Page 20 of The Sculptor

I don’t appreciate his sarcasm or the disappointed frown. “Where there is one snake, there are others. It’s nature.”

“It’s nature, huh?” He circles me, holding his T-shirt hostage. “So, if we’re using your logic, then the mounds of bird shit on your shirt is just nature, too.”

Oh my gosh, he’s utterly impossible and severely dramatic.

“Duke…” I actually stomp my foot like a freaking toddler. “Please let me have your shirt. I can feel the poop leeching through the fabric.” Great, nowI’mbeing dramatic.

“Only you are standing in your way. Say it, Ray. Say it, and you can be free of the bird shit.”

“This is blackmail.”

He shrugs, not giving a damn. “One way or another, you’re gonna tellme—not my brother.”

“Vance and I were fighting! It wasn’t like we had some heartfelt conversation. He warned me to stay away from you, and I—” I stop myself, and it only serves to invigorate Duke’s enthusiasm.

“And you said what, Ray? You…” God knew what he was doing when he blessed the man with that smile. I fall for it every time.

Stepping closer, I bat my eyelashes and gaze up at him. It’s a shy look that he should know not to trust. “I told him too bad because I love you.”

“You love me?” I swear he smiles wider.

I move in, feeling the heat of his body. “I do. I love you, Duke Potter—very, very—”

This time, he isn’t fast enough when I jump, wrapping my arms and legs around his waist and smearing my very shitty shirt against his chest.

“Dammit, Ray!” He tries to pry me off, but I hold on, paying him back for torturing me.

“That’s what you get for blackmailing your girlfriend,” I scold, feeling pretty victorious for gaining the upper hand.

“All right, you win, Sunny Ray.” He stops fighting and accepts his fate of being in a literally shitty situation. “I was wrong to blackmail you…. Just like I’m wrong for doing this.”

“What?”

Dropping the T-shirt, this man holds me tighter and takes off toward the dock. “No!” I scream. “Don’t you do it!”

“Do you still love me, Ray?” I swear he’s running faster than he usually does, and that’s not with him carrying another person.

“Yes, but—”

“But nothing,” he cuts me off, already reaching the dock. “When you love someone, you become one.” He hugs me closer. “Therefore, your shitty situation is now my shitty situation.”

We’re at the edge before I can adequately absorb what’s happening. “No, my situation is not—”

“Watch for snakes. I hear they’re everywhere,” he teases.

And then he jumps.

I wake up drenched in sweat in the guest room of Langston’s mansion, an unsettling feeling swirling in my stomach.

I didn’t get bitten by a snake that day when Duke jumped off the dock.

I didn’t even get the chance to haul ass back to the dock.

Because Duke Potter didn’t let me go in the water.

Instead, he wrapped his arms around me and swore, “I’ll always keep you safe, Ray—no matter what.”

Duke

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