He kept rubbing her back as she cried, and then he began whisper-singing. “If all the little snowflakes were candy bars and milkshakes, oh, if I the little snowflakes, were candy love and milkshakes, oh what a you that would be.”
He felt her lips move into a smile, even though her tears were still wetting the crook of his neck. He leaned back so he could look at her and offer her a smile, too, as small as the one she wore, as pulled by that unseen current.
Their eyes held, and something shifted, some deeper need that each realized could be fulfilled with the other. His heart beat harder, and he saw her pulse pick up speed in her throat as she exhaled, her tears ceasing.
The sex was the same as that in the motel room in Mexico. Frantic, confusing, yet so desperately wanted. Like that day, he both rushed toward his orgasm and regretted it after it’d exploded through him. It wasn’t the point of what they’d done, and yet maybe he should have tried to make it pleasurable for her. She hadn’t seemed to want that, though, and truth be told, neither had he, necessarily. His body was different, however, and it simply couldn’t be stopped.
Whatever need they were fulfilling in each other, it was like a drug, and like any good narcotic, it made him briefly numb.
“Noelle,” he said, when he’d rolled away and they both lay staring up at the ceiling, “we didn’t use anything, this time or the last—”
“They did a rape kit on me at the hospital,” she said, her voice monotone. “They gave me a morning-after pill.”
“Oh.” He reached up, running his fingers through the front of his hair and clenching a handful in his fist. “But this time . . .” God, he hadn’t even thought about that. Both times, he’d just become pure need, no thought. Jesus.
“I got an IUD put in at the hospital,” she said. She sat up, bringing the bedspread with her and bending to retrieve her clothes. He hated the look on her face. She looked remorseful and confused, and just plain sad. This was hurting her. He was hurting her, and it was the last thing he wanted.
“We have to stop doing this,” he said. He felt confused and upset. And he’d felt like he needed the release, or her touch, or just her, but he didn’t know why, or if it was right or wrong anymore. Because it’d stopped the pain for a moment, but not longer than that.
“Yes,” she agreed without turning. “We do. We need to stop this. It’s not right.”
That was the thing, though. It didn’t feel wrong exactly either. It just felt like they were substituting sex for something else, and for the life of him, he didn’t know what the fuck that was or how to get it. If he could have, he would have. He opened his mouth to say something just as loud banging met their ears from below.
Evan sprang off the bed, going to the window and pulling at the slat again. “My dad,” he said, letting out a whoosh of breath. What the fuck was his dad doing there? They both dressed as rapidly as possible, he rehooking his sling and rushing from her room to the stairwell and looking over to where Paula was arguing with Evan’s father in the doorway.
“Where the hell is my son—”
“Dad, what are you doing?”
His father pushed past Paula the way Evan had, yet with more force, and Paula jolted backward, giving his dad a death glare as he passed her.
“Let’s go,” he said to Evan, standing at the bottom of the steps.
“Let’s go? How did you even know I was here?” Oh. He took his phone from his pocket, holding it up. “You put tracking on my phone?”
“Do you blame me?” his father practically yelled, face reddening. “Jesus! You were abducted. You don’t get to just run off without telling me where you’re going.”
“I’m not a child, Dad,” he said between clenched teeth.
“As long as you’re under my roof, you’re my responsibility. And you may. Not. Come. Here. Again.” His father’s jaw clenched like his own, and the older man was studiously refusing to even glance at Noelle standing behind his son. Evan felt her heat at his back. He felt her anxiety.
“She didn’t do this!” Evan yelled, his frustration boiling over. His father wanted to blame someone, and she was the only option. He’d noticed how his father had quietly seethed over the past few days as he spoke with the police and the FBI and his own personal security, whenever Noelle’s name was brought up. “She was there with me. She’s a victim too! For the love of Christ—”
“Evan.” Noelle put a hand on his shoulder, and he sucked back the words he wanted to spew at his dad. This wasn’t fair. None of it was. When he looked back at Noelle, he saw the hostility in her face too. “If my father knew this man was in his home,” she said, glaring at his father, her words cutting off as she pulled in a breath. “Please leave.”