by Reagan Shaw
A voice spoke in my ear, deep, sending a thrill down my spine. “For what it’s worth, Erika, I don’t think you’re a loser.” It was Noah.
I stiffened but didn’t turn around. Had he stayed back a few minutes, just to torture me? I didn’t answer him, but I clutched the remote so hard the plastic cracked and groaned. I waited for the insult to come, but it didn’t.
Instead, hair shifted from my neck as he brushed it back, exposing more of my ear. He kissed the lobe, ever so softly, and I sucked in a breath, eyelashes fluttering. “For what it’s worth,” he whispered, again, “I do think of you at night, all night long. And if you tell anyone that, I’ll fucking deny it.” Another soft kiss, and then he backed up and walked from the room, his steps quiet on the carpet.
I stared at the TV as the door slammed a second time. Outside, Nancy gave a battle cry of epic proportions. Her laughter rang out and traveled through the house, louder than the TV even, but it didn’t affect me this time.
My heart pounded against the inside of my chest.
The car started, and tires crunched on gravel. Finally, I was truly alone.
I blinked back wetness, lifted my hand, and touched a finger to my ear. It was warm but not wet from where Noah had kissed it.
Kissed it.
Why? Why had he done that? Why had he kissed me?
I’d never friggin’ kissed anyone. His lips on my ear… That was the first time any boy had touched me in a romantic sense. It was like he’d stolen something from me, and he’d done it because he wanted to play a game.
It couldn’t be because he liked me. He’d made it clear I annoyed him.
This had to all be a part of the game. Nothing more.
It would always be the same with Noah.
Noah
Present day
* * *
If she thought I’d leave, she’d lost her senses. That or she just didn’t understand the kind of man I was.
I walked with her into the elevator in the hotel, took it all the way up to the fourth floor in silence, then strode down the hall at her side and waited for her to open her hotel room.
“Noah, get lost,” she said.
“Has that ever worked for you before?” I asked. “Speaking to me like that. I told you, Erika, I won’t leave until we’ve discussed this. I—fuck, tonight brought it all home to me.”
She turned, holding her hand behind her back, on the door handle to her room. Her green eyes searched mine. “What do you mean?”
“I’ll explain it to you once we’re inside,” I said.
Erika chewed on her bottom lip, then shook her head. “I must be fucking crazy. That’s all there is to it. I’m crazy to allow you anywhere near me after everything that’s happened.” She opened the door to her room and slipped inside, and I followed her.
I kicked the door shut behind us, then strode across the small hotel room, one of the cheapest, judging by the size. Erika dropped her handbag on the coffee table, then stripped off her coat and walked over to check the heating. She fiddled with the dial and didn’t speak.
“Erika, look at me.”
“I’m mad,” she repeated. “I can’t believe this. I can’t believe I do this to myself. It’s like I can’t get enough of you, even though you’re a toxin in my life.”
Ouch. That wasn’t exactly fair. “Everything I’ve done has been for you, not for me.”
“That’s a lie,” she said, turning toward me. “That’s a damn lie, and you know it. You can’t tell me that this wasn’t a little selfishly motivated. The job? The pictures? You can’t pretend that I wasn’t a conquest or a game, just like when we were kids.”
“It wasn’t,” I said, but paused, examining it from the outside. “Maybe, in one way it was. Selfish. Not a conquest.”
Erika paused at that, tilting her head to one side, studying me now, as if I’d finally given her pause. “What selfish way?”
“I just want to be around you all the damn time, Erika. I want to be there for you, even though I shouldn’t be, even though your brother will lose his shit, possibly quit being friends with me if he finds out.”
She didn’t answer but walked across the room and sat down on one of the armchairs gathered around a glass coffee table. She sat upright—another thing I adored about her—her shoulders stiff and her spine straight. “Marc is your best friend,” she said. “He wouldn’t—”
“Disown me? Yeah, he would, because he’s always thought I wasn’t good enough for you.”
