NOAH
As I tended to Lulu, I was so relieved that I had turned down a night out on the town with the guys to hang out alone. I was no longer solo, but this had to have been a sign. I was put in that bar for a reason, just as she had chosen to go to that one herself. It wasn’t the type of place that attracted many women, so she had to be fresh meat to the perverts there. If she hadn’t left when she did...
I stopped that line of thinking altogether, shuddering to think about what kind of trouble she could’ve found herself in. The reasons she was there were very understandable though, and I kept that in mind as I had picked her up off the floor in front of the elevator and carried her upstairs. I had also been fussing over her ever since. Not sure if the wound required a hospital visit or not, I had called my concierge doctor and sent a few photographs of the wound. I hadn’t told her who the patient was, and for privacy reasons, I had wanted to shield Lulu from any further embarrassment tonight.
“She got a nasty cut, but it doesn’t look deep enough to warrant stitches. I would just suggest keeping an eye on her for a while, and make sure she doesn’t go straight to sleep. We don’t know if she has a concussion or not, so it’s better safe than sorry,” Dr. Rice had told me, and respecting her opinion, I agreed with her before disconnecting the call.
I had a concussion during my first season in the league, and even though I acted as if all was good so I could play the next week, it had actually taken about three or four of them to feel like my normal self. As the doctor had said, there was no telling whether she had one or not from the encounter with the foyer table, so I grabbed some ice and was now making sure she kept the cool compress against her face.
“I am okay, Noah,” she told me before repeating what she had said a few seconds earlier. “You really don’t have to stay.”
“I would like to,” I finally responded, and her eyes widened.
“Surely, you would rather be out with your friends, or some?—”
“Actually, you might not believe this, but it’s true. Being here with you now has probably been the best part of my night. If you don’t mind, I would like to savor it a little longer.”
She seemed a bit shocked, but then winced as she gave me a nod. “I rarely ever drink.”
I didn’t take her for one of those society alcoholics, and I had known plenty in my day. “It never even crossed my mind,” I answered honestly.
“Tonight has just been...” she paused, then after taking a short breath, continued. “It’s been a rough one. I’d been expecting the divorce news to hit, but then he said that I... Cade told them... Those men...”
Her thoughts were broken and I suspected that it wasn’t just due to her intoxication, either. There was true pain in her eyes as she spoke, and it made me want to pummel Cade for causing it all. He was right now partying at the Vault, alongside my friends and other patrons, while his ex was devastated and alone. The double standard when it came to men was never more pressing than now, and I actually felt sorry for her.
I continued to stroke her other cheek, then her lips as she turned toward my palm. There was an electricity between us, and I doubted she was sober enough to notice. I was, though. My gaze stayed locked in on her face, and when her eyes closed, I cleared my throat.
“Lulu,” I said, and those long lashes of hers fluttered open.
“Noah,” she breathed, then turned her head. My hand fell away from her face, and only returned to her seconds later when her eyes closed once more. This time, I picked her up in my arms, and again, she looked back up at me. “W-what are you doing?”
I realized in that moment what she probably thought, and while I would love to take her to bed so I could see if this connection was real, there was no way I would do it tonight. I sat down, then pulled her onto my lap. The towel with ice fell to the floor, but I left it there.
“You need to stay awake, Lulu. Okay?”
“Why?”
“You might have a concussion?—”
“No,” she said, then shook her head despite the obvious pain it put her in. “Not that.”
“Why what, then?”
“Why do men have to lie... to cheat...”
I pulled her tightly against me, and when her head hit my chest, I felt the warmth of her tears. I knew it wasn’t blood, so it had to be them. Kissing the top of her head, I started to run my hands up and down her arms in a comforting gesture. The more I touched her, the more my fingers tingled. If she wasn’t drunk, and hurt, and this had been any other time, I might have flipped her underneath me, then made her moan in something other than pain.
“Not all men lie or cheat, Lulu.”
