Chapter Thirty Five
I am a grown woman.
Sometimes it's easy to forget that.
When I turned sixteen I felt twenty and as soon as I turned eighteen I felt seventeen again; once I was an actual adult I realised how young adults really are.
But I am grown. I have a degree, I have a job, I (usually) live independently. I may not be the most exciting woman in the world but damn it I'm still a woman.
Matt can smash as many plates as he wants, but that won't change the fact that he doesn't get to make my own decisions for me. He doesn't get to choose who I date or what I do in my free time or when I should convey his very unhinged messages.
He's unhinged.
He's fucking insane.
He thinks he can control any person as long as he pisses them off enough that they follow his every lead.
Maybe that's why Skye still seems to cling to his presence; she knows that he refuses to let her go because of the late night visits to her bedroom. There's an in, so he can't have fully let her go. Stringing her along like he could do it forever.
Get out of my fucking hair.
I need him out of my hair. I need him out of my business and out of my personal space.
As if trying to talk through our problems is that much of a hindrance to him, he'd rather just invite the girl over who decided to ruin our relationship over a couple of extra hours together.
"Ugh," I growl, stomping my feet beneath me.
Noah snorts.
"Still not ready to share?"
"He is infuriating," I spit. "And rude, and so- entitled!"
"Maybe a few more minutes to calm down, then," he teases, stroking my thigh before his hand returns to the steering wheel.
We've been driving around aimlessly for almost ten minutes and I am yet to calm down. I'm not even trying to calm down - if anything, I'm replaying the conversation with Matt over and over in my head and cursing the very day he was born. That's calming.
Calming would be Matt being rightfully upset that we'd kept it from him, but deciding to be a grown up and not trash the kitchen.
There are not enough insulting words in the world to even begin describing his outburst. How is my older brother still the child in our family? The man is an accountant and he can't even settle an argument without smashing a plate.
The window opens a dash when I accidentally lean my elbow on it, a sudden burst of cold air shooting into the car. I jolt in my seat, Noah's hand returning to my thigh once more.
"He is a child," I finally murmur once the window is closed again. "A big man child who you wound up."
Noah just says, "he was already wound up." Which is true, really. But still.
"You made him worse."
"He was going to get worse anyway, love. There's literally nothing we could've said to save him wrecking the place- he'd already decided how the conversation was going to go. I'm not going to beg him to forgive me if he's not in the mindset to listen."
"So you'd rather just piss him off more?" I laugh.
"Makes me feel better," he winks. "We're almost here."
I look around, recognising nothing of the street around us. Red brick residential houses tower over us at either side, the road seeming too small to fit two lanes, yet no traffic comes towards us.
"Where's here?"
Only when we turn a corner do I recognise where we are. The restaurant where his father works, so quaint and pub-like, tucked into the corner of the middle of nowhere.
"We're seriously going to get dinner while Matt rages?"
"What else does he expect us to do? Sit on the driveway and cry?"
I can't help but laugh. He's got a point - Matt is only going to assume that we've done the worst anyway, no matter what we actually do.
The car rolls to a stop in the parking space Noah pulled into. His head drops back to the headrest and rolls towards me as soon as the engine is off, a strange invisible hook pulling at one side of his mouth. I mirror him.
"He'll get over it."
"You've never upset him before, huh?"
It's obvious he hasn't, otherwise he'd be aware that Matthew Grayson is the biggest grudge holder on this entire planet - a month of no contact after that broken PlayStation controller, not to mention the few following months of dirty looks even though our mum replaced it with a brand new one almost immediately.
"This shouldn't upset him. He's being..."
"Stupid?"
"A twat."
"You're a twat," I retort immediately. Noah just laughs. "I can't believe you. I am fucking her, I'd just rather stop hearing about it.In what scenario would that have helped?"
He continues to smile at me. My lips upturn too, despite trying my very best at pretending to be annoyed with him. One chaste kiss and he gets out of the car, opening my door for me and taking my hand to lead me into the restaurant.
Just as last time, he leads me to the farthest booth tucked into the darkest corner, right near the 'STAFF ONLY' door that leads to the kitchen. Each side is wide enough to fit at least three people but he still presses the side of his leg against mine once I take a seat.
"I'd just rather stop hearing about it. My God, Noah."
"It made you laugh, didn't it?"
