What He Protects (What He Wants, Book Six) (An Alpha Billionaire Romance) (2 page)

“He’s not coming.”

“He’s not coming?”
 
I frowned.
 
“Why not?”

“Because it pays to know people,” he said
cryptically, and held his hand out.
 
“Please return my phone to me now, Charlotte.”

I handed the phone back grudgingly.
 
“What does that mean, it pays to know
people?”

“It means that I know a lot of the right
people who are able to get things done.
 
And so I didn’t need Worthington.”

My jaw dropped.
 
“You were able to get a judge to sign an order letting you
out on bail?”

“Yes.”

“By acting as your own lawyer.”

“Yes.”
 
He glanced over at me.
 
“Don’t look so surprised, Charlotte, I
am
a lawyer.
 
And in this great country of ours, you’re allowed to
represent yourself.”

“Yes, but it’s always considered a bad
idea.”

“Not when you’re the best.”

I shook my head.
 
How could he have negotiated his own
release so quickly?
 
And on a
murder charge?
 
I wasn’t naïve
enough to think that there wasn’t a certain level of politics involved in the
court system – getting the right judges, knowing the right lawyers,
payoffs and back room deals.
 
Some
of it was just how things worked, and some of it was dark and against the
rules, the kind of thing the people lost their careers over.
 
Was that what Noah had done?
 
Had he called in some kind of favor
with some shady judge?
 

I took in a deep breath.
 
“Does Worthington know that you acted
as your own counsel and negotiated yourself out on bail?”

“Yes, Charlotte.
 
I called and let him know.”

“And he didn’t care?”

“The contrary.
 
He was very upset.
 
Even so, he should have called to let you know you wouldn’t be needed at
Central Booking.
 
It was very
irresponsible of him, and I don’t like the fact that he put you in harm’s
way.”
 
His jaw set in a line, and I
saw him grind his teeth ever so slightly.
 

“I wasn’t in harm’s way.”

“The fact that you think that makes it
even more apparent to me why you shouldn’t have been there.”

“Please,” I said, rolling my eyes. “There
were cops all over that place.”

“And vagrants.”

“Yes, and
cops.”

He laughed a little bit, his laugh making
it clear he thought I was naïve not only for not realizing how bad the vagrants
were, but for thinking that the cops could protect me.
 
His car pulled up to the sidewalk then,
and he held the door open for me.
 
I hesitated for a minute before sliding in.
 

When we were settled inside, Noah folded
his hands in his lap and looked at me.

“Are we going to talk about the fact that
you just got arrested?”
 
I asked.

 
“Are you saying that’s what you’d like to talk about?”

“No.
 
I don’t
want
to talk about it, I don’t want it to have
happened.
 
But since it’s a pretty
big deal, you’d think we’d have some kind of discussion about it.”

“Why?”

“Because that’s what people do, Noah,
when something huge like this happens.
 
They discuss it, they talk about it, they tell each other how they
feel.”

“Fair enough.”
 
He shifted on the seat and regarded me across the car.
 
“How do you feel about me getting
arrested, Charlotte?”

“How do
I
 
feel about it?” I exclaimed.
 

“Yes.
 
You obviously have strong feelings about it, if you’re
feeling the need to bring it up.”

“I don’t… Yes, I have strong feelings
about it Noah, you just got arrested for murder.
 
Murder,
Noah.
 
Do you know what happens to murderers?
 
They go away for life.
 
They get the electric chair.
 
They – ”

“There is no death penalty in New York,
Charlotte.”

I shook my head.
 
“I can’t believe you’re being so
callous about this.”

“Is that what you think this is,
callousness?”

“Yes!
 
How can you not be freaking out?”

“Freaking out?” he repeated, like the term
was completely foreign to him.
 
“What good would that do, Charlotte?
 
To freak out?
 
You think this is a surprise to me?
 
Please.
 
They
should have arrested me six years ago when Nora died.
 
The only thing to freak out about is how obviously
incompetent the police department is that they’d let me roam the streets for
this long.”

I shook my head and turned to look out
the window.
 
I blinked hard,
telling myself not to cry.
 
What
was it he’d said back at the restaurant, exactly?
 
Something about how he’d had to learn to shut his emotions
off in order to survive? Was that what this was?
 
Was Noah really terrified, but just not showing it because
he’d had to learn to repress his emotions in order to survive?
 
Or was it possible that he didn’t have
emotions, that he was a cold sociopath who didn’t care about anything,
including the consequences of his actions?
 

I almost couldn’t decide which was worse.

If he
was
a sociopath, it would be a clear cut
answer that I shouldn’t have anything to do with him.
 
But if whatever trauma he’d experienced had caused him to
become so shut off that he couldn’t express his feelings, I might be tempted to
try and “fix” him, to become like the countless other stupid women who met a
damaged man and thought they could make him into what they wanted him to
be.
 

And I
had
seen glimpses of it here and there,
glimpses of the man he could be.

