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CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

arden

I drop my phone after texting Carter the update. I’m here to visit Wanton, and when I walked into the building this morning, bright-eyed and excited to visit, Shelly was rushing around the desk and pulling me into a hug I wasn’t expecting.

It was as I handed her the tea I’d brought on Carter’s behalf that she told me every dog but Wanton had been adopted.

Carter’s money had successfully gotten all the current canine residents into homes. Tears burn behind my eyes as I round the corner and find Wanton sleeping on his bed. I smile, so relieved for the other dogs, but so heartbroken for him. His ears perk up as I crouch beside the kennel.

“Your time will come,” I whisper, placing my hand on the door. “Your soulmate is just around the corner, buddy.”

He lifts his head to look at me.

I smile, pulling my book from my bag. By the time I’m done reading two chapters, Wanton is curled up next to the door, eyes on me, listening as I read him a story he can’t understand. It doesn’t matter, though. He wants to hear it.

“I’m glad that my celibacy is making you so happy.”

I grin, bringing my coffee to my lips. It’s mid-afternoon, Carter is at my place after practice.

I gave him hard copies of some of the leftover bills from November, like I usually do, but he barely even looked at them.

He’s lounging on my couch, feet up on the table, pretending not to be ecstatic that those dogs are all in warm, loving homes now.

All but Wanton.

“For the greater good,” I remind him.

“My dick needs some greater good soon,” he grumbles, dropping his head back. “How have you done this for years, Red? I’m convinced it’s going to fall off.”

“Well, I don’t have anything that can fall off. Maybe that helps.”

He sighs. “I miss sex.”

“You’ll get over it,” I tell him, but I study his face and wonder if I’m a monster. It genuinely looks like it pains him. I know what we agreed to, but he’s a grown man. “Carter, if you want to?—”

“I’m not ending this agreement,” he cuts me off, glancing at me. “Not yet.”

“No,” I say, placing my mug on the table. I meet his eyes and hold his stare. “If there is somebody you can trust, somebody you know won’t spill about this, you can have sex.”

Carter’s jaw tenses. “Not worth the risk.”

“Are you sure?”

“I don’t have anyone I can trust with something this important,” he admits, running a hand over his face. “I am already being branded a criminal, I’m not letting myself be branded a cheater. ”

I nod, but really drink him in. He’s tense and tired.

He’s been exceptionally aggressive on the ice lately.

I feel like he’s a ticking time bomb, and getting off with a real person again might deflate some of that.

There has been more than one occasion now where I wondered what it’d be like.

If it’d be worth it. If it would ruin things.

I miss sex, too, but not enough to go looking for it. He said if I wanted it, he’d give it to me, and that thought has been sitting in the back of my head like a weight lately. I haven’t looked for it, but it landed in my lap anyway. Right on my couch.

I swallow, imagining what he’d be like. Dominant, for sure. Demanding. Rough, probably. There is no universe that exists where Carter Forkerro doesn’t know what he’s doing in bed, so I have no doubt that it would be incredible.

“What?” he asks.

I blink, realizing that I was staring at him. Staring at him and thinking about how good he must be in the sack.

I shake my head, reaching for my mug again, trying to get the dirty thoughts out of my mind. “Just thinking.”

“About?” he cocks a brow, but I’d rather not have this conversation. Not now. Not ever.

I think about Carter slipping up on that end of our deal all the time. If he slept with someone else and I found out, whether he told me or I stumbled across it online, how would I handle it? The thought makes my heart sink. The green-eyed monster comes to life in my belly. Possessive. Jealous.

He is not mine, but pretending he is makes it feel like he is.

It’s starting to mess with my head. Those kisses in ‘dire’ situations, the ones we always say aren’t real, I’m starting to crave them.

I’m starting to expect them. Those nights in his spare bedroom, I think about crawling into bed with him just so that he can wrap his arms around me .

It’s scary. The ticking clock is a constant sound in my brain.

We have an expiry date, but I don’t know how I will feel when that day arrives.

I know it’s bad. I know I’m an idiot. This is fake.

It’s a ruse. But fuck, a part of me likes Carter a bit too much.

I enjoy him too thoroughly. I miss him the moment he’s on the road again.

And yeah, I’d like to fuck my fake boyfriend. Don’t sit there and look at me like you wouldn’t.

That’s exactly why I can’t.

I smile gently, swallowing the lump in my throat. “Nothing.”