Mr. Fantasy: (A standalone romance)

by Cambria Hebert

  “I sat with him until the police showed up. I never saw his body again. I never even got to go to his funeral.”

  One of my hands flattened against his chest as I pushed a little closer against him. “Why didn’t you go to his funeral?”

  “Because I was in jail.”

  “Jail!” I exclaimed, jolting back.

  Carter turned, leaning against the window. Hair fell into his eyes, but he didn’t bother to push it away. His jawline was shadowed with stubble, and it made me realize I’d only ever seen him with a clean shave.

  “Alan told you I killed him, didn’t he?”

  “I didn’t believe him,” I swore passionately.

  “It’s true.”

  I gasped. “You just said it was an overdose.”

  “If I hadn’t had those pills, he wouldn’t have taken them. If I had stayed sober enough not to pass out, I could have called the paramedics and had his stomach pumped. There are a million things I could have done differently that might have kept Chris alive.”

  “What happened to Chris was an accident. A horrible, sad accident. I don’t believe, not even for a second, that you are responsible for his death.”

  Carter’s lips lifted in a half smile. “Then you’re one of the only ones who believe that.”

  “Impossible!”

  “Did you look at the papers Alan brought here?” Carter’s eyes went beyond my shoulder, gazing into the apartment like he was imaging where Alan and I had been standing before.

  I shook my head. “Very briefly. I saw the picture and got upset. Alan knocked the folder out of my hands before I could read them.”

  “You didn’t look at the hospital?”

  “Why would I? I wanted to hear it from you.”

  Pushing off the wall, he cupped my face, holding it tight. “Sometimes I think you’re too good to be real.”

  “I’m all about the reality of things. You should know that.”

  A low laugh rumbled his chest. Taking my hand, he led me to the couch. “You should sit down. You have a concussion.”

  “I’m fine,” I insisted, but I sat anyway.

  Carter grabbed a bottle of cold pressed juice out of the fridge, along with a bottle of water, and brought them both over to me. Before sitting down, he draped the blanket still laying out over my lap.

  “No one really believed you?” I asked.

  Slowly, he shook his head. “Not even my parents.”

  My heart collapsed. How was that even possible? How could his own parents turn their backs on him?

  “The police treated me like some kind of drug addict, like a dealer who got caught. Because of the money we were set to be paid, they acted like I just wanted Chris out of the way so I could keep all the cash for myself.”

  “That’s crazy.”

  He laughed humorlessly. “That’s what I said. Why would I kill him when my share alone was more than enough to live off of forever?” He turned thoughtful. “Now that I’m older and have more money than I will ever need, I understand why they thought that way. I understand that money changes people. It makes them greedy, and it makes them do things they wouldn’t normally do.”

  “How long were you in jail?”

  “A month.”

  “You finally convinced them it was all an accident?”

  “Aaron did.”

  Surprised, I leaned forward. “Aaron?”

  A little bit of light came back into his eyes. A little bit of life replaced the bleakness deep within. “If it weren’t for Aaron, I might still be in jail.”

  “Tell me,” I insisted, grabbing his hand and squeezing.

  “Aaron was one of the responding officers the day I called 9-1-1.”

  “No.” I gasped as though suddenly I was watching a Lifetime movie and we’d gotten to the plot twist.

  “Yes.” Carter’s eyes widened. “He was a rookie back then, had only been on the force for a year or so.”

  “I really can’t imagine him as a cop.”

  He smiled swiftly. “Probably why he isn’t one today.”

  “Aaron believed you, then?”

  Carter nodded. “Said he knew right from the minute he stepped onto the scene that the kid sitting next to his dead friend, crying, wasn’t putting on a show.”

  Oh, the picture those words created. My heart ached just imagining it. “I wish I’d been there,” I whispered. “I wish I could have been there for you.”

  “You’re here now,” he rasped, lifting my hand to kiss the back.

  “He wouldn’t let the case go. Even when all the other cops told him to. He pushed and prodded and built enough evidence to create enough doubt that I had actually killed Chris for money.” Grabbing the juice, he uncapped it and held it out. “You’re going to get dehydrated.”

  “I had an IV the entire night. I’ll be peeing for the next century,” I muttered.

  “Drink,” he insisted.

  I did as he asked, then forced him to drink some, too.

  “Aaron took a lot of crap for what he did for me. Everyone wanted me to go down. They wanted me to be some kind of poster boy for overdose and drug dealing. When he took all the info he had to the chief of police and they had to let me go, he was ridiculed.”

  “Is that why he quit?”

  He shook his head. “Nah. Aaron’s too stubborn to quit because of something like that.”

  “What happened once you were released?”

  Hurt passed behind his eyes. Then he answered, “My parents kicked me out. They turned their backs on me completely.”

  “What kind of parents would do that?” I yelled. “If I ever meet them, I’m going to give them a piece of my mind.” Shaking my fist in the air, I said, “And my fist, too!”

  Carter laughed. “All right, Rocky, simmer down.”

  “I will not,” I replied, indignant.

  I was about to go on even more of a rant when Carter cut me off. “They aren’t worth it, good girl.”

