“Yes. And you’ll have the room all night,” I say and stop, hearing my phone buzz on my bed. I walk over to it and grab it, barely listening to him tease me. Red texted me she’s outside, so I type back that I’m on my way down.
“Oooooh shit, you two finally getting freaky?” He pops his finger, and I roll my eyes, swiping my finger across the screen to unlock it. “Finally. I was beginning to think you were celibate.”
I walk over to him and grab my wallet off my study desk. “See you around, Ty.” I slip my phone in my back pocket, and I’m out of the door. I jog down the tall stairs, adrenaline pumping my blood. I am so ready for tonight. I feel like I’ve been waiting centuries when, in reality, it was two days.
“Have fun, ya nasty!” I hear him call after me.
“Remember to use protection,” Mike decides to join in as I’m on my way out.
“Yeah, yeah.” I wave a dismissive hand at him. I shut the front door after me and quickly step down the stairs. I tuck my hands in my jean jacket, and when I lift my head, I let a grin sweep across my face.
Red is in the same position as me as she’s leaned against her car. She looks hot as usual: in her ripped and pinned Metallica band t-shirt, ripped black jeans, leather jacket, and combat boots that I swear are too clunky for her small feet. But if she loves to wear them, who am I to say otherwise?
“Are we gonna be that annoying couple who matches?” she says in that husky, low voice of hers I adore.
When I’m close enough, I loop my arms around her waist and pull her flush against me. Her grin is contagious, and I shrug with a sugary smile. “Are we a couple? Hmmm?” I rest my chin on her hair, waltz us around a little; and she’s a laughing mess. “Have you decided you want all of The Noah?”
She raises a dubious pierced brow. “The Noah?”
“Yes. The Noah: a sexy, cute, e-bae worthy boy that is great at being a reliable boyfriend,” I tell her in an obnoxiously loud announcer voice like I’m in a boxing ring.
Laughing so much, she bends backward. “Do not ever do that again,” she demands and stands up straight. Taking my hands, she spins herself over to the front of the car. “And get in the car.”
“Nuh-uh uh.” I rush over to her and pull her back from the curb. I wheel around and walk her back to the passenger side. “I’m driving tonight, little rocker lady.”
“Oh hell no.” She turns to me with a seriously deathly expression. “No one—and I mean no one—drives my baby.”
“I thought I was your baby.” I pout playfully, and she shakes her head. “Oh, come on. It’s just for one night. Tonight is about letting you relax and be yourself.” I lay two handfuls of her untamed golden hair and flop them in my palms, fluffing them out. She just glares at me, but it softens like I knew it would when I play with her hair some more. “Huh? How about trusting me? Be yourself. Laugh for me, Rossa. Laugh!”
“Okay.” She chuckles and ducks her head in the cutest way, and my heart blossoms into a garden of exotic flowers. Licking her lips, she seems to think it over for a while. I poke her some more, hoping to drive her closer to persuasion town. Just gotta push her over this little pesky edge, but she’s getting there; I can tell by the crinkling of her nose. That or I’m annoying her. But in a cute way.
“Okay!” She stomps over to the passenger door. “But if you crash her, I—”
“Will not do anything but forgive me because you’re so in love with me and my abs. I know, I know.” I smile at her, but she doesn’t look amused. “Come on, grumpy pants. We have things to do, places to be.” I wave her butt inside of the car. After closing the door after her, I—ignoring her stank face—jog around the hood. I slide into the driver seat and tap my fingers along the large, leather steering wheel.
“You do know how to drive, right?” She raises her brows, and I throw her a smile.
“Of course I do. Just…” I look at her and raise my left leg, doing a model pose. “Mind taking a pic for the Gram?” I am totally kidding. God no. God. No.
“There’s gonna be a long line of shit you can’t do if you keep doing shit like that.” She laughs and claps her hands. I watch for a few seconds, enamored. Until I glance at the clock on the stereo and realize we gotta leave. Like. Now.