“We already went over this.”
“My point is, Erika, why would I risk losing my lifelong best friend if I didn’t actually give a shit about you? Do you think I’m that petty? That I’d throw a friendship away over a conquest? Everything I told you about who I was and what I wanted, about why I was such an asshole to you, was true. I couldn’t stand how much I wanted you.”
Silence greeted that proclamation, and Erika shook her head slightly, swallowed drily. “What are you saying, Noah?”
Fuck, you’re not really doing this, are you? You’ve never said it before. You swore you never would. You swore.
I warred with myself, but the look on her face, the fact that I was here with her, that she’d still let me in after all the shit, was encouragement enough.
“Noah?”
I walked across the living room and crouched down in front of her, taking her hands in mine. “What I’m saying is… What I’m—”
She inhaled slightly, shocked at the fact that I couldn’t get my words out, when I was usually so in control of my faculties.
“I love you,” I said, and the words warmed my chest. A ripple spread through me, as if I’d finally released something I’d been holding back. And I was. For years, I’d called it an obsession, when love was what it was. “I love you so much I can’t think straight. I do stupid things, thinking I can help you, get rid of these feelings, when, really, the truth is that it just won’t go away. So, I’m sorry, Erika, for putting you through pain, for being unable to manage my own feelings. It was a very shitty thing for me to do and was in no way your fault.” I lifted one of her hands, stroked that soft, pale skin, and kissed it. “I’m sorry, and I love you.”
It was the most I’d ever said to anyone. In the past, I would’ve considered it a weakness, but now, it was the only thing that made sense.
“Noah, don’t play with me,” Erika squeaked, then cleared her throat. “Don’t make this into—”
“I’m not playing games. I’m done with that. Done with who I used to be. I fucking love you.”
“Oh my god,” she groaned, hesitating still, her eyes flicking back and forth as she took me in. “You’re serious. You’re actually serious.”
“I am. About you.”
She slipped off the armchair, practically threw herself at me then, and fell right into my arms, against my chest. “Noah,” she whispered, and kissed my cheeks, my nose, my eyes, my mouth. “Noah. Noah. Noah.”
“I’m here, baby.” I pushed the coffee table back across the carpet, giving us enough space to spread out as she clambered over me, taking in everything I’d said. “I’m right here.”
“Noah,” she repeated and then kissed my lips again.
I parted hers and tasted her again, as I’d done before, but this time it was sweeter. She was giving herself to me without hesitation and accepting me in one. I kissed her, and she kissed me back so passionately it burned us both.
My fingers crept beneath the straps of her red dress, and I pulled them aside, gently, then kissed her collarbones, her shoulders. “I love you,” I repeated.
“Mine,” Erika whispered back, tracing my nose with her fingertips, moving them to my cheekbones. She pushed me, and I let her, lay back so she could sit astride me.
She leaned in, still kissing me, and I hiked her skirt up, feeling at the wet triangle of fabric between her legs, growling under my breath. Fuck, if only I’d set my ego aside earlier, we would have had more time together. We would have worked it out
.
“Take me,” she whispered, against my lips.
I placed my hands on her back, cradled her and rocked her to the side, landing on top of her, but bracing myself so I wouldn’t hurt her. I unzipped my pants, freed my cock, then reached between her legs and ripped at her thong.
A ripppp of fabric followed, and she gasped. I tossed the ruined underwear aside, grinning now, and placed my head where it belonged, right at her entrance.
“Noah, please.”
I entered her in one swift thrust, sure and purposeful this time, no teasing, no hesitation, and she cried out, wrapped her legs around me, dug her fingers into my flesh.
“Oh my god, Noah.”
“I know,” I said against her lips. We moved together, taking ourselves higher and higher, toward the brink. I held myself there even as she crashed into her orgasm, the first of the night, and closed around me.
“You love me,” she whispered.
