11. Drinking Games
Drinking Games
SARAFINA
In the bar, the lights were dim, and a few battery votives flickered amidst the fragrant holiday garland draped across the bar top.
I pulled up a leather barstool, realizing literally everyone else was in the theater, leaving Carter and me utterly alone, and that realization sucked all the air out of the room.
Carter slipped behind the bar. “What’ll it be, pretty girl?” He flipped a cocktail shaker with a flourish and I laughed, realizing he was still wearing that ridiculous bikini shirt.
“Lime jello shots?” I shrugged innocently.
He laughed, loud and throaty. “I can see you’re taking your college drinking very seriously.”
“What can I say? I’m a pro at jello shots.” I mimed it out for him—the sticking my finger in, giving it a swirl, and knocking it back. It earned me a genuine laugh that warmed me all the way down to my toes.
Carter disappeared as he dropped down and rooted around in the liquor cabinet, reemerging a moment later. “I’m sorry to say, it looks like we’re all out of the clear stuff.” He gripped the back of his neck. “We do, however, have enough whiskey left for the apocalypse, though.”
“Just my luck.” I muttered .
“How about a seven-and-seven?” He asked.
“Sure.” I shrugged, knowing I’d take literally anything he gave me.
Carter made my drink, looking far too good doing it, and then he topped it off with one of the edible flowers my mother kept the bar stocked with.
I tucked the flower behind my ear. “How do I look?” I playfully rested my chin on the bare skin that my sweater had slid down to expose on my shoulder.
Carter just stared at me for a long while, fingers gripping the countertop. “You look good.” He nodded, but didn’t add anything else, or apologize as he watched me so incredibly intently.
A long moment stretched between us before I smiled shyly and dropped my gaze.
“Well, how is it?” He asked as I finally took a sip of the drink.
“It’s great.” I grimaced, throwing it back in several eye-twitching gulps.
“Damn, should I just leave you the bottle?” Carter joked, sliding the whiskey my way.
My heart tripped noticing my pink hair tie was still on his wrist.
Heart pounding, I leaned over the bar and grabbed two shot glasses, sloppily pouring a shot in each.
“Let’s play truth or dare.” He gave me a look I couldn’t quite decipher, and I wondered if I was about to lose my gumption.
“You haven’t forgotten how to play, have you? ” I teased, albeit a bit nervously.
“I don’t forget anything when it comes to you.” He crossed his arms, leaning forward onto the counter, which made his buff arms look even bigger. “Tell me what you want to know, pretty girl.” His eyes glimmered suspiciously.
I ran my finger around the rim of the shot glass slowly. So many things I could ask. So many things I was dying to ask, but I chickened out. “Why did you leave?” I asked quietly .
He shrugged before giving me his canned answer. “I wanted to serve my country.”
“If you lie, you drink.” I warned, and he lifted his glass to drink. “Come on.” I groaned, wondering if we didn’t have that familiar cadence between us anymore. “Seriously, why did you leave?”
He set the shot glass down with a lazy smirk. “I don’t know. Just wanted to change things up. Needed to get out of here.”
I swallowed hard. “Was it really so bad here? Was there nothing worth staying for?” Shit, did I really just say that part out loud? I blew out a slow breath, feeling my cheeks heat.
“I needed to figure out who I was without all this.” His mouth twitched in an almost smile that didn’t meet his eyes. “Things were complicated back then. They still are.” He was unapologetic as he stared at me for a moment too long again, and I shifted nervously.
“What happened to your lip?” I finally asked.
He shrugged. “Bar fight.”
“You? Never.” I knew he was lying, and my heart sank a bit, realizing he didn’t trust me as much as he used to.
He chuckled, ignoring my question altogether. “It’s your turn, and you don’t get to pick truth or dare because you picked for me. So tell me something, pretty girl.”
There was a long pause. “Tell you what?” I puzzled.
“Everything.” He said simply, his caramel brown eyes twinkling with something achingly beautiful—something that I was never going to have.
“Ah, well, that would be a lot.” I traced the rim of my shot glass and swallowed thickly. “Where to even begin?”
“Start at the beginning and we’ll go from there.” He shifted his head, trying to catch my gaze. “I want to know the things nobody else knows, the things I know you’re shouldering all on your own.”
“I mean, there’s not much to tell.” I shrugged .
“Liar.” He teased, though there was genuine concern swirling in his expression.
I rolled my eyes. “Fine. What do you want to know?”
“Boyfriend?”
I scoffed. “Really? That’s your burning question?”
His jaw fanned. “Someone from Briar Rose?”
