Fixated On You (Torn Series #5) (20 page)

Picking me up, he opened the door, never parting with my lips. With my arms encircled around his neck, I felt him climb up the stairs as we made out before finally coming right outside my bedroom door. Then, he carried me all the way through to my bed.

Chapter 22

Carter

This was it, this was it
, I thought with excitement and new purpose. Emma might be sad about Bass now, but I could step into his shoes, make her forget him. I had done it before, I could do it again. She’d eventually forget him.

Just like what she said earlier, had it not been for my cheating, we’d still be together now. And fuck, I wanted that chance so bad. Right now, my woman was kissing me back, no holds barred. Tonight was mine. Tonight, I was going to seal this
; our future, together. I knew it might not be the best of times, knowing that she was still in love with Bass, but fuck, when a big opportunity comes your way, you fucking grab hold of it and seize it. This was mine.

I had come a long way from the tortured guy to a man who knew how to love. Shit after shit punched me down, but I was going to risk getting hurt again because I couldn’t live without this woman, my Emma.

I tried to flirt; fuck, I’d tried to see if I could do the whole nine yards and finally take another woman that wasn’t Emma in bed, but when it had been time to pull the trigger with Cami, I couldn’t fucking do it. I even tried it with Ashley with the same result. As hot as the women were, Emma’s face wouldn’t leave my mind. It was her who I wanted to be with, and I was going to follow my heart, even if it led me to more heartache.

Even if my brain was telling me that this was not the way to go, my heart was taking the wheel, ready to take what Emma had for me. What I did was messed up and now I believed we were paying a high price for that mistake. Had it not been for me, we wouldn’t have separated, nor would I have had to witness another man sweeping in and taking my baby away.

I was the first. Her man. Her first, deep, crucial love. I knew, deep down, there were feelings left for me. Although, at the moment, she might be too consumed with her pain, she probably didn’t know what to do anymore. Enough of that, I was going to take charge and heal us together.

“Baby,” I groaned, running my hands down her thighs before cupping her nice, supple ass that drove men crazy. Slowly lowering her down on the bed, I was taken aback when Emma immediately started pulling my clothes off.

“Let me feel your body, Carter,” she moaned, running her hands over my chest, over my nipple, making me hiss and groan at the same time that my cock hardened at the thought of sliding inside of her. It had been so long, so fucking long. I didn’t even care to think or count how long it had been for me. I had vowed that the woman I would be with next was Emma, and the knowledge that I was only a breath away from seizing her body once more, made me shiver in anticipation.

Emma ripped her top off, paralyzing me for a second while my eyes devoured her perfect tits that I’d missed so much.

“Kiss me,” she begged, pulling me closer to her. “Make me forget about him. Make me yours, Carter.”

As I said before, a man just had to seize an opportunity when it opened up and seduced you. It was fucked up, but hell, I think we both needed this.

We deserved this night together.

Finally, after months of sleepless nights, Emma was back in my arms.

Hopefully, this time it was going to be forever.

Chapter 23

Bass

Taylor:
Okay, the key is underneath the rug. Whatever happens, walk the fuck away before someone gets hurt. Best of luck, man.

When Taylor mentioned that he’d stayed overnight in Trista’s place in SB after a Halloween party at Carter’s house, I asked him if Emma was home safe. When he said “yeah” in a strained voice, I knew something wasn’t right. I wasn’t sure why, but for some reason, I had the inkling to ask. I had my suspicions what it was
already, yet still, I pressed on to ask. So when he said that Trista went inside Emma’s room to borrow some styling products and found Carter Mason beside her, I didn’t even have the heart to ask further.

Of course my brain did all the talking for me, which was a torture that never stopped. Imagination was a good thing, although not when paired with paranoia and fear. Combine them all and you got one messed up man, which was how I was right now.

My simple inquiry led me to know that Carter was in fact with Emma. From then on, nothing was made sense. I drove from LA to SB without a thing in mind other than Emma and how she had just nailed my coffin shut.
If
… if she really did it, I wasn’t sure how I was going to handle it. I knew one thing, I doubted I’d ever recover.

Parking right outside her house, I killed the engine and left the key dangling as I took deep breaths and leaned against the cool leather seat to help soothe my throbbing head. I had flown in last night, thinking that Emma might have had a change of heart after her trip in Europe; it appears she did have one, but it wasn’t towards me. It had been for Carter.

This tiresome battle between us was taxing me fully, and I supposed, he had been right all along; he was the one for her. Because no matter what happened, he never once gave her up, nor did she fully let go of him.

I was the intruder in their relationship it seemed. Now, for me to be able to finally see the light and move the fuck on with my pointless life, I had to see if Emma had truly thrown us away with my very own eyes. A large part of me was hoping that they’d merely gone to sleep drunk and nothing happened, however the reasonable side of me thought that there was slim chance of that happening.

Still, I hoped that her love—our love—was strong enough that she wouldn’t throw us away like we were nothing.

Loaded with anxiety and trepidation, I got out of the car and moved at a snail’s pace towards the front door where the key was stuck underneath the rug, so I could let myself in, hoping to clear this once and for all.

Since Lindsey was with Dimitris and Taylor and Trista had already left to head back to his place for the rest of the afternoon, the house was silent except for a small gurgle of gasps and laughter coming from upstairs.

Emma’s laughs
, I noted, making my stomach sink lower as my insides did somersaults. I inched closer towards the staircase, each step felt like my feet were held with balls and chains. This was probably what a death sentence felt like because you knew what was contained on the other side of the door would eventually kill you, slowly but surely.

Three more steps to go and my heart
was gripping me tightly. Breathing became a hardship.

