What He Promises (5 page)

“I want to look at you.”
 
He reached over and removed the sheets
from my body.

My nipples pebbled under his gaze.

“You are so beautiful,” he said, taking a long
moment to drink in my naked body before covering me again.

He pulled me close to him, my back against his
chest, and he was naked, too, and he intertwined his arms with mine. I felt him
harden behind me, and when he whispered my name softly, I turned my head and
his mouth met mine as he entered me from behind.

We both came quickly this time, the emotions
too much to take.

This time, when I slept, it was deep and
comforting.

 
No
bad dreams.

No horrible nightmares.

No worries.

No cares.

Just Noah’s body, wrapped around mine, warm and
good and safe.

***

I woke at six the next morning, surprised to
find Noah standing at the side of the bed, dressed in a dark suit and tie, his
hair damp from the shower.

“What are you doing?” I mumbled sleepily.
 
“Come back to bed.”

He leaned down and smoothed my hair back from
my forehead.
 
He smelled of soap and
aftershave.
 
“I’m leaving for the
office now, Charlotte.
 
But you
should sleep as long as you want. There are things for breakfast in the
kitchen.”

I wondered how he’d been able to assemble
breakfast fixings when it was only six in the morning.
 
And I wondered why the hell he was
dressed for work.

“Why are you dressed for work?”
 
I asked, fighting to chase the sleep
from my brain, to focus on what he was saying.

“I just told you, Charlotte.
 
I’m leaving for work now.”

I sat up in bed, fully awake now.
 
“You’re joking.”

“No.”

“Noah, you can’t be serious.
 
You can’t go to work today.
 
You’ve had a major surgery.
 
You have stitches all up your side.”

“I won’t be digging ditches, Charlotte,” he
said, sounding exasperated at the mere suggestion that he might not be healthy
enough for work less than twenty-four hours after being discharged from the
hospital.
 
“I will be sitting at a
desk all day.”
 
His tone was
forceful now, the same tone he used on me when he wanted me to know he wasn’t
going to back down.

“But – ” I tried.

He silenced me with a kiss, his breath
minty-fresh, the mild scent of hair gel and shampoo filling my nose.
 
He pulled back and looked into my eyes,
and I tried not to show the disappointment on my face.
 
Was he pulling back already, shutting me
down?
 
I was just starting to feel
like maybe he was letting me in.

“What are your plans for the day?” he asked.

“Um, I… ”
 
I hadn’t thought about it.
 
I
hardly even knew what day it was.
 
I
thought about going to class, but the idea was overwhelming.
 
Word of what had happened would have
gotten out by now, and the thought of the whispers and gossip that would follow
me everywhere I went was less than appealing.
 
“I have class,” I said.

“You are not going to class.”
 
Noah’s eyes darkened and his jaw
twitched with expectation, like he was waiting for me to challenge him, but for
once I was grateful for his double standards, grateful that he was insisting I
stay home while he himself was headed to work.

 
“Then I guess I’ll just be here in the
apartment.
 
Maybe I’ll do some
reading so I don’t get too far behind.”

“Good,” Noah said.
 
“You need to rest.”
 
He ran his thumb over one of the bruises
on my thigh, which was already starting to fade.
 
“Your bruise is getting better,” he said
in satisfaction.
 
He stood up.
 
“Meet me for dinner tonight,” he
ordered.
 
“There’s something I want
to ask you.”

“Oh,” I said, my heart thrumming against my rib
cage.
 
“What is it?”

His eyes twinkled mischievously.
 
“It’s a surprise.”

My stomach somersaulted.
 
A surprise?
 

I wanted to marry you, Charlotte.
 
I wanted to spend my life with you.
 

Was Noah planning to propose to me?
 
Was that the thing he wanted to ask
me?
 
No, I decided.
 
That’s not what you said when you were
about to propose to someone, that you had to ask the something that was a
surprise.
 
Was it?
 
I didn’t think so, but then again, I had
never been proposed to before.

“Okay,” I said, trying to keep my voice
calm.
 
“What time shall I meet you?”

“Be at my office at seven.”

“Okay.”

He kissed me again and then he was gone, leaving
me to sit there wondering, as usual, just what the mysterious Noah Cutler had
in store for me.

***

I spent the morning lounging in Noah’s huge king-sized
bed, wrapped up in his ridiculously high-thread count sheets and luxuriously
expensive bedding.

I watched mindless television all day.

I thought about calling my mother to tell her
what had happened.
 
But I had no
idea where to start.
 
How could I
have explained everything that had been going on?
 
She would have a million questions, and
I had hardly any answers for her.

At five o’clock, I took a long bath, sliding
into Noah’s huge ornate bathtub, letting the water comfort my skin and soothe
my muscles.

When I was finished with my bath and wrapping a
towel around myself, I caught sight of myself in the mirror.
 
I almost gasped in horror.
 
I knew nothing that serious had happened
to me, at least not physically. The doctor had said I’d been very lucky.

