Sculpting Grace: A Light Romance Novel (Art of Grace Book 2) (14 page)

But deep down, I knew that at least a little part of me was scared of what might develop between Carter and me, and I didn't want to rush into anything too fast.

We'd at least managed to convince Portia not to come along with us to dinner. I insisted that Carter drive us back to the Halesford Gallery before we went to dinner so that I could collect my own truck, and I kept on poking Portia in the leg and stepping on her toes until she finally got the message.

"I think I'll actually go find my own dinner plans," she told us when we arrived back at the gallery, giving us a wave goodbye. Her eyes lingered for a moment on Carter. "Carter, it was good to finally meet you in person, instead of just hearing about you from Becca! We'll definitely have to find another time for us to talk and get to know each other better."

"Definitely," Carter agreed. I didn't hear the slightest hint of romantic interest in his voice, which gave me a tiny little bit of relief, but I didn't wait for him and Portia to choose another time to come together and discuss things - namely, me.

"Great, great. So Carter, I'll go grab my truck and follow after you," I jumped in, jingling my keys in case he couldn't draw his eyes away from Portia. "And you can lead me to the restaurant?"

'Of course," he assured me - but I didn't miss one last glance that he cast after Portia as she strolled away, back to her own car. I mean, she did have a great butt... but did he really need to look at it, with me right there?

Now at the restaurant with me, Carter picked up one of the menus that our waiter had set in front of us, ran his eyes down it without much interest. "You know, sometimes it's good to take that first step forward, even if it feels a bit scary."

Oh god. He was talking about us, sure enough, not Portia and me. I tried to feign interest in the menu, looking at the different salad options as if the right answer was hidden in the description of the Caesar.

Even though I didn't look up at him, however, Carter leaned forward. One of his fingers gently settled on top of my menu, pushing it down so that I couldn't avoid his brown eyes. "Come on, Becca. Talk to me."

"What do you want me to say?" These words came out a little more aggressively than I'd intended, and I hurried to correct for the harshness in my tone. "This isn't exactly how I planned for everything to turn out," I added, trying to make my comment a little less confrontational.

"I don't think anyone has their life turn out like they intended," Carter sighed, but I couldn't quite sympathize fully with him.

"I don't know. You, Portia, all of those models - they seemed to have their lives pretty together. More than I do." I knew that I was just wallowing in my own sadness, but I didn't have the mental strength to shake it off.

Carter just shrugged. "I'm sure that for everyone, it's more of an illusion than you know."

"Does that include you?"

"I've got things that I'd like to change-" Carter broke off as the waiter reappeared, leaning forward as he politely inquired whether we'd yet made our selection. I glanced down at the menu and made a choice without even reading the words, just pointing at the item. Carter ordered as well, and the waiter faded away.

"What were you saying?" I prompted him, once the man had left with our orders.

Carter started to open his mouth, but changed his conversational tack. "It really doesn't matter, what happened in the past," he said instead. "Instead, it's about where you want things to go, what you want in the future."

"Right now?" I groaned. "I'd settle for actually having a bank account balance that doesn't actively scare me every time I dare to look at it. That's why I'm running around, going to all this trouble, trying to get de St. James to agree to sign on to the gallery. It's all a stunt to try and increase sales."

Across the table from me, Carter nodded, but he didn't look convinced. "Is that all you think about in regards to the future?"

I knew that he wanted to talk about us, but I played coy. "I mean, since I think about it whenever I need to use my credit card, it's pretty much always present on my mind..."

"Dammit, Becca, I'm talking about us!"

I jumped a little at the harsh bite to Carter's words. It looked like he'd surprised himself with his tone, as well, because he leaned back, shaking his head. "Sorry," he apologized immediately. "I didn't mean to yell. I just didn't like us circling around the topic on both our minds. I'd rather confront it head on."

Just like a man, I thought privately, but I kept that particular thought inside my head.

He sighed, reached up to run his fingers through his hair. "So, what do you think? About us?"

"I don't know," I said honestly. "You know that I'm still getting past the whole divorce from my previous ex-husband. I rushed into that because I thought that I knew what I wanted, and it all turned out to be a lie."

"And you think that I'm lying to you?"

"No, not at all!" I replied quickly. "I just... I don't know what I want. Not yet."

As he considered these words, Carter took a sip of his water. I did the same, more out of the need to do something than because my throat felt at all dry.

"You seemed pretty protective of me, back at the modeling agency," he pointed out next when he lowered his glass.

"What do you mean?"

He shrugged, keeping his tone mild. "As soon as we got in there, you latched onto my arm, glared daggers at any other woman who even glanced in my direction." He chuckled. "You seemed like a whole other person! A lioness."

I blinked, surprised by this comparison. He liked the fact that I didn't want other women hitting on him? "I just don't like how all those models immediately started sizing you up, like you were a porterhouse steak," I confessed.

"It would probably be the first steak they'd eaten in years," Carter joked, and we both laughed together for a minute.

As our laughter subsided, the waiter returned, depositing plates in front of both of us. I looked down and saw that I'd apparently ordered a Cobb salad. I cast an envious eye across the table at Carter's plate, with a big burger sitting on top of a small mountain of glistening, deliciously crunchy looking French fries.

Of course, he saw that admiring glance. "Feel free to help yourself," he said, rotating his plate so that I had a clear reach across the table to grab some of his fries.

"Thanks, but I shouldn't," I mumbled out around a mouthful of fries. I swallowed and, with an effort, held back from grabbing another handful. Instead, I picked up my fork and stabbed down at my salad like the lettuce had personally offended me in some way.

