Page 33 of Above All Else

My stomach lurched, and a cold sweat blistered my skin. “Wait. Just wait, Carter.” Tears burned my eyes.

He brought the knife forward, and darkness hit my mind like a power outage during a tornado. My hands jerked and sprung apart, causing my brows to lift.

I glanced down at my freed hands, and a staccato breath left my lips. “Does this mean...”

Carter tucked the knife away and drew closer, his body pressed against mine, his hands cradling my cheeks.

“I used to watch you like a moth drawn to a flame, unaware of how much your touch could burn me.” He bent closer, his breath caressing my lips. “You have no idea how hard it was to walk away from you all those years ago.”

What is he confessing?

Laughter outside of the door drew my attention away from him. He dragged my gaze back to his. “It’s only us. Forget what’s down there.”

I bit down on my inner cheek, the tears welling in my eyes, blurring my vision. “It’s hard to forget what my fate could very well be.”

He shook his head. “That’s where you’re wrong.”

Swiping at the unshed tears, his rugged features focused. “You believe me?”

“More than ever.”

“But you said—“

“It was for show.”

Air whooshed out of my lungs, and I wrapped my arms around his shoulders while standing on the tips of my toes,soaking in his warmth. I jerked away, holding him at an arm’s distance. “We need to get out of here.”

His Adam’s apple bobbed with a slight nod. “We will, but first I need to do something.”

“What? What’s more important than leaving these psycho’s behind?”

“I just need to confirm something first.”

“What is it? Let me help.”

“I need to think it through.” He rubbed his jaw, the muscles pulsing under the shadow of a beard.

“Okay.”

We stood in silence as I stared at him, my hands tucked behind me, braced against my butt, the shivering tightness in my chest melting away.

He glanced sideways at me, and I suppressed a laugh, my teeth digging into my cheeks to stop the smirk.

“What’s so funny?”

I shook my head. “Nothing.”

My stomach morphed from dread to teenage nervousness as though I’d never been in peril, and he’d never professed to wanting me dead.

He turned toward me with a smile and ran his fingers through my gnarled hair.

Pine needles poked at my skin, the leaves crinkling as he picked them out of my hair and dropped them to the ground. “We look like a bunch of people who took a romp in the hay.”

I laughed. “Me, more so than you.” My fingertipstouched his cut brow and stared at the bruise forming over the bridge of his nose. “You look like you got the shit kicked out of you by a girl.”

He raised a brow and walked across the room. “Where did you learn to fight like that anyway?” Opening a drawer in the nightstand, he removed a thin package of wet wipes.

“I took self-defense lessons for a few years after Amber died.” I winced as he cleaned the blood off of his face, using the mirror hanging on the wood-paneled wall, his fingers pinching the bridge of his nose. “I didn’t want to end up like her.” I shrugged and scoffed. “Not that it did me much good.”

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