Chapter 24 #2
Bringing her to meet my eyes as she hangs in the air, I whisper, “I didn’t open the door for your unclean and unhygienic ass to lay anywhere near my Andie.”
Her beady eyes narrow at me, and I mirror her expression. When she thinks that my face is in her reach, she throws her sharp talons at me, attempting to scratch me.
Thanks to the years I spent honing my reflexes, I pull back before she can do any damage, then I get up and walk out of the room to bathe this hellion. But not before dropping a kiss on Andie’s forehead, as she sleeps with the blanket bunched under her chin.
* * *
The ringing of the phone rouses me from my sleep.
After bathing the cat, I slid back in and let myself doze off beside Andie. Some of the tension, which is now a permanent fixture at this point, releases from my shoulders when Andie snuggles in closer and swings her arm and leg over me.
I haven’t slept like that in God knows how long—no nightmare, no sweat or shallow breathing.
But of course, the universe had to wake me up. The phone rings again, and I curse under my breath, stretching out my hand blindly as I pat the side table for my phone, with the other hand now numb under Andie’s head. Looks like we’ve been in the same position all night.
Grabbing the phone, I squint at the screen, and the caller ID has my eyes alert; my heart begins to pound, my hands turning clammy as my grip on the phone becomes slippery.
Why is he calling me?
What does he want from me? I transferred the usual amount of money to his bank account after his last call. Then why the fuck does he keep bothering me?
My breathing turns shallow as I stare at the phone like it’ll tell me the reason behind his call. The darkness creeping back.
A hand moves across my chest, and I grab it tight, startled, looking at the owner of the limb.
“Hey, hey, it’s me,” Andie’s voice penetrates the fog and makes itself known. My breathing becomes a bit easier knowing it’s her.
The cat hops off the bed from beside Andie’s feet, where she made herself comfortable after I bathed her.
The phone rings once again. “You’re not gonna pick it up? Your dad’s calling,” she questions, peeking at the screen as she pulls the sheets up her body, shifting closer to me as we both sit up.
I instantly decline the call. Andie can’t know this, can’t know him. What the fuck was I thinking, sleeping with her, having her around me?
She’s only here because she doesn’t know how pathetic I really am. I’m getting a panic attack from just a phone call in her presence, for fuck’s sake.
The phone doesn’t ring again. But my choppy breaths and sweaty skin have Andie troubled.
She cups the side of my face, scared for a loser like me. “Hey, you’re okay. You’re with me. Come on, Noah, breathe with me,” she urges, taking a deep breath, asking me to imitate her.
Her palm comes back to my chest as she gently rubs it in a soothing motion over my heart. “Now, let it out,” she guides me. “Take in a breath once more.”
When I finally feel my heart beating at a normal pace and breath coming easy to me, Andie coos, “That’s good. I’m right here.”
I sit back properly, leaning against the headboard as I rub my hands over my face and into my hair, the blanket covering my hips.
Fuck!
Andie adjusts herself, too, blanket tucked under her arms to hold it across her chest as she leans against the bedrest beside me. “Want to tell me what that was?” She lets her words hang in the air.
“Not particularly, no,” I say, my words still gravelly from the sleep as we both stare off at the wall in front of us. The sunlight from the floor-to-ceiling window casting a shadow on the curtains of the city outside.
Her head turns to me, her messy waves falling over her shoulders as she deadpans, “Tough luck. That’s what you said when I proposed you take my virginity. Yet, here we are now.” She spreads her hands out in a show of reminding me of everything that transpired yesterday.
“Jesus.” A humorous chuckle slips past my lips as I pinch the bridge of my nose at her brutal honesty.
I look at her with my lips barely lifted, and she looks at me with a smile that would’ve knocked me flat on my ass had I not already been sitting.
She’s a vision like this—messy hair, face flushed but glowing, marks on her neck gleaming, and eyes blazing with life as the sunlight creates a halo behind her.
“Fuck, you’re unreal, Rainbow,” I breathe, awestruck by her beauty like the first time I saw her.
“Oh! Thank you…” Her eyes widen, and her cheeks turn beet red at the sudden compliment as she tucks a strand of her hair behind her ear.
Then she narrows her eyes at me, pointing a finger. “Don’t think you can get out of this, Noah,” she speaks in her what I’ve termed as ‘teacher voice’. One that can make any grown man do anything, let alone me, who’s already willing to be on his knees for her.
