Chapter 23
Noelle
Was he asking me to stay? Or checking my schedule to see how long we could keep seeing each other? Because I wanted to keep seeing him. I already craved more. But I couldn’t think past today or maybe tomorrow.
“I don’t know,” I said. “I’m waiting to hear from my friend Grace. She’s organizing our next gig. I just… go along.”
The way he looked at me made my insides twist into a knot. “You don’t see a future for yourself on dry land?”
Thinking about staying felt like cracking open a heavy door that hadn’t been opened in a long time. If I stopped moving, if I started building something here so close to Bangor, word would eventually get out. Spencer would find me, and I’d have to face everything I’d left behind.
“Do we have to talk about the future?”
He shrugged. “I guess it’ll happen, whether we talk about it or not.”
“Exactly. We might as well enjoy life and…” My gaze dropped to his crotch. “Each other?”
“So we’re together?” He sounded a little wounded. Worried.
“You want to be together?” I looked at him in disbelief.
This man had become my reluctant helper and landlord. And now he wanted a relationship?
He huffed, frustrated. “Yes! I want to be with you, Noelle. Exclusively. Am I not being clear?”
“Not… publicly, though?” I clarified.
He looked conflicted. “I don’t like the town knowing my business, if that’s what you mean. But that won’t stop me from dating you.”
“Maybe we can be together on the down-low?”
“I don’t think you can do anything on the down-low.” A smile warmed his face, and his eyes crinkled at the corners. “And I love that about you.”
It was true. I stood out everywhere I went like a multicolored sore thumb.
I tried to laugh. “Yeah, I’m working on that.” I climbed down the steps. “I need a shower.”
“Go ahead.” He nodded, casting one last look. A weighted one that made my stomach swoop.
I showered, washing my hair with peppermint shampoo I found.
I got dressed while Fredrik showered, grateful that I’d managed to pack a change of clothes in the middle of the night.
Feeling fresh and relaxed in flowy terracotta pants and a green sweater, I waited for him, combing my unruly hair with my fingers.
Our heads wrapped in towels, we crossed the backyard and went back to his house.
Fredrik restarted the fire while I made us coffee and searched his pantry for anything to go with it.
I found crackers and carried everything to the coffee table in front of the fire.
“You have to tell me if this is not okay,” I said.
“I’m walking around your house, sticking my head into places…
making coffee and eating your stuff. I’m not a very good houseguest. I tend to forget my place.
I’m nosy and I want to feel useful. Or maybe I’m just impatient.
I don’t know. But I’m not good at sitting and waiting and not touching anything.
” My words tumbled out, my stomach unsettled.
He huffed a sad laugh, closing the fireplace doors. “Does that mean you feel at home? Because that’s great. It took me a long time to feel at home here. This was always Glenn’s house, and I felt like I was housesitting.”
I pulled a face, sipping my coffee. “I don’t feel at home anywhere. I’ve never owned a house, so I don’t know how it feels, but in my imagination, it’s this grand feeling. Like you’re a little bigger than someone without a house. Because your house is an extension of you or something.”
He laughed for real now. “The only thing grand about owning a house is the amount of mental energy and money it sucks out of you. Renovating it. Maintaining it. Worrying about anything that might make it depreciate.”
I sighed, looking up at the ceiling. “It’s so beautiful, though! Everything you’ve done in here… your uncle would be so proud.”
“It’s taken me embarrassingly long. I couldn’t choose the materials. Or colors. Or anything.” He looked away. “Jackson’s been helping, but even he gave up on me at some point. And then…”
“Then what?”
“Then I met you. And we finally finished my bathroom.”
What?
I sat up, spilling a little coffee on my pants. “You mean the downstairs one with the green tile? The most gorgeous bathroom I’ve ever seen?”
“You like it?” He joined me on the couch, sitting down slowly as he studied my face, as if to see if I was telling the truth.
I sighed. “I’m not being nice! I love that bathroom. The one upside of not having a filter is that I’m pretty honest.”
“Honesty is underrated,” he said.
I nuzzled into his side, and he wrapped his arm around me. I felt so safe and relaxed. “Can we stay here all day? Just you and me and the fire?”
He kissed the top of my head. “You can stay as long as you’d like.”
Would I be safe right here, with him? Fredrik was a recluse. Who would think of looking for me in this house?
My heart swelling, I climbed onto his lap to straddle him.
He kissed me back, running his fingers up my back.
I felt his erection between my legs and shivered.
He was so good to me. So attentive. Spencer hadn’t been a terrible lover, but I’d never wanted him like that.
I’d been performing in the bedroom, just like I’d performed for his friends and family.
“I never thought I was that sexual,” I said, a little dazed. “I don’t usually want it. I have to really focus to get myself in the mood, you know?”
He tilted his head. “With Spencer, you mean?”
“Yeah,” I admitted. “I always felt bad that I couldn’t be as seductive as he hoped. I’m so spontaneous, and he used to say I should save it for the bedroom. But then I’d feel a bit distant and weird, and I had to… fake it.”
Fredrik froze, frowning at me. I tried to kiss him again, but he grabbed my face between his hands. “I know this sounds disingenuous, especially from another guy who’s sleeping with you, but your ex is a piece of shit.”
“It’s true, though. I’m not spontaneous in the bedroom.”
