist through it.
It flies open at last, and Rich Donahue stands before me with a scolding frown and furrow on his Jacob-like face. I barge in, uncaring, and Tristan follows. I have Ernesto taking Lorenzo home to Anita’s for now just so he can update everyone on our new policy.
We have to behave ourselves, or the dirty cops that once shielded us from shit are going to arrest us. I have the mayor to thank for that, but I’ll deal with him later.
Right now, I need two things. Isabella is the first, and the second is an explanation from Donahue.
He ushers me to a table, but I keep walking, even at the behest of his guys, who try and stop me. There are a few bedroom doors open, a long den area near the end of the hall, and a door that’s shut and locked when I try to jiggle the handle.
“Carter, we should talk first,” Rich barks.