I pull out onto the road and focus on driving. I would take my usual peeks to admire her goddess-like beauty, but she cares very much for this car, and I do not want to ride home in an ambulance. The car drives surprisingly smoothly and the air smells distinctly like her: cigarettes, fresh bar soap, and scented shampoo. I may sniff a little harder as I’m driving.
I merge onto the freeway, headed to a nearby small town. According to Google Maps, we’ll arrive in an hour and a half, give or take, depending on traffic. Which, thank the Lord, is lighter than I expected. When ten minutes on the freeway passes, I feel uneasy because of the comfortable, yet staggering, silence between us. I need to hear her voice. Hold her hand. But then the image of me hobbling up the frat house with crutches pops behind my eyes, and I firmly grip the wheel.
“So, how did this lovely contraption come into your possession?” I say, and she looks at me, lips parted as if she’s shocked.
“Oh.” Then she blushes. “My, um, my birth father died. My mom was gonna get rid of it after it sat idle in the garage. I think it reminded her of him every time she saw it too much…so she was gonna sell it. But my grandpa told her to wait till I was old enough and claim it for my own.”
“Wow.”
“What?”
“I feel like shit for just now finding out,” I admit and fidget in the seat. I really should have quizzed her earlier.
“No, don’t feel bad. I didn’t want you to know.”
“Why not?” I take the chance to glance at her. She’s frowning and staring out of the windshield. I want to reach over and take her hand, but, like I said: Ambulance. Crutches.
“Because it’s shitty.” She shrugs, glances at me. “And no one really likes to talk about shitty things.”
“Well, I do.” I pause, glance at her hand on her lap. Fuck it! I reach over and take her hand in mine. She doesn’t pull away or scream at me to put both hands on the wheel, so I keep it intertwined with hers and grip with the other one. “Tell me everything shitty, and I promise I will not judge. I swear it.” And I mean it.
When I glance at her, she’s staring at me with a sort of surprised face.
I chuckle and look back to the road. “Don’t look so shocked. Contrary to popular beliefs, I do have a good ear for listening, and I give tons of shit about your shit.” I squeeze her hand gently, look at her, and smile. “Spill, babe.”
Babe?
Babe, her smile says.
And then, I hear all the shitty shit about her life, well, all that she allows me to hear. I can hear more to some stories, but I don’t force her to elaborate. I just listen to everything she has to say. In the span of an hour, I learn that she ran away when she was fifteen, joined a rock band, and got arrested, all in the span of—wanna hear something funny—an hour. She tells me about dropping out of school for one month, then rejoining but at the boarding school her sister attends. Which, in her words “was two bank robberies’ worth—piece of shit education system.” And she tells me about her mother being murdered, which she gets quiet about, so I attempt to ease her a little by going next.
I relay some of my finest shitty moments: about the time I got so trashed at a party in Tokyo that the next morning I woke up with a sumo wrestler attached to a handcuff. I tell her about jetting off hours after my graduation and getting fucked up in Seoul. And I even admit to my parents forcing me to attend college. I tell her about them arranging meetings with college scouts, even hiding my canvases and paints and basically anything I can use to do the one thing that makes me truly happy.
By the time we are done, we both feel like shit, and I regret we did it.
“I’m sorry,” I apologize, rubbing my thumb against hers. “Didn’t think it’d ruin the mood like that. Not your
best, Noah,” I murmur, and her grip on me tightens. I look over at her and her glowing smile. Even in the dark, she is my ultralight.
“You didn’t ruin anything. We got to know a little more about each other. That’s all,” she says, and I feel a little better, but still like shit. Ironically enough. But I will not let this cast a blanket of darkness over us or our night. Yes. This will be Our Night, goddamn it!
Noticing a sign as I pass, I grin and look over at her. “How much can your mouth fit?”
She pauses, looking worried, then says, “Um…what?”
“I didn’t mean it like that, silly.” I reach over and tap her button-nose; she tries to bite my finger. “Stop trying to bite me, and wait for your dirty-gutter mind to be blown out of the water.”
“What water?”
“There is no water.”
“Then why’d you say it?”
When I look at her, she has this shit-eating grin as she mocks me. I can’t get over her lit by the warm orange light of street lamps as the car rolls down several streets.