“You just seduced me in the sauna, and I’m currently rock hard because you climbed on my lap on the couch in the middle of a serious conversation. So I respectfully disagree.”
I smiled at the evidence he laid out. “Of course! We just met. It’s all new and hot. But you’ll see I’m not… good at it.”
“What do you think I’m expecting? And I’m terrible at dirty talk. I can’t even flirt. I have no moves.”
I drew back, peering at him in confusion. “But you gave me those orgasms! You knew exactly what to do.”
He was trying not to look too pleased. “I collect a lot of trivia. Some of it is sex-related.”
I stared at him in awe. “You’ve learned about female pleasure from books, haven’t you?”
His gaze flicked sideways. “I may have picked up some of those medical romance novels. They’re very detailed.”
“Oh my God!” I clasped my mouth.
He didn’t seem embarrassed, stroking my hair away from my face, his gaze soft and discerning. “How was your first time with Spencer?”
“I… was drunk,” I confessed. “I wasn’t brave enough to go near him, so my friend kept buying drinks. I was impulsive, even forward, but I didn’t enjoy it. It’s never that much fun when you’re wasted.”
It had been another performance. My audition, more accurately. With Fredrik, I didn’t feel like that. I was finally connected to my own body, not using it to win someone’s approval.
“I wouldn’t feel like sleeping with someone either if I were constantly scrutinized,” he murmured, kissing my neck. “You can’t love someone unless you accept who they are. The only person you can change is yourself, and even that’s a tall order.”
His words relaxed me further, and I melted into his touch. It felt so good. So reverent. Like he was in awe of me, mesmerized by every detail, with no judgment. No expectations. And it was the hottest thing I’d ever experienced.
I peeled off my shirt and tank top, throwing them on the couch. He unhooked my bra and ran his hands over me, groaning. “There’s nothing wrong with you, Noelle. Nothing.” His voice was husky, and it pooled more heat into my core.
My clit throbbed in anticipation. He might not have been talking dirty, but he was giving me words I desperately needed. Fredrik drew me closer, pinching my nipple between his lips. Starbursts erupted through me, and I rocked against him.
Somehow, we shifted from an upright to a horizontal position, with me lying underneath him on the couch. I fought to get rid of my pants, then my underwear.
“I’m completely nude. In your house,” I said, biting back a nervous laugh. “On your couch.”
He pulled back, as if noticing the same thing. “So you are!”
“I don’t know why I’m laughing, sorry. It’s just weird.”
“Bad weird? Because this is hands down the hottest thing that’s ever happened in this house. Ever.”
“How would you know? Maybe they had orgies in here.”
He lowered down to kiss my stomach. “Unlikely. But even if they did, it wouldn’t be as hot as this.” He ran his tongue down my body. “I’m completely drunk on you, Noelle. I’ve lost all control.”
My body responded before my mind even caught up to his words, launching fireworks on every point of contact.
His thumbs massaged my thighs as his tongue circled me, teasing and building pressure.
I wasn’t performing for anyone. I was floating in my little bubble, high on his acceptance, free to focus on every sensation.
I felt him there with every breath, kiss, and touch, but he’d stepped into a role that required nothing of me.
I tilted my hips, moving with him, riding the wave of pleasure, making incoherent noises he matched with his groans.
When he sensed me getting closer, he pulled back, holding his breath. I was so desperate for him that I nearly learned to levitate. “Please, Fredrik.”
He caught my clit with his tongue, and my vision exploded with sparkles. I came apart, shaking against his mouth. Time stopped, and the world vanished for a moment, gifting me a delicious, floating fall, like a snowflake drifting through the sky.
I opened my eyes to his smiling face. My grumpy guy was grinning, watching me. “I love seeing you come,” he said matter-of-factly. “I think it’s my favorite thing.”
I laughed. “It’s my favorite thing, too. You wanna see it again?”
I’d never felt this sensitive. This charged.
It was a little foreign, but too good to pass up.
I pulled him closer, and he yanked down his jeans, finally as naked as I was.
The fire crackled behind the glass doors, filling the room with its warm glow.
When he filled me, I cried out, my nails digging into his arms as I held on.
“You want on top?” he asked. “I don’t mind.”
“Maybe,” I said. “But I’m so close I—”
It had never happened to me. I’d never come like this, trapped under someone. But I was too far gone. Too sensitive. Maybe we’d both planned to last a little longer, but it wasn’t in the cards. I felt him pumping inside me as my body took over in the sweetest release, shaking from head to toe.
“You took me with you,” he whispered as we caught our breath. “Next time, I’ll last longer.”
“It was perfect,” I said, still riding the high, my body limp and tender. “I don’t like the performance game. How long you’re supposed to last or what you’re supposed to sound like.”
“You’re right.” He kissed my shoulder, still inside me. “Let’s not do that. Next time, I’ll sound like a foghorn as I come in my pants.”
I chuckled. “Sounds great.”
“As long as there’s a next time.” His voice was thick and tender, and it shot a little arrow straight into my heart.
“We have time,” I said gently. I couldn’t promise anything more.
He rose onto his forearms, looking at me. His eyes were the softest I’d ever seen, his voice so vulnerable it sent instant shivers through me. “Noelle. I’m falling for you.”
I held my breath against a cocktail of emotions swirling like a sugar-rimmed tornado. Love and desire. Fear and doubt. And an overwhelming sense that everything was about to change.