Chapter Four: The Ultimatum

Carter ran.

He grabbed his clothes, pulled them on with shaking hands, and stumbled back through the club, past the bar, and out the door. The night air was cold, but he didn't dare go back for his coat. He kept running until his lungs burned and his legs threatened to give out. Finally, he collapsed against a brick wall in some dark alley, doubled over, gasping for breath.

"Oh God," he choked out. "Oh God, oh God — "

He'd had sex with Dallas Cross. Desperate, needy, mind-blowing sex where Carter had begged and pleaded and come apart like he'd never...

This couldn't be happening.

In one week, he'd lost his fiancee, his dignity, and apparently his mind. Because what kind of person had sex with the man who'd spent nearly a decade destroying their life? What kind of person enjoyed it?

He pulled out his phone with trembling fingers finding three missed calls and seven texts from Sophie. He deleted them all without reading them, they were all probably empty apologies anyway, and somehow managed to pull up Uber.

The driver gave him concerned looks in the rearview mirror the entire way home, but Carter just stared out the window, numb. His apartment was exactly as he'd left it a week ago, when he'd been stupidly, naively happy. The ring box he'd practiced opening sat on his nightstand. His proposal speech, carefully written on note cards, lay scattered across his desk.

Carter collapsed onto his bed fully clothed, trembling with rage, and after long hours spent wide awake, exhaustion and alcohol finally dragged him under. His dreams were chaotic, Sophie and Dallas tangled together, Dallas's mask slipping, Dallas's voice saying mine, finally mine.

His alarm blared at 6:30 AM. Carter slapped at his phone, groaning as the memories of last night rushed back to his head. It rang again before he could set it back down. This time, it was an incoming call and not an alarm. His mother's caller ID was on the screen. He lay there looking at the ceiling for two rings, feeling strangely like he was about to throw up, then he answered.

"Carter."

Carter sighed, bracing himself for the worst. They almost never called, and when they did, it never ended well. "We've been trying to reach you for days. Your father and I have been so worried."

"I know. I'm sorry. It's been a really difficult week for me." He tried to get up and stumbled, feeling a sudden wave of dizziness. That was odd, he thought. Hangover, maybe?

"Yes." She paused. "We heard."

He finally pushed himself out of bed and drifted toward the mirror. His reflection looked pale and exhausted with dark bags under his eyes. There was a red bite mark clearly visible on his neck. Carter took a closer look and noticed it was... glowing? What? How? Had that evil bastard given him some kind of weird STD?

Carter groaned with irritation, poking it with his finger and hissing with pain, hoping it wouldn't leave a permanent scar.

"Sophie called us," his mother said through the phone, snapping him out of his thoughts. "She was in quite a state."

"I'm sure she was," Carter said bitterly. He was ashamed to admit that he missed her. They'd been together for so long, he knew all her moods. Who would take care of her now? What would happen to the life they'd planned together?

Carter shook his head firmly. She'd betrayed his trust, and there was no forgiving that. They were through.

"Carter, she made a mistake..."

"Mother," Carter warned.

He walked over to his fridge, his stomach growling with hunger while he stared with disgust at the vegetables and healthy food he bought. All he craved now was greasy junk food. It was all so strange. His dizziness, his nausea, and now he couldn't even stand the smell of healthy food he usually enjoyed, let alone eat it. He shook his head and quickly ordered a pizza on his phone.

He would have to visit the hospital soon; maybe this had something to do with the mark on his neck.

"People make mistakes, you know? And she seemed very sorry when she apologized to us on the phone," his mother pleaded.

"She cheated on me with my high school bully." It took him a lot of effort to keep his voice calm. "Did that come up during her apology?"

"Yes, well..." His mother's voice faded away. Carter heard the sound of a door opening somewhere on their end and his father's voice came through.

"Put him on speaker." Then, louder, directed at Carter: "How long are you planning to whine about this?"

"I'm not whining. I ended the relationship."

"You ended — " His father let out an annoyed huff. "Do you have any idea what you've done? Do you know what's at stake here?!"

"I caught her with someone else. I don't understand... What else was I supposed to do?" Carter stared at his phone in disbelief.

"I don't care. Do you understand me? I don't give a shit, and you need to put whatever you're feeling aside and fix this!" his father bellowed. "The company is finished, Carter! We have been bleeding money for three years and I didn't tell you because there was nothing you could do about it, but now there is!"

He started to cough loudly into the speaker, his tuberculosis getting the better of him, then he stopped, cleared his throat and continued; "Sophie's father has been the only one keeping us afloat. Our summer home, the cars, the hospital bills for my disease, all of it runs on his kindness towards us. The moment he hears you've broken his daughter's heart, that kindness disappears. Poof!"

Carter sighed and said nothing. He heard a knock at the front door and ignored it. He wasn't in the mood to get any deliveries; whoever it was would have to leave the pizza at the door.

"Your little sister will be pulled out of private school," his mother said, stepping back in, her voice taking on a strained, pleading tone. "We will lose the house. We'll have to leave the South Hamptons high end neighborhood in public disgrace."

Her voice got even more frantic, "I'll have to sell my diamonds and original mink coats for money! All my friends at the country club will abandon me if they find out I'm poor again. And it will be because you couldn't suck it up and look past one mistake."

"One mistake," Carter repeated. "Right."

"Don't use that tone with me. I'm your mother and I'm telling you the reality of the situation, which is that your feelings are a luxury this family cannot afford right now. We're bankrupt!" She paused. "Sophie's father is your father's employer. If Sophie tells him the wedding is off, your father will get fired before the week is out. We will be ruined. Is that what you want for us?"

"I'm a grown man, mother. I'm twenty six years old. You can't make me do..." Carter faltered, trying to defend himself.

His father again: "Save it! I don't care if you're twenty six or five hundred years old! You will go back to Sophie, you will apologize, and you will have a wedding date set by the end of the month, exactly as planned!"

"Are you serious?" Carter asked, his mouth going slack in shock.

His father screamed into the phone, "Yes! Or you will find another solution! Marry someone else with enough money, I don't care how you do it! But if you cannot do that much for this family after everything we have given you, then you are no son of mine."

"What about what I want?" he sighed. "I moved back home to build a life. To settle down and have children and a family of my own. I've wanted that my whole life."

"I got married and had kids, and what do I have to show for it? A wannabe socialite of a wife and an ungrateful crybaby disgrace of a son!!" his father said.

A louder knock came again at the front door. Carter ignored it.

"You have until the end of the month," his father said. "After that, don't you ever bother calling us again! Consider yourself disowned!"

"Your father means it," his mother added gently. "We love you, darling. Please understand that this isn't personal, we're just trying to survive. We can't go back to being poor like before, we just can't..."

The knock came again, so loud it shook the doorframe, and this time Carter was grateful for the interruption. He'd had enough and he couldn't take one more second of that call.

"I have to go. Someone's at the door." Then he hung up his phone before either of them could respond, switched it off and set it on the coffee table.

Carter brushed off another sudden wave of dizziness and nausea, and opened the door to get his pizza from the delivery guy.

"Sorry I took so long, I — What the hell?!"

Dallas Cross stood in the hallway! He looked fully composed too, unlike Carter who'd barely slept at all through the night.

"You again?! What the hell are you doing here?" Carter demanded.

"Pack your things, mate," he said. "I'm taking you home to my pack."