“So Micah doesn’t know.”
Trinity looked down. “No. He’s too little to understand this. He knows his dad had to go to jail for stealing—he knows, and he doesn’t care. He still loves the son of a bitch. When Micah is older, once he’s old enough to understand, I’ll tell him. But … I don’t even understand.” Tears threatened to spill out, but she blinked them back. “How can he not love that boy?”
“That’s a question I just can’t answer.” Noah stared at her, but she hadn’t looked at him for longer than a few seconds, not once since she’d started talking. She kept her head bowed, staring at their hands. Sighing, he looked at the kids playing in the back. They were winding down, finally, collapsed in a pile in front of the TV. “That boy of yours is one of the funniest, sweetest kids I’ve ever met. I don’t see how anybody couldn’t love him. But people are very often messed up.”
“You’re a master of understatement.” She sighed then and went to tug her hands away. He hated to let her but he did so, watching as she leaned back, pulling a napkin off the table. He thought she might have been crying, but when she looked up at him her eyes were dry and clear. “So. Now you know. The whole sordid story. Or what’s going to matter, at least. I fell in love with a crook. I had a child with him. Then I helped send him to jail. People hear that and it’s going to change the entire way they view me.”
“That says more about them than it does about you,” Noah said, shrugging. “I’m not worried about what people think. If I was … well.” He glanced at the almost empty wine bottle and wondered what she’d think if he told her all the flaws he had. “I’m not going to worry about it. I worry about myself, and trust me, that’s a big enough job on its own.”
A look danced through her eyes, something that was a mix of amusement and disbelief, but all she said was, “I guess that means you don’t want my resignation.”
“Try to turn it in and see what I do to it.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
“I think we should do this again.”
Trinity slid Noah a look before glancing back to watch Micah practically trip over his feet trying to keep up with Ali’s boys. It was Ali’s night to leave early and the kids had this plan to stay up all night long.
Trinity and Ali figured that meant they’d pass out by ten. Maybe ten thirty. Ali was up front, keeping the kids from racing too far ahead, while Trinity and Noah rounded up the tail end of the group.
Her head ached.
Her heart ached.
Still, she managed to laugh at Noah’s easy statement. “Do this again, huh? Because it was such a lovely, relaxing night, right?”
His hand, warm and calloused, closed over hers and she absolutely refused to acknowledge the fact that it made her knees go all soft and weak. Then he brushed his thumb along the back of her hand and her heart started to bang against her ribs.
“Well, I guess it could have been a little quieter,” he said, grinning as Micah bellowed out after the two boys who’d left him behind. “That boy of yours, he really does need to work on his shyness.”
“Yes. I’m kind of concerned about how introverted he is.” Trinity nodded soberly.
“I can see why.” Noah slid her an amused glance. “Seriously, though. I think we should try this … maybe just us.”
Trinity’s heart did another slam-bang against her ribs and then it just seemed to stop beating at all. “Just us, Noah?” she murmured. “You think that’s a good idea after everything you just heard?”
“If I didn’t like the idea, I don’t think I’d have suggested it. Nothing I heard changes anything. You’re still the same woman you were this morning … the same woman you were yesterday.” They rounded the corner and watched as the boys tumbled up the porch to Ali’s house. A few seconds later, the porch light came on and Ali and the kids disappeared inside.
Trinity and Noah were left alone and she realized she was more nervous now than she’d been earlier, when she’d laid herself bare in front of him. She was more nervous now than she’d been in a very long time.
Turning to look at him, she swallowed as a thousand questions, a thousand arguments, formed on her tongue.
He stopped every single one. “You’re the same woman you were when I kissed you yesterday … and I’m pretty sure you enjoyed it just as much as I did. So unless I’m wrong about that, why shouldn’t we go out, just the two of us?”
“The two of us. Like on a date.”
“Yes.” He nodded slowly like he was mulling the word over. “Like on a date.”
* * *
The tension that had been all but choking him faded as she tipped her head back to look up at him. He’d been working his nerve up to ask her this for … well, it seemed like almost since he’d met her, although he knew that wasn’t right. He’d tried to just work with the attraction, despite the fact that he wasn’t used to dealing with it.
Then he’d just tried to accept it.
Accepting it made it easier to work up to this point and now he just had to go with it, because it was inevitable.
Whatever this was, there was no working with it, no ignoring it, because all it did was get bigger and bigger. Now it consumed him. Judging by the look in her eyes, she felt it, too.
His grey world wasn’t grey anymore. All the color and light that had been missing from his world … it had returned pretty much the very moment he’d first laid eyes on her.
Everything had changed. All in the span of a few weeks.
Kind of figures, he thought. The last time his life had been upended, it had happened in a second. Before that, it had happened all in the span of a night. He ought to be used to his life being flipped on its head at the drop of a dime.
Reaching up, he stroked a finger down her cheek, and the satin-soft feel of her skin had him aching for more. He wanted to touch her everywhere. Wanted to taste her everywhere.
