TOO LATE : CHAPTER 21 – 30
Chapter 28
SLOAN-POV
I’ve never missed a single Sunday visiting my brother. And even though I’ve been in bed since Carter walked away Friday night, pretending to be sick, I somehow pulled myself out of my slump today.
Asa and all his friends went to the casino. It’s about a three-hour drive north and my brother is an hour drive south. It’s sad, but I feel like the more distance I put between Asa and myself today, the better I’ll feel. The more I’ll be able to breathe.
Right before I walk out of my bedroom, I pause in the doorway. I reach to my left hand and slip off the ring, setting it on the dresser. I’ll be home way before Asa gets back, so he won’t notice I didn’t wear it today.
But my hand will feel a million pounds lighter.
I stop in the kitchen to make myself a drink for the road. When I reach for the freezer to grab ice, my hand tightens around the door handle. My eyes fall to the new words written on the dry erase board.
Pickles don’t feel guilty when people yodel, so why aren’t the sheets ever folded on Tuesday?
I have no idea when Carter wrote this, but I know he wrote it to try and make me feel better about the way he had to leave Friday night. He wrote it to try and make me laugh.
It works, because I’m smiling for the first time in two days when I open the freezer.
I fill my cup with ice and soda, then grab an extra soda for Stephen. They don’t let him keep sodas in his room due to his health restrictions, so I always sneak him an extra one on Sundays as a treat. With his doctors permission, of course. I just don’t tell Stephen that.
I grab my purse, my keys and the drinks and start to head for the door when I receive an incoming text. I wait until I’m at my car to pull my phone out of my purse and read it.
Carter: Pick me up on the corner of Standard and Wyatt. I want to go with you.
My cheeks heat up at the unexpected text. I thought he was with Asa and the guys today. I start to text him back, but another text comes through.
Carter: Also, never respond to my texts. And delete both of these.
I do what he requests and then I back out of my driveway and head to the corner of Standard and Wyatt.
It’s only a few streets down, and I know he wants me to pick him up there because it’s safer than leaving his car in the driveway. But I’m still confused as to how he knew I was even going anywhere.
I’m filled with anticipation as I search for him. When I round the corner of Standard, he’s right where he said he’d be, standing alone on the curb, hands shoved in the back pockets of his jeans.
He smiles when he sees me and it hurts. And feels incredible. When I come to a stop, he opens the door and climbs inside the car.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
“Going with you to visit your brother.”
“But…how? How did you get out of gambling? And how did you even know when I was leaving?”
He smiles at me and then leans across the seat and wraps his hand in my hair. He rests his lips against mine and says, “I have my ways.” He ksses me and then moves back to his side of the seat. He pulls on his seatbelt. “If you think it’s too risky for me to go inside the building with you, I don’t mind waiting in the car. I just really needed some time alone with you.”
I try to smile, but having him this close reminds me of Friday night, and how pathetic I sounded when I tried to beg him to run away with me.
I wasn’t thinking things through. I can’t just up and leave, I’m in the middle of getting my college degree. I can’t pull Stephen out of his facility and drag him on a cross country road trip. He’s happy there and I’d be doing him a disservice.
I just want out so bad, and after feeling what I felt when Carter kssed me, I got emotional. And it made me wish he was wrong-that he really could save me.
Carter reaches across the seat for my hand. “Sloan. Can you make me a promise today?”
I glance over at him. “Depends on what it is.”
“I can see in your expression that you’re thinking about Friday night. Let’s not talk about Asa today. Or what we both know needs to happen. I don’t even want to discuss the possibility of getting caught, or how stupid I am for coming with you. Let’s just be Sloan and Luke today, okay?”
I raise an eyebrow. “Luke? Who is Luke? Are we role playing?”
His jaw twitches and he says, “I mean Carter. I used to go by my middle name when I was younger. Hard habit to break.”
I shake my head and laugh. “Do I make you that flustered that you can’t even remember which name you go by?”
He grips my hand tighter and smiles. “Stop making fun of me. And don’t ever call me Luke, only my grandfather called me Luke and it’s weird.”
TOO LATE : CHAPTER 21 – 30
****
“Okay, but I’m not gonna lie. I kind of like Luke. Luke.”
