Page 65 of Where the Roses Bloom
I’d leveled up.
“I came to tell you it didn’t end up being mine,” he said, lower now, like that would make a difference. “The baby. It wasn’t mine after all. She lied.”
I crossed my arms. “So you weren’t the only cheater in the equation, huh?”
“That’s not fair.”
“Seems perfectly fair to me.”
His jaw clenched. “I never meant to hurt you.”
“But you did,” I said quietly. “You hurt me over and overagain, and I let you. I let you make me small. I let you convince me I was too needy, too emotional, too much.”
The wind moved through the trees. I took another step forward, staring him down like I wasn’t the same woman he used to forget to text back.
“All while you were out there,” I said, “looking for someone else to make you feel like a man. A girl who’d flatter your ego. Who’d tell you how good and kind and funny you were…while you cheated on her too.”
Carter looked like he wanted to argue—but the words didn’t come. His mouth opened. Closed. His fingers curled tighter around the flowers.
“I came here to make things right,” he said finally.
“No,” I said, and this time, my voice didn’t shake. “You came here because you finally realized I was the best thing that ever happened to you. And now you can’t stand the thought that I don’t want you anymore.”
He bristled. The fake charm cracked—just a hairline fracture, but I saw it.
His shoulders pulled back. His jaw set.
“You act like I never gave you anything,” he said.
“Because you didn’t.”
His lips pressed into a thin line. “Willow…you’re being a real bitch right now.”
I didn’t flinch.
Not even a little.
Because I’d heard that voice before. I’d been on the receiving end of that tone. Not always with that exact word—but with its cousins. Dramatic. Selfish. Cold.
Too much.
Always too much.
But this time?
This time, I didn’t have to answer.
Rhett was off the porch before Carter could blink.One second, he was behind me—tense, silent, waiting. The next, he was stepping between us, broad and bare-chested, the veins in his forearms popping, fists clenched tight at his sides.
“You say that again,” Rhett said, low and lethal, “and I’ll put you in the ground so fast this town will forgot you ever set foot here.”
Carter stumbled back a step, shock flaring in his eyes. Before now, I hadn’t understood howbigRhett was compared to my ex…but he was huge. Rhett had this way of carrying himself with such gentleness that he was never imposing, always kind—but right now, he was terrifying.
And he wasmine.
Carter’s mouth opened like he wanted to bark something back—but nothing came out.
Not with Rhett standing there like a storm he hadn’t prepared for.
