Page 69 of Stuck in Paradise with You

Hell, no, I want to be the only person who takes her out of my clothes.

I’m so tightly wound, I could burst out of my own. So I surprise even myself when I stay in the doorway and ask her, ‘Did you love me, Carrie?’

Her hands drop from my hoodie. This time, I have caught her off guard. As her hands fall to her sides, she watches an invisible spot on my chest. Her voice is barely a whisper when she tells me, ‘Yes.’

I don’t know what I expected but that word seeps into my skin, into my veins, and it warms my entire body, making me weak with the heat of it, the heart of it.

‘Then why did you return my letters? I get that you might have been hurt, I can see that now. But I wrote six letters to you, Carrie. I explained everything. I apologized for everything. I told you how much I wished…’ My words catch in my throat. ‘Every single letter was returned to sender, all but the first unopened.Why?’

‘You wrote to me?’

She didn’t know?

‘Every month for six months. I told you in my very last letter that if you didn’t reply, I’d leave you to get on with your life. So that’s what I did. Even when I came back to New York, I didn’t look for you, I didn’t try to get in touch. Nothing. Until you showed up here.’

‘Luke, I never got any letters. Not one.’

‘You didn’t? But they were returned to sender. The first one had been opened and resealed with tape. It wasn’t you who returned them?’

She shakes her head. ‘My lease was coming up anyway and I just… I needed a change from everything when you left. As much as I could change.’

She didn’t send them back? She didn’t even get them?

She loved me and she didn’t get any fucking explanation as to why I left? She didn’t even know I’d attempted to explain?

Christ.

The enormity of it hits me and knocks the air from my lungs. Outside, the wind is picking up, creating background noise that wasn’t there earlier today. The sky is purple and darkening further.

And the woman in front of me looks broken and sexy as hell in equal measure. I want to take her in my arms and hold her, then make love to her, the way I know we can.

What a mess we made.

I drag a hand through my hair in frustration and replace my cap on my head. This feels like a crossroads and every route feels like the wrong way, but looking at her, seeing the way she’s looking at me, through her lashes, her breasts pushed up and round beneath my hoodie, in that sinful workout bra…

‘I’ve got to… I’m going to…’Jesus, I just need to get out of here before I start something that won’t be good for either of us.

I practically run for the door and hear Carrie turn on the outdoor shower before I’m even off her front deck. I look to the sky, asking the universe if it’s having a laugh at my expense.

SEALs training would be easier than walking away from this.

I force myself back to my own pod and, like Carrie, I turn on my own outdoor shower. I need to wash away the day. The dirton my clothes, the grime on my skin, every confused thought and emotion in my mind.

I kick off my sneakers and step under the monsoon head fully clothed, leaning my head back and asking whoever’s listening up there for mercy.

I feel Carrie’s presence before I even open my eyes into her hooded ones. She’s right in front of me, wearing just those tight pants and bra, staring at me through the mist and steam of the shower water.

This could be a really bad idea for so many reasons. It always was.

It could be the second-worst decision I’ve ever made, but the first was walking away from Carrie, so I’ll be damned if I can stop it.

32

CARRIE

‘You’re so fucking beautiful, Carrie.’

The way my name sounds on his lips, the husk in his voice, it’s visceral. I want him as much now as I did before the first time we ever made love. Urgently. Potently.

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