Page 97 of Splintered Hearts

Fuck Josh.

I get up and sit on the bench next to Noah. There isn’t much room but I squeeze on there with him, looping an arm around him and pulling him into my body. I kiss the top of his head and feel Noah sag against me. “He’s lucky I didn’t kill him.”

“I’m lucky you didn’t kill him.” Noah smiles up at me. “Orange is not your color.”

“I know you’re upset but... you kind of owe me.”

Noah wrenches away from my arms. “Owe you?!”

“I mean, Iwaspromised a super-fun game night. I thoughtyou were better than this,” I tease.

Noah’s brows scrunch and fuck, it’s so goddamn cute. “Excuse me. I am the game-night master!”

I shrug, getting off the bench. “Kind of mediocre if you ask me.”

“Oh, you are an asshole!” Noah grabs a hair tie, putting his hair into a tiny ponytail. “Come on. Redo. Right now!”

“Or.” I laugh. “My turn. Show you how it’s done.”

“What?” All his teasing stops. “What do you mean?”

“I got something set up. Could be fun.”

“Okay. I’m intrigued.”

“Not a sex thing.”

“Less intrigued.”

I grab his chin in my fingers, tilting his face up. Damn these green eyes, sparkling and shining and so fucking beautiful. I want to kiss his lips, but I just settle my forehead against his. “I’ll be in the backyard. Wear something warm, that you won’t care if it gets ruined.”

Noah walks out onto the back porch wearing a loose white sweater with a scoop neck and small holes here and there—one close to his nipple, giving me a peek—as well as black yoga pants, molded to his shapely thighs in a way that had to be meant to kill me.

This man is unreal.

“What are we doing?” He darts his eyes between mine and the canvas, a little confused. “I’m not very artistic.” Well, I have to disagree with that. Noah has this little notebook he tracks all his reading in, and the way he’s decorated it is very artistic.

That fluttery feeling is back—the one I feel every time Noah walks into a room, just existing. Noah’s been open and honest this entire time, now it’s time to give back. Just a little. Noah won’t make fun of me, I know this.

Vulnerable and open.

Let’s go.

“When I moved in with Lia I’d just left a very very bad home.” An understatement. Every time I’d thought,this can’t get worse, but it was like the universe said hold my beer. “There had been a long string of bad ones, and it was hard adjusting at first. I didn’t trust anyone. I was just so fucking angry at everything and everyone.

“She knew I liked to draw. I used to do it at the library, so she bought paint and canvas. She said, ‘If you’re going to be pissed at the world, at least do something productive with that anger.’” Reaching in, I scoop lime-green paint into my hand, loving the way it feels. It brings me back to those early days with my new forever family.

All I want is for Noah to have a piece of me. Just a tiny one. My life’s been so shadowed all these years, and I’m tired. So fucking tired. Being depressed and angry all the time—I’m sick of it. “She set up the canvas and paint and told me to take whatever I was feeling out on the canvas.” The thick paint, a little broken from age, runs through my fingers. Deciding where to throw, I wind up, paint flying through the air and landing on the canvas with a satisfyingthwack. “You try.”

Licking his lips, Noah looks at the paint, and then his sparkling eyes land on me, nearly taking the air out of my lungs. Will there come a time when his mere existence doesn’t hit me in the chest?

Noah walks slowly, and my eyes dip down the thin fabric of those fucking pants as he bends to grab some paint. “Can we play twenty questions?

Playful little fox. “Always with the games.” I smile, though. He loves to have fun. Everything’s a game—or could be.

“You can ask me a question, and I’ll answer after I throw the paint on.”

“How does someone win?” I ask.

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