Read Online Carter (Bourbon & Blood Book 3) by Seraphina Donavan - Free Book Online Page A

your feet, you don’t understand us at all… You don’t have to lie to us, Carter. We lie to ourselves. We build these elaborate fantasies in our heads of how things will work out. We plan weddings and houses and babies… there’s a whole universe of expectation tied up in nothing more than a first date. So, when I say this is going to end, I’m not saying it because of you, Carter. I’m just reminding myself to stay focused on what’s here and now, and not what I want it to be down the road.”
    He didn’t respond, just stared at her like she’d started speaking in tongues and he didn’t have an interpreter present. Josie grabbed her keys and marched toward the door. She wasn’t mad at him, but she was more than a little mad at herself.
    It was all well and good to talk about keeping her distance, of reminding herself that theirs was a finite arrangement, but it didn’t stop the flare of hope in her. It certainly didn’t do anything to lessen the fact that all she wanted, more than anything else in the world at that moment, was to be curled up in his arms. If ever there was a reason to turn tail and run, that was it.
    She needed space, she needed perspective and she needed to find some way to armor herself against the hurt that was going to coming crashing down sooner or later.

    A fter Josie left , Carter stared at the door for the longest time. She tied him up in fucking knots, he thought bitterly as he walked into the kitchen to grab a beer. It was perverse to want her, an exercise in misery since she was clearly the most prickly, contrary and difficult woman who’d ever walked the face of the earth.
    Using the antique bottle opener mounted to the wall, he popped the lid off the beer. He didn’t actually want to drink it. He didn’t want to sit around in his apartment and mope about her. Putting the bottle in the sink, he grabbed his discarded shirt from earlier then put on his boots.
    Heading out into the night, his aimless drive wound up taking him to the farm. The lights were on in the barn so he knew Emmitt would be up. Letting himself in, he drove right up the open doors of the barn and then climbed out of the truck.
    There was no telling what he would find inside. As the local vet, Emmitt tended to keep a lot of sick or injured animals in the barn if they couldn’t be treated at their home or fit in the exam rooms of the attached clinic.
    But it wasn’t an animal emergency that had Emmitt out there so late. He was putting down fresh straw in the stalls.
    “You do realize that it’s almost midnight,” Carter pointed out.
    “You do realize that if you want to talk, you better be willing to work,” Emmitt said and tossed the pitchfork toward him.
    Carter caught it by the handle and sighed. He should have stayed home. Still, he walked over and started spreading the straw. It was hard work, burning the muscles but soothing the mind.
    “So why are you out cruising around in the middle of the night?” Emmitt finally asked.
    “My evening didn’t go as planned.”
    “Her husband came home early?” Emmitt shot back.
    “You’re not funny,” Carter said. “I don’t mess with married women… that I know of.”
    “If it’s midnight and you’re in my barn instead of someone’s bed, there’s a problem,” Emmitt shot back.
    Carter finished spreading the straw in the stall and went for another bale. Hoisting it onto his shoulder he carried it over and set it down, using a pocket knife to snap the twine that bound it. “Let’s just say we move in different circles… There’s some conflict there.”
    “Church lady?”
    Carter frowned. “How do you figure?”
    Emmitt laughed, a rusty sound that was rarely ever heard. “That’s the only circle you don’t run in. Either step up or step off, Carter. If you want her, you have to meet her where she is… and if you’re not willing to do that, let her go.”
    Yeah. He wasn’t going to church with Josie. He wasn’t going to sit there in the