He raised his eyebrows. “That… says something.”
“Yeah,” I said flatly. “It does.” The silence was heavy, then, but not uncompanionable.
“I’m not going to screw up your life,” I said finally. “I was fully on board with… what happened.” My cheeks flare hot at the mention of it. “But I won’t say anything. And it won’t happen again, so it’s like it never happened, right?”
He resumed staring at the parking lot. “I don’t think that’s how that works,” he said, taking a drink from his cup.
And it wasn’t, it didn’t. Because somehow that distance between us closed, his hand brushed mine, and then, I don’t know, my back was against the damp vinyl siding with him on his knees in front of me, the oversized grill hiding us from view.
And it kept happening that way, chance encounters, planned meetups, casual “study” sessions. Until the end of last semester, when he cut everything off abruptly. With a text—“I can’t do this anymore”—out of nowhere.Six monthsago.
Which is what makes the last couple of days—“I miss you,” “Jo can stay at my apartment,” “everything is fine”—extra bizarre. I cannot get a handle on what Carter is thinking.Why? And why now?Nothing has changed, as far as I know.
“The Nantucket Inn is not a safe place,” Carter says now, stiffness in his tone. “I assure you, you’ll be fine at my apartment. I have no intention of attempting to resume any of our previous… encounters.” He shakes his head. “This is an emergency situation and I’m trying to be—”
“Good for you.” I cut him off, the heat of humiliation stinging my cheeks, before he can talk more about being friends or what the fuck ever he’s about now. “That’s not why.”
His head jerks toward me, away from the road. “Then… why?”
“Can you take me there or not?” I persist. I’m not feelingparticularly generous with information. Mainly because he’ll want a more detailed explanation, and I don’t have one to give. Or, not one that he’ll understand or accept.
Carter slows for a stop sign, coming to a complete halt. Of course.
He takes the moment to look over at me, his blue eyes troubled and stormy. “If I say no, can I assume that you’ll attempt to get there on your own, one way or another?” he asks, and that stress twitch in his jaw is back. His back molars will be dust before long.
What is wrong with me that I find that hot? That I want to lean over and kiss that pulsing area, see if I can make it pulse harder, faster. Even after he’s basically told me he wants nothing to do with me inthatway.
Self-esteem, Jo. Try it, you’ll like it.
“Yep,” I say to Carter. I have no clue how I’d manage it, though, and I’d rather not try to figure it out. Probably because it would involve stealing someone’s car and taking some of their life in the process. But needs must.
He sighs and signals to the left.
The Nantucket Inn is on the outer edge of Beecher, the town, not campus. That puts it at about four and a half hours northeast of its namesake island. I don’t know if the owners were hoping to capitalize on confused tourists or just make their place sound cozier and more inviting.
But the Nantucket—known colloquially on campus as the Just Fuck It—is, in fact, a shitty twelve-room motel that sits mostly empty during the year, except for graduation, when out-of-town parents don’t make reservations fast enough at the two nicer hotels in town.
It’s the standard U shape of highway motels from horrormovies, with peeling turquoise paint and an empty concrete pool at the center. And if shady shit in Beecher needs a place to happen, the Just Fuck It is ground zero.
The orange neon sign on the pole out front still flickers OPEN, visible against the gray stormy sky. And the outdoor floodlights in front of the office are on.
That tells me Erik is probably still here, finishing out his shift from the night before. Most likely asleep, head down, at the desk.
Good. That’s… helpful.A greedy, gleeful anticipation pulses in my chest, followed immediately by a wave of shame and self-loathing.
I feel sick to my stomach. Causing pain, death, and destruction is my father’s forte. I am not him. I refuse to be.
Even if someone deserves it.
“You can let me out here,” I say to Carter, as he pulls into the parking lot.
But Carter ignores me and continues into a parking space just past the motel office, then turns off the car. When I open my door, he does the same on the other side.
Whoa, no.I stop. “I don’t need help.”
“You needed a ride,” he points out from across the roof of his car, the very car I needed to get here.
I grit my teeth. “Yes, and thank you for that. But you should just wait out here.”
