A Pound of Flesh (A Pound of Flesh #1)(112)

Closing his eyes, he let the words come.

“What do you remember of the night that he—ya know—when he passed away?”

She lifted her face to the evening sky. “I remember everything.”

Carter’s stomach hit his shoes. “You do?”

“Yeah, everything,” she murmured, placing her cheek back against his chest. “I remember the car ride from DC. The hotel, visiting his rehabilitation shelter, the walk to the sandwich shop, the moment they hit him with the baseball bat.”

His lips pressed against her hair. “I’m so sorry.”

He hated that she’d been hurt. He hated that he hadn’t been strong enough to stop the bastards from killing her father. And he hated that he knew, deep down in his soul, that Peaches would hate him for it, too.

“Don’t be,” she said. “No one could have saved him. Not even me, even though I tried like hell.”

“You were nine.” He knew she would have tried, if she’d been able. She would have fought with all of her might to stop them from hurting her father.

“I ran,” she whispered. “I ran away when he needed me.”

Carter’s face collapsed.

“Don’t do that to yourself.” He waited. Breathed. “He told you … to run, Kat.”

She froze in his arms. Carter shut his eyes and clasped his hands at her back, suddenly terrified she would bolt. He couldn’t let her run again. He couldn’t lose her.

“What?”

Carter held his breath. “He told you to run.”

She moved her head back. Her eyes told him the pieces were falling together, slowly but surely, and all he could do was plead with his own for her to wait, listen, and try to understand.

“Carter.” Her voice shook. “How do … how do you know that?”

He stared at her, praying he wouldn’t have to say the words aloud, but knowing with every inch of himself that he had to. He had to tell her. “You told me last night.”

She didn’t look convinced.

She cocked her chin, studying Carter’s face. The cogs of her mind turned behind her emerald-green eyes. They flashed with pain and shock at the same time she gasped loudly, shoving him, breaking his hold on her. She stumbled back.

Carter’s heart shattered.

“I … I want to know what you remember.” His arms dropped to his sides. They were useless without her in them.

“Why?” she pushed, with anger in her voice. “Why do you want to know? Why, Carter?”

He took a step closer and she instinctively took one back. Carter’s teeth clenched.

“Because,” he started, rubbing his hands across his beanie, terrified, “I was— Because … Peaches.”

“Fuck’s sake,” she cried. “WHY?”

Her yell ricocheted around them as the rain clouds broke, and the heavens opened above them. But it didn’t matter. Carter was numb. He stared at her and lifted his arms minutely before letting them fall, defeated. He dropped his chin, gathered himself and the fear pounding in his head.

“Because I was there.”

The look on her face tore Carter wide-open, making his legs unsteady. Christ, she looked sick. She started shaking and gasping for air while mumbling words he couldn’t decipher. She clamped her eyes shut while her mouth continued to move in incoherent ramblings.

“No. No. No,” she repeated. “It wasn’t— I can’t.”

The rain pummeled Carter. “It was me,” he whispered. “It was me, Kat.”