Chapter 29
Emma
“They won’t stop asking questions,”Noah said, taking my wrist and pulling me into the bathroom an hour later. He closed the door behind us and locked it.
It was true. We’d been bombarded. Everyone wanted to know what exactly had happened, and when, and why we hadn’t said anything. They wanted to know what our plans were for a long distance relationship. They wanted to know if we were serious.
They wanted to know how I had managed to tame Noah out of his man-slut ways. They wanted to know how Noah had convinced me, the career-minded CEO, to soften up.
And Samantha gave me a look that said she definitely wanted to know details about the sex. She was just too polite to ask me in front of the others.
As happy as I was that our friends knew about us, and were happy for us, I didn’t want to answer any of those questions. I still thought of my time with Noah as something just between him and me, an escape I’d taken from my regular life. Except that now, somehow, it was going to become my regular life.
Because Noah was standing in front of me, right now, crowding me back against the bathroom counter. He was very real. I’d just kissed him in front of everyone. And I still didn’t know how we were going to navigate our relationship from this point on.
Noah didn’t seem to be thinking about that. He’d taken his coat off and I was struck again, for the thousandth time, of the effect he always had on me when he was close, when his body was near mine. Even with clothes on, it was electric, making my blood hum in my veins. Naked, he made me mindless. And I was going to experience that again, because once we left here, Noah and I were going to be naked again very soon.
I could hear talking and laughing outside the door. Everyone was sitting down to dinner. I forgot about food as Noah pressed his hips to mine and kissed me, long and deep. I leaned up into him as if I needed air. His beard rasping against my skin made me throb with need. I tasted him and nipped his bottom lip.
His hands moved under my sweater, then stopped in surprise. “Emma. You aren’t wearing a bra.”
“I know,” I said. “I forgot it.”
“You forgot it?”
“I’ve been distracted lately.”
“Well, it’s fucking hot.” His hands moved over my breasts in the way I loved so much, the way I remembered. Sensation pulsed through my body and I kissed him again.
“Say something dirty,” I said, because it had been far too long without his sexy voice saying filth in my ear.
Noah sucked on my neck softly, enough to make me squirm against him. Then he said low in my ear, “I want your mouth on my cock. I’ve thought about it every fucking day since you left. I remember it every time I take a shower.” His hands moved to the buttons of my jeans, undoing them. “Then I remember what you taste like, the sounds you make when you come on my mouth. Then I remember what it feels like to be inside here.” His expert hand slid into my panties, his fingers stroking me, sliding through my wetness. “You’ve been torturing me from the other side of the country.”
I gripped his shoulders and felt my skin flush as he stroked me. I needed to ask Noah to say filthy things more often. He was very good at it. Still, I tried to keep my head. “We can’t do this in here,” I said.
“What? Fuck?” Noah pressed a finger inside me, and I squirmed. “I bet we could be quick and quiet and no one would know.”
A fist pounded on the door outside. “Hey!” It was Alex’s voice. “Are you two fucking in there? Knock it off.”
Noah smiled against my skin, laughing softly as I shouted, “We’ll be out in a minute!” in a voice that probably sounded like I was halfway to an orgasm. He slid his hand—somewhat reluctantly—out of my jeans and slowly rebuttoned them. “Fine,” he said, his voice a little raspy.
“We need to talk,” I said.
“Yeah, we do. You go first.”
“Fine. Why are you here?”
“To see you,” he said. “I was going to avoid you, and I thought you wanted to avoid me, and then I thought, fuck it. I don’t want to avoid you. I’m miserable without you. I figured if you don’t feel the same, you could just tell me to get lost. At least then I’d know.”
I swallowed. Why was my heart squeezing? He put things so simply, so logically, and yet I knew he felt every word. “I’ve been miserable, too.”
“Good.” He kissed the corner of my mouth. “I’m glad you’ve been miserable, and I’m not going to apologize for it.”
“I haven’t wanted to work,” I said, the words tumbling out. “I’ve been watching Netflix, when before I forgot I had a subscription. I even watched Chinatown, like you said I should. I’m wearing jeans.”
“You look incredibly sexy in jeans.”
Oh, this man. “We haven’t fixed anything,” I said, trying to quell the beat of panic in my chest. “I’m glad you’re here, but we live on opposite coasts and we have no plan.”
Noah ran a hand through his hair, his expression serious. His coming here might have been impulsive, but I knew from that look that he’d actually thought things through. Anyone who assumed Noah Pearson was flaky, I thought, was a fool.
“Aidan wants to consolidate Tower,” he said. “With Dane gone, we can’t handle as much. His idea is to close the Dallas office and move Alex to New York.”
I blinked at him. Samantha had said nothing to me about this.
“I’m going to propose an alternate idea,” Noah said. “We shift Alex to L.A. and I come to New York.”
I couldn’t think of a single thing to say. My throat had closed and my mind had gone completely blank.
“It makes the most sense,” Noah continued. “I could still do entertainment deals here, and Alex can still work some of the Texas stuff from California. The only problem is that it has to wait until after Alex takes his vacation. He’s leaving soon and taking a month off. So we’ll be long distance for a while. I’ll visit as often as I can.”
I finally found my words. “You’d do that? Give up your life in California? Your house?”
Noah’s eyes met mine. “Well, I’d keep the house. We can stay there when we visit. But my life, yes. I’d do that.”
“You have friends there.” My voice was wobbling. “You know so many people. There are businesses you’ve helped build that rely on you. You can’t leave.”
“I can’t leave you,” Noah said. “So yes, I can leave all of that.”
“No.” My voice was stronger now. Something about this idea sat wrong with me, so wrong I almost panicked. Noah belonged in L.A. He simply did. “You can’t move. I won’t let you.”
“Emma, you’re not leaving Executive Ranks. That company is part of you. It’s yours.”
“I know.” Things were shifting, moving in my mind. Realigning. I should be drawing a line, deciding that this relationship was impossible and not worth the effort. I should be bailing out.
But that possibility didn’t even cross my mind. I was in—all the way in. This was worth figuring out. And between us, Noah and I could do it. Whatever it took to keep him, I wanted to try.
I reached up and brushed my fingers over his beard, running my thumbs over his jaw and his cheekbones. I pulled him down to me and kissed him again, feeling everything settle within me. The certainty, the anticipation, and yes, the love. I really, really loved this man. And when a Boss Bitch falls in love, she fights for it with everything she’s got.
I broke the kiss and looked into his eyes. “Don’t worry,” I said.
The corners of his eyes crinkled. “Why not?”
I felt myself smiling back. “Because I have an idea.”