She still hadn’t said it back, probably wasn’t ready, and I didn’t blame her. I didn’t need to hear it from her lips yet. I’d known for years that I was the one thing she’d always resisted, simply because she wanted me. Or, that was what I’d told myself.
I pulled out of her, slowly, then rose to my knees, helped her up.
“What are you doing?” she asked. “You didn’t come.”
“I know,” I laughed. “But I want to do this properly. I want you where you belong.”
Together, we walked to the bed, and I stripped her down, piece by piece, until she was just bare skin and beauty in front of me. Perfection.
Erika
Was this really happening? Was what he’d said for real?
Still, after the confession, after my first orgasm, and even as he laid me down on the crisp, white sheets, I couldn’t wrap my mind around it. Around the fact that Noah Cox, Mr. Inaccessible, my brother’s best friend, the man who’d made me feel so many negative and positive emotions, had said that he loved me.
It wasn’t that I couldn’t be loved. It was that I couldn’t be loved by him. I’d convinced myself of it, years ago, and rejected my feelings for him as a result.
Yet, here we were.
Noah crawled up my body, leaving a trail of hot, wet kisses over my calves, the insides of my knees, my thighs. He paused at my pussy and gave my clit one languorous lick, and I jolted.
His revelation had shocked me to the core, and I’d chosen to believe it, to be in this moment with him, even though the kernel of doubt still sat there, waiting. What would it take for me to believe it?
Noah parted my thighs and ran his tongue between my lips, slipped it inside me and pumped it back and forth, circled my clit with his thumb.
I jerked and moaned, gripped handfuls of his hair and hissed, softly. It was too good.
The pleasure, the moment with him, brushed the guilt and fear away, and I lost myself in him. I moved against his face, panting now, as he brought me closer to another orgasm. “Noah, oh my god.”
“Come for me, gorgeous,” he said, against my pussy.
The words sent me over my edge. I planted my feet, twitched beneath him, grabbed the pillows and pulled them toward myself, my mind blanking out at last. Nothing existed except for him, at my core, my center point, my world.
I jammed through my orgasm, pressing myself into his face as I did.
After, Noah continued his ascent, kissing his way up my body, my skin tingling beneath his gentle nips and licks. He focused on my breasts next, sucking one nipple into his mouth and massaging it with his tongue. He moved across to the other one and did the same, his hands everywhere, smoothing fingers over my skin.
“I want you,” I said. “I want you inside me, Noah. I want you to fill me up.”
“Fill you up?” He grinned around a mouthful of my breast. “Is that so? Fill you up with what?” He pressed a finger inside me and I closed around it, jolted on the sheets. “Fill you up with what, Erika?”
“With your cum,” I replied at last.
He shifted over me, kissed my lips and dragged his dick between my swollen pussy lips again but didn’t plunge inside. I arched my back, tried capturing him, but it didn’t work.
“Noah!” I slapped the mattress. “Come on!”
He chuckled and finally pushed into me, speared me—there were no thoughts or words to describe it, or the feeling. It was a joining, and I tightened around him instantly.
“Yes,” I said and looped my arms around his neck, tried tugging him down to me.
He lowered himself—the tugging had had no effect on him whatsoever—and placed his forehead against mine. Together, we looked down at the space between us, at his glistening shaft emerging from me, then entering me again, twisting our bodies so we’d get a better look at it.
“That’s so fucking hot,” Noah growled.
“It’s all yours,” I replied, and my heart skipped a beat. Is it? Is it all his?
“Fuck, Erika, that will make me come. That will make me lose it.”
I wanted him to lose it. “It’s all yours,” I repeated. “Noah, it belongs to you. It’s yours.”
“Fuck, fuck, fuck.” He thrust into me on each word, squeezed his eyes shut, his mouth losing all tension. He hardened inside me even further, so thick I lost my breath all over again, and he filled me up as I’d asked, again, and again, and again.
