Stacking the Deck (A Betting on Romance Novel Book 2)(80)

She shook her head. “I don’t feel up to cook—”

“We’ll let someone else do the cooking. You look like you could use a break.”

“I don’t think—”

“Just friends,” he insisted, though why he did he couldn’t say. He didn’t want to be friends with Liz. He wanted to be much more, in fact. “I know just the place.”

Before she could protest again, he was tugging her with him.




LIZ ORDERED AN ICED TEA and slid into the booth as Elvis Presley crooned in the background. Aunt Claire was right. Liz had taken the gossip about town at face value, never giving Carter the benefit of the doubt. And here he’d been nothing but helpful, considerate and charming since she’d set foot back in Sugar Falls. Asking her out to dinner was just another example.

Meanwhile, she’d been no better than all those who’d never seen beyond the successful student to the Liz she was inside. Didn’t she owe Carter more than that? She at least owed him her appreciation. She glanced gratefully across the table. “I want to thank—”

“Don’t.”

“Don’t what?”

“Don’t make me out to be some Good Samaritan. I didn’t help today because I’m a good person, Liz. I did it because it was you.”

Liz folded her hands on the table in front of her. “I don’t believe that for a minute.”

“You always gave me more credit than I deserved.”

Perhaps compliments embarrassed him. Liz let the comment slide and tried to relax. The creak of the vinyl seat as she shifted position and the warm scents of coffee and fried food could almost lull a person into believing you could come home again. Almost. But she wasn’t so na?ve as to believe in happily-ever-afters even if she did believe Carter deserved the benefit of the doubt. Perhaps he wasn’t as wild as everyone made him out to be, but that didn’t really change anything.

She sucked in a bolstering breath and faced him.

“I fly back to Chicago in two days,” she announced.

“To him?”

Liz straightened her napkin. “No.”

“Good.”

She glanced up in surprise. Carter’s eyes were dark as he looked at her, that rare, serious intensity on his face, and she knew she couldn’t pretend indifference anymore. Couldn’t pretend they were just casual friends—or casual lovers even—enjoying a meal. They had shared more than a few nights of pleasant camaraderie. More than physical passion. He deserved to know the truth. And for some reason she couldn’t explain, she needed him to know she was being completely honest with him. “You were right,” she admitted. “About Grant. I called him after you left.”

He didn’t say a word, didn’t ask what he was right about. They both knew what she meant. Liz mumbled a thanks to the waitress for their drinks then picked up her menu. She looked back at Carter. “What?” she prompted, embarrassment flooding her as he continued to stare. “No comment? No I-told-you-so’s?”

“Is that what you want me to say?” he asked. “Would that make it easier to walk away? Go back to Chicago?”

“Walk away? Chicago is my home.”

He grunted and picked up his coffee.

Liz sipped her iced tea and let out a sigh. Maybe agreeing to dinner had been a bad idea. Maybe she should have gone...

“Godammit, Liz!” The utensils chattered on the tabletop as Carter’s fist slammed down on it suddenly. “It doesn’t end here.”

Liz’s eyes skittered toward the other diners. “I don’t know what you’re—”

“Don’t you? This. Us.” He gestured back and forth between them. “It doesn’t end here. I won’t let it.”

“I don’t think it’s—”

“It’s not about thinking!” he cut in, reaching across to grip her fingers in his. “You can’t tell me what happened this weekend meant nothing! You can’t sit there all quiet and calm and tell me you felt nothing!”

Her heart hammered in her chest as his fiercely whispered words pounded against her. “What do you want from me?”

“You’re not ‘sort of’ engaged anymore, are you?” he demanded.

“No.”

“Then there’s nothing stopping you from giving us a chance.”

“A chance? You make it sound like—”

“Like we have something good going here? We do. And it’s something worth... exploring.”

“I can’t believe you’re that hard up for sex,” she scoffed.

His eyes glittered, and she felt his fingers flex over her own. “What makes you think this is about sex?”

“Isn’t it?” she countered, slipping her hands out of his, her smile taut as the waitress returned to take their orders. She couldn’t delude herself into believing it was more than that. Not again.

Carter sat back and all but tossed the menus at the waitress. “Two cheeseburgers. Medium. And a large onion rings.”

Liz glared at him as the waitress retreated. “I was going to order a taco salad.”

“Forget the damn food. Now what’s this horse,” he caught himself and lowered his voice, “crap about my wanting you only for sex? That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.”