by Chloe Walsh
The lights darkened and everything slowed down.
Pulling me closer, Noah rested his cheek against my head as he moved us slowly. My hand looked so little, felt so incredibly fragile against his as the lyrics of the Wyclef Jon’s 911 rang through my ears, setting alight a fire in my heart I knew I could never douse.
With one hand wrapped around mine, and the other pressed firmly against my lower back. Noah looked down at me, immersing me in the brown hue of his eyes as the music drowned out my racing heart that hammered against my ribcage.
“I got your gift,” I told him. “I have to say, I wouldn’t have put you down as a flowers man, but I loved it.”
Noah looked down at my face and frowned. “What gift?”
“The red rose with the thorn?” I smiled like an idiot. “It was sweet.”
“I don’t know anything about it, Thorn,” he replied, shaking his head. “I didn’t send you any flowers.”
“Oh, and I suppose you don’t know anything about the card either?” I teased. “What the hell was up with that anyway?”
“What card?”
I rolled my eyes. “Oh Noah, come on. Stop pretending –”
“What card?” he asked, his voice rising.
“The one in the box,” I heard myself whisper.
“What did it say, Teagan?” he demanded, stopping mid-dance. His gaze darkened, actually, he looked kind of murderous. “Tell me.”
“I’m coming,” I told him, feeling uncertain and afraid.
Noah’s body tensed and he let out a string of curse words, but I didn’t have a chance to dwell on it because the sound of glass smashing nearby startled me.
I swung around to see what the hell was going on. My heart sank when my eyes landed on Liam who was having a full-blown meltdown, kicking over tables as he stalked towards me with a face like thunder.
“Just keep walking, Liam,” I told him when he reached us. “Please.”
“It’s bad enough you’re all over the papers with him,” he slurred, glaring at me. “But you have to rub it in my face now too?”
“Am I missing something here?” Noah asked in a heated tone.
“No,” I replied, eyes locked on Liam, willing him to fuck off. “Absolutely nothing. So just leave me alone, Liam.”
“Oh I’m nothing now?” Shaking his head, Liam pointed his finger in my face and roared, “you’re a heartless bitch. A fucking whore!”
Oh god, now you’ve done it, I thought to myself seconds before Noah shoved his hand away.
“Say that again, asshole,” Noah snarled, as he stood chest to chest with Liam. “I fucking dare you.”
“Noah, don’t,” I screamed, diving between them. Placing my hands on his face, I forced him to look at me. “Hey,” I coaxed, desperate to calm him and stop him from doing something he could get into trouble for. “Don’t do this.” Even with the skyscraper heels I had on, Noah still towered over me by a good five inches.
“He doesn’t get to talk to you like that,” Noah snarled, clearly livid, as he inhaled short, fast breaths. “No goddamn way, Thorn.”
“I know,” I coaxed, stroking his face. I kept my body between both men as I turned around. “You need to go, Liam,” I warned him. “You need to walk away right now!”
“So you don’t want a relationship with me, but you’re prepared to be this guy’s next fuck?” he demanded, furious. “What the hell, Teagan?
“You have no idea what you’re talking about,” I shot back, trembling. I never wanted to hurt Liam, but this needed to stop. He was acting like I had been unfaithful to him when in fact the only person my heart felt like I had been unfaithful to was Noah. “So drop it.”
“Have you fucked her?” Liam demanded, goading an already worked up Noah.
“Liam,” I hissed, mortified. “Shut up.”
Clamping his hands on my hips, Noah dragged me backwards and into his embrace. “I’ve had her in ways you couldn’t begin to imagine,” Noah shot back, furious.
“Oh this is perfect.” Shaking his head in disgust, Liam let out a harsh laugh. “You don’t even know him, Teagan!”
“He’s Noah, you asshole,” I screamed, losing all tact and what was left of my patience. “He’s Noah,” I repeated, voice breaking with emotion.
“Yeah, the great Noah Messina,” Liam sneered, and then his eyes widened in realization. “Wait a fucking minute,” he hissed, looking at Noah and then shaking his head. “Noah as in your ex?” Liam gaped at me. “The ex?”