"I don't find you funny at all," I deadpan.
"Huh."
"Huh?"
"I just wasn't aware you performed stand up comedy, is all."
My stare could burn holes through him, but he's still wearing that signature smirk, looking at his menu as if I hadn't even looked up from my own.
"He's going to hate us forever."
Finally, the menu held between us is closed.
With a gentle voice, he replies, "no, he isn't."
"Shouldn't is not the same as isn't. Just because we don't think it should hurt him doesn't mean it actually doesn't."
"It's very difficult to feel sorry for him after he smashed up half the house and then kicked us out for the evening - and I don't even know what he said to you in private yet, Maddie."
"It wasn't..."
Maybe it was that bad.
I'm not aware that I have Noah's undivided attention until I don't anymore. His eyes drift from mine slowly and settle behind my hair, an even smile gracing his mouth.
A surge of red hot jealously floods my body, erasing every emotion from my face and heating my skin until I'm near ready to burst. Immediately I think the worst. The ex girlfriend, the primary school sweetheart, the one his family always dreamed he'd be with. A hot stranger.
I turn with no intention of being polite or welcoming. half snapping my neck in the process, and am greeted by Noah's mum's gentle wave.
It's difficult to try and calm my erratic heartbeat.
She's wearing the same slicked back bun as when I first met her, with clips holding back the wispy pieces and a dark scrunchy blending into the dark shade of her hair.
Instead of the casual sweats she'd been in before, she now wears overalls similar to Noah's, covered in oil and grime and way too baggy on her lean frame. A mechanic. Of course.
What had I thought? That I'd just start beating up a pretty girl in this pub because Noah smiled at her? Am I seriously that in love with him?
Absolutely unhinged.
"You just missed you dad on his break," she says, sliding into the booth opposite us. "He'll be furious if you don't at least order his tagliatelle." She then turns to me, "He makes a mean bolognese sauce."
"I would never doubt it," I grin.
The pizza we ate the last time we came here almost made me order a second one. Then there's Noah's cooking, which is definitely a testament to how amazing his father's food tastes.
"Is it date night?"
"Just a last minute thing," Noah replies casually. "Join us for dinner mum."
"No, I couldn't-"
"Oh, please do," I request as soon as her eyes flit to me. "You never did finish telling me Noah's terrible teen stories."
From what I recall of our dinner, Alice and Luca had no idea that their son had been taken under the wing of an older criminal. To their knowledge, Noah had just fallen in with the wrong crowd and they desperately kept trying to pull him out of a hole he only kept digging himself deeper into.
The stories were a bit funny though.
Noah coming home, pretending not to be drunk out of his ass.
Skipping school and walking past his mum's garage.
Changing the school phone number to his number so that when they called home with his absence, he could answer the call so his parents wouldn't find out.
(They always found out; Alice was regularly invited into the school to discuss his behaviour.
She's still friends with his form tutor.)
"He was a terror," she grins, eyes flashing. Noah blushes beside me. "It'd take four dinners to make sure we got through it all."
Noah strokes my thigh, head tilting to the bar. "I'll order us some drinks."
His mum eyes us as he squeezes past me and out of the booth, leaning in as soon as he's out of earshot.
"My brother found out," I explain before she can ask. "He... didn't take it well."
"Ah," she winces. "That'll explain Noah's constipated look, then."
A blubbering laugh surfaces, quickly pushed back down when Noah turns back to the two of us, eyebrow raised. The two of us wave in sync.
"Did I ever tell you about the first time he brought that horrible ex girlfriend of his home?"
"No?"
She grins. It's similar to Noah's too - all white teeth and a sinister glint about it. Killer. To bring someone to their knees. For a second I can see her at my age, running the streets of Italy with Luca, giving him that irresistible grin that says chase me back to England.
"My God, I despised her!" She starts, delving into the story.
I eye Noah at the bar, glancing at the menu in his hand as he relays our order to the bartender. Smiling politely, eyes flickering to his mother and I as she chats animatedly about the audacity of Noah's at-the-time girlfriend.
He winks at me and, despite the chaotic events of the evening, life doesn't seem all that bad.
Luca cooks a tagliatelle that has me wanting to undo the top button of my trousers. We eat it animatedly, sharing stories from childhoods, family gatherings and work.
