Page 45 of Bloodstained Wings
I’m not sure if it’s possible, but I canhope.
“I was waiting for Sam. I called last night, practically this morning, and Tristan picked up the phone. I asked if he would tell Sam I’d like to meet with her for coffee, and he said he would tell her. I went after you left for work, but she never showed up.”
His hand on my side tenses slightly, squeezing my hip in his long fingers. “Go on.”
“Rich showed up, and he just sat down to talk, Carter. He could tell I was upset, so I talked to him a little bit. It wasn’t anything serious, I swear, but it was personal. He just seemed like he would listen to me, and I needed that so badly because—”
“Because I don’t listen to you?” he bites off.
I shrink in size, feeling that I’ve angered him even more. I didn’t mean for this to happen, and it’s not to say that Carter doesn’t hear me, but sometimes I need someone else to hear me, not just the man who loves me and says he listens. He listens to everyone else, too, and sometimes it overshadows what I have to say.
With the election failure, the family drama, and the tension between the two of us, I know I’m making it worse by pointing out the obvious; at least, I thought it was obvious to him, too.
“You’ve been so wrapped up with everything lately that I just needed someone to—”
“What did you tell him, dove?”
“Nothing too personal, Carter. We talked about Sam, about the Lacey family.”
He nods like it’s appeasing the anger inside him, but his lips have started falling into a deep frown, one that I won’t be able to bring back up into a grin anytime soon.
“Please, Carter. Trust me for once.”
“I do. It’s him I don’t trust, dove. I want to make things right, for argument's sake, because the Lacey trouble was woven through the city and stirred up far too much attention for the family. But that’s not to say I trust this guy. I don’t. He’s still a Lacey, no matter what he claims. And having you around him, alone, it’s like you’ve learned nothing, Bella.”
“Learned? What the hell was I supposed to learn, Carter?”
I shouldn’t raise my temper here, but it’s only natural since I feel I’m under attack for not doing anything.
The thought of him telling me that I should have learned something after what Jacob Lacey did is a little bit hypocritical, and I won’t stand for it.
He brought half of that trouble onto me, and I won’t be blamed for the war that preceded it.
I shove his arm off my shoulder and stand at once. Storming out of the shower is my attempt, but I don’t make it to the glass door, a set of very hungry hands finding my hips. Carter moves me like a rag doll, lifting my feet off the floor and pinning my back to the wall just under the blue lights and the hot water. I choke on the heat from both the shower and his touch.
It’s a lot to handle at once.
He stands against me, naked and fuming, his hands squeezed into my sides without an inch of mercy. I can’t help but suffocate from the pressure, from the intensity, and I can hardly inhale through the proximity of his lips against mine.
We’re not kissing, though, he’s just…
Breathing.
“You want to walk away from me, dove? Just like that. You act like I don’t listen, but you don’t talk, Bella. You keep shit from me, from the man you claim to love, and then you tell me that some Donahue-Lacey fucker is a better listener?”
“I never said that, Carter.”
“You might as well have.”
He stands straighter and taller, but his pressure-heavy position against me hasn’t changed at all. Looking down the bridge of his nose, his frown is nothing but a gritted expression, full of spite and ire that can’t be tamed. I don’t attempt to, either. It would only set him off more.
If that’s possible right now.
“You are mine, Isabella. Right?”
I swallow my hesitation and nod. “Of course, Carter. I love you.”
“And you want me forever, don’t you?”