But there were marks all over my body.

A jagged scratch down my cheek.

The bruise on my thigh.

A tiny nick on the inside of my leg.

A laceration on my knee.

Little nicks and cuts and muscle
aches
and bruises, all of them reminders of what I’d been
through.

I looked away, telling myself they were just
physical marks, that they would heal, and probably quickly.
 
I reminded myself again of what the
doctor had told me, that I was a lucky girl.

I pushed the image of my battered body out of
my mind, and began to dress with dinner.
 
I found an elegant black wrap dress in with my things, and I pulled it
on carefully, then curled my hair into loose waves around my shoulders and took
my time with my makeup.

When I was done, I surveyed myself in the
mirror.

The makeup hid the bruises, and the dress hid
the marks on my body.
 

I looked almost normal, like a girl who was
about to go out to dinner with her boyfriend.

But would I ever be normal?

Would I ever feel normal?

I’d been through something horrible, and I
wasn’t sure a person could just move on from that so quickly.

And even if that horrible night at Force hadn’t
happened, how was my relationship with Noah ever going to ever be normal?
 
The fact that he wasn’t accused of
murder anymore didn’t change the fact that he had demons deep inside of him I
hadn’t even begun to exhume.

He was starting to let me in
, I told myself.

I just had to hope it would continue.

I swiped my lips with one more brush of
lip gloss
, then grabbed my purse and headed for the door.

And that was when I saw it.

An envelope, sitting on top of a stack of mail outside
the front door.

 
The
envelope was a dirty cream color, the kind of color that was usually reserved
for cheap, recycled paper.

I wouldn’t have even noticed it if it weren’t
for my name.

It was written in block letters, big and bold
across the front, followed by Noah’s address in smaller letters underneath it.

I frowned.

Who would be sending me mail to Noah’s
apartment?
 
My first thought was
that Julia must have forwarded it, but the letter didn’t looked like it had
been forwarded – there was no yellow forwarding label from the post
office.

There was a stamp in the upper right hand
corner, a flower stamp with bright colors, and something about it seemed out of
place.

I picked it up and checked the return address.

Inmate Colin Worthington,
it said,
New York State Correctional
Facility, New York, NY.

My pulse pounded.

It was from Professor Worthington.

Why the hell was he writing me a letter?

I turned it over in my hand as if trying to
make sure it was real.
 
I felt dizzy
and lightheaded.
 
Suddenly I had a
flashback of me lying on that table at Force, Professor Worthington’s hands all
over me, his mouth on mine, the way I had disassociated from myself and left my
body.
 

The metallic scent of blood filled my nose.

I wretched, feeling the bile rise in my throat
and burn the back of my mouth.

But I didn’t throw up.

I couldn’t have thrown up – I hadn’t
eaten anything all day.
 

I stared at the envelope for a long moment and
then shoved it into my bag.

I wasn’t going to read it now.

I would wait until I was with Noah.

Noah would know what to do.

***

When I got to Noah’s office, there were
reporters and paparazzi scattered around on the sidewalk outside.
 
Photographers with cameras slung around
their necks, sleek-haired blond journalists holding microphones and notepads.

They swarmed
me
as I
got close, peppering me with questions.

“Charlotte, are you okay?
 
Charlotte, is it true that Noah almost
died?
 
Is he back at work?
 
Charlotte, will you be testifying at
Colin Worthington’s trial? Charlotte
Charlotte
,
Charlotte…”

Their voices blended together into a cacophony
of sounds and frenzied snaps of the camera.

I ignored all of them, not sure what I should
say or do.
 
Instead I strode
purposefully into the building, breathing a sigh of relief once I was safely
through the revolving doors.

I breezed through security, and when I got to
Noah’s floor, the receptionist smiled and buzzed me through without even asking
me
who
I was.

“Hello, Charlotte,” she said, her voice
friendly.
 
“Mr. Cutler is waiting
for you.”

It was a small thing, her knowing my name,
letting me in without questioning who I was or why I was there.

But it was a change.

Noah must have told her he was expecting me,
must have told her who I was, that we were together.

I flushed with pleasure.

And yet it was tempered.

The whole time, Professor Worthington’s letter
burned a hole through my purse.
 
I
knew he was locked up, that he was being held without bail.
 
Noah and I had given statements to the
police in the hospital, and they’d assured us they were doing a thorough
investigation, had even made a point to tell us the charges against Noah had
been formally dropped and that they would work as hard as possible to bring
Professor Worthington to justice.
 
It
would be a while before he even stood trial, and even then, with my testimony,
he would most certainly be found guilty.

My testimony.

I would have to testify against him.

I imagined him staring at me, his eyes cold as
I took the witness stand.
 
I
remembered the sick squishing sound his eye had made as I’d slammed the heel of
my shoe into it.

My stomach lurched, and I quickened my pace as
I walked down the hall to Noah’s office.