He reaches over and squeezes my knee. “Sloan and Carter. Let’s be Sloan and Carter today,” he corrects again.
“Which one am I?” I tease. “Sloan or Carter?”
He laughs, then unbuckles his seatbelt and leans across the seat. He presses his mouth to my ear and slides the palm of his hand over my thigh.
I hold my breath and grip the steering wheel when he whispers, “You be Sloan. I’ll be Carter. And on our way home this afternoon, we’ll pull over somewhere quiet and you can be Sloan in the backseat with Carter. Sound good?”
I exhale with my nod. “Uh-huh.”
TOO LATE : CHAPTER 21 – 30
CARTER-POV
“When is the last time Asa visited?” I ask her.
She turns off the car and begins gathering her things. “Two years ago. He’s only been here once. He said it made him uncomfortable.”
Of course he’d say that.
“So no one would think it’s odd that I’m walking in with you?”
Sloan shakes her head. “I think the employees are so used to seeing me alone, they’d only be curious that I finally showed up with someone.
But they wouldn’t be suspicious or tell Asa, because they don’t even know Asa.” She drops her keys and her phone in her purse and then grips the steering wheel.
She stares out over the parking lot in front of us. “That’s really sad, isn’t it? That I have no one? Literally no one. It’s always just been me and Stephen against the whole gddmn world.”
I reach over and tuck a strand of hair behind her ear. I want to comfort her-to tell her she has me. But she’s being so honest right now,
I don’t want to feed her another lie. She doesn’t even know my real name and the more lies I tell her in moments like these, the harder it’ll be for her to forgive me when she finds out the truth.
Which she almost did earlier. I swear to God, sometimes I wonder how I ever got this position to begin with. I am the worst undercover detective that ever existed. Seriously, they should call me The Pink Panther.
Sometimes I think maybe she could handle it if I told her the truth. That maybe she would be able to help out in some way. But that would only put her in more danger and I already do that enough.
Maybe in time, if I can get her to earn Ryan’s trust, he’ll see the benefit of filling her in. But for now, it’s better she doesn’t know.
She’s still staring blankly out the window, so I pull her to me and hug her. She wraps her arms around me and sighs against my neck, and I wish Asa would fucking die on the way back from the casino.
Shit. That was really harsh.
But can he not see how much better the lives of those around him would be if he didn’t exist?
Of course he can’t. You see nothing outside the realm of yourself when you’re a sadistic narcissist.
“You give really nice hugs,” Sloan says.
I hug her tighter. “I think you just haven’t been given enough hugs in your lifetime.”
“That too,” she says with a sigh.
I keep my grip on her for a moment longer, until she whispers against my neck. “Fifty-six King Crabs ate shoelaces for Easter dinner and then they coughed up Rainbow Brite through their nostrils.”
I laugh and kss her on top of her head. “You can’t buy illegal butter with a bike wheel or silly string.”
I can feel her smile when she finds my mouth and ksses me.
That’s all I wanted before we got out of this car-for her smile to return.
TOO LATE : CHAPTER 21 – 30
***
“You said he didn’t like Asa,” I say on our way down the hall toward Stephen’s room. “So if he doesn’t communicate, how do you know if he likes or dislikes someone?”
She’s been filling me in on her brother’s condition during the walk to his room. She listed off about five things he’s been diagnosed with, but I can’t even remember the names of them, so the least I can do is try to understand them.
“We have our own way of communicating,” she says. “I’ve practically raised him since he was an infant.” She rounds the corner and points down a hallway. “He’s down here at the end.”
I still have questions, so I pull on her hand until we come to a stop. “But you’re only a few years older than him. How did you raise him?”
She looks up at me and shrugs. “I did what I had to, Carter. No one else was around to do it.”
I don’t know that I’ve ever met anyone like her. I kss her, partly because I want to get as many ksses in as we can today and partly because she deserves a little more affection in her life. Selfless affection.
I don’t mean for the kss to be anything more than a second or two, but we haven’t been able to kss like this since our first kss. I’m instantly pulled into it and everything else fades away.
TOO LATE : CHAPTER 21 – 30
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