Page 34 of Falling for the Forward

Hallie gently tugs Darling’s leash, bringing him closer to me.

“Darling wants a kiss and hug.”

I laugh. “How about ear scratches and belly rubs?”

I love on Darling while Carter is gone, and he’s back in the kitchen within two minutes. I’m sure he literally just said “bye” to both girls. But at least he said something, I guess.

Things have been tense between us since our conversation about the business. I liked it better when he didn’t know a single one of my weaknesses or past mistakes. Now I feel exposed, and I don’t like it.

Carter puts our bags in the back of his Lincoln Navigator and we start the drive in silence for the first fifteen minutes.

“If you want some of the five hundred thousand dollars now, I can do that,” he says out of nowhere. “However much you owe on those loans, there’s no reason to rack up another year of interest.”

It’s a nice offer. I fight my urge to tell him to drop the subject. Simply because it makes me so uncomfortable to talkabout anything related to how stupid it was of me to trust Tyler so much.

“That would be nice.”

“Would three hundred be enough?”

I decide to bite the bullet and be honest with him. If online sleuths keep sleuthing, it’ll only be a matter of time before it’s public record anyway.

“Two hundred would be enough. I owe just over a hundred and eighty thousand.”

He nods, a cringe flickering across his face. “I’ll take care of it Monday. My accountant will need your account information for a wire transfer.”

“Thank you.”

He sighs softly. “I shouldn’t have gotten so mad about it.”

“I get it. You’re paying me a lot of money for this arrangement. I never imagined anyone would dig into my past like that.”

“I was a dick about it, Suki. I’m used to the way I communicate with my teammates and that’s not how I should be communicating with you and the girls.”

I’ve never seen Carter be contrite. It’s endearing, him admitting he was a dick, his half scowl in place and his massive hand wrapped around the steering wheel.

“It’s okay.” I glance over at him. “So, where are we going in Ann Arbor?”

“I booked us an Airbnb just outside the city on a lake. It’s cold as shit there, so I got a place with fireplaces. There’s a chef coming to make us dinner there tonight and I figured we can go out tomorrow night.”

“That sounds nice.”

“I’ve always liked Ann Arbor.”

“Did you used to go there with the archaeologist?”

He shakes his head. “Kaia lived in New York, so we only saw each other two or three times a month. She’d fly in for weekends when I had home games. When we spent more time together during my offseason, that was when we argued the most.”

I can’t help being nosy; I’m dying of curiosity about his relationship with her. “Were the arguments her fault or yours?”

A smile plays on his lips. “Probably sixty percent me and forty percent her. She liked the New York nightlife a lot, you know? Wanted to take me to all these dinner parties with her friends and colleagues, and it just wasn’t my jam. And she just wanted more out of the relationship than I did.”

“How long were you guys together?”

“Almost two years. She gave me an ultimatum that if we weren’t engaged after two years, she was out.”

“And she didn’t wait the full two years?”

He shrugs. “I told her it wasn’t happening.”

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