Page 7 of Under the Lies

I wasn’t lying last night when I told him nothing happened. Nothing that would interest him, unless he took pleasure in all the ways Harlow tried to put me down…which knowing Noah he might. Other people’s pain is his pleasure.

He doesn’t need to know any of that.

Though, something doesn’t sit right about my sister’s visit the more I find myself thinking about it. Little details of that night surface each time Noah’s question runs through my head.

Harlow wasn’t quite…Harlow. She’s usually as recklessly carefree as they come and up until that night I don’t think I’d ever seen her rattled. Not even when she got into a fight in prep school, bleeding from a broken nose, but that night it was like she was possessed by violent nerves, on edge and vicious.

At the time, I didn’t question it. I stopped concerning myself with my sister’s problems around the same time she held a knife to my neck when I was seventeen.

But after my encounter with Noah yesterday, I can’t stop wondering what happened and why Noah cares.

With my mind preoccupied, the majority of my day has passed in a daze. My body might be present but my mind is not.

It’s not until I’m walking to my final class of the day, Technology and Conservation of Art, that I feel myself snap out of the foggy haze that’s consumed me. And it’s only because I spy a familiar figure leaning against a light pole with carefree arrogance.

My steps slow but it’s futile. I can’t avoid him. He’s strategically placed himself in the direct path to my next class. It’d be stupid to turn around and go the long way around to the back entrance.

I’m not fourteen anymore. I can handle Noah Kincaid. So I swallow the groan that’s built in my throat and raise my chin, conjuring confidence I don’t feel as I stroll up to him.

He smirks around the cigarette between his lips as I near.

I study him, taking in his black on black suit sitting beneath the steel gray pea coat. All articles of clothing tailored to perfection.

The arrogant smirk grows as the distance depletes between us. He stubs out his cigarette on the light pole, flicking it to the ground as he pushes off it and meets me halfway, bringing us almost toe-to-toe.

“What’re you doing here?” My arms cross over my chest, a barrier, a shield between us.

“Just passing through.” He slides his hands into his pockets, looking as innocent as the wolf who ate the lamb.

“Bullshit.”

A brow peaks up from behind the mirrored aviators he wears. “My, my, Baby Brooks what a filthy mouth you have.”

“All the better to sass you with.”

Amusement twists his lips. “The last time I saw you, you still blushed when saying darn.”

“A lot has changed, Noah.” My crossed arms tighten. More than I want to admit.

He takes off his glasses, sliding them into his coat pocket as his eyes roam over my body. “Clearly,” he murmurs, taking in my curves, my attitude. I see the appreciation on his face, the mask he usually dons slips, revealing a glimmer into his thoughts. Baby Brooks is all grown up. A part of me hums under his sweeping gaze.

In a louder voice he adds, “But that sharp tongue you’ve grown isn’t going to save you today, Brooks.”

“You don’t know the things this tongue can do.”

Time freezes as my words hang between us, as my eyes widen and heat blooms across my neck and up my cheeks.

Noah’s face piques with interest and that perfectly manicured brow of his raises again. “There she is.” His words are innocent but spoken with heavy meaning, no doubt thinking of much dirtier uses for my tongue than I can imagine. “There’s the Sayer Brooks I know.”

There was a time when I would’ve never been so mouthy to Noah. Where forming a sentence past a couple syllables was a challenge. Back when he was the bad boy in a beat up leather jacket who was four years older than me. He simultaneously terrified yet sent thrills through me every time I saw him.

He still does.

“What’re you really doing here?” I ignore the way my body hums with him so near. There should be a switch to turn this reaction off.

“I told you last night we weren’t done.”

Unease courses through me, but I keep my face blank. “I already gave you my answer.”

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