Page 87 of Carter

“You’re not broken, Nash,” I whisper.

“Neither are you.”

I almost believe it.

Chapter twenty-nine

Nash

“I’m sorry. I just took over that whole conversation when you wanted to talk,” I apologize, holding on to Carter still.

He pulls back, sniffling and wiping his eyes. “No, it’s fine. I feel better; good about what we talked about.”

“If there’s ever anything you need to say, no matter what it’s about, you can tell me, Carter. Please, don’t ever be afraid to talk to me about something.”

“I know and I won’t. I… trust you.”

I smile softly. “I trust you too.”

And because I want to, I lean in to kiss him. Just gently. A soft press of my lips to his.

When I pull back, he blinks slowly, and a smile forms across his pink lips. I want to do it again, but I won’t push my luck—I don’t want to push him.

“I’m sorry the food is taking so long,” he apologizes. “You’re probably starving.”

“Don’t worry about it. Find us a good movie to watch.” I hand him the remote, and he takes it cautiously.

“I don’t have any of the streaming services like you do.”

I take the remote back, and navigate to one of them to log in.

“There. Now you do.”

“You didn’t have to do that.”

“I hardly use them. Someone should.”

“Thanks.” This time when he takes the remote, he scrolls through the movies and stops onMomento. “We didn’t finish this last night. Want to try again?”

I think there are a lot of things I’d like to try with him, but we don’t even know what this is. We’re just… doing it. And that’s okay, but I don’t want to lose what this is by trying to turn it into something it isn’t supposed to be. And I don’t want to fuck up this case. We’re so close. Fucking this up with Carter could ruin that. I need to be careful. Tread lightly. Let him take control, tell me what he wants—showme what wants. Hell, he can just take what he wants.

“Sure,” I say.

Carter starts the movie from the beginning because I hardly remember any of it. Roughly twenty minutes into it, the oven beeps. I pause the movie and we both get up. Just like last night, both of us peer into his oven.

“The light is broken so I can’t tell if it’s done,” he says.

“Well, everything was cooked before you put it in, right?” I smirk, repeating his words from last night.

“Right.”

He grabs his oven mitts, opens the oven, and pulls out the dish of lasagna. The sauce is bubbling, the cheese melted and tinged brown.

“It needs to sit for a little while.”

“This all feels so familiar,” I say.

He chuckles as he sets the dish onto the stove to cool, dropping the mitts on the counter beside it.