Page 35 of Cursed Touch
“You mean the shop?” she asked, fixing the pillow at her back.
“Yeah.”
She nodded. “I will, but today we open around lunch.”
Carter sighed and looked around her apartment. She tried to see it through his eyes. It had two side tables and an entertainment system with her TV, Blu-Ray player, sound system, and a few novels. A few mermaid figurines completed the space that she had decorated with a beachy feel.
“Are mermaids real?” she blurted.
Carter pursed his lips. “I haven’t got the faintest idea. Maybe.”
She pouted, wishing he knew.
He grabbed her free hand in his and squeezed. “I asked a friend over to get rid of the last of the secrets between us.”
Worry pulled down his lips, and another piece of her fell for him. “Really?” she asked.
He nodded. “Sweetheart, keeping anything from you hurts. This truth will hurt you some, but I promise if you listen, you’ll understand why you were kept in the dark.”
She pulled her hand back and cradled the mug between her hands. “That’s like a parent beating their kid and telling them it hurts them more than the kid.”
Carter pushed to his feet and looked around her things. “My mom died giving birth to Brandy.”
Vanessa gasped. “I’m so sorry—”
“It turns out the same thing happened to my mother and her mother’s mother for a total of seven generations. Each woman died giving birth to their seventh child, a girl. That truth had been kept from us. Until Brandy’s powers unbound on her twenty-first birthday, none of us knew the truth. As a young boy, I thought something was wrong with me. I even questioned if I was adopted and maybe my real parents were aliens.” He turned and faced her as he chuckled. “Never in my wildest dreams would I have considered what I could do was magical.”
“What can you do?” she whispered.
He looked at her door before meeting her eyes. “I heal people.”
She shrugged. “All doctors do.”
Carter smirked. “We do, but that I know of, they can’t bring someone back from near death within moments. I told you last night, Tyler was about to die. If I had not been in the lobby saying good-bye to those ladies, hewouldbe dead.”
Vanessa’s mouth formed an O, and he continued. “I don’t work at Schwab Memorial. I used to, but now I work at Sacred Heart Hospital and Maple Valley medical group. I was only at Schwab because I was consulting on a patient with a rare pulmonary disease. I truly believe it was our fate to meet in that moment. I also thought he was your boyfriend, which is the only reason I managed to keep my mouth shut and not ask for your number right then.”
Warmth crept up her neck and to her cheeks.
Carter set down his mug on a side table. “This thing between us we can’t fight, and honestly I don’t want to fight it now that I’ve found you. Secrets have no place in a relationship. I get we’ve only just met weeks ago, but we have a ways to go to get to know each other.”
Someone knocked on the door, and he moved to it faster than she could push herself off the comfortable cushions. Carter looked out the peephole before he looked at her seriously.
“Please keep an open mind and heart. I won’t lie and tell you this won’t rock your world because I’m sure it will. It will piss you off most likely, but know secrets were kept for a reason,” he said before pulling open her door.
Vanessa reached his side and looked from Peter to Carter before turning back to Peter. “Peter? Is Georgia okay?”
“Let him in, sweetheart,” Carter stated as he tugged on her arm lightly.
“Georgia’s fine, Vanessa. Hey, Carter,” he said, and the men shook hands.
She looked from one to the other. “Wait… You two know each other? How do you two know each other?” she asked, her eyes narrowed on them.
Peter closed the door behind him. “Why don’t we sit down?”
Carter’s warm hand pressed on her lower back, and he guided her back to the couch. He sat first and helped her to his side.
Peter joined them and smiled. “I hear congratulations are in order.”