  I slumped, suddenly weighed down by sadness.

  What are you afraid of?

  Trusting people.

  The conversation we’d had replayed in my mind, and so much of it began to make perfect sense.

  “Almost right after I got cleared, Lewis Regal paid me a visit.”

  My eyes flew to his face.

  “He still wanted the game. He offered me both shares of the money.”

  “You agreed?” I surmised, knowing the game belonged to Regal Tech.

  “I told him I only wanted my share of the money, not my best friend’s. I also asked for a job.”

  “You asked Lewis Regal for a job?”

  He nodded. “I wanted to stay close to the game I’d created with Chris. I wanted to be able to update it, keep it evolving, and make sure it stayed true to what Chris always envisioned it to be.”

  “Why not just keep it?”

  “What was I, an underage guy with a bad reputation, going to do with it? I had no job, no money, and I was crashing on Aaron’s couch. I thought if I took just my share of the money, it would be okay because I’d earned it. Because that was the amount I was supposed to get before Chris died. I could get my own place, and I could continue to work with the game we both loved.”

  “Lewis wouldn’t give you the job?”

  “He agreed to give me the job. Said I would be an invaluable part to their gaming division. I signed the contract, and he deposited the money. When I showed up to work the first day, security wouldn’t even let me in the building.”

  “What?” I squinted in confusion.

  “It was my first lesson in reading between the lines,” Carter replied, no trace of contempt in his voice. “He used a well-worded loophole to renege on the job offer. He laughed in my face and told me he would never hire a criminal like me into his empire. So I took the money and ran off to the Caribbean. I bought my first resort not long after and then bought the island where I live.”

  No wonder he didn’t trust people. The ones he should have been abl
e to trust the most had betrayed him. No wonder he lived on an island alone. It was better than being surrounded by people who would only try and take advantage.

  How many times could a man be burned before he stopped getting close to a flame?

  “About a year later…” Carter continued, and I admit I was shocked there was more to this story. “Lewis contacted me. Asked me to update the game. I guess the people on his team were doing a shit job and didn’t quite grasp all the original coding Chris and I had done.”

  “Karma.”

  Carter smiled like a cat. “Technology is ever-evolving. It’s a constant process to stay current. That’s true even with something like video games. You have to keep players coming back. You have to introduce more and better. You have to evolve with them or the game will go stale and become nothing but a relic.”

  “That’s what happened with Primal Fear.”

  Carter nodded. “Lewis Regal might be a technology giant, but his gaming division is only as good as the people he hires.”

  “You refused to help him with the game,” I concluded.

  “I wasn’t quite as polite about it,” Carter remarked, a glint in his eye. “Even though I was living in the Caribbean, doing well with the resort, my heart was still with gaming. Regal’s call reignited the passion, so I took some of that money he’d paid me and started up Ansoft.”

  “That’s why Alan said everything you have rightfully belongs to his father.”

  Carter raised a brow. “Is that what he said?” He scoffed. “I guess in their twisted minds, they would think that.”

  “How close is Zero to Primal Fear?”

  “Not very. It has some of the same aspects and features, but it’s updated and current and filled with all the things Primal Fear could have had if Regal had the right team.”

  “He’s jealous.”

  Carter nodded. “I hurt his pride when I created Zero. When I started up a company that can outperform any gaming division he creates.”

  “And he threatened to leak the sealed police records about what happened to you and Chris.”

  A strange expression crossed Carter’s face.

  “What?” I asked, sitting forward. The stitches in the back of my head tugged, but I ignored them. “Did I say something wrong.”

  “No one’s ever referred to it as something that happened to me and Chris. It was always just what happened to Chris.”

  A sound ripped from my lips. Scooting forward until I was perched between Carter’s legs, I said, “You are just as much a victim as Chris. Your entire life was torn apart.”

  “Most people would say I turned out okay.”

  “Because you have money? Because you take a helicopter to work and own your own company?”

  The intensity of his onyx eyes captivated me. “Because I have the most beautiful girlfriend in the world.”

  “You don’t have to sweet talk me.” I scoffed. “Clearly, I’m already on your side.”

  “Which is exactly why you can believe what I said.”

  Oh.

  “You know what I think?” I asked, tilting my head.

  He gestured for me to tell him.

  “I think money has allowed you to protect yourself. It’s given you the opportunity to appear to live a fantasy when you’re just hiding from reality.”

  “Then you came along, squawking about how you wanted real.” As he lowered his hands into his lap, the smile on Carter’s face disappeared. “What do you think of me now, good girl? Now that you know I’m not Mr. Fantasy, but just a guy with a fucked-up life and a big bank account.”

  “You know the difference between fantasy and reality?” I mused.

  A smile curved his lips. I knew he was remembering when he’d asked me something very similar. “What’s the difference?”

  You figure out the difference between a dream and reality yet?

  You!

  “Me.”

  He laughed.

  Easing into his lap, I wound my arms around his waist, gently resting my cheek on his chest. “Thank you for telling me.” Lifting my face, I scowled. “Although, you should have told me sooner.”

