Page 41 of To Have and to Hold

“Doesn’t matter if I’m not a cop.”

At last, she said, “No. It doesn’t. You’ve proven what you’re capable of. I’d want you to use everything you possessed.”

“Then let me do this,” I said and pressed my forehead to hers.

“I want to support you,” Noelle said.

“You are,” I said. “This isn’t easy for you, either. But you have to trust me.” When she said nothing, I prompted, “Do you?”

Her shadowed face nodded.

“Trust isn’t an easy thing to give. You should say it, if you truly mean it. I’m not going anywhere. This case is different from everything I’ve ever done because I know—knew—Emme. Things aren’t going to be as they normally are. But I still want you beside me. I’d still like your advice and judgment. You’re important, Noe.”

She said, “Remember what we used to do? Where we used to go when we first started dating?”

I thought back to a year ago. It wasn’t easy, and finding what Noelle was truly looking for could be a trap. I decided for neutral, and said, “Yeah, I do.”

“We’d have dinner in Times Square, lunch in the Empire State Building, see a movie next door to Freedom Tower.”

“Breakfast beside the Chrysler Building,” I added.

“Yes! Do you remember how much fun we had being tourists?”

I recalled how enjoyable it was to watch Noelle check off all the bucket list goals she wanted to experience in this city. Being from Vancouver, Canada, when she moved to New York two years ago, she wanted to experience everything this city had at her fingertips. We met at a continuing legal study—educational hours that all lawyers must commit to in order to keep their bar license current—and her keen sense of legal theory coupled with her enthusiasm for a simple hot dog on a street corner during our break (because it was a New York City hot dog) is what had me looking closer.

Maybe not immediately. Noelle was the hottest specimen in the lecture hall. All the men—and some women—in suits were cataloging her exposed, toned legs and thick, pink lips shining with gloss.

I was still raw, only a year out from breaking off my engagement and not even close to wanting to find another woman, other than to scent my sheets. I made a promise to myself—never find a woman like Emme again. She’d turned me into a man I never thought I’d be. Ripped through the jagged edges, unperturbed if she bled herself. I had a hole inside me, ever since I developed enough thought to see it. My mother, as soon as she died, gave it to me. My father, in the brief years he had me, made it start to tear wider. A blackening flaw.

When I first hurt someone by accident, they let me get away with it. Then, when I did it on purpose, they still hung around. Foster parents. Foster siblings. Peers. Friends. Enemies. I stole, fought, cheated, survived. And I applied that logic to women. Sex.

The more I allowed the devil to slide behind my smile and creep into the bones of my deft fingers, the more my father haunted my reflection. There was a risk in making the hole as large as his. A smart mouth got me what I wanted—but a smart brain accomplished a future. I traded in the physical fight for power and chose mental. Used it to hurt and climb higher and away from the filth. Found success by covering the emptiness with studies and college girls. It worked for me, and a bar license wasn’t far off.

Until Emme saw right through it.

She was exactly the type of woman I took to bed. Gorgeous, with dark hair so long it would cover her breasts if she were naked in front of me. Lips like two pillows that could cushion my cock. All the usual horny things that went through my mind when she approached me for tutoring help. Then, she spoke. Wanted to know more about me than a simple, casual fuck. Asked about my past—which, not then. But eventually. Wouldn’t stop asking, with genuine interest, about my life, both lived and dreamed. I almost ended it right there, because for once I didn’t want to poison someone else’s charmed existence.

The one thing that terrified me in twenty years was the kindness that came with her.

Emme was the only woman who knew everything about me.

The only one who made the hollowness lighter.

When she left, the emptiness she’d shrunk grew ten times the span of my lifetime. I had a choice, but I chose to re-embrace the dark.

So, when Noelle walked over that night, her hips swaying like I imagined they would when I was inside her, I was surprised she couldn’t see all the black behind my eyes. I found myself accepting her invitation to a Broadway show she scored after the CLE finished.

Noelle endeared. My goal to have her naked and rocking underneath me didn’t change, but I was surprised at how much I liked listening to her. I appreciated her company, and soon wanted it, even after we fell into bed and I did everything I imagined doing to her—and more, including the discovery of the pleasures of a nipple ring. After every date we went on, it was easier to give in to her laughter and affectionate touches in between the fucking.

“Let’s go to the Boathouse in Central Park this weekend,” Noelle said now. “And have brunch like we used to. Feed the ducks.”

One year later, still Noelle preferred the tourist spots, the trendy areas. The crowds didn’t deter her, nor did the slow walkers and fanny packs. She was content to blend in with those who were experiencing New York City for the first time. Didn’t care that half the things she wanted to do were complete rip-offs. The very opposite of Emme. Maybe that was what drew me to Noelle. Emme searched for hidden gems and long forgotten rooms in this city. Noelle saw it for what it was—half tourist trap covered in glitter and half unaffordable luxury with a splash of poverty and welfare. But Noelle enjoyed its surface and felt no need to dig deeper. A refreshing change. And, at the moment, I supposed it didn’t matter that it was winter and there wouldn’t be any ducks.

“You’ll never get tired of the popular shit, will you?” I asked Noelle.

“Not unless they turn Manhattan’s power grid off,” she said, then, with sudden seriousness, wrapped her hands around my shoulders. “Spence, I trust you.”

She didn’t sense my reservations in the dark. “Good.”

Noelle let me guide us back to lying down and nestled into my side. Soon, her breaths slowed, soft flutters on my chest turning into low exhales.

I tried to allow the rhythm to lull me, but it didn’t work. I thought of Becca in the next room, her eyes probably as wide open to the ceiling as mine.

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