“Stop with the sass and just wait.” I reach out to poke her shoulder, but she bites at my wrist and, wrenching it back, I gasp dramatically and glance over at her with a dropped jaw. “And the biting! This needs to stop right now, you little shark.”
“Why should I listen to you?” she says. Then, a second later, she’s leaning over and biting at my neck. The car sways barely a fraction of an inch, as I laugh and shout at her to sit back before we get into an accident. I curse the seatbelts for being so loose, but I can’t say I’m not enjoying her mouth on my skin. She’s having a laughing fit when I finally push her down and glare at her shortly, but I can’t stay mad at her long, with her too-large blue eyes and adorable laughter.
“You are quite insane, Red Sylvetti.” I pick up my beanie that fell onto my lap in the middle of her biting and plop it onto my hair. This amuses her, and she giggles and grabs it and pulls it over her curls. I would grab it back, but it looks too cute on her.
“Quite,” she mocks me, baring her teeth in a terrifying way.
“Gross. Don’t do that,” I say, but I’m laughing. And she’s laughing. And I swear there’s an open laughing gas in here.
It took a few minutes to find parking, but now we’re quieter as our date’s about to officially begin. I get out first, then help her out, even though she grumbled that she could get out on her own. To that, I plopped kiss after kiss all over her face. After receiving several shouts of my name and laughter, I smile successfully and sling an arm around her, and we head to the venue.
“A boardwalk? Seriously?” She scoffs at the location.
“What matters is what’s on the boardwalk,” I tell her, and she mumbles something. “Don’t be like that. Smile. For. Me. Red.” I kiss her forehead with each word until she’s beaming up at me. I playfully tug down the beanie, covering her eyes, and she punches me. But I chuckle and drop my arm to the back of her lower back, holding her close and tight.
There aren’t many tourists out, since this is an event not many families would spend their night on. People wearing matching t-shirts, caps, and hoodies are milling around. I hope I didn’t ruin the surprise, but I know it’s shit when a lackluster guy holding a sign in front of a little shack that says: ‘MERCH 20% OFF’ definitely ruined it.
“The Arctic Monkeys?” she squeals and actually bounces on her reliable boots. She looks up at me with a hung jaw, dilated eyes, and peachy pink cheeks. I almost don’t realize she’s actually talking until she pinches me back to reality. “How—what? I didn’t even know they were coming here!”
“I have my ways.” I flip my hair dramatically, and she grins wider. I chuckle and blush, shrugging my shoulders. “I kept a close eye out for pop-up concerts and stuff ever since I found out you liked them and their kind of music.”
She looks stunned, brows dropping, smile hopeful. “Seriously? You did that for me?” She sounds so shocked, it makes my heart ache.
“Of course I did.” I cup her face and smile. “I’d do anything for you, Red. Anything.”
“Kill for me?” She raises her brows.
“Depends on who it is,” I say.
“Trump?”
“Done deal. Bourne just got back to me earlier than Wick—that prick.” I shake my head and make a rueful expression, mouth bunched up, brows curved. She grins a toothy smile and shakes her head, golden curls swaying softly.
“You’re something else, prep.” She’s holding my waist now.
I’m so close to her, I don’t even see it coming. “Hopefully yours…”
She grips, and I sigh.
“Oh!” I pull back, but she doesn’t let go, still shocked about my intensive research. “And to top it all off, I’ve got dinner. Huge…wait for it…” I flick my wrists in the air, making a gesture like I’m drumming rapidly.
She laughs into her hands, and with her red cheeks bunched up, blue eyes lit up under the soft street lamps, I lose focus on the drumming and just throw my arms wide open.
“Churros!” I scream obnoxiously loud. People stare at me weirdly, but I don’t care. I pay attention to my beaming girl.
“Dope! Where?” She looks around with wide eyes, like a bunny on the lookout for a sweet-ass carrot.
“Over there by the food trucks—which will be our dignified dinner on this fine night.” I point over my shoulder, and her greedy eyes follow my thumb…only to frown and look back at me.