"But still, we do need to talk about this at some point," Carter returned back to his main point, just as I lifted a forkful of salad to my mouth. At least whatever chef made this salad hadn't skipped on the cheese and bacon bits.

"Really? I'm happy just going along like this," I tried to say around my mouthful, but he just shook his head at me.

"Becca, I really like you, and I think that we can really have something between us. If you need some time, need for things to go slowly, I can handle that." He sighed, lowering the burger that he held in his hands. "But I can't keep on waiting forever."

"I'm not asking you to wait forever," I protested, even as I admired his ability to eat a delicious looking burger, the sandwich dripping with sauce, and somehow not get a single drop on his immaculately white shirt. How did he do it? "I just need to handle things at work first. That way, I won't be distracted."

"You say that, but there's always going to be something else," Carter said. His voice remained mild, but his words still stung. "You'll never have the perfect moment, when you don't have anything else to focus on besides us. If you want something to happen with us - something real - you're going to need to make an effort for it."

"Me?" I replied. "Why do I have to be the one making an effort?"

Oops. Not what I meant to say. The words were already out, however, and I saw Carter's brows draw down and together.

"You think that I haven't been making an effort?" he asked. His tone was quiet, but I heard anger - and a faint note of pain - in his words.

"No, that's not what I meant-"

"I've been the one who's always dropping by your work, looking for you," he went on, as if I hadn't tried to interject. "I'm the one who keeps on inviting you out for lunch or dinner - and by the way, I have no problems picking up the check each time. I don't care about anything like that - I'm willing to keep on putting myself out there for you."

He reached across the table and caught my hand, gently pulling it down to the tablecloth. "Because I think that you're worth it, Becca," he said gently.

I couldn't bear to look back at his brown eyes, so open and honest. I swallowed, fighting against the lump in my throat.

Carter looked at me for a moment longer, and then released my hand from his soft fingers. "I'll keep waiting, Becca," he said, his voice barely audible. "But not forever."

I didn't have any words to respond to this.

The rest of the meal passed in near-complete silence. I managed to find my voice a couple times to ask Carter about how his day had been, and he shared a few insignificant little stories and facts. Both of us knew that we were just saying words to break up the silence. Like a shark lurking beneath the surface, we could both sense the real topic swimming back and forth, too dangerous to try and touch further.

At the end of the meal, Carter paid as I guiltily finished off the last of the fries that remained on his plate. The waiter brought back his credit card, and he tucked it away in his wallet.

"I don't suppose you want to come back to my apartment for a nightcap," I tried without much conviction.

He sighed as he stood up. "Tempting, but maybe you need to have a little time to think," he answered, and I hung my head. He was right, as always.

Walking me out to my truck, Carter paused and pulled me into his arms. I prepared myself for just a light kiss goodbye, another little sting to point out that I needed to think about what we had together, but it wasn't coming.

Frowning, I looked up at him. In the darkness outside, I couldn't see his eyes or his expression; his face was hidden in shadow.

As I looked up, his hand crept up my back, pulling me in closer against him. He bent down, and my lips parted when his met mine. This was no chaste kiss! He filled this embrace with passion, and I could practically taste his hunger for me. He wrapped his fingers up in my hair, cradling my head as he held me close, my body throbbing against his to the rhythm of my rapidly beating heart. His tongue explored my lips, and I met it with my own.

"Wow," I gasped out, when we finally separated. "What was that for?"

Even in the darkness, I couldn't miss the momentary sparkle of his white teeth as he grinned at me. "I just wanted to make sure you knew what sort of things came included in this package deal," he murmured.

"Wow. You've given me a lot to think about." I let my hand, resting on his chest, slide downwards. "Is that all that's included?"

Sadly, however, he released me and stepped back. "I'm afraid that you'll need to commit if you want to see everything," he said. He flashed me one last smile, and then headed back to his own car.

I stood alone in the parking lot next to my truck, watching him go, before I finally climbed inside and headed back home to Salem.

Chapter Seventeen

*

Back at home, after I fed the wailing cat that immediately intertwined himself between my legs and threatened to send me crashing to the floor, I knew that I ought to turn in and get some rest. I'd had a long day, after all, and I still had one last task to tackle tomorrow for de St. James.

Instead, however, I found myself propped up in my bed, the lights still on and the catalogue of models sitting open on my lap. I flipped through the pages, looking down at the glossy head and full-length shots of these beautiful people, each of them smiling or gazing seductively back at the camera, out of the page and back at me.

We judge you, those faces seemed to whisper to me, their expressions ever so slightly scornful. We know about your flaws, your imperfections. We don't have those. It's not that you don't try, but you'll just never quite compete with us. You might as well give up, settle for someone more at your level.

Someone more like your ex-husband, Barry.

With a groan, I pushed the magazine off of my lap, away from me so that I wouldn't need to look at those smirking faces any longer. I knew that I shouldn't compare myself to them, that they didn't have the perfect and glamorous lives off-camera that their appearance suggested, but I still heard the little whispering voices inside my head. If I kept on looking at the pages, I'd drive myself crazy.

Still, I kept on wondering about whether Carter really meant everything he'd said to me in the restaurant. As soon as we arrived at Exalt, those models had gravitated towards him. He was at their level, handsome and successful enough to date someone like a supermodel.

I looked down at my stomach, bunching up a little and poking over the top of my pajama bottoms. I was most definitely not at that same level.