Instead, all he did was ease closer and stare down at her as she watched him, her grey eyes somber and sad.
“You really think a date is a smart move, Noah?” she asked.
“Well, I don’t think acting like I’m not interested is a smart move.” He shrugged. “We’ve both been doing that and it’s not really going away, now, is it?”
Her lashes drooped down, shielding her eyes from him. A soft breath shuddered out of her and she reached up, closing her hand around his wrist. “No. It’s definitely not going away.”
“I dream about you.”
Her lashes flew up and her gaze locked with his.
“All the time.” He buried his face against her hair and breathed in the scent of her, that scent that chased him, haunted him. “I can’t seem to stop thinking about you. I see you all the time now and it’s just getting worse.”
“You’re making it pretty hard for me to think straight,” she muttered.
“Why should you be able to think straight?” He grinned against her hair. “I haven’t been able to think clearly since I met you. All in all, I think the date is a good move.”
She tugged away, a groan falling from her lips. “I’m trying to be responsible here and do the adult thing … thinking clearly is helpful when you’re trying to be responsible.” She leaned against the fence, staring out into the night, but when she glanced at him there was a smile on her face.
He echoed her position, shifting around so he could rest his hips against Ali’s neat little white picket fence. Crossing his arms over his chest, he stared out over the street as the shadows started to deepen. “Well, there’s really no logical reason why we shouldn’t date,” he pointed out. “I mean, unless you don’t want to go out with me.”
Trinity laughed, the sound echoing through the fading light of day. “That’s not the issue. A very huge part of me just wants to say yes. If it hadn’t been for the bomb that got dropped between us earlier, I don’t think this would even be a discussion.”
She closed her eyes.
“Nothing’s changed, Trinity,” Noah said softly.
�
��Nothing’s changed,” she echoed. “It’s just that I started to think things through a little more. There’s just so much going on already. Do I need more complications? Nothing here has been simple. The house. The…” She grimaced and scuffed her foot along the ground. “The body. Then this mess with somebody breaking in. It’s like I’ve fallen into the Twilight Zone. Part of me wonders if I should just leave … find someplace else for me and Micah.”
“Is that an option?”
She was quiet, still staring out over the street. Finally, she turned her head and looked at Noah. “If I absolutely had to get out of here? Yeah, I could go. I’d need some help, but if I asked my dad he’d give me the money in a heartbeat. He’d even pay the damn house off and it could sit there and rot for all I care. He wouldn’t say a word about it. But…”
Her voice trailed off, and once more she lapsed into silence.
Unable to keep his hands to himself, he pushed off the fence and moved to stand in front of her. As he reached up and smoothed her hair back, her lashes fluttered. Her breath hitched as he slid his hand down to curve around her neck, but she didn’t say anything, didn’t pull back.
“But…?” he prompted.
“I can’t quit.” She took a deep, steadying breath. Quiet intensity shone in her eyes. “There is a huge part of me that just wants to do that, but there’s another part of me that’s like … The house is a wreck … so what? I can fix that. Okay, the problem with the body…” A shudder rolled through her. “That was a bigger hurdle, but what good does it do to run? I had nothing to do with whatever happened, and no matter, whoever that was down there, they needed to be found. You were right about that. Somebody is probably looking for them and they can get answers now. That’s not a bad thing, right? As for the other little stuff, the detective, he can kiss my ass. The guy who broke in? Still processing that, but it’s like the more that happens, the more it feels like if I leave I’m running away. I left New York because I thought a fresh start was best for Micah, but if I leave here? It’s like I’m just running because things are hard. That’s not teaching him how to handle the hard stuff life will throw at him.”
Noah rubbed his thumb across her skin. “You have to admit, though, this is a rather bizarre amount of chaos you’re dealing with.”
“Yeah. But it has to end, doesn’t it? Nothing bad ever lasts. Besides…” She shrugged. “If I leave, where do I go? I don’t want to go back to the city. I don’t want to find someplace else. I came here. I bought a house here. I want this to be it. A place for Micah. A place for me. A place for us. I’m not ready to give up on that.”
“You’ve got more determination than a lot of folks.” Noah eased a little closer to her, drawn in, like he had no choice but to get closer.
“Determination. Stubbornness. Stupidity.” She shrugged, self-consciousness dancing across her face. Her gaze darted down to his mouth, and for a moment his thoughts just fizzled to a stop.
Literally. He couldn’t think of anything except for the fact that her gaze had dropped to linger on his mouth and then she was dragging the tip of her tongue over her lips—
* * *
Nothing’s changed.
His words echoed inside her.
Up until that asshole detective had steamrolled into her office and thrown out that bit about her past, up until Micah had innocently dropped that bomb about Anton …
But it was the truth.
Nothing had changed.
Slowly, she reached up and curled her hand in the worn material of Noah’s work shirt. It was faded and soft and it smelled of him. Heat danced between them, taunting her, and she wanted to stroke her hands down the hard wall of his chest, maybe push the shirt out of the way and learn the feel of his muscles with her hands.
