Noah (39 page)

And the date—New Year
’
s day. The day after he’d told
Veronica
he loved her. The
very
day he’d sworn
Rita had spent the entire time inside and
nothing happened between
them
. 

“Very cute,” she muttered tossing the phone at Noah.

Noah flinched in surprise but managed to catch it as she stood up. “What?”

She didn’t respond. She couldn’t. The boulder wedged
at
her throat made any ability to speak impossible.
She had nothing to say to him anyway. This was her own damn fault. How many
times did
things like this ha
ve
to happen before she learned to just stick with her initial gut feeling.
Already this could cause a rift between them. The very thing she
’d been
so afraid of
from the beginning
. 
    

Noah was obviously slow to catch the connection his phone had with her sudden change in mood that now had her bolting from the room. “What’s wrong?”

She’d made it all the way into the
bath
room, locking the door safely behind her. But instead of crying which was the original plan she took a deep breath and rinsed her face. She hadn’t slept with him yet
—s
omething her gut had managed to win out on all this time.
F
or that she was eternally grateful. There was still time for her to pull out and do some damage control to
their
friendship
.

As unpleasant as any thoughts of being around Noah with other girls or to even have to hear him talk about other girls if she wanted to keep him in her life it was something she’d have to consider.
This
was not going to work.

Veronica had just managed to ward off the tears when Noah knocked on the door. “You okay?”

His voice alone was enough to have her choked up again. “I’m fine.”

“What happened? Did you suddenly feel sick?”

“Yeah, I did.” That was one way to put it. “But I’m
okay
now.”

She turned the shower on in hopes that he’d walk away. She wouldn’t be able to talk to him much longer without him noticing the strain in her voice. Thankfully he left
and she could
shower in peace.

The long shower she took did the opposite of what she thought it would. Instead of calming her it gave her more time to evaluate the facts. First of all Noah had lied. She couldn’t be certain that he’d actually slept with Rita New Years day, but
Rita’s
body language in the picture
made one thing clear
.
His visit with her that day
hadn’t
been as innocent as he’d
made it
out to be
. 

Second
,
Rita was obviously under the impression that Noah was with
Veronica
now. They lived together for Christ
’s
sake
. The two
-
faced bitch had the gall to be all over him like that and be texting him with that fucking picture? 
She
had
to know the possibility of
Veronica
seeing it was a good one.

Veronica thought she’d been a little too nice—a little too accepting of the fact that the guy she’d just done a few weeks
pr
i
o
r was now giving his undivided attention to another female. Maybe this was her way of sticking it to her.   

Unless of course
sinc
e Noah
seemed so impressed that Rita wasn’t the
clingy type
,
she probably was the type that didn’t mind being his whore on the side. Veronica was so worked up by the time she got out of the shower she had to fight the urge to confront him about it.

If she did
,
the way she was feeling now, she knew without a doubt the conversation would probably end with her screaming at him to get the hell out of her house. That’s exactly what she didn’t want to happen
ever
. As much as she hated to admit it
,
the very thought of Noah no longer
liv
ing
with her
was one she wasn’t ready to accept.
She wasn’t even ready to think about it.
Not yet anyway.

Maybe in time. Maybe once she’d slipped back into her life—
got
a life of her own—without him. Maybe then it wouldn’t
feel so unbearable.
For now she’d just have to start slow. Take a few steps backwards.
And—this
thought made her literally gasp—stop the goodnight kisses.   
   
  

~*~

Noah heard the bathroom door open and Roni walk into her room closing the door behind her. It took him a while but he’d finally found some tea bags in the pantry. Chamomile—perfect.  No matter what the reason nothing fixed an upset stomach better than chamomile. Jack swore by it and it always helped Noah whenever he wasn’t feeling so hot. It even worked for hangovers. The sour stomach part anyway.

He fixed Roni a cup and waited for her to emerge from her room but she never did. After a half hour of flipping through channels hoping to hear from her he knocked on her door. “Are you feeling better?” he asked softly in case she was already asleep.

“Not really,” she said her voice sounding so strange it made him nervous.

“Anything I can do? Take you to the doctor
’
s or something?”

“No, nothing. I took a sleeping pill and it’s really kicking in.”

Though the thought of going to bed without the taste of her on his lips was disappointing his worry outweighed anything else he felt at that moment. “Maybe you shouldn’t go to work tomorrow.”

“No, I have to. I’ll be fine. Don’t worry.”

After saying goodnight he walked the mug of tea to the kitchen and dumped its contents in the sink. He cleared anything they’d left out in the kitchen from dinner, something they usually did together and called it a night early. Even watching TV without Roni wasn’t the same anymore.

