Page 137 of The Sins of Noelle

God, how the hell is that possible?

We'd had layers of anonymity on that platform, and we'd both agreed not to give too many recognizable details. So how the hell could she have found out who I was?

But that's not even the most shocking aspect.

She'd not onlyknownwho I was, but she'd followed me around…

Fuck!

I can't wrap my mind around this. She would have been so damn young too.

We're more than five years apart in age. At the time we started talking, that would have made her…fifteen?

For fuck's sake!

I groan out loud. I was twenty to her fifteen.

Fucking hell! This makes me feel like a goddamn predator.

Fifteen! She was fucking fifteen!

But no matter how much this piece of information throws me off, I have to admit that it's my fault, too, for not checking—for not asking her for her age from the beginning.

As we'd started talking, I'd thought both her thinking and her vocabulary far too advanced to be anything less than my age. At some point, I'd thought she might be older too.

There was a maturity of thought and ideas to her. It was what I most admired her then, and what I admire now.

Fifteen… My fucking God…

It's the first time I realize what would have happened had we met back then.

She would have continued to lie to me about her age, and if what Cisco is saying is correct, she'd been prepared to sleep with me. Knowing myself and my weakness for her, I wouldn't have been able to say no.

I would have done it.

I would have fucking slept with an underage girl and I would have been none the wiser.

A chasm opens in my chest as my mind and my heart find themselves in conflict.

Theoretically, I realize how fucking wrong everything is. But while my mind can compartmentalize right and wrong, my heart cannot.

Even back then, Iknowthat I would have taken one look at her and I would have been ready to place the world at her feet.

If we had met, I am absolutely certain I would have done anything she would have asked of me.

Back then, I hadn't even dared dream of a kiss, let alone more. She'd only needed to bat her lashes at me and give me one of those sultry looks of hers and I would have been fucking gone.

Had she asked me to sleep with her? I would have done it.

Had she asked me to take her away and run off in the world, just the two of us? I would have dropped my entire life and followed her wherever she wished.

God, but it's quite unsettling to realize how one moment in time could have changed the course for all our lives.

If she'd made it to that meeting… If we'd seen each other back then…

We wouldn't be here, would we? We wouldn't have suffered everything we did along the way.

Noelle wouldn't have married Sergio, and I wouldn't have been sold to Armand.

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