The compliment was never to distract her; it was just a truth that slipped out. But I play along with her because that seems less vulnerable than admitting how intense my feelings for her are.
“Busted,” I quip, raising my hands in surrender.
“So?” She cocks an eyebrow at me, waiting me out until I break.
With a heavy sigh, I tell her, “It was my dad.”
“Yeah, well, I figured as much since I’ve eyes and all,” she shrugs, being a smartass.
It’s my turn to narrow my eyes at her, “Don’t be a brat.” Her only response is a cheeky smile that causes my lips to twitch.
“What did he want?” she asks, petting the cat that has now trotted back and found her way to her lap.
“Don’t know, don’t care,” I bite my tongue before I tell her things that she doesn’t need to know.
She looks at me with furrowed eyes. “Why?”
All the memories that keep haunting me well into my adulthood, that keep me up at night, flash before me. My mind is a fucked up place, and my parents played a part in it. I feel the shadows pulling me in, and dread settles over me.
“My parents and I…we don’t get along well. That’s all you need to know,” I say in a clipped tone, the lightness between us evaporating in an instant.
“But—”
“That’s enough, Andie. Just because we fucked doesn’t mean I’ll bare my soul to you,” I say, exasperated, hating myself for it but hoping that she’ll take the hint. Because anywhere near me or my dad is a bad fucking idea.
Her expressions shut down, her eyes losing all the mischief, hiding everything she’s feeling. My stomach churns, and my insides scream at me to rectify this.
I reach out, but she pulls back. That action alone guts me, slices me into a thousand pieces.
She feigns a smile, and it feels wrong for a smile on her face not to reach her eyes. “No, you’re right,” she agrees, raising her hand to keep me from touching her. “Who am I to ask you anything personal? Nothing. A woman you slept with once. That’s all.”
She lets the creature on the floor and picks up her dress from the armchair in the corner—where I kept it last night when she was asleep.
“I’ll take my leave,” she says with yet another tight smile as she gets dressed.
I hate the dejected look in her eyes. I’m an idiot for hurting the woman who literally just gave herself to me, put so much trust in an asshole like me.
Andie walks out of the room and straight to the front door after picking up her bag and phone. I hold the sheets around my waist as I follow her.
“I won’t come back to you again. I understand where you stand after making good on your words. You’ve completed your end of the deal and taken my virginity. Thank you,” she chokes on the last words, but hides it by bending down to strap in her sandals.
I don’t stop her, not when my heart yells at me to. Not when everything in me begs me not to let her walk out this door with tears in her eyes.
But that phone call was a glaring reminder of who I am and why I don’t let people get too close to me.
I don’t deserve Andie.
And Andie, my beautiful Andie, certainly doesn’t deserve me, a screw-up.
I don’t speak when the cat pads across the living room and dashes to Andie, climbing her feet as she watches her protector go.
“I’m sorry, Millie. You’ll have to stay here,” Andie says, bending down again to rub her fur as she gives her a name.
“You can take her with you,” I offer, and I sound foreign even to my own ears.
Andie straightens and looks me dead in the eye. “No. I’ve taken enough advantage of your pity,” she spits the words like venom, and my heart breaks at the meaning of her words.
What the fuck is she on about? Pity? Fucking pity?
That’s not even in the list of things I feel when I lay my eyes on her, when I think of her, which is constantly.
I’m about to tell her so, taking a step toward her to give her a piece of my mind, when she jerks the front door open and strides off straight into the elevator.
All I can do is stare at the place where she was only moments ago as the feline scratches my leg for rushing her mom away.
If I thought my past scared me, I’m afraid the look of devastation on Andie’s face might now be at the top of that list.
I did not have to be so cruel to her to keep her away. She might not have wanted to stay with me either. We could’ve parted amicably, respectfully.
But I had to go and cause her distress, hurt her the way I was afraid I might. That’s why good things like Andie don’t happen to losers like me.
It’s in this moment when I watch her walk away that I wish I’d spent my entire life becoming a better version of myself.
And the truth is, I don’t think I know how to be.
Because all my life, I’ve only ever been called worthless, useless, a waste of fucking space. And after one point, I started to believe it was true.
I still do.
I know it deep in my heart that Andie Moore deserves better.
And I am not that.
So, letting her walk away is the only better thing I could do.
Regardless of the truth of my being, there’s another part of me that feels something entirely different.
I realize one thing with glaring clarity—I’ve fucked up.