“The ex, the current and the fucking future, asshole,” Noah snarled, pushing against my back.
Sniffling, I nodded my head. “And I love him,” I added, throwing it out there. Everything had gone to hell anyway. I couldn’t see the point in denying my feelings anymore. With drunk, pointless tears streaming down my cheeks, I let out a quivering sigh. “I’m in love with him.”
Noah’s hands tightened on my waist. “You do?” he whispered.
Nodding, I wiped my cheeks with the back of my hand and exhaled a sharp breath. “I never stopped.”
Turning me in his arms, Noah’s attention was focused solely on me. “Say it, Thorn,” he said in a tone thick with emotion as he pulled me flush against him. “I need to hear you say it, baby.”
“I know you do,” I whispered, clutching his arms. “And I’m sorry for making you wait seven years to hear it –”
“Don’t worry, Messina. I took real good care of her while you were gone,” Liam interrupted from behind me, taunting Noah and destroying the moment. “I had a real good time keeping your bed warm!”
The snarl that tore from Noah’s throat was truly terrifying. Shoving me aside, Noah lunged for Liam.
“Steady up, buddy,” Lucky who had arrived back just in the nick of time, warned him. Blocking his path to Liam, Lucky put his hands on Noah’s shoulders and shoved him back. “He’s not worth ruining your career over.”
I stood, paralyzed with shock and fear, as Lucky wrestled Noah back to the booth.
Swinging around, I searched the club for the rat bastard himself who had aptly skulked off. Spotting him at the bar, I made a beeline for him. When I noticed who Liam was standing next to at the bar my heart sank.
“Ciarán,” I squeezed out through clenched teeth. “I need to talk with Liam in private.”
“Give us a minute,” Liam told Ciarán and, surprisingly, he listened.
“Catch you later man,” he told Liam before smirking at me. “I’ll see you real soon, Ice Queen.”
“Fuck you,” I spat before turning my attention back to Liam. “Why did you do that to me?” I demanded when Ciarán had disappeared out of sight. “We’re supposed to be friends, Liam.”
“I’m not your friend, Teagan,” he sneered. “I’m your stand in.” The smell of alcohol from his breath was so strong it was making me dizzy. “Why did you sleep with me, Teagan?” he demanded. “When you were always planning on going back to him?”
“I didn’t plan any of this,” I shot back, shaking. “I never meant to hurt you, Liam, but I love Noah.” Exhaling heavily, I added, “And I can’t change my feelings no matter how bad it hurts you.”
“What about when he retires?” Liam demanded. “He’s a fighter, Teagan, they tend to burn out fast. And they’re not exactly known for fidelity,” he added cruelly. “I’ve worked my ass off to win you back. To bring you home. I can give you more than him,” he choked out. “I can give you stability.”
“I want Noah,” I repeated, flustered.
“The ex con?” he hissed in disgust.
“That’s right,” I spat back. “The ex con. You need to stop thinking there’s a future for us.”
“So what, you’re just going to leave me for him?” Liam sounded appalled.
“I was never yours to leave,” I reminded him tersely.
“That’s bullshit, Teagan, and you know it,” he hissed. “We’ve been together for seven damn years.”
“No,” I corrected him, steeling my resolve. “W
e’ve been friends for seven years.” Letting out a sigh of barely contained impatience, I growled, “Look, Liam, we had sex. Once. And it was fair to middling, but there was never any passion between us and you know that.”
He shook his head. “You are making the biggest mistake of your life,” he warned me. “This is wrong, Teagan. There’s no future for you in his world.”
“I love him,” I shot back, lip quivering. “Do you get that? I want to be with him.”
“And you think he feels the same?”
“Yes.”
“He doesn’t love you,” Liam shot back. “He wants to possess you – because you walked away from him. That’s not reality, Teagan, that’s control. He only wants you because you’re the one that got away. When he’s had his fill, he will walk away from you, and you will be alone.”
“Stop saying that!”
“What are you going to do when he gets bored of you and tosses you to the curb, huh? Come back to me with your tail hanging between your legs?” I heard Liam roar, but I didn’t respond.
