Page 21 of His to Unwrap
I chuckle and bite the tip of her finger, making her squeal.
“Let me talk for a minute, okay?”
She nods, still looking apprehensive. “I’ve wanted you from the moment we met. You know that, right? You had to have seen the way I was always looking at you.”
“I saw,” she agrees. “But I tried to convince myself it didn’t mean anything.” She shrugs. “Thought it might hurt less when you stayed away.”
I close my eyes, hating that I hurt her.
“I stayed away because I knew I wasn’t the right guy for you.”
“Roman—”
“You said you’d let me talk.” She pouts before nodding and I can’t help but lean down to kiss the tip of her nose. “So fucking cute, angel.” Then I sigh. “Noelle, you have such a bright future ahead of you. You’re so talented, so beautiful. So very sweet andkind. You light up any room you walk into. I couldn’t stand the idea of ruining that.”
“Why would you ruin it?”
“Well, first of all, I’m thirty-nine. That makes meseventeenyears older than you.” She makes a scoffing sound. “That’s a big deal, Noelle. You’re just starting out in the world, you have your whole life to look forward to. You should have someone more like you.” The very words are sour in my mouth, and I know I’m scowling.
“Look at us, angel.” I hold out my hand and wait for her to place hers in it. “You’re so small and soft and perfect and I’m…” I sigh out a chuckle. “I’m calloused and scarred. An unpolished, gruff, beast of a man.”
“I like you unpolished and gruff,” she mutters, and I shake my head.
“Those things are only the tip of the iceberg. What’s more important is that I’m not like you. I’m bitter and jaded. I’ve seen things, done things…” I trail off, trying to keep the images from invading my mind.
“In the special forces you mean?” she asks quietly.
I nod. “And after. My security company…sometimes we have to deal with people who aren’t worth the air in their lungs. I’ve done some messed up shit, trying to protect the innocent.” I let out a long breath. “It changed me. All of this shit in my head. It’s given me a piss-poor view of the world. I don’t know if I can ever be normal again.”
She peers up at me and I’m afraid to meet her eyes, afraid of what I might see there. But she waits for me and when I finally look down into her face, all I see is her normal calm sweetness shining up at me.
“Is it my turn yet?”
I let out a shaky laugh. “Sure, angel.”
She nods once, then looks away. “I’ve been alone for a really long time, Roman. It was hard to make friends, moving as much as we did. We came here to Charlotte so my dad could be in a clinical trial for his cancer. Then he died anyhow and I was in this town I didn’t know, with no family…” her voice cracks and I squeeze her tighter to my chest, wishing I could take that pain away. “The first time I saw you in the club, I felt safe,” she whispers. “It was the first time I’d felt safe in years.”
“Angel,” I choke out.
“I’ve been so lonely, for so long,” she continues, voice stronger now. “I’ve been afraid and confused…like I didn’t have a tether, you know? Like there was nothing grounding me.” Her clear blue eyes meet my darker ones. “Youground me.”
I don’t even know what to say to that. A feeling I can’t identify is blooming in my chest and I try to tamp it down, scared of losing control.
Apparently, Noelle isn’t finished wrecking me, because she continues. “No one has ever looked at me the way you do. All that shit you said about yourself?” She shakes her head. “Roman, when I look at you I don’t see someone too old or too bitter or too unpolished.” She rolls her eyes like the very idea is stupid. “I see someone who I know will take care of me. Someone I know I can count on.” She gives me a sly smile. “Someone I know will meet every one of my needs in the bedroom…and the playroom.”
I groan, pulling her around to face me, adjusting her legs so she’s straddling me. “You need to understand,” I growl. “I won’t be able to be casual with you.”
She laughs. “What on earth makes you think I would want casual?”
“I mean it, Noelle. I’ll be overbearing. Controlling. I might have a hard time even letting you out of my sight.” I sigh, feeling helpless. “I’m fucking obsessed with you, angel. I won’t know how to control it.”
She doesn’t look turned off by this in the slightest. “Sounds good to me.”
“You’ll have to move in with me,” I blurt out. “Like, right away. Tonight. And let me take care of you. You can still dance here, if you want, but no one else is going to touch you. I’ll fucking kill anyone who tries. So no scenes with anyone else or I swear to god?—”
She giggles, the sound going straight to my chest and enflaming that feeling I hadn’t been able to name. I know what it is now—hope. No wonder I couldn’t identify it at first. It’s not something I’ve felt much of for a very long time.
“What’s so funny?”
