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And then, as we sailed under a beautiful, old-fashioned white drawbridge dotted with street lamps, the landscape around us changed. We passed a golf course peppered with palm trees on one side, and beautiful homes lined the opposite shore. The backyards were thick with peach and olive trees, or rose gardens with arbors surrounding full tennis courts. A lonely frame ladder stood in one yard, there to trim a menagerie of hedge animals into their respective shapes. The house beyond the yard was enormous, Tuscan style, with tiered arches spanning the length of the floor to the ceiling.
I leaned my arms against the prow, taking in the lavish mansions; the modern glass and steel monstrosities and the attempted charm of the sprawling older homes. The boat rocked gently beneath my bare feet. I spent so much time feeling sick these days that I was mildly surprised at not feeling sick on the boat.
A blast of loud music assaulted my ears and I looked up. Someone in one of the homes had turned on a massive outdoor speaker system. I heard the angry wail of guitars and crashing electronica in the background, and a growling singer yell about damage and abuse and saving yourself.
We passed an enormous boxlike house, a throwback to the sixties, I guessed, and then floated by a grand, white mansion with soaring windows that faced the water. Greek statues bordered the intricately landscaped lawn, and something about it felt—
Familiar.
Because it was Noah’s house. I almost didn’t recognize it from here; I had always been on the inside looking out, but now I was out, looking in.
But I didn’t see or feel any sign that we were stopping. That apparently wasn’t where we were going. Curious.
The houses soon gave way to forest. An enormous banyan tree bent away from its roots, saturated with Spanish moss that kissed the water. The dying sun reflected off the surface, casting rippling shadows beneath the tree. Palm trees on either side of us bent and swayed, heavy with coconuts. Then the forest became less dense. We passed pylons with nothing tethered to them, their weathered wood exposed at mid-tide. A palm tree with the top cut off stood at attention to our right, just a tall stump that punctured the air.
And then, finally, I saw where we were headed. A small island appeared in front of us—we had passed many, but I felt, I knew, that Noah was on this one. Waiting for me.
We sailed around to a narrow dock that jutted out into the ocean. The crew anchored the boat and Ron helped me step off, but didn’t join me. He just nodded to the end of the small pier, and I began to walk.
The wind had untied my hair and now it hung loose in dark waves over my bare shoulders. The wood beneath my feet was smooth, worn down by air and water. I lifted the hem of the dress—I would die if I tripped—and wondered where I was going.
I didn’t have to wonder very long; at the end of the dock, small torches rose out of the ground, and their flames guided my way. I followed them down the beach until finally, I saw him.
It was hard to appreciate how beautiful the silent, secret beach was with Noah standing there, looking like sex in a slim-cut tux, lean and tall and extravagantly gorgeous. I dropped the hem of the dress, along with my jaw and my thoughts and everything else.
“You’re here,” he said.
The sound of him, the sight of him, stole my words away.
Noah gracefully crossed the sand and dipped his head to meet my eyes. “Mara?”
Still speechless.
Noah smiled that crooked smile of his and I thought I might dissolve. “Should I be concerned?”
I managed to shake my head.
He took a slight step back and considered me. I felt his eyes slide over my skin. “You’ll do.”
I broke into a brilliant smile. “You too,” I said, my voice strangely hoarse.
“You mentioned a tux in your fantasy, so . . .”
“Actually,” I managed to say, “I believe you mentioned a tux in your fantasy.”
Because I was too limited to comprehend what he would look like in one. I adored Noah’s I-can’t-be-bothered-to-care wardrobe of worn shirts and destroyed jeans, but this . . . there were no words.
“Hmm,” he said thoughtfully. “Perhaps you’re right.”
My smile widened. “I am right.”
“Well,” he said, his voice even as he glanced back at the dock. “I suppose if you’d rather go back to your house . . .”
I shook my head vehemently.
“This will do, then?”
Would it ever. I nodded.
“Excellent. Oliver will be pleased.”
“Oliver?”
“The tailor I rarely have the occasion to use. He was thrilled when I called, even though he had to drop everything to make it in two weeks.”
“Sounds expensive.”
“Five grand, but for that look on your face, I’d have paid ten. Shall we?”
