Sugarbaby (19 page)

“A question? From
you
?”

Funny. “How do we handle our friends? What I mean is, I still have that NDA. Are you going to be my mystery man, sheltered away so I need to sneak off and see you in the shadows?”

Noah rolled to his back, his expression thoughtful, his hands tucked under his head. For a moment, my body flushed and sputtered. The sight of him was just so raw, with his thickly muscled biceps and the hair underneath his arms. I fought the whim to run my fingers over him there, not so I could tickle him, but because he was so damned hot and I wanted to touch, touch everywhere—his chest, his ridged abs, and the happy trail of hair that stretched from his belly to his penis. I wanted to wake it up, have him inside me again.

I'd never been brave with Rex like this, and definitely not with Micah, who'd been the aggressor. But, really, they didn't matter anymore.

No one else mattered.

“This takes some thinking,” he finally said. “I told you I've never had a relationship before that lasted for any length of time.”

“So you never met your sweeties' friends? No one but your insignificant others had to sign those NDAs?”

“Why? Do you want me to meet all your friends?”

Before I responded, I couldn't resist laying my palm over his stomach. I thought I saw him twitch down below. Bad me.

“They'd love to meet you,” I said. “You met one of them already—Carley.”

“The waitress who abandoned the table when Simmons and I ate at the café. I don't remember her much. My eyes were on you.”

Getting bolder, I skimmed that happy trail over his flat belly, and he made a low sound of need.

“What about my NDA then?” I asked, determined to get an answer out of him. “How do I handle that when it comes to my friends? Do I even tell them you're back in town?”

Now he looked pained, and I wasn't sure if it was because I was turning him on or putting him on the spot.

“Jade . . .” he started.

“I know you're in a tough place right now.” I stopped tormenting him, resting my hand on his hip instead. “You're still out of the public eye and your plan is to keep laying low until you can make your grand entrance in The Reeves Group boardroom. So I ask again—does that mean you're going to be my secret in the meantime?”

“Unless you want your friends to sign NDAs, too, then, yeah. I've got to be your secret.”

There it was—the reality again. But I didn't want to face what was outside my door yet. I wanted to wallow in this place Noah and I had created for as long as I could.

Resuming, I drifted my fingers down, coming to the grand prize, touching him, making him grow bigger as I traced his tip.

“You're killing me,” he said, his jaw tensing, his gaze going steamy.

When a chiming sound came from my nightstand, I didn't want to pay attention to it, especially since it wasn't from my phone. Instead, I slipped my fingers under him, cupping him, but the text chimed again.

“Shit,” he said, his voice a growl. “That's Simmons's tone.”

Simmons, who was still in New York, watching over business.

My heartbeat was muffled as I did what I knew I should do—got his phone for him and handed it over. My blood whomped through me, punishing me.

Noah accessed the message, but when he didn't react, my stomach knotted.

Shit
, I thought, echoing Noah but not saying it out loud.
Here it comes. Trouble
.

But then Noah laughed, covering his face with his arms. He was still laughing.

I made a grab for the phone but he avoided the steal.

“What?” I asked. “Tell me!”

“Silas.” Noah showed me the screen. “He finally found his balls and he's on board with me. This means he and Thomas can start persuading my other uncle to do the right thing now, then my youngest brother, Eli. We're almost there. Almost ready to get to Diamont.”

I absorbed the news while Noah kept laughing, looking at the text again as if it were a trophy. Something had returned to his gaze that frightened me, and it wasn't the pull of darkness that I'd seen when he'd been with his mom or had been dealing with Silas's reluctance.

A fallen angel
, I thought. The vengeful type.

I tried to join in his happiness, but I was afraid. Afraid he was going to slip back into a disguise that I wouldn't recognize. Afraid he'd go back to New York after all of his family was supporting him again. Afraid he would never remember me.

Stop it
, said New More Confident Jadyn.
Don't fall into that trap. Don't be the weenie you were before
.

And when Noah tossed the phone aside, grabbed me, and rolled me into his arms, I forgot about all my neurotic worries.

