Chapter 32
NOAH
It ended up taking several days for Torin to finish his vase project, and he invited me to hang out with him each time he went up to the attic studio.
For a whole host of reasons, the biggest one being my need to avoid hard conversations with Minho, I accepted and became a temporary fixture in Torin’s studio while he worked.
In fairness, I took my laptop and worked on cutting together some of my own content from previously filmed stunts, and he spent a good amount of time working silently with music playing over the speakers, but it was a comfortable environment.
Once the vase was glazed and fired, I helped him edit all the timelapsed footage into several Bytes, which ended with a showcase of the finished piece.
“You’re really talented, Tor,” I told him as he packed up his supplies and cleaned his work area. “I admit I kind of thought the worst of you—of all of you—before joining the team, but I’m a big enough person to admit when I’m wrong.”
He arched a brow at me, his muscles rippling as he cleaned his work station down.
He’d taken his shirt off for the content and just hadn’t put it back on, which really shouldn’t be as distracting as it was, had I actually been a dude.
But I wasn’t, and Tor was sexy as hell, so I’d been fighting the urge to drool constantly.
“The worst?” he asked, tossing his cloth into the little sink at the side of the studio. “How so?”
I huffed a short sigh, feeling like an asshole. “That you all gained your followers with cheap tricks and thirst traps. That you wouldn’t have had the same success without…you know…” I gestured to his gorgeous body and prayed my face wasn’t blushing.
A slight smile tugged at Torin’s lips, and he shook his head slowly. “I don’t know. Without what, Short Stack?”
I rolled my eyes at his feigned ignorance. “Don’t be coy, Torin, you know what I mean. Team Olympus is kind of known for the shirtless content, but you are genuinely mesmerizing to watch creating art. Even with a shirt on.”
His brows both shifted up in surprise. “Mesmerizing, huh?”
Fuck, is that what I said? “Uh, in an art-appreciation kind of way,” I quickly mumbled, gathering up my stuff and heading for the door. “Thanks for letting me hang out, Tor. It’s been fun.”
“Anytime, Noah,” he replied, but I was already beating a quick escape before I could embarrass myself further. I dropped off my laptop in my room, then headed out to the backyard to spend the rest of the afternoon playing with Skye’s tracking drones on the cliff-drop trampoline.
It was exactly what I needed, a healthy dose of adrenaline to balance my frazzled nerves and mixed-up emotions. Even better when Skye came out to join me and we made a game of how many funny poses we could strike in the air after rebounding on the trampoline.
At some point August and Z arrived to watch and cheer, scoring us out of ten for each bounce. They whooped and hollered for the good ones and booed dramatically for the shit ones.
Eventually Skye and I were out of breath and sweaty, collapsing on the grass at the top of the cliff beside our cheer squad.
“Sick,” Skye murmured, lying on his stomach and scrolling some of the footage on the drone camera. “There’s some gold here. Want me to ask Ace to edit?”
I bit my lip, unsure. I’d always edited my own clips, but that was largely due to the secret nature of my platform. Ace was good at it, though, and I could admit it wasn’t my favorite job. If I didn’t like what he put together, I could just do it myself, right?
“Okay, sure. Thanks,” I replied after my moment of reflection.
“Ace wants to see us inside anyway,” Z announced, checking his phone. “Leight’s here to discuss episode content.”
I groaned, burying my face in my hands. “I really hate that guy.”
“You’re not alone,” August muttered as he pushed to his feet and offered Skye his hand to get up. “But he basically created the team, so we don’t have much choice.”
“He means well,” Z protested, grabbing my wrists to pull me up to my feet. “He always has the team’s success as his top priority.”
“Yeah, because that’s how he gets paid,” I shot back cynically.
Z just shrugged. “Mutually beneficial arrangement. Besides, he’s all bark and no bite once you get used to him.”
Sweat dripped down my spine as we approached the house, and I slipped away for a lightning-fast shower, promising to meet the team in the living room.
I rinsed off quickly, then dressed in fresh clothes—and a fresh binder—before exiting the bathroom and nearly jumping out of my skin when I found Minho sitting on the end of my bed.
Thank fuck I’d taken my clothes into the bathroom to dress.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you, Chicken,” he said with a small frown on his pretty face. His black hair was down and messy, falling softly around his face like a shadow. “Are you avoiding me?”
I wet my lips, drawing a shaking breath. “Yes,” I admitted honestly.