The longer I spend around Alice the more I see her in Noah - same humor, same mannerisms, same obsession with sports cars. She raised a near identical version of herself. She even asks Noah to pop the hood of his BMW before we leave so she can assess his latest work on it.
We're sent on our way with another three servings of pasta and a promise to stop by his parents house in the next few weeks for a catch up on the Matt situation.
The Matt situation.
Honestly, it's been forefront on my mind the entire evening. Through every smile, every laugh at Noah's expense with his mum, I've been thinking of Matt's disappointment when we talked alone earlier.
I've been swaying between sad and angry. Understanding and outraged. Wanting to hug him and cave his bloody head in.
Even some of the best bolognese sauce I've ever eaten couldn't distract my thoughts.
The car bonnet suddenly jolts shut, juddering the car underneath my seat.
I realise I instinctively grabbed my seatbelt at the noise, my fingers white with grip.
I let it go the second Noah smiles at me from in front of the bonnet, eyes flickering between me and his retreating mum, walking to her own car.
Only when she's behind her own steering wheel does he slip into the driver seat, leaning over the console to kiss the side of my head, my ear, then my mouth.
"My mum thinks you're an angel," he grins.
Headlights illuminate the car park, shifting as we pull out of our parking space.
"She wouldn't be far off."
"Marriage material, I believe were her exact words."
A strange pang in my chest. The word marriage, said so soon. We aren't evening dating yet and yet, that word... There's something about that. I can't quite place my finger on it, but I should probably run for the hills if someone I've only been sleeping with for a few months even mutters the word.
Instead of running for the hills, I settle further into my warm seat.
"Oh yeah?"
He turns to me, face stoically serious, before snorting in laughter.
His voice suddenly softer, he breathes, "she said we could stay there, if we needed."
We could stay there. If we needed.
The words circle in my mind. Like we're already a couple, especially in his parents eyes. I don't ever recall Noah asking me to be his girlfriend, no matter how many times I manifested the event.
"We?"
"You and I."
I turn to him with a deadpan stare.
He smiles, making a left turn on the main road without so much as a glance over at me.
"Matt's going to ask us what the extent of this is, eventually."
"Is that how you're phrasing it?"
"I don't know what you mean." I do.
He just grins. "Then I guess I'll tell Matt whenever he asks."
What are we?
I'm going to drive myself mad. I've certainly been driven mad by boys not even nearly as worthy as Noah,
"And what will you tell him?"
He snorts then, finally looking over at me. Crinkles line the sides of his eyes, deep and upturned, a brush of colour along each of his cheeks.
"You make these conversations so awkward, Madelaine."
It's not like I need the word. Girlfriend. Noah's feelings are no secret to me, not since Matt revealed them all for him in one very telling outburst. He doesn't even sleep with a girl unless he's in love with her.
But it might be nice. If we are going to be we, invited as a duo rather than an attendee plus one. Just to say my boyfriend, Noah, rather than my brothers best friend who I am sleeping with and also sort of in love with.
It dawns on me that Noah is still waiting for my response.
"Just making polite conversation," I quip.
"Right," he smirks. "So very polite of you, sweetheart." A beat of silence passes between us. "You know if you ask me yourself Maddie, I might just give you an answer."
Arrogant, self-centred, narcissistic-
I wipe the scowl from my mouth, much to Noah's continued amusement.
"Your mum seems to think we're together," I rush out, the words crumbling into one another like debris.
Another beat.
"Close. That was a statement."
Smug fucking asshole.
This conversation should not be as embarrassing as he's making it. He thinks I make it awkward? My cheeks are on fire, the heat bubbling under my skin to the point of boiling.
"You're infuriating."
"So you tell me," he drawls, hands flexing around the steering wheel as he merges into a lane to our left. The roads are near empty, just a few straggling cars here and there, rushing to get to wherever home is.
I hadn't realised how late it had gotten. Streetlamps light up the space we drive through but the night is pitch black, cold and bitter. It doesn't feel like a Tuesday at all. It feels like I found out about my possible promotion weeks ago, not within the past few hours.
Fuck. I'm even trying to distract my mind from thinking about the question.
The question. Say it. Just ask. Ask and you shall receive. Say it! Am I squeezing my eyes shut?
"What do we tell Matt we are?"
"So close," he coos, still smirking at out the empty road in front of us. "Now ask without your brothers name in your mouth."