I disappeared into him, helpless, and just as fallen as he was.

If I thought business with The Reeves Group would move quickly after Silas joined Noah's side, I was dead wrong.

After a quick shower, Noah persuaded me to go to his house on The Hill, and while he spent time in his home office, I set up a study camp down the hall in a spare room with my laptop. I made a valiant attempt to write a paper on
Slaughterhouse-Five
for my Modern Lit class, and I was almost done with it when I heard Noah stalking down the hall. I glanced up to see him passing by the door in his black workout pants.

It didn't take Stephen Hawking to see that he was on his way to the gym.

He was going to work off those demons, I thought, and I left him alone, unable to finish the paper, merely staring at the screen.

The next time I saw Noah, I'd already put on my Angel's Seat uniform, and I stopped by his office, only to see him through the crack in his door as he sat at his desk, staring out the window into a backyard with an infinity pool and casita.

“Noah?” I whispered, pushing open the door the rest of the way.

He slightly looked over his shoulder, then, as if his mind had been somewhere else entirely, he held out his hand to me. I went to him, grasping him. He didn't have to look at me for me to know that the blacks of his irises had probably gotten wider and deeper these past few hours.

I squeezed his hand. “Waiting sucks, doesn't it?”

“I'm about to gnaw through the walls. Simmons hasn't had any more news.” He finally peered up at me, and his smile . . . Well, it tried to be a smile.

But even more disturbing was the restlessness I sensed in his taut muscles. I'd come to recognize what hunger looked like in Noah Reeves, and he had it—but his appetite wasn't for me right now. And when I saw the picture of Harry Diamont on his computer screen, I realized what Noah had been filling all his time with—thoughts of a reckoning.

I pulled at his hand as if I could tug him out of this latest mood. “Come to the Angel's Seat with me. Put on that cowboy hat and sunglasses and do your work there.”
Be around people
, I thought.
Be around me
.

“I'll be fine,” he said, just as he always did. Then he kissed my hand and turned back to the window, as if he were looking toward New York.

Toward the only thing that could take him away from me.

***

After work, I spent the night at Noah's, and when it came time to meet Shelby at my place for our get-together the next day, I had to force myself away from him.

I'd forgotten what it was like to be in the first crushing madness of infatuation with someone, and I knew that I hadn't been this consumed even by Rex. All I wanted to do was sit in Noah's lap and bury my face in his neck, smelling his clean smell. That would've been enough, too, just that simple thing, but Evie had texted me, saying how excited she was about our Skype call. Carley was also coming over so she could meet my other friends.

I couldn't be That Girl—the one who didn't remember that she even had friends. The ones I'd had in high school had dropped me like a hot cattle brand after they'd gone away to college and I'd betrayed Rex, so I knew what being dumped felt like.

“If you feel like taking a break,” I said to Noah as he lounged in bed, watching me get ready, “you know where I'll be.”

“With the girls, giggling and painting your toenails.” When I wandered too close to the mattress to grab my phone from his nightstand, he wrapped an arm around my waist and pulled me down to his ultra king-sized bed that felt like a cloud from Heaven.

Truthfully, Heaven would've been anyplace with him in it.

I lay on top of him and kissed his chin. “I just wish you could come to meet them.”

“We talked about this.” He ran his fingers down my temple.

“That's right.” I sighed. “You're my secret.”

“After I get Diamont, it won't have to be that way.”

There was a razor to how he said it, and adrenaline pumped through me with that same fear that grew every time I saw his gaze get a little darker.

But he was in a good mood now—much better than last night before I'd improved his spirits with kisses and caresses, before we'd loved each other and slept with our arms and legs tangled. Who knew how long he'd be this way, though.

I hoped Simmons would call with some news today. And I was praying it wouldn't be bad.

When I finally drove away from his place, I was so focused on what I should do about Noah—talk to Simmons about getting him into therapy? Talk to a doctor on my own?—that I was shocked when I found myself pulling into my garage. I didn't even remember the drive over.

