by Nicole Helm
Like they were made from the stars that first night, shaped to belong together, to be each other’s. That kiss and this one sealed that fate. Forever. He’d known then. He knew now. They belonged together.
She had to know it too. She had to.
But as he pulled away, his blood pumping, his heart racing, and everything inside of him whispering Sierra, it didn’t matter that her eyes were glittering, or her cheeks were flushed from more than the cold. He knew in a horrible instant that the kiss wasn’t a real acquiescence from her.
She stepped back. “I don’t deny this—attraction. We’ve always had that,” she said. Even though her voice was shaky and she was stepping away she seemed so…certain. Strong. “I don’t even deny that we care about each other.”
“What else matters?” he demanded, frustration leaking through.
“I’m not happy, Carter. You’re not happy. We don’t make each other happy.”
“Nothing would have made me happy in the past few months. You don’t know what it’s like to find out your entire world view, self-view, life view is built on a lie.”
“No, I don’t. But why wasn’t I a part of any of those views?”
It took him a good few seconds to actually feel that blow. To exhale the breath he’d taken as she’d said the words. It was too…true. Lina had said he only cared about himself and she was right. She was truly right. He’d absorbed his father’s news and kept it all to himself, only thought of how it affected him.
He’d kept Sierra out of it, but she was wrong that it meant they should be over. It was one mistake. One wrong way of looking at things. It had been about cushioning the hurt, saving her from the pain. It hadn’t been about not loving her.
So, he had made a mistake, yes, but he could fix it. Somehow.
“I don’t want to talk about this anymore,” she said, her voice scratchy as she turned and began walking toward her car. “Your five minutes are up.”
“I love you, Sierra.” Because it was all he had. The simplest truth he knew. He needed it to be enough for her, even knowing it wouldn’t be.
“I love you too,” she replied, pausing at her car door, but Carter knew she wasn’t giving him what he wanted.
“But I don’t want you,” she continued. She got in her car, slammed the door shut, and Carter could only stand there. He didn’t just feel sliced open, he felt as though all his organs were spilling out of him and he was nothing but an empty shell.
But her car didn’t start or move. He had a fleeting moment of hoping she planned to get back out, take the words back, but then he realized she was moving around, punching the steering wheel.
Her car wouldn’t start.
Carter glanced up at the sky, promised himself he’d believe in divine intervention if this worked, and he grinned.
Chapter Eight
She wanted to scream, but Carter had already caught sight of her punching the steering wheel and apparently thought it was quite hilarious based on that grin that skittered through her like light.
Oh, it had been so long since she’d seen him smile, really smile, and it felt like summer in the midst of all this winter. But nothing was hilarious after that kiss. Because no matter how she repeated what she’d told him in her head:
Of course we’re attracted.
Of course we love each other.
That kiss reminded her so much of their first she could hardly shake off the need to run right back to him. She had never, ever expected to fall head over heels for Carter McArthur. Doctor Carter McArthur. She’d always been aware she was a bad girl—not exactly from the wrong side of the tracks, but certainly not from the McArthur side.
She’d never been like Kaitlin. Never tried to be good or responsible. She’d done what she wanted because it had been clear after all the arguing Dad and Luke had done that Dad would find fault either way.
But she’d fallen hard and fast for Carter and ignored that little niggling voice that had always told her she’d never be good enough for him. But it had come back and with a vengeance, hadn’t it? The past few months had been nothing about knowing she wasn’t good enough for him. Not good enough to be confided in. Not good enough to accept comfort from. Not good enough to trust.
Giving in to this now would only repeat the last year on a cycle. Maybe they’d be happy for a bit, but that McArthur world where he and they were the center and she didn’t factor into any of his ‘life views’… It would all come back.
She’d tried the love route, and it hadn’t made either of them happy.
For some reason she thought of Kaitlin and Beckett, who were one of the most demonstratively in love couples she knew. Sierra knew Kaitlin had never planned on falling for their brother’s bad boy of a best friend, and she knew that Kaitlin’s unplanned pregnancy had played a part.
But they so clearly loved each other. What sense did that make?
Carter tapped on the window and she scowled at him.
“Go away.” Childish? Yes, but she’d spent five minutes being very adult and talking about things that hurt like hell and she was done with it.
He motioned for her to open the door. There really wasn’t another choice. She couldn’t freeze in her car for another twenty minutes or however long it would take to find someone free to come pick her up and take her home.
“I’ll drive you home.”
“No, I’ll call my dad. But I’ll sit in your car with the heater on while we wait. Silently, of course. If you can agree.” She could be adult if she had to be.
“Sierra. Let me drive you home. I promise, I won’t say a word.”
If he was anyone else, she wouldn’t have believed that promise, but even in all this…weirdness, Carter didn’t lie. Oh, he might go off into his own little world, might shut her out, might turn into someone else completely and then slowly start to morph back into the man she knew, but he didn’t lie.
She had to remember not to trust that morphing. It was temporary now just like it had been before. The next bad-news thing and he’d behave the same way. There was no hope. She couldn’t allow herself to have any.