I blushed and suppressed a small smile. “No boyfriend.” Because only douchebags and assholes seemed to be interested in a romantic relationship with me.
“Hmmm.” He murmured in approval. “How’s your painting coming along?”
“Fine, I guess.” I shrugged. It was a heaping pile of crap.
“You have any pictures of your work? I’d love to see it.”
“My phone’s in the theater.” It was in my back pocket, but I’d never shown my family or friends my work, and I was not about to start with Carter. The bona fide art investor. Hell to the naw.
“Fine.” He drawled mischievously. “Then tell me a secret, something nobody else knows.”
I stared at him, wondering how so much time had passed so quickly. “Carter… you already know something no one else knows.” I admitted quietly.
He inhaled a sharp breath. “You never talked to Sloane or Jules?”
“No.” I fiddled with a berry on the decorative garland.
“Your mom?”
I shook my head, and when I finally glanced at him, his expression was so incredibly concerned.
I forced a smile, hating that Carter had been the one to find me that night.
The one who knew even a sliver of my dirty little secret.
I rolled my eyes, with a small smile. “I still can’t believe you thought I murdered Tag. ”
Carter chuckled lowly to himself and nodded, something sharp flashing through his expression.
“ So that’s who you were with. ” My pulse spiked, but Carter didn’t miss a beat.
“I could have killed him for even looking your way, let alone whatever happened between the two of you that night.” He didn’t press, but I knew he was asking me to finally explain.
I didn’t. The fact that I’d just admitted I was with Tag was damning enough.
Taggart Caldwell had a reputation, and Carter certainly knew about it.
It was complicated, but I was ashamed all the same.
Carter’s jaw fanned as something lethal flashed through his expression, and he dropped his gaze, practically drilling through the countertop with his quiet simmering rage. “Still could kill him.” He considered.
I realized in that moment that I believed him. “ Have you ever killed someone? ” The question was out before I could think better.
“No.” He responded all too quickly and then, after a moment, he looked dead into my eyes and took the shot. I swallowed hard as he quietly poured himself another, immediately downing that one too.
I felt like I couldn’t breathe. “Carter, I have no idea why I asked you that.” Hot, I felt so incredibly hot. “I shouldn’t have asked you that. I’m so, so sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry.” He murmured. “You’re always allowed to ask me anything.”
I nodded, at a complete loss for words.
When I looked up, he was watching me carefully, and I couldn’t stand the pity in his eyes. Not for himself. For me.
The only thing worse than having his pity for my shit luck in the relationship department was the fact that I’d do anything to meet someone exactly like Carter. Someone kind, funny, driven, passionate, someone who understood me, but unfortunately, that had never been in the cards for me.
“Your turn.” I forced a deep breath in, breaking the tension. “Truth or dare.”
“Dare.” He tilted his head, cocky as ever.
Why I did what I did next, I couldn’t tell you. Something possessed me. “I dare you to go kiss Sloane.”
“What?” He pushed up off the counter abruptly.
“Kiss Sloane or drink.” I said tightly .
“Why would you dare me to kiss Sloane ?” His tone was clipped.
“I don’t know?” Except that I did. Blondes had always been his type, and Sloane wasn’t just blonde, she was beautiful, and funny, and exactly Carter’s type.
My stomach churned just waiting for him to go do it.
“Is there a reason you don’t want to?” I asked innocently, while my heart pounded a mile a minute.
“Uh yeah, there’s a lot of reasons.” He downed the shot with a heavy roll of his eyes. “Your turn, a dare for you.” He refilled his shot glass.
“I don’t get to pick?”
“Nope.” The firm tenor of his voice demanded submission.
I scoffed, shoving the fluttering feeling down. “Alright, let’s have it.”
With a totally straight face, he said, “Kiss me .”
I almost fell off my stool. “What?” I breathed nervously. “You don’t seriously mean that.”
“Oh, I’m very serious, Sarafina.” He repeated slowly. “I dare you to kiss me, or drink.”
“Carter, that would be totally weird.” As if I hadn’t spent all day replaying the feeling of him on top of me in the woods, wondering exactly what it’d be like to be swept up in those corded arms and then devoured by that perfect mouth of his.
Would he be gentle and soft? Or would he be demanding and passionate? Honestly, I could see either with him.
“Kiss me or drink.” Carter hummed, his voice lower and more gravelly this time.
How long had I been staring at his lips? “That would be too weird.” I stuttered out.
“Would it?” He rounded the counter, making my breath catch. “Give me one good reason it would be weird.”
“Because you’re—you’re you.” I stuttered out ineloquently, breath pulsing, as he neared.