The sensation sent me into an orgasm that was totally internal. I let out a yelp and bit down on his shoulder, straining through it, clenching around him and trembling.
Time ticked by, him still inside me, no longer thrusting, but still hard. My teeth were still on his skin, my arms still around his thick torso. This was it. This was what I’d always wanted to feel and never had. But it had to be too good to be true.
“Noah,” I said, the doubt leaking into my voice.
He pulled out of me, sighing slightly, then hurried into the ensuite bathroom and returned with a towel. He cleaned me gently, blowing on the wetness there and bringing chills and aftershocks of pleasure.
“Noah,” I repeated.
“Yes, Erika,” he said. “What’s bothering you?”
“I think you know.”
He tugged on his shirt but didn’t button it, pulled on his pants, and zipped them up.
I sat up, and he dragged the sheet toward me, tried to cover me up, keep me warm, but I shrugged it off, opting to dress instead. I changed into my pj’s, the same silky ones that’d driven him crazy back at his apartment, in that damn kitchen, and whipped a threadbare robe out of my suitcase. I threw that on too, then turned back to him.
He was fully dressed again, handsome as ever, though his top button was still undone and he’d left his tie off. He brushed fingers through that dark, mussed hair, and quirked an eyebrow at me. “What’s it going to take for you to believe it?” he asked. “What do I have to do to show you that I’m not fucking with you? That I’m not playing some kind of sick joke on you?”
I shook my head, at a loss. What would it take? I had no idea. Everything and nothing. Trust. It would take trust, and we’d had very little of it over the past little while. “I actually don’t know, Noah. I just want to—I want to believe that you’re being real with me, but I’m scared of believing it.”
“Why?”
“Because of what happened to me. God, my ex destroyed me. He picked on the only weakness I was really sensitive about and just—you know what happened. How can I trust that the guy who tortured me in high school, the guy that I most fantasized about, hated, wanted, needed, will be the guy who actually wants to be with me? Who loves me? It seems too good to be true. Like a fairy tale.”
“Shit, if this is a fairy tale—”
“You know what I mean,” I replied. “I want to believe it, but I need time. I need time.”
Noah nodded. “I get that. And I’ll spend that time proving myself to you, OK? I’ll show you that you can trust me.”
“But that’s—ha, now I’m going to sound like I’m going back on everythi
ng I just said, but that in itself feels selfish on my part. Like, you have to prove yourself to me? You shouldn’t have to. And that worries me. Adult relationships shouldn’t be about proving ourselves to each other. They should be—right. Easy.”
“Christ,” Noah said, and ruffled his hair again. “Easy? I don’t think I’ve ever witnessed a marriage that’s been easy. That people haven’t worked at.”
“Marriage!”
“Relax,” he chuckled, putting out his palms. “I’m not trying to scare you here, I just mean that long-term relationships aren’t just supposed to work. You work at them. You know how difficult that is for me to say.”
That I did—his parents had always been on the rocks, apparently, fighting with each other, despising each other, and just hiding it well. Maybe, that was why Noah had been such an asshole—it was the only method of communication he’d witnessed between two consenting adults.
I inhaled then exhaled. “I need time to think about all of this. About the St. Katherine’s thing, about the photos. You saying what you said, while amazing, doesn’t change any of that, Noah. And I feel like we’re going to burn each other if I don’t back up for a second here. OK? Does that make sense?”
“Yes,” he replied. “That makes sense. I don’t fucking like it, but it makes sense. I’ll be on my way, Erika, but you can bet that cute ass of yours that I will be in touch.”
I managed a giggle at that, then walked with him to the doorway, my heart pounding in my chest, still. Perfect example of why I needed that space to think this over, to weigh all the confusion and everything I’d wanted from the start. To decide whether I was OK with risking my heart and my plans for him. For a love I wasn’t even sure was real, at this point.
Noah kissed me on the cheek. I kissed him on the lips.