“Fine,” she agreed, because if he had to be silent, she could be home and crawl into bed in the next fifteen minutes. God, she was tired.
She got out of her car and followed him to his. True to his word, he didn’t talk. They simply buckled, he started the car, and then he started driving.
Sierra yawned. She’d take a nap when she got home. Pregnant women got to have naps without guilt. Damn straight. She yawned again. She’d just close her eyes until she got home. It would make it so much easier to ignore him, that was for sure.
She had no idea how much later she awoke with a start. The sun seemed unbearably bright. The car wasn’t moving, but she was in it, still buckled. She blinked and looked over at Carter in the driver’s seat. He was reading something on his phone.
“What…” But before she could finish that sentence her gaze drifted to what lay outside the window.
It was not her parents’ house. It was not Marietta. It was an unbelievable view of mountains and a valley below, the sun setting into it and shining directly at her. She was almost awed, until she realized how far away from her destination they were. How late it was.
She screeched. “Where the hell did you take me?”
Carter only smiled calmly, maneuvering so he could slide his phone into his back pocket. “Beautiful, isn’t it? I can’t believe we’ve never found time to come up here. My fault, I know.”
She gaped at him. Was this a dream? Had he sustained a head injury? Had she?
But it all made a horrible kind of sense. “Your parents’ cabin.” Outside Marietta, closer to damn Yellowstone. Was he insane? “Are you insane?” she demanded. No use only thinking it.
“Insane isn’t the word I’d use. But we could use some time alone. Together. Let’s get inside. I’ve wasted an awful lot of gas sitting here letting you sleep. Be a shame to not be able to leave when we’re ready because we ran out
of gas.”
“I’m ready. I’m ready right now! I can’t believe you did this. I can’t believe…” She had no words for all the things she couldn’t believe. Carter had been devious. He’d tricked her. Carter. The man who didn’t even like practical jokes because they were too close to a lie.
She took a deep breath, gathering together all her strength and pride and…whatever you called what was going to get you through a horrible thing. Grit, maybe. Yeah, she liked that. She wanted to have grit.
“Take me home. Now,” she ordered, giving him a look Mrs. McArthur was forever giving her. Disdainful and disgusted.
“Wouldn’t be smart to drive these icy roads in the dark,” Carter replied as if they were having a calm, sane conversation. “Especially when we’re so low on gas. Have to spend the night.”
He said it so cheerfully she wanted to junk-punch him. “I’m not spending the night with you here. I refuse.” She grabbed her purse and started pawing through for her phone. “I’ll call someone to pick me up.”
“And have them brave the icy roads in the dark?” he asked casually. Not even disapprovingly. Just a simple, non-threatening question.
Damn him. Damn. Him. “I will make you pay for this. In ways you can’t even fathom.”
“Trust me, I spent plenty of time fathoming on my way up here. I even turned around once. But as mad as you are, as mad as you’re going to be, the only thing that’s going to solve this problem is time together.”
“No. The only thing that’s going to solve this problem is div—”
He reached out and put his hand on her stomach out of nowhere. Just his big hand on her still-flat stomach, and she nearly burst into tears in that second. Pregnancy felt like such a disconnected experience this early. She knew there was something in there, but it was hard to really wrap her head around the reality of it.
Carter’s hand on her stomach made it feel impossibly real. It made the connection between them a tangible thing. No matter how she told herself to be strong, to be sure, she was torn.
Couldn’t she put up with hard times and him shutting himself away if it meant they got to do this together?
She looked up at him, his blue gaze on her stomach before it slowly lifted to hers.
She was so close to crying, to giving in. “I can’t do this,” she whispered. “I can’t keep doing this, Carter. You have to stop.”
His gaze was so solemn, so caring. It nearly undid her completely.
“Let’s go inside and get you something to eat,” he said, acknowledging nothing at all.
She wanted to argue, but what other choice did she have? She was hungry, and feeling nauseous, and still fuzzy from sleep.
If they went inside, he’d take his hand off her stomach and she could remember that she’d made a decision. The right decision, and second thoughts and doubts were only weakness talking.
God, she really hoped she could remember that.
*
Carter deposited Sierra on the expensive leather couch Mom had bought in one of her redecorating frenzies. Carter had never figured the furniture in the family cabin made much of a difference when there were big picture windows showing a breathtaking view of the mountains and valley below.
Who cared what the indoors looked like?
He’d already been inside to turn the heat up and whatnot while Sierra had been sleeping, so it was nice and warm, but he grabbed one of the throw blankets from the sleek, modern cabinet that dominated the side wall anyway.
He draped it over Sierra’s lap, not missing the angry glare she kept focused on him.
He knew she’d be angry for taking her anywhere but home, and maybe he should feel guilty about that. But he wasn’t. She kept walking away just when they were getting somewhere. Maybe he shouldn’t be so impatient after three days, but in reality it had been something like months.
His fault, yes, but that just meant it was his responsibility to fix things. So, he would.
“Soup? Frozen pizza? I can make some hot chocolate.”
She groaned from over on the couch. “Just one. Whichever one. But just one, please.”
“It’s a little early to be having morning sickness,” he offered, looking over his shoulder at her.
