Chapter 51
Lily pulls me into my office the moment I walk through the door. I don’t even have to ask her why. We’ve been friends long enough that I knew when she saw my face, she knew I’d been crying.
She all but forces me into the desk chair, turns and closes the door, then turns back to me.
“Spill it,” she says, her arms folded in front of her.
I can’t even talk.
The tears started in the shower and they haven’t stopped. I hurried out of the hotel room, leaving Noah in bed sleeping because I didn’t want him to see me like this.
Lily leans herself up against my desk. “Em, what happened?”
“I only have a few more hours,” I managed between sobs.
She studies me for a moment and then it sinks in. “Before he leaves?”
I nod, wiping at my eyes, not even caring about the small amount of makeup I’d managed.
“Oh, honey,” Lily says as she rests a hand on my shoulder. “You knew this was coming.”
I nod. Knowing didn’t equate to being ready for it.
“So, go with him.”
I lift my eyes and study her. “What?”
“Seriously, go home with him.”
Now I laugh through sobs. “I can’t leave here.”
“Why not? We’re here.”
That has me rising to my feet and wrapping my arms around her. “I love you.”
She laughs in my arms. “I love you, too. So you’re going?”
I ease back, wipe my tears, and shake my head. “No. But to know you would send me off and take care of everything, that means the world to me.”
“I’m not kidding,” she confirms. “You love the man. So go home with him.”
I cup her face in my hands. “I do love him, but my home is here.”
There is no doubt she’s ready to argue with me over the fact that she didn’t mean leave forever, but her fight is interrupted when the door to my office eases open.
“Am I interrupting?” Noah’s voice threatens to throw me back into a sea of sobs.
Lily grips my wrists and looks me sternly in the eyes as she mouths the word go.
I drop my hands from her face and she stands from her perch at my desk before walking out of the office and closing the door once Noah is inside.
His eyes are on me as I wipe my eyes with the heels of my hands.
“You left without waking me,” he says, and for the first time I realize he’s just rolled out of bed and is now standing in front of me.
Noah moves to me, wrapping me up in his arms.
“I take it you’ve talked to Katie?” he says, his lips pressed against my temple.
That has me easing back. “No. Why would I talk to Katie?”
Noah eases back and drags his hand down his stubbled and weary face, then rakes his fingers through his mussed hair.
“They changed my flight.”
I bat my eyes trying to dry them. “You’re staying longer?” Optimism fills my voice and for the first time since I laid down next to him last night, I feel some hope.
He shakes his head. “Dylan left last night. The production company that has movie rights to one of my books needs a meeting ASAP. I have to head back to New York.”
I purse my lips. “In this day and age you can’t just call in? Zoom?”
Noah gathers my hands in his. “I need to be there, Em.”
I bite down on my bottom lip to keep it from trembling. “I’m not ready.”
“Come with me,” he says, just as Lily had.
I snort out a laugh. “Are you kidding me?”
“No.”
Turning from him, I wipe my eyes. “I can’t just leave. We are right in middle of this.”
He nods. He knows. He understands.
“Come next week. Or the week after.”
I turn back to him, crossing my arms in front of me.
“Noah,” his name comes out as a sign of resignation. Almost as suddenly as the tears had started this morning, my mind is clear. “We live two very different lives. We knew this was temporary.”
His eyes widen and I swear the color has drained from his face.
“What does that mean? I thought?—”
I move to him and gather his hands in mine. “We both know you’ll go home and get busy. You’ll get locked into your life, I’ll get locked back into mine.”
His throat works and his eyes mist.
“I don’t know that at all,” he says, reversing our hands so that he’s holding mine, now pressed between us. “That’s not what I want.”
“Want or not, we know it’s what’s going to happen. We’re both too old to change our ways—to start something new.”
There is a flash in his eyes. I can’t decide if it’s anger or acceptance, but he doesn’t move from me. Instead, he leans in, pressing his forehead to mine.
“We have a few hours,” he whispers.
“We have a few hours,” I agree.
“Then come back to the hotel with me and let’s spend them together.”
Again, I want to argue that I’m too busy, instead, we sneak out the back door and to Noah’s car.
We both climb in, throw on our seatbelts, and Noah starts the car.
We are only moments from our getaway when the back door swings open and Katie and Rachel are standing in the doorway watching us with wide eyes.
“We’ve been caught,” Noah says.
“Shit.”
When Katie puts her fists on her hips, I realize that this moment is over. We can’t just run away from it.
Noah turns off the engine. “Go. I’ll come back.”
“You can’t. You’ll disrupt everything.”
“I’ll come back. I have to leave town by noon,” he says now looking at me. “I’ll be back to say goodbye, but, Em, I won’t be gone forever.”
The tears are back, and I let them fall in front of him. “What—what does that mean?”
“I love you too much to let this be the end of it all. I’ll be back.”
Now Katie is knocking on the hood of the car and Rachel’s eyes are wide.
I don’t know what he’s talking about. I don’t have the mental capacity to take in the angry woman in front of the car and the broken man next to me. I can’t handle all of this and be expected to go back into that store and care about the authors who have their spotlight day today. But I have to.
I unbuckle my seatbelt and turn fully to Noah. “I have to go. You have to go.”
“I’ll come by to say?—”
I shake my head. “No. Don’t come back. I can’t handle you coming back to say goodbye.”
“Then we don’t say it. I’ll be back, Em.”
“Don’t promise me that.” I wipe at my eyes. “We’ll cross paths again, Noah Carter. Just go knowing that I love you, and in these three weeks, you’ve changed my life.”
There is a mask of confusion on his face and it hurts. I move in and press a hard kiss to his lips.
“I love you,” I say again before I push open my door and run past the two women staring at us.
A clean break is the best, right?
Fuck that!