Her CEO Stalker and Her Second Chance Mate Chapter 82

Briar

I put Tucker down and waited as Carter quietly moved around the kitchen to make coffee. I held my head in my hands as I sat at the island, trying to sort out my thoughts after the whiplash from the dream. Lost in thought, I didn’t hear Carter come up behind me as he wrapped his arms around me. I startled only a moment before I relaxed into the comforting heat of his body. He kissed me where my shoulder met my neck, and I let my head fall to the side, exposing that side of my neck to him because I don’t know why, but it felt good, relaxing. He inhaled deeply, before his exhale tickled over my sensitive skin. My body shivered in pleasure.

“Are you cold?” I was before, but not with his arms around me. I shrugged, not wanting to explain. He reached over to another stool and grabbed his hoodie, and pulled it over me. His scent washed over me like a comforting cocoon. I slipped my arms through the too-big sleeves and felt instantly better, besides the headache. 

He wrapped his arms around me again. “Better?” I nodded. “Nightmares?” he asked. I shrugged again, not knowing how to explain my feelings right now.

“I have a headache,” I explained. He released me, and I frowned. That confused me too, as he rummaged through a cabinet and set a bottle of Ibuprofen in front of me before grabbing a bottle of water out of the fridge. He leaned over me, setting the water in front of me before going back to get the coffee together. I opened the pill bottle and took three before chugging half the bottle of water. Why was I so thirsty? That's right, I probably sweated out half the hydration in my body. I downed the rest of the bottle.

Carter came back with the coffee, and the warmth of the cup seeped into my chilled hands. I needed to clear my head. I grabbed my smokes and took my coffee with me, and Carter, Rosie, and Tucker followed me as I stepped out on the deck. Carter let Rosie out of the gate, taking a seat beside me, his own coffee in his hands as I watched the glow of dawn begin to light the horizon over the mountains.

“It's probably the stress; you should take a few days off,” he suggested.

I shook my head no. “He’s not stopping me from living my life,” I said and sipped the coffee. Carter frowned but took a drink of his own coffee. I set my cup on the table and lit a cigarette. It wasn’t something I did all the time, and Carter seemed to realize it because he didn’t comment. I was waiting for the ‘that shit will kill you’ speech. I only did it when my nerves or my anxiety made me feel like I wanted to burst out of my skin.

“If that's the case we will run tonight, and the bag I got you for your place should show up today.”

“You got me a bag?”

“Yeah, I’d let you keep walloping me but I like my pretty face,” he said with a mock smile. He was trying to be funny to break me out of my thoughts. Now I couldn't stop wondering why this man was so invested in me. I took my coffee in my free hand and considered. Why ponder when you can just ask?

“Carter, I need to ask you something, and I need you to be honest with me.”

He looked at me and nodded, the creases in his forehead wrinkled in concern as he wondered what I was asking.

“I don’t want to hear the excuses you usually give me, I need to know really why I’m important enough that you are willing to kill him, that you are so patient with me, that you would even consider something with someone so broken. I don’t know what I can possibly offer you. You act and move before I’ve completed my thoughts as if your brain is wired to my needs. I don’t get it. Maybe if I understood your reasoning, I could make sense of it enough too…Right now I can’t help but overthink it all, and it scares me that you would go that far for me. Who am I to you?”

A long moment passed and I gave him the time to collect his thoughts, taking another drag or five before he finally answered.

“Do you believe in fate?” he asked. 

That wasn’t an answer, but I obliged him. “I don’t know anymore, I didn’t until I ran into a mother and her child on the subway, if it weren’t for them, I would have never made it to Beck, and that's another mystery. How did I even run into the one person in the entire city who could keep me safe and willingly get me out of there?”

“I’ve always believed in fate, trusted in it, accepted it even when it was harsh. But the day I met you, I had sat right here that morning questioning what my life was worth, then you showed up and everything changed for me.”

“How?”

He smirked a little. “I may be giving you more info than you want, but I’m excited to see you, to be around you, it’s not just what I guess you think it is, I don’t see you as a damsel in distress. I see you as a person I really enjoy being around, someone who burns fire back into my life. You're special to me deep down into the core of who I am, and anyone who tries to harm you makes me see red.

“Lana told me about her ex. Did you kill him?”

“No, I let Mazzie deal with him; only she knows how that story ended. I was just a look-out.”

I swallowed. “It's the only way to stop him, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” he agreed.

I sat and let that realization sink in before I decided. I made peace with that choice deep down in the core of who I was. The parts of me that were conflicted were echoes in my veins that needed purging, I had decided. They made me feel guilty, dirty, and even I realized it.

“I need to train harder.”

“Why's that?”

“Because the only person who will spill his blood is me, I don’t want it on your hands, and the only way I will find peace, whether or not I’m behind bars, is if I do it myself. I don’t want you to ruin your life for me. So I will train, and I will live my life until I can end him or he ends me.” 

“That's not happening, sweetheart,” Carter’s voice was cold as I narrowed my eyes at him. “You want the final blow, fine, but if that fight is going to cost your life, I’m going to step in because your life is worth more to me than your ego.”

I let out an indignant breath through my nose. However, he was right; my ego had no place in murder. That may very well be a suicide mission. Either way, the outcome was the same. “Fine  but only if you ride my ass with training so I’m as ready as I can be, also just in case I want to ride my bike before I die.”

“You're not dying,” he growled. “But I’ll teach you everything I know, and if you can’t, I will.” There was a grit to his voice at the end. The promise, non-negotiable, and I could accept that. If he was willing to bolster me to the max and I couldn’t win, he’d take the kill shot, and I would help him dispose of the body. How messed up was I to even be considering this?

As messed up as he made me when he violated and beat me. Yeah, I was doing the world a favor here, I decided to check my conscience at the proverbial door.