She was typing angrily onto her phone. “Why don’t you crawl inside my stomach and tell it that?”
Carter opened a cabinet and grabbed two cans of chicken noodle soup. She was likely texting her parents. Or maybe Lina. “Right. Well. Just so you know, I told your parents you wouldn’t be home.”
When there was nothing but a vibrating silence, Carter glanced away from his soup preparations to her spot on the couch.
Her mouth was hanging open and she stared at him like he was some kind of psychopath.
“I didn’t want them to worry,” he explained, focusing back on the task of dumping soup into a pot on the stove. “I knew they would worry, considering they likely knew you’d been with me and it was only supposed to be for a brief meeting. So, I called your mom and told her we were going away for a day or two to try and work things out.”
“A day or…” She inhaled deeply as if trying to calm herself. “Is this high-handed bullshit supposed to be winning me over?” she demanded.
“No, it’s supposed to be giving me a chance.” He frowned at the soup. “All I want is a chance.”
She didn’t have anything to say to that, so he focused on getting bowls and rounding up crackers. He was lucky Mom and Dad had been here last weekend and one of their hospital friends was coming up next so they weren’t bare bones on the necessities. Too bad he hadn’t had a chance to buy a carton of milk. Sierra should probably be drinking milk.
No doubt her parents were taking good care of her though, except… He filled the bowls and walked them to the little glass table he hated eating at, but it was too cold to eat outside. “Have you told your parents?” he asked.
“Told them what? I think they figured out the whole I’m leaving you thing.”
“That we’re pregnant.”
He imagined the snort of derision she gave him was over the word we’re but that wasn’t about to stop him from considering this their pregnancy even if he didn’t have to do any of the hard parts.
“I haven’t told them. I…” She placed her hands over her stomach. “It’s so early. It feels… I don’t want to start telling people until it feels more certain. More possible.”
Carter nodded. “I haven’t told anyone either, and I won’t until you’re ready. But I still want to come to your first appointment.”
“Right because the entire medical community wouldn’t spread that around like wildfire. Carter and Sierra McArthur were in her OBGYN’s office together! I think we know what that means. And I hear they’re divorcing. The elder Dr. McArthur will be so thrilled to be rid of that trash.”
“He doesn’t think you’re trash, and what’s more important, I don’t.”
“Is it more important when you respect him as much as you do?”
A hard question to untangle because he didn’t respect his father, or non-father, the way he had. He wasn’t sure it had ever been respect, exactly. Awe. Yes. He’d wanted people to react to him like they reacted to Gerald. Was that respect? Were respecting him and loving her mutually exclusive?
“Come eat,” he said instead of figuring that all out. His father didn’t have anything to do with this. This was about him and Sierra.
She glared up at him, though there was something other than anger in her expression. He couldn’t read it—reading expressions was not his strong suit—but even beyond that he thought she was trying very hard to hide whatever it was.
“You can’t keep me here forever,” she said, not making a move to get off the couch.
“No, I have tomorrow off work, but then I’ll have to be back at the hospital.”
She rolled her eyes, flinging the blanket off her lap and getting to her feet. “Of course.”
“Was I working too much? Is that it? Getting too w
rapped up in the hospital? Because that’s an easy fix, Sierra.”
“No, that wasn’t it, jackass. I wasn’t afraid to ask you to stay home. I’m not afraid to ask for what I want.”
He mulled that over in his head. He’d always thought that true. Sierra was so forthright and, well, volatile at times, he’d always figured if something was wrong, if she needed something, she’d voice it.
But clearly that wasn’t true, no matter what she said about herself. Because there was something he’d done or something she’d needed that he hadn’t given her, something that was making her unhappy—miserable was the word she’d used—and she refused to tell him what it was.
She sat down to the soup and sighed, but she started to eat so he did the same. He watched her while he did. She didn’t look up at him. Not once. She was focused on the soup.
The thing was, he’d been in a kind of fugue state almost these past few months. They’d barely interacted and that was all on him. In trying to fix things, in wanting her to explain what went wrong, he wasn’t ignoring the fact he’d made some grave mistakes. But he was trying to understand why it had gotten so bad.
Sitting across from her didn’t feel wrong. He hadn’t suddenly woken up to find a stranger. She was the same as she ever was. The woman he loved with all of his being. He’d treated her wrong, yes, but that hadn’t meant he didn’t feel the same.
In fact, it wasn’t her at all. He had changed some. He was a little different. He wasn’t sure why, maybe finding out his life had been based on a lie made him pay a little more attention to the world around him, to more than McArthurs and what he was supposed to do. Even more attention to the woman who’d been his not supposed to—that he’d promised to love and cherish forever anyway.
She loved him. She’d said so herself. But something was missing, and she didn’t want to fight for it. She didn’t want to dissect it and figure out what it was.
There was a kind of pattern in that. Subtle, definitely, because Sierra always seemed so confident. She’d never withered under his mother’s cruelties. She’d oftentimes given right back. Carter had assumed it was because she was secure and didn’t care what his mother thought, which had made it easy not to intervene.
