Page 29 of Ly to Me (Devils of Alliston Springs #1)

Lyra

The Truck

M orning sun pierced into my swollen eyes as they fluttered open. I sat up and turned, my gaze darting around the room like I’d actually find Car beside me, or in the chair facing the bed. Somewhere, waiting for me.

But he was nowhere to be found.

A paper taped to the door forced me from the bed as a pit formed in my stomach. I expected the note to be from him, but the words on it were not ones I thought I’d see.

Image of a note, which reads: Ly, Breakfast is on the kitchen counter.

Hope you still love bacon. I have to work today, but when I come home, I’m taking you out.

Take my card into town. Buy something you can dance in.

I’d tell you to take my truck, but I think we both know that’s not a good idea for Article 1. Be back at 5. Car

My fingers traced over his signature before they slid down to the credit card taped to the bottom. I worried down on my lip as I stared down at the plastic, surprised that my first thought wasn’t how much I could spend on it, but rather, the reason why he’d left it.

He was taking me out…on a date?

Maybe it was to show the rest of the town that we were, in fact, married. I knew he wrote those articles to make me squirm. That’s what he was doing. He wanted to test me. And Article Three said he could give me funds as he sees fit.

I sighed in exasperation and walked with the paper to the desk when another piece of white paper stole my attention.

I dropped the note to the surface and bent to collect the other from the floor.

As I held the crumpled paper in my hand, my eyes wandered to the stack on the desk, then back to the words scrawled in front of me.

Worry clogged my throat.

I’d finally pushed him over the edge of sanity that he seemed to teeter on. He was done with me or done with our contract, or both. My knees buckled, and I reached to the chair for support, uncertain which one was worse.

And that feeling, that thought of utter unease, only bloomed more while I showered and ate the breakfast he'd left out for me. I even sniffed the bacon and searched the counters, checking for poison or drugs.

Something .

But found nothing. It even tasted really damn good.

I felt like a doe with nowhere to hide on the first day of hunting season, and Carver was the most skilled hunter I knew of.

Five o’clock came faster than I hoped for. I’d left the front door open, too on edge to want to hear any loud or sudden noises as I sat on the couch that faced the rest of the house.

What if he tied me up again, but did it in public?

I didn’t know what his plans were. I didn’t even know if my being here was moot now with the contract in a ball.

But, it wasn’t shredded, and as thorough as Carver had been when we were teens, I was forced to believe that meant our agreement was still valid.

“You’re okay, Lyra. Stop worryin’ your heart out,” I murmured to myself, my fingers twisting in my lap.

“Breathe.” I took a deep breath, the green floral sundress I’d bought earlier in the day expanding with my chest, the strings tied into bows on top of my shoulders sagging with my exhale.

I bent over my knees, the leather boots with wildflowers embroidered on them shining from the light still pooling in through the windows.

The creak of wooden floorboards made me stiffen, but when no voice came, I adjusted myself and gathered the courage to look at the door right as it clicked shut.

Carver was leaning against the wall by the door, dirt covering his shirt and jeans, lining the edges of his fingernails and hands that rested over his bulging biceps as his arms crossed.

My throat ran dry as my eyes wandered from his backward-facing ball cap to the bits of dark hair that stuck to his sweat-slicked skin and finally landed on those atala eyes.

Dirt looked good on him.

“Wife,” he growled, his eyes doing the same as mine. “You saw the note.”

The note. I cleared my throat and straightened in my seat, clasping my fingers together on my lap, discreetly pushing the fabric of my dress between my thighs.

“I did.”

He continued his perusal of my body, reminding me of the way he looked yesterday when his cock was buried in the back of my throat. My thighs involuntarily clenched together and the edge of his lip curled at the movement.

Carver pushed off the wall and closed in on me. His breath warmed over my skin as he bent down, surrounding me in a sweet floral scent that went well with the oak and leather he toted. I all but melted further into the couch as he took the ends of my hair and twirled it gently between his fingers.

“You look absolutely edible.” His lips skirted over the sensitive flesh along my neck, right beneath my ear. I whimpered as my eyes shifted lower, noticing the strain in his jeans as he towered above me, bracing himself using the back of the couch.

“Car—” I froze, the reminder that I wasn’t supposed to call him by his nickname buzzing in my head. I expected fingers around my throat, and my pussy throbbed at the thought.