I swear only my annoyance with him gives me the actual strength to say the words.
"What are we?"
"Was that so difficult?"
"What that another question?" I ask, raising my eyebrows. "When you so clearly said you'd give me an answer?"
Noah's response is instant. "I said I might."
In one swift movement and with one hand on the wheel he pulls over to the side of the road, mounting the curb. Gravel crunches underneath the tires as they screech to a halt.
"We're almost home," I point out stupidly. Noah lives there; of course he knows we're almost home.
He twists his key in the ignition to turn off the engine and flicks the headlights off. We're under no street lamps, there are no nearby houses on this stretch of road. The only thing I can see a few paces ahead of us is another parked car, pulled onto the curb like we are.
Noah reaches over, fingers brushing down my knee before dragging all the way up my thigh, squeezing at the inner bit before repeating the movement on my other leg.
A fire starts inside me.
"Here?"
I glance around once more. We're surrounded by darkness, the distant echo of rustling leaves brushing past the car windows curiously. Headlights of another car are in the far distance behind us, crawling closer.
"You know how I feel about you," he says, voice naturally deeper, as if the words caught in his throat before he managed to push them out.
My seatbelt clicks undone.
The words show me are on the tip of my tongue.
"Tell me," I say instead, threading my fingers through his. "But don't say the L word. Not yet. Not until we've got all this bullshit with Matt figured out."
"Presumptuous of you to assume I was going to use that word," he smiles, head leaning against his seat. "But alright."
There's something behind his eyes, a flash that I notice just before I blink. A quirk in his lip.
"I- do." I swallow. "The word. I just don't want him to ruin it."
Noah's throat bobs. He nods quickly, jaw tight as if Matt has already ruined it (which, let's be honest, he's not made it incredibly easy thus far) and squeezes my hand with his own.
"Yeah," he rasps. "I do too."
"Alright," I breathe. "Well. Do you want to get in the back seat with me?"
"Uh huh," he half groans, already opening his door. I follow his lead, jumping between the seats, undoing the button of my trousers. They're already down my legs when he slips back into the car, pulling up his shirt.
I abandon my own clothes to help take off his, running my hands up and down his smooth skin, putting my mouth wherever possible, pulling at zips and buttons and huffing when his clothes don't fall off at the click of my fingers.
His cock springs free as soon as I pull down his boxers. I catch his mouth with my own as I wrap my hand around it, feeling him hard and hot and ready for me.
Hands slip into the sides of my underwear and push them down alongside my trousers, our tongue's locked together like breaking apart to take off a single sock might wound us.
A single finger pushes between my folds.
"Fuck baby," he whispers through a groan, mouth next to my ear but eyes downcast at his hand between my legs. "If I knew you'd been this wet the entire time I would've talked a lot faster."
Two fingers, pushing inside me. I feel myself clench around him.
"I don't," I shake my head, moaning at the curling motion he makes. His eyes follow mine, lips parted as if he's in bliss just touching me. "I just need-"
The second his fingers are out of me they're in his own mouth. Eyes flicker, but don't leave my own.
I'm a woman on a mission, sliding my leg over his lap and positioning his cock at my entrance, meeting his eyes once more as I push myself down on him. No foreplay. Not right now, when everything feels just right.
Not fucking him feels a little like dying. Slowly. Waiting for the sweet release of death to come any day now and whisk you away to something better. Who can stand foreplay when the release is that close?
And when the words, 'yeah, I do too' are on fire behind your iris', heating up your very core.
Noah throws his head back when I bottom out, hands stretching out against the seats as if he's stroking them.
"You love this car," I tease, reaching out to take hold of his wrists.
"Yeah," he breathes, eyes closed. "That's what I love; the car."
Our mouths crash together.
My hips grind in a pattern towards him, pushing his cock in deeper, stroking him to the brink of insanity. He pulls me forward in time with each and every movement, like he already knows what I'm about to do before I do it.
His breath is hot against my own, forehead pressed against mine as he glances down at where our bodies are joined. My stomach twists and rolls with each movement, my pale thighs splayed wide against his tattooed ones in stark contrast.
Finally, I lift myself up the smallest amount and press back down again.
"Fuck," he hisses. More of that. Definitely more. I do the movement again and again, locking my lips against the dip above his collarbone and biting down on the skin.