And it was the truth. There were so many good men I knew, and I even liked to classify myself as one. Then, there were those like Cade, men who didn’t deserve the love of a good woman, and definitely not her tears. He deserved a bitch-slap from karma, and I was sure it would come one day in some way. It always did.
My own father had been arrogant enough to believe he escaped the universe’s justice simply because of his name, title, and wealth. A windy road in a sports car meant for speed, and his life ended in the blink of an eye. No one truly knew whether it had been intentional to stave off a jail sentence, or if it had been a tragic accident after all. To be honest, no one even cared, least of all me.
“Cade had promised to love and take care of me.”
“I know,” I told her as I continued to kiss the top of her head. “You were always too good for him anyway.”
She pulled her head back, and when her eyes met mine, she looked questioningly at me. “Aren’t Titans supposed to stick together?”
“We’re a brotherhood, not a cult,” I quipped, then chuckled at her expression. “He was always an asshole, Lulu. He was also a womanizing manwhore.”
“But he said?—”
“I don’t care what he said about you, or anyone else. I like to make my own mind up about people, and I tend to think I’m a great judge of character.”
“You’re one of the good guys,” she said, then yawned.
Remembering what the doctor had told me, I needed to keep Lulu talking. “And you’re a strong woman. I can tell by the way you’ve carried yourself through this all.”
“I’m so pathetic.”
I growled at those words, especially because it was never something I had thought described her in all of the time that I had known her. Granted, most of it was just in recent weeks, but I had been around her at various events over the years. She had never struck me as being anything other than graceful. Sure, she had fallen a bit tonight, but it was hard to maintain a specific image at all times when so central in the public eye. Being not only a Titan, but a professional athlete, I had a double whammy when it came to that. The public expected me to be a professional at all times, yet society expected a Titan to be powerful at the same time. It was a narrow, tight rope to balance on, but I only needed to remember my parents and it would give me the extra motivation to carry on.
What motivation had Lulu had all this time?
I realized that I knew next to nothing about her. Sure, she had three kids and was the ex-wife of a Titan, but outside of that and the society events she threw ad nauseum, I knew absolutely nothing about the woman herself. Society stories would always focus on Cade, so not much was known about her before she married him. Other women in the Titan ranks were more prevalent, but only because of their fathers. She obviously didn’t have as powerful of a patriarch, at least not one in Chicago.
“You’re not pathetic. In fact, I find you the complete opposite. You’re strong, yet compassionate, and so beautiful that Cade had to have been a fool to step out on you.” She barked out a small laugh at that, the sarcasm heavily laced inside of it. “I want to know more about you. How about the two of us go out to dinner one night?”
I hadn’t meant to ask her out, and the timing was not the best considering what had driven her to the bar to begin with, but the words came out before I could stop them. Gabriel’s mocking voice entered my thoughts, and I shook my head to push it away. I knew my friend had just been fucking with me, but he hadn’t been completely wrong.
“We can’t,” she finally said, bringing me back to the present.
“Why not?”
“People will talk.”
“Let them!”
“They’ll talk to Cade.”
“I hope they do. Fuck him!”
“They’ll also talk to my kids.”
No words came out after that for several seconds as I realized she was right. It was bad enough that others would talk to them about the divorce, and seeing their mother with a man would only make those conversations more difficult. I had dealt with enough of them on my own when it came to my mother and father, and their various scandalous activities. I could remember what it felt like being that kid that others pointed at and talked about sometimes behind my back, but also out in the open, too. There was no way I would ever contribute to something like that for her children, or anyone else’s. I wanted to see her more, though. There had to be another way for me to get to know her better.
“The next night that the children are gone, let me cook dinner for you here.”
She looked incredulously at me, and when she saw the seriousness in my eyes, her sigh confirmed what her words did right after. “Okay.” From there, we did talk a little more, and once the first few crucial hours passed, I finally let her go to sleep, then I let myself out of her place. I would check on her tomorrow, then come up with a date for our dinner.