I was past the point of burning angry and I needed to remove myself from this environment and fast.
Rushing blindly down the stairwell, I squeezed through the throngs of people in the bar downstairs, pushing and shoving them out of my way in my bid to get to the exit. Breaking through a gap in the crowd, I slipped through the side door of the bar and into the back alley.
SCANNING THE BAR FOR TEAGAN, I saw red when I spotted her arguing with Liam. Fuck, even thinking his name made me want to break something. I would break something – his fucking jaw.
“Calm down,” Lucky ordered, blocking my way. “Noah, I mean it,” he added, pushing me back down on the seat when I stood up and tried to move around him. “You’re losing it and you need to get a fucking grip, man.”
I couldn’t focus on a word Lucky was saying to me, not when every fiber inside of my body demanded I go back there and pummel that bastard, firstly for touching her and then for bell ragging about it.
“Noah, you’re drunk,” Lucky told me. “And he’s a walking ticket back to prison.” Crouching down in front of me, he forced me to look at him. “Do you want that to happen?” he added. “Do you want to get slung back in a cell and leave her unprotected?”
“No,” I grumbled, feeling the fight fade out of me. “Shit, man, he knows she’s here,” I repeated for what had to be the fifth time in five minutes as I pulled at my hair and thrashed around like a deranged lunatic. “He sent her that goddamn rose, Lucky.” I knew what it meant. One single red rose in a box. That note. “He’s been following me, man,” I snarled. “Every fucking move I’ve made. Waiting for his chance. And coming here?” I shook my hand and hissed. “I sealed her fucking fate coming here.” Exhaling a pained groan, I added, “He knows where she lives, man. She’s not safe here.”
“I know,” he agreed. “So just shut the fuck up and let me figure this out.” Moving over to sit beside me, he kept one hand firmly clamped down on my shoulder as he spoke. “We are going to walk out of here without causing a scene or getting arrested,” he instructed calmly. “You are going to get your girl and take her back to the hotel with you. And in the morning, when you’ve slept off what will undoubtedly be the hangover from hell, you’re going to convince her to come back to the states with us while I make arrangements.”
“What arrangements?” I asked, as I searched the crowd for Thorn.
“It’s like you said,” Lucky growled. “JD knows where she lives so she can’t go back to her apartment. Now that he knows where she –”
“She’s gone,” I hissed. Stumbling to my feet, I scanned the room again. “She’s not fucking here, Lucky.”
“Okay,” he said with a sigh. “Now we can panic.”
“THANK YOU, JESUS,” I muttered when the sharp night air hit my face, cooling me down, and stomping out the claustrophobic feeling that had been building up inside of me.
Footsteps behind me startled me. I swung around and groaned loudly when I saw who was there.
“Oh for the love of god,” I muttered. “Go away, Ciarán.”
“Look at the Ice Queen,” he purred, prowling towards me. “All alone.”
Turning my back on him, I headed for the main street and as far away from Ciarán as I could. He was bad news, and I knew enough to not be in dark alleys with bad men.
“Don’t walk away from me, you little bitch,” he snarled as he grabbed the back of my dress and tried to pull me backwards, further into alley way.
I felt the fabric tear, the strap holding my dress giving away in his hand and he fisted my hair, pulling me roughly to a halt.
“You and I have some unfinished business.”
“Get your hands off me,” I screeched, reaching up to claw his hands out of my hair. “I mean it,” I growled, digging my fingernails into the flesh of his hands.
“Did you think I wouldn’t get you back for that little stunt at the gym?” he hissed, releasing my hair roughly before shoving me forward. Staggering forward, I couldn’t maintain my balance and landed hard on my knees. “The look suits you, Teagan,” he taunted as he towered over me. “On your knees at my feet.”
“You’re going to pay for that,” I warned him as I scrambled onto my feet and charged forward. Screw not causing a scene. No man was going to put his hands on me. Over my dead fucking body. Fury drove me on as I threw my hand back and slapped him in the face.
Ciarán’s head twisted sideways and he covered his cheek with his hand, momentarily stunned, but then he raised his arm back and punched me in the face. He hit me so hard and with such force that I was propelled backwards. My back hit the wall of the bar with a hard thud before I collapsed on the ground in a heap.