  “I should have.” He agreed.

  “If you can’t trust me, then what we have will never work.”

  Staring intently into my eyes, he whispered, “I do trust you, Nora. As scary as it is, I do.”

  “I won’t break that trust, Carter. I promise.”

  We lay together for a long time, not saying anything at all.

  After a while, my voice broke the silence. “So when did Aaron quit the police force?”

  “When I asked him to head up security for the first resort I bought. He’s done all the security on all my resorts, and now he does it for Ansoft.”

  “So he was never your butler?”

  Carter laughed. “Not really. We just let people think that sometimes. Or my personal assistant or my bodyguard… Whatever suits the situation. He’s sort of like a shield for me. Before you, he was the only person I trusted in this world.”

  “I guess he’ll be suitable for Val,” I mused.

  Carter groaned. “I should probably head back to the hospital,” he added. “I want to make sure he’s still doing okay.”

  “Will you be back later?”

  He gave me a dubious look. “You think I’m going to leave you here alone?”

  “Yes?”

  “Try again.”

  I whined.

  “Alan is still lurking around Miami,” Carter growled. “He’s probably waiting for the chance to pounce.”

  I knew that. I was counting on it.

  “This isn’t over yet, good girl. The reason Alan attacked you, the reason his father tried to run me over with a car… You can’t be alone until I settle this. I’m not letting you out of my sight.”

  “Okay then.” I relented. “Let’s go.”

  If I couldn’t go to Alan, then Alan would have to come to me.

  Carter

  Did she think I wouldn’t notice how easily she gave in?

  How she didn’t so much as grumble when I insisted she come with?

  First, her veiled comment about her and Regal sharing a mistake, and now her following along behind me to the hospital like a good little duck?

  Nora was up to something, and you bet your ass I was going to find out what it was.

  So here I was, trailing her as she so innocently went to the hospital cafeteria for some coffee. No one drank that shit. It was nasty.

  I stayed back just far enough that she wouldn’t suspect. Although, for all the attention she gave her surroundings, I could have practically breathed down her neck and she wouldn’t have noticed. Clearly, I was going to have to give her some lessons in awareness.

  When she turned in the opposite direction of the cafeteria, I knew I’d been right to stalk her.

  Heh. Look at me. Guess I was the stalker she claimed me to be after all.

  Don’t wait for an apology. I’ll never give one.

  I watched her pull out her phone, her fingers flying over the screen. Seconds later, the same phone dinged, and she glanced back down.

  At the end of the hall, she made another right, heading in the direction of the gift shop.

  Using a giant potted palm as camouflage, I watched between the leaves as she ducked into the shop, waiting for a few passing people to move on, then quickly rushed back out, slipping into some room beside it.

  Is this what the rest of my life was going to be? Following along behind her while she did shit that gave me gray hair?

  That’s it. I was getting her a tracker. I’d put it in a nice piece of jewelry. And Knox wasn’t getting another day off until never.

  After another moment, I hustled to the room she went into and pushed open the door, silently praying it didn’t squeak and give me away. Maintenance was clearly up to par because the door was soundless.

  The low murmur of voices floated to my ears.

  “I’m surprised you asked to meet me.
”

  Alan’s voice was unmistakable, and it took everything in me not to barge into the room swinging and kicking like a karate star gone rabid.

  “Or maybe that blow to the head knocked some sense into you.”

  Forget rabid karate star, I was going to Mike Tyson his ass and start biting.

  “If anything, it knocked the sense I did have out,” Nora replied.

  “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

  “I changed my mind.”

  “About…?” Alan cajoled.

  “About giving you the information on Zero.”

  Even though I was already standing there motionless, I froze, paralyzed by the words she’d just said.

  “You expect me to believe you changed your mind just like that?” Alan punctuated his words with the sharp snap of his fingers.

  “I talked to Carter,” Nora said, her voice hollow. “I can’t get that photo you shoved in my face out of my mind.”

  My eyes slid closed. Had our talk not gone the way I thought? Was she just playing me when she said her love hadn’t changed?

  “So he admitted it, then?” Alan mused. The know-it-all tone of his voice really grated on my nerves. This guy needed a fresh punch in the face.

  “He said he was guilty.” She agreed.

  Alan laughed. “If only you had listened to begin with, things wouldn’t have had to go this far.”

  “I’m ready now,” she replied. “Is that job your father offered me still on the table?”

  “Of course.”

  “There’s something else I want.”

  “Bold, aren’t you?” he said. “All right then, what is it?”

  “The truth.”

  “The truth about what?”

  “About everything you and your father have done lately.”

  I perked up on the other side of the door. Was she doing what I thought she was doing?

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Then I guess we have nothing left to discuss.” She must have started to walk away, because Alan called out for her to stop.

  “If you’re done with Carter like you say, then what do you even care?” he asked.

  My stomach twisted, and my upper lip curled. Just the thought of Nora betraying me this way made me utterly sick.

  “It’s not about that. It’s about honesty. I’m risking a lot by giving you Ansoft secrets. It’s only fair if you risk something by giving me yours.”