“I don’t see one,” she says, and I freeze.
A pause, then a shaky, “What?”
She bites her lip and checks again. “That’s all right, though. Everything else is kinda perfect.”
“Kinda being the keyword.” I turn around and search with my own eyes. Yeah. Yep. The fuckers aren’t there. “Huh.” I scratch my head, and she stands next to me, head tilted to the side, hands tucked in her jacket.
“At least there are gyros. I love me some gyros.” She’s trying to lighten this horrible, terrible, despicable situation.
“But you also love you some churros,” I huff out and stomp. “Damn it!” I throw my head and scream. Again, staring people. Drawing my chin down, I look over at her to find her nervously chewing on her lip and looking around with her bug-eyes. I smirk and nudge her, reaching inside my jacket. “I guess it’s a good thing I bought some earlier when they were here.” I pull out a pack of the large churros, and I swear I have never seen a light so bright in her eyes.
She reaches for them, but I hold them up playfully. She glares at me.
“I didn’t hear a: Oh my God, Noah. You are the bestest, sweetest, most devilishly handsome guy on this planet to ever exist.”
“And you won’t ever.” She reaches again. I hold them up higher, pucker a hand around my ear, and lean down. Sighing, I feel her smile against my cheek before she says, “You are all that and more.” Then she kisses my cheek, and I turn to her. She’s not even staring at her supposedly favorite treats in the entire world. She’s staring at me. Like I’m her world.
I stare right back because she’s my entire damn galaxy.
“Red Sylvetti, I’m pretty sure I love you,” I say it. And I damn well mean it. My heart’s a gone sucker because she bats her eyes rapidly and steps back. My heart breaks, and I’m pretty sure I died a little inside.
A storm of regret and sadness begins to hurl its best at me when she steps forward and cups my face before pushing her lips against my nose in the purest way. I close my eyes and wrap my fingers around her frail wrists. Rubbing gently, I pull her even closer to me and listen to her soft voice say, “I sort of think I love you too, Noah Wells.”
My heart revives, does a backflip, dances, throws an office party with my other organs, and I’m lifting her off the ground and spinning around. Cheesy romance novels and movies ain’t got shit on us. We’re the true ones. I feel it in every bone and muscle in my body. I spin her around and around, listening to her sweet, lively laughter, ignoring haters, and feeling my love for this one gir
l soar my feet off the ground.
When she’s still and in my heart, we’re staring at each other with this sort of expression I can’t explain. I see bits of fright and admiration and elation and euphoria and relief, and I see it all in her golden-kissed blue eyes. And I’m kissing her and feeling the band start their set in my heart, under my flesh, and against her soft, graceful lips.
Chapter Forty-Five
“Thank you for coming out, everyone!” Alex says into the microphone, and a cluster of girls wearing their merch screams like the man just told them there is a sale at their favorite stores.
Their complete and utter adoration over the guy makes me a little frightened of him randomly choosing my girl as his; they’d ride off into the sunset, wearing all black and him flashing me a smile of his stupid charming British mouth.
But when I look over at Red, she’s just smiling fondly, like she’s remembering a good dream. Has she been in a dream state all of the concert? During it, I glanced over multiple times to make sure she was enjoying it. And she was. She was dancing and singing, but not shouting as if the guy threw the spotlight on her and declared her his rock band wife.
I paid more attention to her than the band; I’m sorry, Arctic Monkeys.
“Did you enjoy it?” I ask her as we’re aimlessly walking around the boardwalk.
“I did more than enjoy it,” she exclaims. “I freaking loved it! Like, a lot! That was the best date ever!” She stares up at me with wide eyes and a giddy grin.
I think it’s safe to say I can relax about her being swept off by a British guy with luscious black hair and the voice of an angel. What? I didn’t say he couldn’t sing.
My heart aches, and I breathe out heavily in relief. “I’m glad you did, Red. You deserved it after our last shitty date.” I run a hand through my hair, embarrassed, but she pulls my wandering hand away and frowns at me.
Red: Burning Desire (Spectrum Series Book 7) Page 30