His frown deepened. “Because of what happened the other night?”
“Yeah,” I confirmed, giving a small nod.
His dark eyes locked on mine, and genuine sadness seemed to hit me like a sucker punch, then he pushed to his feet abruptly. “I see. I should go—”
“Min, wait.” I darted over to grab his arm before he could leave the room, stopping him. “I didn’t mean—I just can’t—”
Words were failing me, and panic was rising in my chest at the thought of hurting him. But guilt damn near choked me out when I thought about how I was deceiving him.
“No, you’re fine,” he quickly said, forcing a tight smile. “I thought maybe we were on the same page because you definitely kissed me back…but maybe I misunderstood.”
“You didn’t,” I said in a small voice before I could stop myself, my hand slipping from his forearm to his hand, and he interlaced our fingers together like it was an unconscious reflex. “But we can’t—”
I didn’t get any more words out because his other hand was at the base of my skull, tilting my head back as his lips met mine in a bruising kiss. A shocked moan slipped out of me, but my whole body reacted exactly as it had the other night, like we were magnets.
Powerless to resist, I gripped the front of his shirt in my free hand and kissed him back, parting my lips to let him in and drinking down the heady waves of euphoria that were fast becoming as addictive as adrenaline.
“Noah,” he growled when I bit his lower lip like I’d been dreaming about doing for far too long. “I need—”
Shit. We couldn’t do this. I couldn’t do this.
It wasn’t fair. “Minnie, I need to tell you something,” I blurted out in a hurry, attempting to put some distance between us and failing miserably, because somehow his lips were on my throat and holy shit it felt good as he kissed the sensitive spot just above my T-shirt collar.
“You can tell me anything, Chicken,” he murmured against my skin. “It won’t change how I feel about you.”
But it would. There’s no way it wouldn’t. I’d lied and deceived them all, and now I was fucking with Minnie’s heart.
“Noah! Minho!” Ace called out from somewhere down the hall, “Hurry the fuck up! We’re waiting on you!”
Crap. The meeting with Leight.
“Damn it,” Minho groaned, burying his face in my neck and dragging me into a tight hug. “I want to continue this later, okay?”
I gave a noncommittal hum, knowing full fucking well I’d lose my nerve again later. Maybe I needed to start drinking alcohol with the guys? Nah, that was a recipe for disaster. I’d probably end up confessing feelings to more than just Minnie and destroy the whole fucking team.
“We should go,” I muttered, peeling myself out of his hold with reluctance, licking my lips and wondering how obvious it was that we’d been kissing. What would the other guys think? Torin had been weird about it…
Minho kept hold of my hand as we left the room and tightened his grip when I tried to tug free before reaching the living room.
It was harmless enough, seeing as how affectionate he was in general, but when we sat down on the sofa he hooked his leg over mine in what could easily be interpreted as a possessive move.
Torin met my eyes with a curious look, his brows lifted, but I ducked my gaze away before I could blush. Fucking Minho didn’t seem to care if anyone guessed what we’d been doing, and I didn’t know what to make of that.
“Good of you both to join us,” Mr. Leight said with a dry tone as he dragged over a dining chair to sit in. “I trust you all saw the episode that went live last night?”
I wrinkled my nose because I hadn’t watched it yet. Considering how often Xavier and I had both disabled our microphones, I figured there wouldn’t be much footage of us to cut in anyway. None of the guys had said much about it this morning, either, so maybe I wasn’t the only one.
“Yeah, what about it?” Minho asked, releasing my hand and draping his arm along the back of the sofa so the tips of his fingers brushed my shoulder. It was a tiny gesture but incredibly distracting.
Ace shot us a sharp look, and my stomach turned cold. Does he suspect?
“Initial public response has come back with a surprising result,” our team leader informed us in a quietly thoughtful voice. “I’m assuming you haven’t looked at the comments, Eight?”
I wet my lips, suddenly nervous. Why was it me under the spotlight again? I’d done what he asked and worked with Xavier, so what was the problem now?
“No, I was helping Tor this morning,” I murmured. “Why?”
Ace held my gaze steady with his ice-blue eyes unreadable.
“Fans have responded really well to the teamwork between you and Xavier,” he said, then glanced from me to Xavier and frowned.
“In fact, the response has been more positive than anticipated, since we all know you disconnected your mics so you could trade insults the whole time.”
Xavier shot me a smirk and I responded with a subtle middle finger as I pretended to scratch my face.