Page 31 of Twice as Forbidden

And he doesn’t. He grabs my arm, and since I prefer it not to be dislocated, I get up and allow him to lead me through the house into the kitchen. “Sit. I’ll be right back.” He retreats down the hall while I climb onto a barstool at the island. When he returns, he’s carrying a bottle of tequila.

“You sure you’re not worried about making your dad mad?”

“Do you really care?”

After seeing Jackson with that woman today, no, I really fucking don’t. “Not at all.”

Noah’s always had a great smile. It spreads across his cheeks, reminding me of why I fell for him in the first place. He sets two shot glasses down and fills each to the rim. Picking one up and handing it to me, he says, “What should we cheers to?”

I raise my shot. “To the future. To surviving this god-awful internship and getting back to school in one piece.”

His lip curls into a bigger smile as he clinks his glass against mine. “I’ll cheers to that.” I tip my head back and let the liquid coat my throat. I wait for the burn, but it doesn’t come.

“Wow, this must be good tequila. My throat isn’t on fire.”

Noah chuckles and pours another round. “When it’s a seventy-five-hundred-dollar bottle of Patrón en Lalique, it better not—”

“Seventy-five hundred!” I practically choke the shot back up. “Noah, if he makes you pay for—”

“He won’t. Trust me. Let’s play a game.”

I raise a brow, unsure where he’s taking this. “Get your mind out of the gutter, Price. A question for a question. You can answer or take a shot.”

This may be worse than the sex approach. “Fuck it. Sure.”

“I’ll even let you go first.”

I ponder any pressing question I’ve ever wanted to ask him. Throughout our relationship, we’ve always been surface level. He knew the basics of my and my mom’s relationship. I knew he hated his dad, but our demons were kept secret.

“Don’t hurt yourself.”

“Shut up. Okay, I’ve got one. Why did you choose Iowa?”

“You already know this—to piss off my dad.”

“I know, but why would it piss your dad off?”

“That’s technically two questions.”

I roll my eyes. “No, it’s not. Now, answer or take your shot.”

He rolls his shoulders. “Fine. He wanted me to attend a more prestigious school like Harvard or Yale. I have the grades. He made sure of it. But pleasing him was the last thing I wanted, so I found an out-of-state school I knew he would cringe at and applied.”

His answer shocks me. “Wait, you could’ve gotten into Harvard?”

“That’s technically three questions. Automatic drink.” Shit. I clink my glass with his, and, to be a good sport, he takes the shot with me. “Just because all I’ve done at school is party, doesn’t mean I don’t have the brains. I got into both.”

“Noah, that’s amazing. You should have gone, even if you wanted to defy your dad.”

“Nah. If I had, I wouldn’t have met you.”

I roll my eyes again. His chuckle is cute, but I ignore it. He refills our shots. “Okay, my turn. Why did you never report your stepdad for abuse?”

I flinch at his question. “I don’t want to talk about that,” I answer and take my shot.

His eyes crinkle at the edges. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to pry. It’s just… I’ve always wondered. That fuckin’ prick should be in jail.”

He should be a lot of things—six feet under being one of them. “Do I get a retry?”

---