Two more, I almost lost my balance.

Last one, I could barely stand on my feet. Grabbing hold of the rails, Emma’s giggles were drowning me in absolute sorrow.

Moro
mou, looks like this was goodbye after all…
I thought wretchedly. She sounded so happy, totally apart from the woman I saw last, packing her things to move out of our home.

Passing a few doors, I finally stopped right outside her door, unsure what to do, but when I heard Carter’s voice, my hand gripped that handle so tight that one would have thought that this tiny brass handle was my lifeline.

When my hand pressed down, turning it open, I held my breath, hoping for anything other than the inevitable before I stoically walked in with eyes immediately darting towards her bed.

I knew—of course I knew—what scene I could possible walk into, but never in my life did I imagine I’d see a lot of Carter’s ass as he situated himself on top of her while Emma laughed at something he said while fearing what was going on underneath the blanket.

It was like I had been incapacitated as I watched this horror happening before me. My voice was out of commission and so was my body. I stood there, paralyzed like a capsized fish, letting all the hurt drown me right before my very eyes while the woman I vowed to love—to marry, to spend the rest of my life with—took another man.

I wasn’t sure what was going on, but when I saw Carter shifting—and I just knew what was to come next—with a shattered heart and tear-filled eyes, I tried to silently walk away, unnoticeable just as I had come in.

Maybe I was too numb, or maybe I was too caught up in my own misery that I didn’t realize that my steps were making loud thuds because, just when I was about to walk out of there, I heard her.

“BASS?”

I paused, not wanting to see her face. I momentarily closed my eyes, reliving the memory of her underneath him before I snapped my eyes open and darted out of there. In a flash, my body was full of adrenaline as I hurried my steps, descending the stairs and into the foyer, hoping to leave this house forever.

Opening the door, I heard her scream behind me. “Bass! Stop!”

Unmoving, I tried to make sense of what was going on with my body because I felt like I was being gunned down, bleeding me alive. I felt the pain, the burn, the open wounds, and yet, I couldn’t see a drop of blood in sight. It sure as hell felt like I was going to die soon, though.

When Emma caught up with me, I bent my head down, unwilling to talk as I stared at the marbled flooring. A glimpse of her sheet gliding down on the floor told me that she was naked. She was wrapped in her soiled, fluid-filled sheets that she’d romped with Carter in last night.

She was here, the woman I had been calling on a daily basis, though not one of my calls had been answered nor replied. Emma had finally moved on, and still, I was reeling with pain while having a hard time accepting that she was gone.

“Look at me, please?” she whispered, but I moved my head to the side.

What for? So I could feel more pain? More anger? More resentment? Rejection?
I had it all; tripled in spades. Asking me to look at her would be staring directly into the sun, and for the life of me, I just couldn’t look into her eyes and be blinded by pity for me. Most of all, I couldn’t live with the fact that, if I saw happiness there, it wasn’t me who had placed it there; it was the man who was waiting upstairs, naked.

“Emma?” I could hear him from the stairs, making it all worse. “Let it go, baby.”

Not uttering a word, I moved passed and left. I could hear Emma gasping and sniffing as if she was in tears as I left her house, but I didn’t care to check.

It was done. She had finally left me, just as she’d promised she would. Getting inside my car, I raced through the freeway, but my tears and heavy heart were too much of a bother that I had to stop midway and calm myself in Malibu Canyon as I coached myself to breathe.

Emma and Carter.
Intimate
. His body on top of hers while she squirmed and giggled at something he said, or from something he was doing underneath those blankets.

There were no ifs and whats now. They were fucking. And Emma had looked as though she was enjoying herself really well.

Had I been less broken of a man, I could have fought Carter off her and dragged her with me into the car, but what was the point? Emma had made a choice and that choice had been him. I wasn’t going to barge in there like a sore loser, demanding rights that were no longer mine. I wasn’t her fiancé, I wasn’t her boyfriend. I meant absofuckinglutely nothing to her.

Even though I was crippled inside and out—immobile and still reeling from my shock—I knew one thing. My love for her might live on forever, but it would be in the dark depths of my soul, pushed somewhere in the back of my mind because I would never—
fucking ever
—put myself in this eviscerating-kind of misery
ever
again.

I’d rather be a monk than go back to her again.

Emma Anderson, you’re dead to me
, I promised.

Chapter 24

Emma

Bass, forgive me
, I prayed as I stared at the door that had been left ajar from his departure.

Never in my life did I picture that I would be in this position, but after last night’s activities, I found myself in this terror of a dream, not knowing what to do.

Although he wouldn’t look me in the eye, I knew with ever fiber in me that Bass was hurting, all due to me. Even with all the hurts and outbursts I had thrown at him before, not once had I wanted to inflict this kind of pain on him. He must hate me now, and I should be happy that he did—perhaps this would mean that he would stop calling me—but for some reason, I hated myself all the more.

I broke for him. I wanted to reach out, hug him and tell him that I was sorry, but I simply couldn’t because I felt guilty.
Dirty
. Most of all, I felt like I had committed the biggest sin of all, adultery. It was absurd to feel the things I was feeling because one thing was for sure, we weren’t married, nor we were going to be; most especially after that debacle. One thing I had learned about Bass was that, when he loathed someone, it was hard for him to be swayed to change opinion from then on.

Another thing I knew was that I was never going to get over the defeated look Bass had; it had been like he was giving up hope on everything. A part of me was screaming to drive to his house and explain. Another was telling me to call him now and meet me somewhere so we could talk, but I couldn’t do any of those things because I didn’t think I deserved to be heard. What I had done was cruel. Awful. Despicable.