She’d meant to say something. What in the hell was it? She floundered for the words, but they evaded her.
His gaze dropped to her lips, then returned to hers. Then, a second later, he was looking at her mouth again and that look was as erotic as if he’d reached out and touched her, stroking a blazing trail from her lips down to her core.
Trinity groaned, leaning in. She should say no.
She should pull back.
She should do a lot of things.
She should take a little more time to think things through before she plunged headlong into this.
But that plunge was just so enticing.
He slid one hand up her spine, his fingers brushing over the skin of her neck.
But he didn’t kiss her back.
“Noah…?”
In the dying light, his eyes glittered. “You never did answer me. Dinner, Trinity?”
Her mouth had gone dry. Heart slamming away inside her chest, she settled back on her feet, eying him nervously.
“Ah…”
He curved his hand over her neck. “If I told you how long it’s been since I asked a woman out, you’d probably either laugh or just look at me like I’m crazy.” The calloused pad of his thumb rasped over her skin and that simple touch felt undeniably good. “But suffice it to say, it’s been quite a while. I want to spend more time with you … a lot more time. But if that’s not anything you’re interested in, it’s probably best that I know now.”
He leaned in and she caught her breath, but he didn’t kiss her. He just pressed his face into her hair, like he was breathing her in. It caught her off-guard and she swayed against him, reaching up to fist her other hand in his shirt.
He curved his free hand over her hip. “It’s not going to change how anything is now—your job, the work I’m doing on the house. But it’s a question that needs to be answered. Are we going to just ignore this or do something about it?”
He wasn’t going to just pretend like this conversation hadn’t happened, she realized.
He wanted a hard-and-fast answer.
Nerves jangled inside her, insistent and chaotic as she lifted her head, staring into those penetrating eyes. She slid her hand up his chest and rested it on his cheek. The stubble there abraded her skin, and when he turned his face and pressed a kiss to her palm her heart raced even harder.
“Part of me wants, very much, to just back away from this and think about it for a while,” she said honestly.
Closing his fingers around her wrist, he pressed his brow to hers. “Think about what? I want to be with you. You want the same thing.”
Heat shrieked through her and turned every last bit of her into lava as he sank his teeth into her lower lip. She might have collapsed if he hadn’t been holding her up, the forearm he had braced against her back solid and strong. He hadn’t really done all that much. His arm at her waist. His chest pressed to hers. The warmth of him reached out through his clothing and she caught her breath, barely able to think past the rhythm of her heart and the need that screamed through her veins.
Others had touched her far more intimately without making her ache like this.
Want the same thing.
Oh, want didn’t even touch it.
But she didn’t think it was really the right time or place to tell him that she wanted to rip his clothes off and have her wicked way with him, either.
“Ah … yes.” She managed to find her voice and squeeze those words out, staring at his mouth, because if she kept looking into his eyes her control was going to shatter. He stripped her bare with that gaze of his. Completely bare, and it should have terrified her, but it didn’t.
“Then what’s to think about?” he murmured, his breath ghosting across her lips as he leaned in and kissed her, light and soft.
It wasn’t enough.
But before she could catch his mouth and take it deeper, he’d pulled away.
Groaning, she pressed her brow against his chest.
“There are any number of things we should think about … any number of things you should think about.”
His hand fisted in the back of her shirt and she shivered, her nipples tightening to hard, aching pebbles as her breasts pressed flat against hi
s chest. She was almost positive this was the most aroused she’d been in … maybe ever. Her skin felt two sizes too small and her breasts ached, her belly was hot and liquid and her hands itched and …
His fingers slid under the hem of her shirt, and then, as she gasped at the light contact, he pressed his mouth to the curve of her neck. “What are those things, then? Let’s start thinking about them.”
“Now?” Her head fell to the side and the idea of trying to think about anything was pretty laughable. All she could think about was him. Getting naked. With him. The SUV would work, she thought. If they were quiet—
You’ve lost your mind. You’re standing there thinking about getting naked in your damn car with a preacher. You’re in front of the house, while your son is running around and can come outside at any time.
Convulsively she tightened her hands in the material of Noah’s shirt.
Words failed her. Her lungs failed her—it was like she’d completely forgotten how to breathe. Her brain had definitely failed her, because she just couldn’t think. A car drove by and the world realigned itself as sanity came crashing back.
She went to pull away, but Noah tightened his arm around her waist, holding her in place, and when she squirmed against him, that just made the position so much more interesting. Against her belly she felt the length of his cock, burning into her like a brand, and she shuddered, a moan ripping out of her.
Dry mouthed, she swallowed and forced herself to stare at the taillights of the car instead of up at him. Looking at him was what had led to this entire situation.
“We should think about things like that,” she said, nodding to the car.
A chuckle rumbled out of him. She felt his chest moving against her breasts, and really, did she need that particular torture?
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