Something was seriously wrong with me.

Instead, his lips pressed sweetly to my collar bone right before he stood and took a step back. “Gonna go shower.” He winked, and then he was gone.

My palms were damp, and my breathing was completely out of sync with the stillness of the room.

Was I in a dream? I pinched my skin, over and over, then did the same check with my eyes—shutting them tightly and snapping them back open.

But no matter what I did, I was still sitting in his beautiful home, on a comfortable, homely beige couch, in new clothes that were all mine.

Safe had never been in my vocabulary. Not even when Carver and I had been together ten years ago. I always knew, at the end of the day or when the weekend was over, that I’d be back at home, sitting on pins and needles waiting for Chet to be back.

For the first time in my life, I felt a flicker of that word come and go, like a taunting gust of wind on a hot summer day.

I forced myself to focus on the glass Carver made me kneel in, the way he’d chased me through the woods, and the way he’d forced himself inside me.

The way he’d just dressed up what he’d previously called trash and expected me to wait on him to get ready.

When I wasn’t forcing those thoughts in, my mind wandered to the good memories—his arm draped over my waist, holding me after a terrible night.

Flashes of us in the shower together that I couldn’t quite remember all of.

The way each of the times he’d fucked into me, save for the one the day before, he’d sought my pleasure , not his own. He gave me space, made me food—

“Fucking hell, Lyra. Get your shit together. He’s using you to get his money, too.

” I nodded, as if ending all of my internal battles with the finite one—he needed the money, too.

He was just as desperate to own his facility as I was to start the life I wanted, and for some reason, his parents put it all into a contract that forced him to be married first. His additional stipulations were just as he was—monstrous and unneeded.

You hate Carver Roland. You hate Carver Roland. You hate Carver Roland.

I swallowed past the lump in my throat, steadying my rapidly thudding heart as I heard him start to dress in the room.

Hatred was easy. Using my looks to get my way was easy, too.

Meshing them together between Carver Roland should be easy.

He stepped into the room, buttoning a shirt over his defined abdomen.

I fought to keep my gaze steady, making sure it wouldn’t fall to his unbuttoned jeans or the boots he picked—the same light shade of leather as mine.

He finished buttoning his black shirt and smirked at me as I watched him zip his jeans, remaining silent, but also sure my cheeks spoke for me.

Fucking tattoos and barbells.

“Where are we goin’?”

“Do you remember”—his side pressed into the wall as he leaned and started cuffing his sleeve, revealing the butterfly—“the bar my parents owned?”

I bit down on my lip and nodded, fighting against another unwanted sensation—sympathy. His blue eyes homed in on my lip as he continued rolling his other sleeve. “New owner started a dance night. Once a month, I think it is.”

“I see.” Carver pushed off the wall and strode up to the key rack, taking an older set of keys from the hook. My attention snapped to the window as my nose scrunched. “I didn’t clean up the inside,” I admitted.

He pushed a hand into his pocket. “Two things, sweetheart.” I braced myself for the crazy as I stood and crossed my arms. “One—I don’t expect you to clean it.

The only reason I haven’t hauled it off to the junkyard is because if you decide you need to let out more anger, I prefer you not burnin’ our house down.

” Our house ? Surely that wasn’t what I heard.

My arms dropped to my sides, and he continued, “Two—I have another truck. That one was just to haul Bee’s trailer, so I think any apologizin’ or worryin’ over it should be directed at her.

She does like being taken to the occasional trail or two out of town, and now, she’ll have to wait until I get a new one. ”

“Oh.”

He stretched his hand out, and I stared back at him, dumbfounded by the gesture. He usually just…took. “We’re gonna be late. I’m sorry I took so long in there, but I got a bit dirty today. Leo was out sick.” Leo ?

“Doesn't Jamie do that, too?”

“Jamie isn’t supposed to touch what he doesn’t know. The growing is all me, sweetheart.”

“Oh.”

His brow arched. “I didn’t know how much you got out of him, but clearly, nothing on the positive end.

For my sake, at least.” He stepped up and gently took my hand in his, apparently tired of waiting for me to do the same.

When he pulled me to him and kissed my forehead, the butterflies that had long since died came bursting back to life.

“I’ll take you for a tour soon, if you’d like. ”