Page 73 of Love is a Harmony
Noah said neither, instead, dropping into a chair and rubbing a hand over his tired face. “She’s my oldest friend.”
Melanie’s shoulders dropped. An old friend he obviously had history with. “I remember her.” She’d seen her enough over the years, dealing with the situations Noah got himself in.
“She helped me out a lot.”
Melanie turned on her heel. “You think she helped?” Tears burned her eyes, and she hated herself for them.
Noah shrugged.
Melanie marched toward him, stopping when she towered over him. “Fans love bad boys, Noah, labels do not. I have spent countless hours cleaning up after you and your affairs with your ‘oldest friend’.” She dropped her air quotes.
“I never had a relationship with her.”
“That would have been better than just sex scandals.”
He flinched at her words. “Ava and I… we only ever used each other.”
“And you think that makes it better? Tell me, Noah, how is it your photos always ended up on social media?”
He lowered his face into his hands, his words muffled. “Because they were staged.”
Every word she’d wanted to say stuck on her tongue. Staged?
Noah refused to look at her. “We thought… Ava loved my brother as much as I did. And he loved her before he left. We thought if we broadcast a relationship between us, he would eventually see it and contact one of us if for no other reason than to yell at us for betraying him.”
“You mean…”
“Ava and I have never kissed when there wasn’t a camera on us.” He lifted his face and the look in his eyes nearly broke her.
For years, Noah risked his entire career in hopes his brother would reach out to him. “And the other scandals?”
“Carson was always on my case about not letting fame turn me into another person. I wanted him to see I needed him. I don’t care about the fame, Mel. I don’t care about any of it—the money, the fans, the contracts. I just wanted my brother to come back to me.”
Melanie dropped to her knees in front of his chair and stared at him for a long moment. She understood everything so clearly now. How the Noah the world knew could be so different from the one she’d first met. How he so quickly decided Stella belonged with him.
Everything was for Carson.
It was the purest and most beautiful motivation she could have imagined. Leaning forward, she fitted her mouth to his.
Noah grunted in surprise before sliding onto the floor in front of her and pulling her into his lap. His arms wound around her back, holding her as if he was afraid she’d disappear.
She tilted her head, deepening the kiss and letting him invade every part of her save one.
Her mind wanted Noah. Her body definitely agreed.
But her heart… why was it still shuttered, refusing to beat for this man?
21
Noah
Melanie was here in his arms, and Noah couldn’t quite believe it was real. She soothed the raw emotions she’d ripped open with their conversation moments before.
Her body relaxed in his arms, fitting against him like this was meant to happen.
Her kiss… man, her kiss. Whether she let it happen again or not, he would dream of this moment, of giving in to what he’d wanted since she’d shown up in France, maybe before.
Melanie had always been a conundrum for him. Their working relationship was friendly, playful, even flirty. He’d loved being near her.
