59. Noah
“You’re not supposed to be here.” Ms. Annie met me at the front desk, her raspy voice strained in a higher pitch as she glared at me.
“Greyson got you working security now?”
Unamused, she stood in my way, arms folded across her chest.
“Come on, Ms. Annie. I’m not here to work. I’m here to talk to my parents.”
After everything that happened this weekend, I woke up this morning and decided I didn’t want to walk on eggshells anymore.
Ms. Annie looked surprised but moved out of my way and fell in step beside me. “It’s about time. You know, your mother has worked my last nerve since they checked in. And your father…do you know he requested eggs Benedict this morning and then when it was brought out to him, he sent it back and said he meant Florentine instead? I swear, every day it’s something different and it’s only been four days!”
She didn’t stop talking until we were standing outside of suite 14. Now I wished I had let Greyson cancel their reservation when he offered.
“Sorry about that, Ms. Annie.” I bent to kiss her cheek.
“Oh, it ain’t your fault.” She pinched my cheek and her kind eyes wrinkled at the corners when she smiled at me. “I’ll be in the lobby if you need anything. Come see me before you leave, I need to know what’s going on with Duchess and that pretty lady you had in here Friday morning.”
She walked away and the smile on my lips fell when I knocked on my parents’ door.
My mother’s voice was the first one I heard. “Oh, Michael, I think it’s finally housekeeping with those extra towels we asked for at breakfast.”
The heavy oak door eased open and my mother’s shocked face stared up at me.
“Hey, mom.”
All her attention was on my mouth as she squinted. “Oh, thank God, you took them diamonds outta your mouth.” She eyed me warily. “You look so much better.”
No good morning . No how are you? Nothing .
I was used to it, but it was always a mind fuck realizing they would rather pick me apart than love me.
The truth was that I left the house too fast to remember my golds. But the urge to explain that to her never came, so I let her words slide. Even when she looked triumphant.
My father barreled around the corner before she could find something else on me she didn’t like. He gave me one look and cut his eyes at me as I closed the door behind me.
“I’ve been trying to call you since Friday night, but it keeps going straight to voicemail. I wanted to talk to you about that… woman . I don’t know who she is, but you were right for getting her in check. A woman like that doesn’t deserve?—”
“Shut the fuck up about True.” That wasn’t how I planned to start this talk, but I wasn’t letting shit slide when it came to True.
“Noah Isaiah Hunt!” my mother screeched at me while my father’s face turned to stone.
“I see you still ain’t found your sense,” he roared, but the extra bass in his voice didn’t do anything but make me laugh.
I couldn’t believe I wanted this man to accept me so much that I used to let him talk crazy to me whenever he wanted.
“I’m fine , dad. Not that either one of y’all asked before you started talking at me. Do y’all ever get tired of hearing yourself talk?”
I held up my hand when my mother started sputtering, her expression vexed.
“Don’t answer that. Matter of fact, don’t say shit to me at all. I just came here to tell you I’m done. I been passive with y’all for so long that you think this shit is normal and I’m telling you it’s not. I don’t care if you like me. I don’t care if you accept what I do for a living. I don’t care if you think I’m too soft, too freaky, too anything. Because I’m not trying to make anybody happy but myself. Whether you like that or not, it ain’t changing anything.”
I watched their faces fall as my words sank in.
“Your calls keep going to voicemail because you’re blocked now. I’m not giving you a pass to harass the fuck outta me anymore and call it love. I used to be too scared to call you on your shit because I didn’t want to burn bridges. It was never about burning bridges though; you just wanted me to think I would need you again. I’m good on that.”
My dad stuffed his hands in his pockets, his narrowed gaze full of judgment.
“It’s always been wrong for me to be myself around you, and I didn’t know that wasn’t normal until I got around people that gave a fuck about me.”
Greyson. His family. True. Her grandparents. Ms. Annie.
None of them ever told me I was too much or that I should be different than exactly who I was.
“Look, I get that I’m sensitive and you don’t like that. But I can’t help it. I don’t wanna help it. And the people meant for me don’t make it feel like a chore to love me.” I focused on my dad who was still standing there with a scowl. “I should have let True say so much more to you, but I was too caught up on how you’d retaliate against me that I let my pride get in the way of a woman who fucking adores me. She was defending me like you should have my whole life.”
I shook my head, a slow smile tugging at my lips.
“I love True. I am so fucking in love with her. And Greyson, too. I love him like he’s a part of me. He is a part of me. They both are. We’re all together, and it wasn’t planned but it’s perfect. I’m going to make a family with them, and they never make me second guess whether I’m doing something wrong just because my brain works differently or because I show my emotions in a way that might not be convenient. I don’t need you to understand or accept it, I’m just telling you what it is.” I backed toward the door, putting space between us before I said, “Go back to Charlotte. Sell your cars, love your wife and leave me the hell alone.”
I grabbed the knob but stopped and added another thing. The final thing.
“And stop asking Lottie about me. If you can’t talk to her without bringing me up, then maybe y’all ain’t got shit to talk about.”
They stood there with matching heat in their gazes that made me smile as I dipped out into the hall and ran right into…Greyson?
He recovered from the collision quickly, rubbing the back of his neck as he pretended to study the wood beam above us.
“Grey, what you doing out here?”
Dropping the act, he turned to face me and pushed his glasses up his nose. “Ms. Annie said you were up here, and I thought you needed me.”
He kept running a hand over his brow like he knew they were giving away how worried he looked.
“I took care of it.” I couldn’t keep the smile off my face when his shoulders slumped from relief.
“Yea?”
“Yea, Grey. I’m good.”
“You don’t need me?”
I grabbed his tie, coaxing him closer. Our lips were a breath apart when I said, “I’ll always need you. Just not for that.”
He nodded, his throat flexing with a hard swallow. “Okay.”
“I’ll see you at home,” I promised, kissing him before I pulled away and turned to go down the hall.
“Noah,” Greyson’s deep voice called when I was only a few steps away. He used his hold on my hand to tug me back to him easily. “I’m in love with you too.” His intense stare made my heart skip a beat. “I love you too.”
All my words left me, so I just stared at him, hoping my ears weren’t broken.
I’m in love with you too.
I love you too.
He had a tight hold on the back of my neck, pressing his forehead against mine. “My bad for eavesdropping, but I don’t wanna pretend I didn’t hear that.”
“You really got a thing for making confessions in hallways, Grey.”
He smiled against my lips and kissed me, hard and fast, pulling away before we could get lost in it.
Still holding me against him, he echoed my earlier words. “I’ll see you at home.”