Page 22 of Bride for Keeps

“It’s not working,” Carter said flatly.

“What’s not working?”

“Where’s Jess?” Carter demanded, looking over Cole’s shoulder.

“She’s at work.” Cole shifted to let Carter in. Carter didn’t particularly want to go inside the old house. It had been his grandfather’s when they’d been kids and Carter had never felt comfortable in it. It had been the only place in his entire life where Cole had been the favorite.

For years he’d convinced himself that wasn’t why he didn’t like it. He was better than petty jealousy, but standing in the kitchen now—decorated with Jess’s feminine touch—he realized that’s all it had been.

Petty jealousy.

“What’s not working?” Cole asked, and Carter had to admit it was weird seeing his brother like a…man. Cole had taken off at eighteen and spent most of the next ten years far away from Marietta. Carter still thought of him as that surly teenager.

But he wasn’t. He was another person entirely. Somehow it made it easier to talk to him, thinking of him like someone else. Not the brother he’d never had anything in common with, but a man with a certain amount of life experience, just like him.

“The trying-hard thing. Sierra isn’t coming around at all.”

Cole tilted his head, looking Carter over like he’d gone a little crazy. “Carter… It’s been two days.”

“Yes. Two days. I’ve talked to her both days and she still insists that divorce is the only answer.” It was taking everything he was to not act frustrated in front of her. To appear calm and reasonable.

But touching her and having her move away was… He didn’t want to endure that ever again.

Cole ran a hand over his short hair and continued to study Carter with that obnoxiousyou’ve lost itgaze. “How long were you and Sierra married? A year?”

“In a little over a month it’ll be our anniversary, but we’ve been together over a year now.”

“Okay, so in that year you ended up getting married and having your wife want to get divorced. I don’t think you can fix that in two days. Forgiveness and acceptance and working through problems take time. Jess didn’t exactly fall at my feet when she came and told me to come home to help Dad and the family. Or even when I actually did it.”

Carter frowned. “But it didn’t takethatlong. You’ve only been home a few months and you two are happy.”

“We are, but we also weren’tmarriedback then. We were teenagers when we were together, and we’re different people ten years later. And…relationships aren’t math, Carter. They’re messy and a lot complicated and different for everyone. You shouldn’t be here telling me it’s not working. You should be with Sierra figuring out how to make it work.”

Carter really resented taking advice from his younger brother, but Cole was here and who else was Carter going to talk to? Lina was even younger and not happy with him. And he knew what his parents would say.

And that was his life. Without Sierra, his entire life was the McArthurs and the hospital. A supposed to, and yet it felt so empty and cold without her in it. When did that happen?

“Go talk to her,” Carter urged. “Keep talking.”

“She doesn’t want to see me,” Carter grumbled.

“Man,whatdid you do?”

“I didn’t do anything!” Carter started pacing. It was so strange to have this anger clawing inside of him. He wasn’t an angry guy, but it was growing. Every day. And it felt weirdly…good. It felt good to give in to this thing that wasn’t rational. That wasn’tsupposed to.

Like Sierra. His not supposed to. He wanted more of that. More of all the good he’d gotten out of going against what he wassupposedto do.

“You had to have done something.”

Carter glared at his brother. “Well, whatever it was, I have no idea. And she won’t tell me.”

“Did you ask?”

“Yes, I did.”

Cole sighed. “Look, I’m no marriage expert. I’m no anything expert, except how to wrestle a steer. But you can’t fix it if you can’t talk about what went wrong. If you don’t know, you have to find out. And if she won’t tell you… Well, I can’t believe I’m about to say this, but that’s a bit on her.”

“Well, how do I change that?” Carter demanded.

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