Large hands caress the sides of my thighs, my ass, and then grip my hips, pushing me down as he thrusts his cock up against every sweet spot inside my pussy.
I lick a very slow stripe up his neck, tracing the skull tattoo with my tongue.
"Fuck angel, you're gonna make me come."
"Good," I breathe.
"Not good," he replies quickly. "Not until you do."
He thrusts up again, practically picking my body up and down with just those big fucking hands, covering half my hips and squeezing like I'll disappear if he doesn't hold on tight enough.
I'm moaning around each thrust, collapsing my body into his, trying to rub my breasts up against him even though I'm still wearing my bra.
The air inside the car is as thick as smoke, hot and wet, clinging to my skin and the windows, gluing my hair to my forehead.
Still Noah moves like he's unaffected, like he could fuck me for hours without tiring.
Sweat glistens over his skin, making the tattoos sparkle despite the lack of light surrounding us.
A car races past, one sound that comes and is gone again in an instant, just a blur of light disappearing.
As soon as it's gone, Noah's hand leaves my hip for a split second, and then the car door is open. I can't help the squeal that falls out of my mouth despite seeing him reach for the handle.
A burst of cold air enters the space but that doesn't matter.
Still with my fucking knickers around my ankles, I'm pulled out of the car and my bare ass is pressed against the driver door.
Freezing metal feels as if it sticks to my skin, stabs me in a thousand tiny places, dries out my sweat-laced skin instantly.
A hot tongue runs down my neck as a hand appears between my legs once more.
My eyes dart around the trees, the empty car in front of ours, the black road stretching in either direction. No movement, no sound, nothing but my cries as Noah is dipping two fingers inside me and using his thumb to rub small circles on my clit.
The back of my thighs bounce against the door handle, just as cold as the rest of the car. His hand disappears.
"You wanna see how much I love the car, Maddie?
" He murmurs, as if standing half naked in the cold doesn't affect him at all.
As if we do this all the time in the middle of nowhere.
As if his cock, still wet with my fucking juices, isn't pressed against my bare stomach.
"I've been thinking about doing this for months. "
Then I'm flipped and bent over the hood of the car.
A rush of cold air gushes between my spread legs. I don't have a second to register the cold, his hands on my ass or the fact that my cheek is now firmly pressed against his bonnet, because he starts fucking me again as if we never stopped.
My clothes rub against the surface as my thighs bounce against the bodywork, bent over like we're in the privacy of our own home. Ass on view for the whole world to see.
If another car were to travel down this road now there'd be no missing us. Headlights would only make the white of my skin stick out more, the ruddy redness I'm sure is on my cheeks more prominent.
It's hard to care as my head is pushed further into the metal.
Sounds fall out of my mouth, both loud and quiet, lost in the heavy breeze around us. Noah doesn't falter, fucks in and out of me like it's just job, hitting every perfect spot inside of me with incredible precision, grunting and grabbing and pushing me in whichever way necessary.
"The first fucking time you got into my car," he spits. "All I could think about was this."
Somehow harder. My mouth falls open, lip dragging against the cold surface beneath my face.
I reach out a hand and grip whatever I can - the dip between the bonnet and the windscreen, a perfect edge to grab and hold onto as tightly as I can.
To ground myself before I'm actually fucked out of existence.
"Noah," I moan, though it doesn't come out right. I stress each syllable like they're separate words, cut in half by a heavy breath.
"Yeah, baby?"
My fingers curl around the edge I've managed to keep a hold of.
"You gonna come for me, Maddie?" He asks. "Even with that car coming towards us right now?"
I half snap my neck to look at the road, the two headlights dim but obvious in the distance, coming closer towards us by the second.
"Fuck," I cry. "Yeah."
"Yeah? You want them to see?"
I can't get a word out. I'm too close.
"Want them to see how pretty you look bent over your boyfriends car?"
My hand drags down the cold bonnet as I come, spasming and clenching around Noah's cock like we have all the time in the world. He comes too, as if he waiting for me to let go first. Fucking me through it, grabbing my ass.
As soon as I can form a coherent thought I look back towards the road.
The car is gone, turned off a side street somewhere.
Only the darkness surrounding us remains, and low panting, mixing into the rustle of the trees.
"My boyfriends car, huh?" I manage through breaths.
"Yeah," he responds, just as breathlessly. "That's what we are."
Yeah, I think. I love you.
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