Page 50 of Noah
I ran around the room, gathering my things and stuffing them into my camera back. Damage control. I needed to figure out a story for this. He was my oldest friend and I was just helping him out. We knew each other in the orphanage and he was practically my big brother. He was drunk and didn’t know what he was doing, and we all laughed about it at the time because it was so ridiculous. Nothing happened. Nothing was happening between us.
I grabbed my phone and typed out the response to Janette before I thought about it, hoping that I’d be able to play on her empathy. I’d never told anyone about the orphanage and it wasn’t ideal, but if it made her feel sorry for me and saved my job, I didn’t care. She could scream about it from the rooftops if she wanted.
I finished the text, hit ‘send,’ and then looked around the room to make sure I hadn’t left anything behind. My eyes caughton Noah, and then Whiskey, and I nearly sobbed. He was still peaceful in his sleep, all tattoos and cigarette smoke, and looking just as sexy as he ever had.
I loved him. I wasn’t going to pretend I didn’t. But I couldn’t keep him and my job at the same time.
I was going to have to fix this. I had to save us both, and I was going to do it. Even if it meant taking the next available flight back to LA and leaving the tour. I had to get back to the office and make things right with my boss. Tell her what had really happened and salvage both my career and Noah’s.
Because his label was on the line here, too.
He’d understand. He’d have to. Sure, he’d wake up to me having walked out on him, but as soon as I told him what had happened, he’d get it. He’d know I’d done what I needed to do to save us both.
Hell, he’d probably say it was for the best, anyhow.
He didn’t like to keep girls around for longer than a night, and I didn’t want to stay long enough to see him leave me.
29
NOAH
She was gone when I woke up, though at first I didn’t believe it.
I woke up slowly, full of memories of the night before. Standing with her pinned against the wall, taking her like a man out of his fucking mind with lust. I had been, at that point. Laying there in my boxers, spread out before her like a feast waiting to be devoured, had driven me mad with lust. I hadn’t realized that watching her work would be so sexy, though maybe that was because she was working on me at the time. Her movements as she shot the film, her direct orders about where to lay and how to do it, had wound me up until I could barely think for how much I wanted her.
When I caught her staring at me rather than working, her thoughts plain on her face, I’d thought she might be mine for the taking. And I’d been right.
Then, of course, I’d brought her back to bed and made sweet, slow love to her all night. All gentle kisses and teasing movements. Laying behind her while I moved inside her, holding her against me as she cried out in pleasure. Sharing our bodies and our souls.
It had been the most wonderful night of my life.
And now…
Wait.
My hand shot out to where she should have been and I abruptly sat up, all the hazy dreams of Molly’s body fleeing. WherewasMolly’s body? Or more accurately, where was Molly herself?
My eyes flew around the room, searching. Bathroom? No; the door was open and the lights off. She wasn’t in the shower. In the sitting room? I jumped out of bed and made for the second room of the suite, some part of me hating that the tour kept booking me into such large rooms. It gave Molly more places to be hiding. But she wasn’t out there either, and though I searched the entire suite, Whiskey trotting along behind me like he was equally concerned, I couldn’t find her.
Or her camera case or clothes or shoes.
Molly was gone. Why? what had happened? Had she… Had she decided that this was a mistake? Realized that she was on her way up in the world, primed to do amazing things, while I was stuck in this same band, touring small towns and venues and trying desperately to stay relevant? She had the big job and all the talent and now maybe even a dad, and the last thing she needed was some deadbeat rocker who may or may not be a business genius, but came with a trashed reputation and questionable dating history.
She wouldn’t care, I argued with myself. She knew me well enough to know how much I was worth. And she’d been there with me last night. She experienced the same thing I did.
Right?
But then I came to the final argument against myself. The one I’d been ignoring. Yes, she was there last night and might have felt all the same things I did. But she’d lose her job if she gave in to them. She’d already told me that. The magazine hadrules about her fraternizing with the enemy, or at least the stars, and breaking that rule meant the end of her contract.
And given how short a time she’d been there, probably the end of her career. Getting that job at Tempest had been a long shot, and if it only lasted a couple of weeks...
I was no employment expert. I’d never had a real job. But I didn’t think a couple of weeks before you were fired for breaking the rules looked very good on your resume. And sure, I would have taken care of her. I would have done anything to keep her happy and safe.
But could she trust me?
Wouldshe trust me with something that important?
No. Why should she? She knew how I felt about people depending on me, or me depending on other people, and she’d seen me discard girl after girl over the years. More importantly, she was Molly Rush. She didn’t believe in depending on other people, because they had never come through for her before.
