RUSH (City Lights, #3)(95)
After the report was filed, we took a cab back to the townhouse. It was nearly four in the morning by the time I unlocked the door, but before I could close it, I saw another cab pull up, and Valentina, all long legs and elegance even this late, stepped out. She told the cabbie to wait and took the front steps quickly, Noah’s white stick and sunglasses in hand.
“I’m sorry to follow. I thought he might need these.”
I glanced uncertainly at Noah. He had already started up the stairs.
“It’s okay,” Valentina said. “I don’t wish to bother. Tell him…” She shook her head. “I don’t know what to tell him.”
“Neither do I,” I said.
“I kissed him,” Valentina said, not meeting my eye. “Deacon told me Noah wanted to see me. To reconcile. So I agreed to go to the deck.”
I crossed my arms. Her words hurt, like little knives in my heart.
“He didn’t kiss me back,” Valentina said quickly. A small, sad smile danced over her lips. “Noah didn’t love me. He never did. But I always carried the hope, you know? And that’s hard to let go of.” She raised her gaze, looking at me now intently. “I shouldn’t have believed Deacon, but I wanted to. Do you see?”
“I see.” And I did, but that didn’t make it easier.
Valentina nodded, a faint, sad smile on her beautiful features. “Okay. Good night, Charlotte.”
I watched her return to the taxi and drive off, then I shut the front door and locked it tight.
Noah was upstairs, on the third floor. I found him in his walk-in closet, throwing a change of clothes into an open, rolling suitcase.
“That was Valentina. She brought your white stick and glasses,” I said slowly, not quite comprehending what I was seeing.
“Did she tell you what happened?” Noah asked, tossing a jacket in the general vicinity of the bag.
“She said she kissed you.”
“Yeah, she did. I pushed her away, but so what? I know how pathetic that sounds.” He stopped, turned to me. “You didn’t see it?”
“No. Deacon crafted a pretty good set-up but his timing was off. I only saw you…together.” I hugged myself as the room suddenly seemed chilled. “Noah, what are you doing?”
He knelt by the bag and felt for the zipper. “What I should have done when I first knew how much I cared about you. The first second I felt something. That’s when I should have left.”
“You’re…leaving?”
His hands dropped to his knees, and he craned his head up at me, his face a mask of anguish, his eyes shining. But he didn’t speak, or couldn’t. His head dropped and then he stood up, taking the bag with him, past me. He threw it on the bed, found the folded white stick and glasses and tossed them in too.
“Talk to me,” I breathed. “Why aren’t you talking to me?”
“Because I’m so disgusted with myself that I can’t…” He carved his hands through his hair. “When I think about what happened to you…what almost happened to you with Deacon. If he’d touched you…God, Charlotte, if he’d really hurt you? It makes me sick to think about it. And I did that. I let that happen.”
“Deacon did that. You can’t blame yourself…”
“No?” he barked a harsh laugh. “You told me not to leave you alone with him. You made me promise, and what did I do? I got f*cking drunk and left you alone with him! So that he could shove you into an elevator and try to…” His words tapered away, and he shook his head, a stricken grimace on his face. “I can’t breathe just thinking about what might have happened. And why? Because I was too f*cking wrapped up in my own bullshit. I just had to prove I was okay, that I could work at PX and pretend like everything was just the way it was, when it wasn’t. My old life is gone and until I learn to live with that, this shit will keep happening to you; more pain and more pain, I’m just piling it on you—”
I shivered with dread at where his words were taking us. “No, that’s not true…”
“Isn’t it? The subway ride…” He squeezed his eyes shut. “I can still hear how you cried that night, the pain in your voice, and the fear for me because I’d been so selfishly reckless. I did that. I put that there, Charlotte. And the mugging—your violin is gone because of me, and then tonight. Oh Christ, tonight.”
“Noah…”
“I didn’t need this clusterf*ck of a night to tell me that I couldn’t go back to PX. You knew that. You told me and I didn’t listen. But deep down, I knew it too. It’s all still here, waiting for me. The anger and frustration and rage.” He zipped the bag with an angry swipe. “I have to go. I have to leave and find a way to let go of my old life, and I have to do it on my own. I can’t lean on you or weigh you down or cause you one more ounce of pain. I can’t.”
He turned to me and took hold of my shoulders, looking at me intently in his own way. “The only thing that matters right now is that you go to that audition. You win that spot, Charlotte. Reach out for it and grab it. Seize it because it’s yours and you know it.”
His hands dropped away, and I watched him pull the handle up on the suitcase because he was truly leaving. I couldn’t believe it, or want to. “Noah, what are you going to do? Where are you going to go?”