I don’t stop him. I don’t move away. For the first time since I got here, for the first time since I met him in person, since I looked him in the eyes, since I realized how fucking deep I’ve already fallen, I don’t want to.

14

Carter

Oh, fuck. Her words are still hanging in the air, wrapping around me, sinking into my skin, curling into my bones like a match dropped into gasoline. My body frozen in place like I can’t quite believe what just came out of her mouth.

She wasn’t teasing, wasn’t trying to get a reaction just to laugh at the way I’d stumble through it, she was dead serious.

Now I’m sitting here trying to figure out how the hell I’m supposed to handle that. I drag in a sharp breath, push up from the couch, and start pacing before I even realize I’m moving.

If I stay sitting right next to her, staring at her, trying to figure out if I actually heard what I think I did, trying to understand how the fuck I got this lucky? I might actually lose my goddamn mind.

The living room feels too small, too hot, too suffocating with all the things I want to say but don’t know how to. I scrub a hand down my face, dragging my fingers through my hair, exhaling sharp, fast, my nerves completely fucking fried.

“You can’t just—” I stop mid-sentence, shake my head, start again. “You’re really saying this now?”

Haven is still sitting there, still watching me, entirely too calm when I feel like my entire fucking world just flipped upside down. One of her brows lifts, and that little amused tilt to her mouth should not be making my brain short-circuit right now. “Is there a better time?” she asks, voice all teasing, but I can still hear the weight of it underneath.

I let out a rough laugh, more breath than sound, more disbelief than amusement. “No, just—” I pace a few more steps, then turn back toward her, my hands braced against my hips like that’s going to somehow ground me in this moment. “You’re telling me you don’t hate me? After everything? After Tate, after me not telling you, after this entire night?”

She tilts her head slightly, considering, and my chest squeezes so fucking hard it’s physically painful. “Do I think you should’ve told me?” she muses, tapping her fingers against the couch cushion. “Yeah, obviously.”

I brace for it, waiting for the inevitable ‘but.’

“But,” she continues, smirking now. “You’re clearly already punishing yourself for it, so…”

I exhale hard, dragging my hands through my hair again, my body still too wired, my heart still hammering like it hasn’t caught up to the fact that I’m not about to get ripped to shreds.