“Here’s a friendly warning,” Ciarán snarled as he stood over me, taunting me. “Don’t give it if you can’t take it.”
My back was aching. Every muscle in the upper half of my body was burning in protest. Every fiber inside of me was screaming don’t get up. Stay down. Let it go. But that fire inside of me, the one that had protected me my entire life, was burning a hole through me. That fire was niggling and tormenting me and ordering me to get back up. That fire was saying don’t you dare go down like this.
“You think you’re a big, tough man, don’t you?” I cried as I forced myself to get back up. “Hitting women?” Climbing unsteadily to my feet, I hacked up as much salvia as I could and spat in his face. “You’re a piece of crap, Ciarán.”
Clamping his hands on my shoulders, he slammed me against the wall. “You’re going to pay for that,” he hissed, eyes flaring with anger. “You’re gonna get it now, bitch.”
“Teagan!” I heard Noah’s voice calling out and relief flooded me. “Teagan!”
“Noah,” I screamed as I tried to make a break for it, but Ciarán grabbed my arm and dragged me back. “Noah, help me!”
BARRELING THROUGH THE CROWD, I shoved everyone out of my way as I took the staircase three steps at a time. “Teagan!” I roared, as I pushed my way through the bar, searching every face for hers and coming up empty. Fear was choking me, propelling me forward, commanding that I find her as I burst out of the front entrance of the bar roaring her name at the top of my lungs. “Teagan!”
“Noah!” I heard her scream out and I ran full speed in the direction of her voice. “Noah, help me!”
The minute I turned the corner of the back alley my blood ran cold.
One of the prick’s from earlier had Teagan shoved up against the wall, with his fists curled around her arms.
He had his hands on her arms.
His hands were on my Thorn.
“Noah!” Teagan cried out in relief as she scrambled away from the prick who was manhandling her.
Her dress was ripped.
That was all I could see.
Her ripped dress and her bloodstained knees.
Moving purely on instinct, I lunged forward, spearing the son of a bitch in the stomach. Taking him to the ground, I pummeled his
face with my fists. Fuck the MFA. Fuck everything. I didn’t work as hard as I did for as long as I had to watch this piece of shit put his hands on my Thorn.
“Noah,” Teagan cried out, pulling on my shoulder. “Please stop,” she begged. “I’m okay, baby. I’m fine –”
“You’re not okay,” I roared. “He put his hands on you. He put his hands on what’s mine!”
“I didn’t touch her,” he spluttered, covering his face with his hands in his pathetic attempt at protecting himself from my fists. “Not the way you’re thinking... Teagan, tell him.”
“Don’t speak to her,” I roared, trembling with rage. “Don’t fucking look in her direction, you pathetic sack of shit.” Shoving off him, I dragged him to his feet.
“Hit me,” I ordered as pure fucking elicited rage rushed through my body. “Come on you piece of shit. You wanna hit someone, then hit me.”
The sound of police sirens filled the air, but I didn’t stop. I fucking couldn’t. I was going to kill him and I was going to enjoy every damn moment.
THE MOMENT NOAH STEPPED into my vision I felt my body sag in relief.
He looked like an avenging angel, dressed in black, dark, dangerous and poised to inflict pain.
I watched as his eyes drifted from my torn dress to Ciarán’s hand on my arm.
His eyes clouded over with pure unadulterated rage.
His expression turned murderous.
And then he attacked.
Noah moved so quickly I barely had a chance to jump of the way when he charged Ciarán, knocking him to the ground. Straddling him, Noah let loose, unleashing his fury, as he pummeled him.
“Noah,” I choked out, pulling on his shoulder, trying to stop him from doing something he couldn’t come back from. “It’s okay,” I coaxed, trying and failing to pull him off Ciarán. “I’m okay –”
“You’re not okay,” Noah seethed. “He put his hands on you. He put his hands on what’s mine!”
“I didn’t touch her,” Ciarán spluttered, covering his face with his hands, protecting himself from Noah. “Not the way you’re thinking... Teagan, tell him.”