I busied myself by putting together snacks for my friends since I'd stopped by the market last night before work. Soda, chips, popcorn, licorice—the usual treats. Soon, Shelby arrived, and we set up the Skype call for when Carley got there.

When we connected with Evie, she was her usual peppy self, greeting Carley with effervescent charisma. “So
you're
the substitute me! I debated whether or not to like you since you single white femaled my café job and my friend.”

At first, Carley only gave Shelby and me a look that said,
Should I be worried about this?

Evie busted out laughing on the computer screen, and Shelby wagged her finger at her.

“Don't scare the new girl,” she said.

Carley grinned at that, although it was only half-hearted. She was still smarting from her fight with Bret, and he wasn't due to come home until the day after tomorrow. The talk she needed to have with him wasn't one you did over the phone or computer, either.

Shelby got out the organic wine she'd snuck from her mom's ample supply at home. Since I was off work today, I was going to share some with her, but when she told me that Micah had dropped her off here so she wouldn't be driving and she'd be meeting him at the nearby Wag-A-Bag later, I nearly cringed.

“Translation,” I said. “He doesn't want to come near me.”

Shelby uncorked the bottle. “Micah doesn't want to make you uncomfortable, based on what the two of you went through.”

She sent Carley a curious look, as if asking if my newest pal was fully aware of my brief yet notable history with Micah. I merely nodded.

Evie was fixing her red hair into a twisted bun. “Shel, the night we all confronted Rex at the lake was uncomfortable. Dropping by Jade's house? Not even comparable.”

Shrugging in acknowledgement, Shelby offered to pour some wine into Carley's Sprite-filled cup, but she lifted a hand in refusal.

“Work starts in an hour for me,” she said.

Boy, she sounded low, but Evie came to the rescue.

“Oh, whoa, Cars!” She already had a nickname for her. “Where did you get that bracelet?”

“I made it.” Perking up, Carley showed off her leather creation.

Evie does it again
.

There was a knock at the door, and I stood with my wine in hand. Had I invited someone else and I hadn't remembered because I'd been distracted with Noah? I didn't think anyone had told Diana about this get-together, and maybe we should have. Or was it Noah's on-call stylist at the door again with more gifts?

Turned out that it wasn't someone any of us had seen coming.

Bret waited there, dressed in a bulky army jacket, jeans, and work boots. His black hair slumped over his forehead, his dark eyes gleaming like his temperature was too high. I recognized his look all too clearly because I'd seen Noah with it;
I'd
even felt that way since he'd come into my life.

I knew the second Carley saw he was at the door because the room went still, like all the air had been sucked out of it.

“Bret?” she whispered.

I got out of the way as he rushed past me to go to her. She was already halfway across the room, too, and they surged toward each other, meeting in an embrace so passionate that I rested my hand on my stomach. It was tightening, as if I already missed hugging Noah like this, being with him, adoring him.

“I'm sorry,” he was whispering to her, holding the back of her head and pressing her to him. “I'm such an asshole for going out of town like that.”

“I'm the asshole,” she said. “Please tell me we're not going to fight like that again.
Please
.”

“We won't if I start to listen to you. God dammit, the band was already on the way to another festival when I knew I couldn't take this anymore. I can't keep running off because I don't like what you have to say.”

“And I'll—”

He silenced her by lifting her off her feet and scooping her into a kiss that had me looking away once again.

My chest felt hollow. Bret had been on the road, yet he'd turned around and come back for Carley, covering miles and miles, but Noah was only across town. It would be so easy for him to be here, but he wasn't.

He was my secret.

Why couldn't it be different? Yes, I knew the answer, but it just didn't feel right to not be in public with him, kissing him freely, staring into each other's eyes like Carley and Bret were doing now as he stroked back her long, dark hair, reveling in the feel of it as if he hadn't been able to go another hour without touching her again.

I glanced at Shelby, who was smiling like she was watching the end of a romantic movie, but she had Micah to go to when she left my house. Even Evie, who felt no pressure to be in any relationship whatsoever, was on the computer screen, leaning her chin in her palm, smitten with the sight of true love.

