Chapter Fourteen
Noble
“Are you sure?” I said, meeting Oren at the side door to my apartment. He insisted on coming up. His arm was behind his back, but my senses picked up on the scent of tulips. The alpha brought me tulips.
He’d seen all of me and was bringing me flowers. Oren was one of a kind.
“Am I sure? About what?”
I felt myself smiling. I did that a lot around him. It felt silly. I did it anyway.
“About this date? About me…out…in public.”
He brought his arm around and showed me the most beautiful bunch of tulips wrapped in brown paper with a simple white ribbon tied around them that set off the bold yellow color.
“They said yellow represented friendship but the red ones didn’t look so hot, so I thought nice yellow ones instead of crappy red ones but there’s nothing friendship about it. Well, some of it. I’m rambling.”
I took the tulips from his hand and brought them to my nose, trying to brand this moment into my brain. Tonight might go ass-up, but I would keep these tender moments close to my heart.
“And about you?” He shook his head, and I thought he might have changed his mind. My heart plummeted down into my stomach as I held my breath. “I am honored to have you with me tonight. You are beautiful, Noble.”
My turn to shake my head. “But…”
“But nothing, omega. You are beautiful and gorgeous, and I’m gonna keep telling you that until you believe it. Because it’s true. Yes, you have some scars, but who doesn’t? Yours are just on the outside. It doesn’t change who you are.”
This alpha got better and better by the minute.
“I’ll try,” I said. “I’ll put these inside, and we can go. If you’re ready?”
Oren smiled, but a low growl came from the center of his chest. “If we don’t leave now, I might ask to come in, and we might not ever leave.”
A thrill shot through me. Saying I was beautiful was one thing. A good thing even though I couldn’t completely comprehend it. But lust? Wanting me? This tall, incredible alpha wanted me?
“Oh. Then we’d better leave. What kind of omega do you think I am?”
“The kind I want to do things right with. The kind I want to court and get to know better. The kind I can see myself with for a long time. Come on. I’m getting sappy.”
A half hour later, we were at a restaurant I’d drooled over from the window. I passed it a few times on my way to the grocery store but knew by the elegant china and glassware and white tablecloths that it was out of my budget.
“I’ve been wanting to come here,” I said as Oren came over to open my door. He insisted.
“I’ve never been here either. Seemed like a date spot. I’m glad you’re with me.”
We went in and were seated in the window. I cringed thinking about how people would pass and stare. Oren must’ve noticed.
“Noble, focus on me. Because tonight, there’s no one around but you for me. I want to know everything.”
I let out a laugh. “Everything? That’s a lot for dinner.”
He winked at me and while I’d been winked at before, back in the day, this one made me melt.
Time to face some things. My animal knew Oren was ours.
Our mate. Our alpha. The one we were supposed to belong to.
To love. No matter what I looked like. Fate choosing my mate was hard enough to wrap my head around, but the fact that he was clearly choosing me despite my appearance… Oren was surely imaginary.
What a great fantasy to live in.
I took a breath and decided to face the hardest subject. To get it out of the way. He wanted to know everything.
He might regret that.
“Are you wanting to know how all of this happened to me?” I asked after the wine was delivered to the table. Because my story demanded wine. At least, from my perspective.
“If you trust me with it. If you’re not ready, then I can wait. I’m a patient man.”
“Are you?” I teased, rubbing his foot with mine under the table.
The controlled and serious alpha choked on his wine. “I-I thought I was until you.”
I took a deep breath. Revisiting the accident was hard. “My partner and I were at a schmoozing party, that was what he called it. A networking opportunity for models and agents and photographers. Neither my partner nor I ate very much, normal for us. Skinny was in. Still is in that world.”
Oren reached across the table and took my hand, signaling me to pause while the waitress approached.
He understood my story was private and something I didn’t share with just anyone.
The touch was endearing. We ordered our food and, once we were mostly alone again, he rubbed his thumb over my palm. “Do you want to continue?”
I nodded even though my stomach revolted a bit.
“He drank too much that night. He said it was because I wasn’t being social enough.
My fault. My career depended on me talking to everyone and being positive.
He claimed I was so negative and was sabotaging our future.
I was modeling for brand names, had done Paris Fashion/week twice, and was invited to several Milan shows.
It didn’t matter. Nothing I ever did was good enough.
” I took a breath. “He was really drunk but wouldn’t give me the keys.
I should’ve called an Uber or taken a cab.
At least not gotten in the car, but I was stupid.
Two blocks away from the party, we wrapped around a pole and the car caught fire.
Not sure why it did, but I will never forget the searing agony of the flames burning my skin.
Screaming for him not to leave me there to die.
He abandoned me. In the fire. He escaped with a concussion and some broken ribs, but my seat belt was stuck and the only reason I got out at all was a passing driver stopped and saved me.
But not fast enough to avoid…” I ran a finger down my face and neck.
I didn’t cry. Amazing. Maybe Oren gave me the courage.
“I’m so sorry that happened to you, Noble. You deserved better from a partner and from this life.”
When I’d told the story before, to the firefighters and EMTs, to the police…
the insurance adjuster…I’d cried every time.
Humiliating, but the words were enough to fling me back into that conflagration, to feel the searing licks of flames and the hopelessness as the man I thought loved me ran for his life. Not that I was a saint…
“I was a different person, Oren. I was mean and shallow and judgmental. I valued things that don’t matter. Treated myself and others like garbage.”
He scoffed. “Would you have left your worst enemy in that car and saved your own skin?”
“Never.”
“Then why in the name of the goddess would you think it was punishment for you. We have all been judgmental, shallow, mean, even angry. I’m an attorney. Have you heard all the jokes? Like what do you call a hundred drowned attorneys? A good start?”
“All lawyers can’t be that bad. You’re not.”
“I hope not. Most of those I work with are not. But all people have faults of one kind or another. I’ve been too focused on the storing up money for some future time, to look around and appreciate what’s right in front of me.
All of those things you mention make you human, not a target.
And if I see your partner on the street, he’s going to wish he walked a different way. ”
I let out a laugh. “He is too horrible for your anger, Oren.”
“Maybe so. I’m glad of one thing.”
“What is that?”
“Without life’s troubles, we might not have found each other, Noble. I might have missed out on my fated mate.”
I sucked in a breath. I wasn’t the only one. Not my imagination.
“You really think it’s true?” I had to confirm.
“I’ve known it since the first moment I saw you.”