Page 20 of In My Heart
We both picked up the bags of clean clothes we had brought with us and headed for the showers. We were covered in blood and it all needed to be gone before we went back home. There was no way we could risk triggering Cara with anything when she was so fragile right then. It had killed me to leave her, and I couldn’t wait to get back and see for myself she was safe.
***
“I’ll check on Cara,” Rafe announced as he set off running up the stairs the moment we walked into the house.
I wanted nothing more than to follow him and see her for myself too, but I knew I was treading a fine line with Rafe.
It was fucking dangerous for my life to be falling in love with the boss’s sister and I knew it. It had become very obvious there was something going on between Cal and Cara, but Rafe seemed okay with that, and why wouldn’t he? Cal was a good kid. He was going to be a doctor. He had brains and looks, and he had stayed on the right side of the law his entire life – at least as far as anyone knew, anyway.
If, or hopefully when. Cara learned to handle what she had been through, I was confident Rafe would accept her being with my brother, because he was right for her. Me, however? Or both of us, more specifically? Rafe was not going to be alright with that, and I knew it.
Not only was I older, but I had also been around a bit when it came to one night stands. It was how I had operated for years. Pick a woman up, make sure she understood the score, then fuck her once and gone. I never wanted commitment, and I didn’t believe in love. Until Cara. She had changed everything for me. She was the only woman I could ever see myself with now. Nowoman before her, or any who could possibly come if I lost her, would ever even begin to compare. Cara was special.
But that was why Rafe wouldn’t want her with a man like me, one who had blood on his hands and scars on his soul. He wanted better for his little sister, and he should. I should. But I couldn’t walk away from her. I was falling so fast in love with her, that it scared me and thrilled me in equal measure.
I already knew Cal was on board with us sharing her. We had briefly touched on it, after Dante started mouthing off about Cara wanting all of us. As in him and Dario too. And maybe she did. I wasn’t sure how I would feel about there being four of us claiming her, but it would be better than me walking away from her all together.
But if Cara wanted all four of us, there was no way on this Earth Rafe was going to be on board with that. No, I foresaw a shallow grave in my future for sure, but it wasn’t enough to stop me fighting for her. She was worth it. Cara was everything.
“Cara?” Rafe called as he came flying back down the stairs and past me towards the living room.
“What’s goin’ on?” I demanded as I followed him.
“She’s not up there. Dar and Cal are gone too,” he gasped.
“I’ll check the kitchen!”
I was already running down the hall. I burst through the kitchen door and winced as it bounced hard off the wall behind it. Inside, the lights were off, Terza likely gone home for the night. I was about to leave, my adrenaline kicking up as I mapped out all of the possible exit and entry points to the house in my head, when Cal’s laughter stopped me. I moved towards the sliding doors that led out to the small back garden, and peered out.
“It is not!” Cara laughed as she hit out towards Cal weakly.
They were both laid out on the sun loungers, mounds of blankets over their laps. They looked comfortable, their heads leaning together as they looked from one another, and to something on the screen of Cal’s phone. The best thing of all though, the part that was making me smile and my heart skip a beat, was the fact that there was a smile on Cara’s face – a real smile.
“It’s true!” Cal laughed. “Look it up. Maybe they just don’t have it in America.”
“Get lost!” Cara cried animatedly. “ It’s the same bloody sky, you idiot!”
“Arran, where are they?” Rafe demanded as he stormed into the kitchen.
“Sshh,” I rushed to quieten him. “Come see.”
I beckoned him over and he stopped beside me with a glare. But his head shot up when Cara laughed loud enough for him to hear.
“And you’re at university?” she scoffed, turning her head enough for us to see almost all of the smile on her face.
“She’s talking,” Rafe gasped. “…and laughing.”
“Aye. She’s smilin’ too.”
“How? Did Cal do that?”
“Probably,” I shrugged. “Let’s just leave them for now,” I added, not wanting to break the bubble of contentment that Cal seemed to have built around Cara.
“Yeah, okay. You’re right,” he agreed, and we both quietly moved away, leaving Cara and Cal in the bubble of calm and peace theyseemed to have somehow found. Cal was going to need to do much more of that in the coming weeks and months, and teach me how the fuck to do it too. Making Cara laugh like that again, the way she used to, had just become my top priority.
CARA
I woke with a start, ripping myself from the terror of another nightmare, just managing to stifle the cry that wanted to rip from me. My eyes opened and I looked around as I tried to calm my frantic fight for breath. I was shaking and my skin felt clammy against the heavy duvet covering me.