Both Shelby and Evie looked at me then, as if they could sense my sadness, and I walked down the hall with my wine, hoping Shelby would follow with the computer as the lovebirds made up.

***

Days passed, and I threw myself into Noah, even if he was like a caged animal in a gilded enclosure.

Every night, he seemed to lose himself in me, too, treating me as if I were a one-of-a-kind gem, treasuring me, looking so deeply into my eyes that I felt as if there was nowhere to hide. I didn't
have
anything to hide from him, anyway, but no one had ever taken me over like this. Sometimes the way he searched my gaze even scared me; sometimes he looked
so
deeply into me that I could actually look back into him, seeing the turmoil, the black sea that was always storming.

But there were new reasons for the chaos. Back in New York, his brother Thomas and uncle Silas were carefully working on Noah's other uncle, Jordan, but it wasn't going fast enough for Noah. Apparently, Simmons was even getting frustrated because he'd flown down here a couple days ago, having nightly powwows with his boss and then spending all day in his own office in the mansion, working the phones, probably to keep their most important shareholder allies up to date.

But Noah had told me their supporters wouldn't wait much longer.

It was time to get him out of the house, and I'd suggested going to the local stables since we hadn't marked riding off his tourist list yet. He'd agreed, as if he wanted to see
me
happy, and he'd had his private chef put together a picnic lunch of stripped steak sandwiches, spinach and orzo salad, and maple pecan cookies that we laid out after riding on the trails.

Surrounded by grass, big rocks, and oaks, the air cool with clouds overhead, we sat on our blanket. We'd tethered the horses to a nearby tree, and they nickered as they waited for us. Our trail master had left us alone for a while, promising to return in an hour and a half.

I watched Noah fix an aerator to the top of the bottle of Bordeaux he'd packed in the saddlebag. He'd left the Stetson at home, but he was in boots, jeans, and flannel, his eyes bright today. My heart thrilled to see that, and when we were ready, I toasted with him.

“I didn't realize,” I said, “that you can ride. And here I thought you'd be a newbie.”

“I took lessons when I was younger, but it was English style, not Western.” He didn't eat or drink, instead giving an absent nudge to the phone he'd set on our plaid blanket. “But you know what they say about climbing back in the saddle.”

“It's like riding a bike?”

He gave me an absent smile, then looked at the phone again, and when he took an agitated sip from his wine, I knew something was wrong.

“You okay?” I asked.

“Sure. I didn't plan on there being be no reception out here but . . . Hell, sometimes I wonder what it'd be like to live back in the days when we didn't have a phone attached to us twenty-four-seven. This is my chance to find out.”

Did he seem a little wistful about that? I sighed as I imagined a simpler Noah. Would it ever be possible?

“What was it like growing up in your family?” I asked, because it seemed like the right time.

“Are you looking for a poor little rich kid story?” he asked. “Because I don't have any of those. Not before Diamont came along.”

I didn't want to hear that name, because even now it seemed to bring that cloud back over Noah.

“I want to know what you were like as a boy,” I said. “That's all.”

He relaxed, opening his arm and inviting me over to him. We still hadn't touched the food yet, but there'd be time.

As I leaned back against his chest, I took in the smell of his shirt, the feel of his arms, the vibration of his words through his chest and into me as he spoke.

“My parents doted on us kids. I was the oldest, so I was brought up strictly, taught to be responsible, but I never resented the way I was raised. My mom refused to bring in a nanny for us, and she and Dad showed me how to respect hard work and always look after my younger brothers.” His arms stiffened around me. “We all looked after each other until—”

“Diamont.” All roads led back to the man. Would there ever be a time when the way he affected Noah wasn't a factor?

Noah obviously hadn't caught the irritation in my voice. “Harry Diamont used to bring over gifts for us kids all the time, and I saw what he was doing—ingratiating himself. Thomas and Eli were a few years younger than I was, and they just liked the presents, so you could say they were groomed. And when Diamont made his move with Dad, they saw him as a benevolent uncle stepping in to help during a bad time. My
real
uncles even felt that way, but I was alone with Mom in seeing the truth.”