He was
still
lying in bed awake when his phone rang. He rarely got calls in the evening but it was even stranger that it was from Hector, so he sat up little worried.

“What’s up, Hector?”

“Did Roni and that asshole
Kratz
actually go out?”

The call alone was out of left field but his question was even odder. “Why?”

The phone got a little muffled and Noah heard a door squeak closed. Hector lowered his voice. “Well, you gotta promise first of all that you won’t say anything to Abel.”

“About what?”

“About me being in the
D
eans office …again.”

Noah chuckled. He knew first hand all about being in the
D
eans off
ice on a regular basis
.
Kratz
was such a
hard ass it made total sense that wiseass Hector would be on his shit list. “I won’t.”

“Alright, so I’ve been in there a few times lately but today I noticed a picture of him and some chick. You know like a couple in the snow. I
had
to get a closer look to see who the fuck would be with asshole
Kratz
.” He laughed but Noah was already feeling to
o
annoyed to laugh. He had a feeling where this was going. “I didn’t recognize her at first because she’s wearing a beanie and shit but she looked familiar then just behind it there was another picture and there she was, Roni and
Kratz
holding hands in front of that Medieval Times place.”

“Yeah, they went out years ago, I guess.
” The annoyance he’d felt had manifested. He was now officially pissed. “H
e has the pictures on his desk?”

What a fucking joke. They hadn’t gone out in over a year and his pathetic ass still had the pictures of them up?

“Nah
,
they were on a bookshelf behind his desk. Only reason I got up to get a closer look was because he left the room for a sec.
So no shit? She really went out with his ass? You know the more I’m around her the younger she seems, so seeing her in
t
hat picture with him was creepy as shit.”

“That’s ‘cause it is.” Noah wished he could add,
And that’s why she fucking dumped his ass
,
but he
could
n’t.

That
was
the
worst thing about her having dated such an
asshol
e
. Not only had she actually been attracted to
him
and
date
d him
for several
years
,
s
plitting with him hadn’t been her choice. It’d been his. And now he was sniffing
around
again
and he was still displaying pictures of the two of them?

This didn’t sit well with Noah.
He may’ve agreed to the no violence rule with Roni but he’d made it clear he wasn’t promising
anything
.
All the shit
this bastard had put him through in high school was water under the bridge now.
In hindsight,
Noah probably deserved some of it, but this changed everything. He’d gotten Roni to admit one thing. She wanted nothing to do with
Kratz
now.

If the fucker even thought about weaseling his way back into her life now he’d have to go through Noah. And Noah could think of no better way to unleash all the tension he’d been building these last few weeks
around R
oni than beating the shit out of someone who would try to come between them.     
  

 
The next morning Veronica made it a point to be up earlier than the norm. Noah was usually up
before
her even now that she’d gone back to work because of his early morning runs. But today Veronica wanted to spend as little time with him as possible before she left.

She was just filling her commuter mug with coffee when he walked in the back door.
He wore the usual dark grey hooded sweatshirt he wore every morning. He stopped quick at the sight of her
,
taking his earpiece out of his ear and pulled his hood back. “Hey
.” His smile was so sincere
her insides
warmed
. “Y
ou’re up. How you feeling?”

She
returned the
smile
,
attempting to
do what she’d decided after a long night of soul
-
searching and
arguing with that little voice of reason who so often won, but hadn’t been winning lately. Noah was one of the best things that had happened to her. Her mother often spoke of people being brought into your life for a reason. He’d been there when she needed him most but she’d confused things
. The feelings she finally admitted to having for Noah had allowed her to ignore the impracticality of it all. Just because Noah said he loved her,
didn’t mean things would automatically work. Even though she got the distinct feeling that Noah thought it did.   

Veronica knew
now
better
than ever that
relationships were
a struggle. Noah hadn’t the faintest
idea
and she shouldn’t expect him to. As far as she knew he’d never even been in
a serious relationship
and for his age that
was normal.
Like her
,
he had other things he was obviously working on first.

She wasn’t even mad anymore that he’d had Rita’s body wrapped around him the day after he’d professed
to
love
her
. How long did she really think
he’d wait
around
for her
to make her
grown up
decision?
This
young guy with
the sex drive of a stallion—she’d been witness to it every single time she’d tortured him with her goodnight kisses
—
it
was a living thing
.
She almost felt guilty now for having put him through what she had and then
f
e
eling
upset because he was unable to repress it when someone else offered
herself
up to him so easily.