But did I really want to spend days,
months, years, trying to convince him I was worthy of more than glimpses?
 
Putting the responsibility on myself
was a losing proposition, and I knew it.
 

And yet when we pulled up in front of his
apartment, I was hoping he would invite me inside, was feeling like I needed
and wanted to spend more time with him, was afraid he would send me back to my
apartment.
 
I wanted to be in his
presence.

So when we got onto the sidewalk and he
ushered me inside, I was relieved and happy.

“Are you hungry?” he asked once we were
in his kitchen.

“No.”

“But we never got to have our
dinner.”
 
He shook his head and
grinned. “I left our takeout containers in the back of the police car.
 
The officers probably brought them into
the station and enjoyed a nice meal on me.”
 
He laughed, like this was the funniest joke he’d ever heard.

“You think this is funny?” I asked.
 
“You think it’s funny that you’ve been
arrested for murder?”

He shrugged, then crossed the room to the
refrigerator and surveyed the contents. He shut the refrigerator door,
obviously not happy with what he saw.
 
“We’ll order in,” he decided, crossing the room and opening a drawer
filled with takeout menus. “You need to eat, Charlotte.”

“No, I don’t,” I said automatically,
annoyed that he was still trying to boss me around.
 
“And you shouldn’t be, either.”

“I shouldn’t be eating?”

“No!” I said.
 
“You should be upset or angry or scared!
 
Not standing in your kitchen like some
kind of fucking statue looking at takeout menus!”

“Charlotte,” he said, his voice a
warning.
 
“It’s been a very long
day.”

I walked over to him and put my hand on
his forearm.
 
“Noah,” I said
softly.
 
“Noah, what are you
doing?”

He turned and looked at me, his eyes
serious, his breathing suddenly slightly labored.
 
“I’m not scared to go to jail.”

“You’re not?”

“No.
 
In face, in some ways, it would be a relief.”

“A relief?” I slid my hand down his arm and
intertwined my fingers with his.
 
“Why?”

“Because then I would finally get what I
deserve.”
 
He said it
matter-of-factly, with just a trace of sadness, the way you’d talk about a
tragedy in the world you couldn’t do anything about, like world hunger or terrorism.

I took in a ragged breath.
 
“Noah,” I said.
 
“Are you… did you…?”

“No.”
 
He shook his head.
 
“I didn’t kill those women.
 
But I may as well have.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

 
But he was done talking.
 
He picked up his phone and ordered the food, again without
asking me what I wanted.

When he was done, he went to go shower.

And this time, I knew better than to push
him.

***

The Chinese food arrived about twenty
minutes later, just as Noah was finishing his shower.
 
We ate at the dining room table in silence, and soon after
that, he retreated to his office, telling me had work to do.

I stayed in the living room, curled up on
the oversized couch, doing my reading for my classes the next day.
 
I was somehow able to lose myself in
the case studies and the legal briefs, turning pages and making notes,
highlighting passages in my books and on my iPad.
 
I blocked out everything that was going on – that Noah
had been arrested, that he had withdrawn from me again, that he’d opened up to
me about his childhood and told me something horrible that might have only been
the tip of the iceberg.

Finally, at around midnight, Noah came
back to the living room.

“Charlotte,” he said.
 
“It’s time for bed.”

“I’m not tired.”

“I don’t care.
 
You need your rest.”

I sighed and packed my books and papers
back into my bag.
 

I followed him into the bedroom.
 
He was already dressed for bed, in just
a pair of loose-fitting grey drawstring pajama pants and no shirt.
 
The pants hung low on his hips, and I
admired his body as we walked down the hall, letting my eyes linger on his
tight ass and his chiseled back muscles.

I got ready for bed in the master
bathroom, quickly brushing my teeth, washing my face, and slipping into a long
t-shirt.
 
The bedroom was dark when
I got back, and Noah was already in bed.
 
I slid in next to him, turning over on my side and facing away from him,
toward the windows.

I held my breath, hoping he would reach
for me, or whisper something, or pull me close.
 
I didn’t even care if it was just about sex, if he just
wanted to use me to satisfy some kind of urge.
 
I yearned for some kind of connection with him, and if I had
to settle for a physical one, I didn’t care.

“Good night, Charlotte.”

“Good night, Noah.”

I lay there for a while, hoping there
would be something more, but there wasn’t.
 
I pressed my eyes together and prayed I would be able to
fall asleep.
 
And miraculously,
after a long time, I did.

When I woke, the room was pitch
black.
 

The blinds had been open just a crack
when we’d gone to sleep, allowing a tiny strip of the city lights to filter
into the room.
 
The bedroom door
had been open as well, the nightlight in the hall throwing a faint circle of
light onto the carpet.

But now there was just blackness.
 
For a moment, I was disoriented,
blinking hard, trying to make out any objects in the dark room.
 
I groped for my phone on the nightstand
and unlocked the screen.

2:08 am.

I turned over and shined the light around
the room.