A Pound of Flesh (A Pound of Flesh #1)(125)

He didn’t want to upset her, but he was aching to find out what had led her to his doorstep after she’d screamed such hatred. What had triggered the realization that he had saved her rather than holding her back from helping her father?

“I wandered for a long time.” Her fingers gripped Carter’s side. “I didn’t know what to do. I was just— I just hurt. Everywhere.”

Carter held her closer.

“I eventually got home.” She paused. “I think I got a cab.” Her lips moved against his skin. “I called my mother.”

Carter’s hand halted its movement against her shoulder blade. “What?”

Kat scoffed. “I know. I must be f*cking stupid to call her, huh?”

“Peach—”

“As soon as she heard it was me,” she interrupted fiercely, “she started telling me how disappointed she was about what happened at my grandmother’s. She said I was ungrateful for the people around me, the people that cared about me. That she only wanted what was best for me and I was too self-involved and caught up with you to see it.”

He swallowed. “She knows about me?”

She lifted from his shoulder to look at him. She was so close Carter had to shift his head back into the pillow to see her better.

“She knows I care for you.” Her index finger moved along his bottom lip. “She knows that we kissed.”

[page]A cold shiver darted down Carter’s spine as the last seven days began to fall into place. “That’s why you left your family and friends. That’s why you came back from Chicago.” He smiled wryly. “They know.”


Kat shook her head. “They think they know what’s going on, but they don’t. They have no f*cking idea.” The anger was clear in her voice. “Carter, you have to understand, my own mother thinks my choices are wrong and that I’m still a kid who knows nothing. She doesn’t know how much I love my job, how much I love what I do every day, how much I love—” Her eyes burned with fury. “You’re the only person who treats me like I’m me, who makes me feel like what I’m doing is right and meaningful. There’s no bullshit, no hiding with you.”

Her lips twitched with the beginnings of a smile. “And I began to see how hard it must’ve been for you to tell me about who you are.” Her palm slid down his jaw. “Carter, I know the only reason you didn’t tell me was because you were scared. You’re the only person on this planet who knows what I went through. And do you want to know something really ironic?” Her eyes blazed. “My family, my friends, the cops, my f*cking therapist, they all said you weren’t real, that you were a figment of my imagination, a result of post-traumatic stress.” Kat nuzzled his cheek. “But you’re the most real thing in my life.”

Carter couldn’t answer. He was speechless and crazy for her touch. “Kat” was all he could utter before their mouths met. Three little words whispered relentlessly through Carter’s psyche, bubbling furiously, whipping away his breath. Swallowing them and the fear that forever accompanied them back down, Carter rolled Kat onto her back and settled at her side, lifting one of her legs over his hip. Although she moaned, the movement was not sexual in its intent. He wanted her again, but he wanted to reassure her more that he was real and that he would always be that way with her.

“Stay with me tonight.” He pushed her hair back, needing to see her whole face. “Please, Kat, just … just for tonight.” He searched for an answer in the depths of her eyes. “But don’t stay because you’re upset. Stay with me because you want to.”