Carter #2
Dominic doesn’t just recoil; he lunges. His hand snaps out, a sudden blur catching Luka’s wrist. The sound of his hand gripping the skin is a sharp, dry friction that echoes against the garage. Dominic’s knuckles are white, his grip looking like it could snap the small bones in Luka's arm.
“Don’t fucking touch her,” Dominic hisses.
The words aren't a shout. They’re a snarl—low, primal, and vibrating with a level of raw, territorial violence that makes the blood in my veins turn to ice. It’s the sound of someone who has finally stopped pretending to be a "team player."
Luka freezes, his eyes widening as he looks down at the hand clamped around his wrist, then up at his brother. I stand paralyzed, the breath trapped in my lungs. I can see the pulse jumping along Dominic's face, his eyes turning into something uneven and vicious.
Luka remains still for a second, his expression hovering in a state of calm, professional confusion. “Let go, Dom,” he says, his voice level, though the easy warmth from a moment ago has evaporated. “You’re making a scene. I’m just helping.”
“She doesn’t want your help,” Dominic counters, his grip tightening instead of loosening. “She doesn’t want you.”
The weight of those words—the absolute, brutal certainty in his voice—sends a tremor through the air.
Luka’s head tilts slowly. I watch as the veil lifts from his face, replaced by a sharp, clinical focus. He looks at his brother’s grip, then his eyes drift to me—tracking the way I’m standing, the way my chest is heaving, the way I haven’t moved an inch away from Dominic despite the snarl.
The silence stretches, heavy and toxic. It’s a true, agonizing pause where the only sound is the distant, rhythmic thud of a tire gun three bays down.
I see the exact moment the pieces click into place for Luka.
His eyes darken, the hurt bleeding through the cracks of his composure like oil from a ruptured tank, thick and staining everything it touches.
“You told me nothing happened,” Luka whispers.
The words are barely audible, his voice cracking with a sudden edge that sounds less like anger and more like something vital breaking inside him.
He looks at his brother, and for the first time, I don’t see siblings—I see enemies.
“I asked you to your face, and you lied. You let me sit there like an idiot while you were already…”
He trails off, a bitter, exhausted laugh escaping him. He looks back at me, but the kindness is gone. Now, there’s only the desire to strike back, to wound the person who just gutted his pride.
“Does she even know?” Luka asks his brother, his voice turning lethal. “Does she know what she’s actually signed up for? Or are you waiting for the press release to fill her in?”
“Luka, enough,” Dominic warns, his voice vibrating with a dangerous, low-frequency threat.
“No, I think Carter deserves to know who she’s ‘working’ so closely with,” Luka snaps, his gaze pinning me to the spot.
The pity in his eyes is the cruelest part—it’s the look you give a victim who hasn't realized they’re bleeding yet.
“You’ve really leveled up. I didn’t realize you were the type of person who was okay with being the side-piece to an engaged man. ”
The world doesn't just stop; it shatters.
The roar of the fans, the whine of the impact wrenches, the thrum of the engines—it all vanishes into a deafening, dull hum.
It’s a sudden, violent decompression, like a building groaning right before it collapses.
I can’t feel my hands. I can’t feel the floor beneath my shoes.
Everything soft I let myself feel for him just before this curdles into something bitter enough to choke on.
I turn my head slowly, my neck feeling like it’s made of rusted iron, until I’m looking at Dominic.
He’s still holding Luka’s wrist, his knuckles solid against his brother’s skin, but his gaze has finally snapped to mine.
“You’re engaged?” I ask.
The words are small, fragile things in the middle of the wreckage.
Dominic’s mouth opens, then closes. He looks at Luka, a flash of pure, murderous rage crossing his features, before he turns back to me. The desperation in his eyes is frantic—the look of someone trying to catch smoke with his bare hands.
“Carter, it’s… it’s complicated. It’s not what you think.”
“It’s a yes or no question, Dominic,” I say. My voice is steady only because I am completely numb, the anger beginning to settle into a quiet weight in my gut. “Is he telling the truth?”
“I was going to fix it,” he says, his voice cracking. “I was going to tell you, I just needed to—”
“Yes or no?” I repeat. I step closer, invading the space he’s been trying to claim all morning. I don't want the story. I don't want the excuses. I want the truth to stop slipping through my hands.
He doesn't answer immediately. He just stares at me, his chest rising and falling in those heavy, ragged hitches I recognize from yesterday.
But then his gaze falters, his eyes tracking the way my expression must be fracturing in front of him.
He must see the exact moment what I thought of him is replaced by a stranger who is already grieving him.
He reads the devastation, the silent plea for a denial that isn't coming, and I see his shoulders sag as he realizes the lie has finally run out of road.
The silence around us becomes absolute. The whine of the air-guns, the roar of the crowd, the thrum of the idling engines—it all falls away, leaving nothing but the thick, rhythmic thud of the blood in my ears, heavy and slow like a failing engine.
I watch the way his throat moves, the way the light catches in his eyes one last time before the dark pulls them under.
I’m waiting for the impact. I’m waiting for the crash that’s been coming since the moment I let him in.
He swallows, the sound audible in the charged silence between us. His lips part, and the word is a single, solid strike that ruptures everything.
“Yes,” he confirms.