Page 79 of The Fallen
She’s pushed onto the bed, and I pull at the hoodie and t-shirt, trying to get them off without ripping my stitches. There’s nothing else that needs talking about as far as I’m concerned. We can find the rest in time, assuming she’s agreeing to something here. Still not sure about that, but at this moment, I don’t care either. Maybe we can do breakfast in the morning, talk about more shit then, and see if acting like a couple is doable for us both.
I unbuckle my belt and put a knee on the bed to get to her, but she brings a hand up to make me stop. “I don’t want to change anything about you, but you need to give, too. They’re my family, Noah, and nothing is going to change that. I need to know this is real before we go any further.”
“Real?”
“Yes. Say more words. Mean them.”
My other leg climbs me up onto the bed slowly, a smile coming at her challenging attitude and want for words I don't know how to give, let alone how to get feelings out of my mouth. “Got myself shot for you. Isn't that enough for you to know how I feel?”
“Yes, but what about my family?”
“What about them? Not thinking about them, in all honesty.”
“I need you to. I need you to acknowledge that they’re a part of me, and with me comes them. I won’t hide this from them, and, for once, I don't want to disappear.”
I look down at her, considering that and all that comes with it. Champagne fucking lunches, days out in pretentious clothes. Might shrug the thought off, or at least give it a few seconds worth of dismissal, as I settle in between her spread legs. If that's what she is and what she needs me to try dealing with, then I’m relatively game to try. Landon doesn’t seem quite the dick he usually is now anyway. “Alright.”
“Alright, what?”
“Alright, I’ll try dealing with that shit, just don’t ask me to change.”
She smiles. “As if I ever could.” Makes me smile in return as I run my hands through all that expensive hair of hers, my eyes looking at hers.
“Okay then,” she says, blinking.
Alright. We’ll do this first, and then, when we’ve spent some more time in the real world without problems chasing our arse, maybe then I’ll find the love stuff she wants me to say. For now, I need her and this bed. The rest we’ll see about.
Chapter Twenty Eight
NEVE
Four weeks later
The apartment building is exactly how it should be. Inviting, beautiful – a sanctuary for any tourist to stay in. And this time, I plan on taking every advantage of that.
This trip is more than needed. At some point, I convinced myself that everything would be okay if I could bring Lewis to justice. Make him pay and show my family that I wasn’t the monster responsible for all the bad things. Yet even with Lewis dead, and the problem dealt with, things aren’t back to normal.
I sigh and head up the stone steps to my apartment door.
Although it’s more of an opportunity than a burden, I've lost my job. Too much time off, they said. If only they knew why, but it’s not something I’ve been able to divulge because Landon has somehow managed to cover the whole sordid situation up.
Media buyouts, payoffs, yet more stories about other companies and their problems to divert the actual news of our own situation. It’s made me feel less than useless as he’s tidied up the mess in his own succinct way. The Broderick way.
The only good thing in these last few weeks is Noah.
Noah, who, after agreeing we wouldn’t change each other and that we wanted to start again – has been hard to figure out. He’s not a regular guy. Which, for the most part, is what I want. He’s mysterious and sexy and is as far away from conventional as possible. But when you’re trying to date, it’s not so easy. I thought it was just the words that he found awkward, but it’s more than that.
Which is leaving me feeling a little lost to what we actually are, and maybe the sacrifice for what he had offered would have been the better choice. He’s the prize, at the end of this.
This time, when I open the door to my apartment, I’m not frantically trying to lock it behind me. Instead, the fear and paranoia that gripped me on my last trip here are replaced with a melancholy that I hope can be cured with some sun and sand.
I wheel my suitcase into the bedroom and wander back into the main room.
“Ahh … God!” I clutch my hand to my chest. “You scared me. What are you doing here?Howare you here?” Noah’s sitting at the table where I drugged him the last time we were here together.
“You said you were going on holiday. I know this place.” He shrugs as if that’s enough of an explanation.
He stands and walks towards me.