I followed the line of Noah’s gesture down the length of the beach. There was a blanket anchored farther down the expanse of white sand, surrounded by torches. A piece of bright fabric was swathed between two trees.
He walked toward the ocean and stood at the edge where the waves licked the sand. I followed him almost all the way, careful to avoid the water. The sunlight was all gone and gray clouds chased one another across an inky, perforated sky.
“This is what I should’ve given you for your birthday,” he said, his voice velvet, but shot through with something I couldn’t name. Then he turned to me and his eyes dropped to my throat. He took a step closer, nearly aligning my body with his. His elegant fingers moved to my neck. They wandered over the jewel. “And this.”
They traced my skin, dipping below the necklace, then up. “And this,” he said, as they came to rest below my jaw, tipping my face up to his. His thumb followed the curve of my mouth, and his beautiful, perfect face angled down toward mine.
“And this,” he said, his lips just inches from mine.
He was going to kiss me.
He was going to trust me.
Somewhere between the boat and the dress and the beach and the sky I had forgotten what I’d done. But now it roared back loudly in my ears; if I didn’t tell him now, I never could. Lies make us look like someone else, but with Noah, I had to be myself.
The words burned in my throat. “I—”
Noah drew back slightly at the sound of my voice. His eyes translated my expression. “Don’t,” he said, and pressed one finger to my lips. “Whatever it is. Don’t say it.”
But I did. “I read it.” The words took my breath with them. Noah’s hand left my skin.
They lie, you know. It’s not easier to ask forgiveness. Not even a little.
45
I’M SORRY,” I STARTED TO SAY. “ I DIDN’T—”
“Yes, you did,” Noah said, his voice cold. He looked at the ocean. Not at me.
“I just thought—”
“Must we? Must we do this?”
“Do what?” I asked softly.
“This.” The word was a splash of acid. “This—whatever.” His voice had slid back into flatness. “You told me to write what I see. I did. Then you read it without asking. Fine.” He dropped a viciously indifferent shrug. “I suppose part of me wouldn’t have left it there if I hadn’t wanted you to. So, done. It’s over.” He stared ahead into the darkness. “It doesn’t matter.”
“It does.”
He turned to me with predatory grace. “All right, Mara.” His voice lacerated my name. “You want to hear how I first learned about my ability? About being told that we were moving into yet another miserable home two days before we left by my father’s secretary, because he couldn’t be bothered to tell me himself? About feeling so numb to it and everything that I was sure I couldn’t actually exist? That I must be made of nothing to feel so much nothing, that the pain the blade drew from my skin was the only thing that made me feel real?”
His voice grew savagely blank. “You want to hear that I liked it? Wanted more? Or do you want to hear that when I woke up the next day to find no trace of any cut, no hint of a forming scar, all I could feel was crushing disappointment?”
There was nothing but the sound of deceptively tranquil waves and my breath in the stillness before he shattered it again.
“It became a kind of game, then, to see if there was any damage I could actually do. I’ve chased every high and low you can imagine,” he said, underscoring the word every with a narrow look to make sure I understood what he meant. “Completely without consequence. I wanted to lose myself and I couldn’t. I’m chasing an oblivion I will never find.” And then he smiled; a dark, broken, empty thing. “Have you heard enough?”
He was terrifyingly cold, but I wasn’t afraid. Not of him. I took a step toward him. My voice was quiet, but strong. “It doesn’t matter.”
“What doesn’t matter?” he asked tonelessly.
“What you did before.”
“I haven’t changed, Mara.”
I stared at him, at his expression. I still want to lose myself, it said. And I began to understand. Noah craved danger because he was never in it; he was careless because he didn’t believe he could actually break. But he wanted to. He wasn’t afraid of me—not just because he believed I couldn’t hurt him, but because even if I did, he’d welcome the pain.
Noah was still chasing oblivion. And in me, he found it.
“You want me to hurt you.” My voice was barely above a whisper.
He took a step toward me. “You can’t.”
“I could kill you.” The words were edged in steel.
Another step. His eyes challenged mine. “Try.”
As he stood there in his exquisite clothes, his flawless features staring me down, he still looked like an arrogant prince. But only now could I see that his crown was broken.
The air around us was charged as we stood opposite each other. Healer and destroyer, noon and midnight. We were silently deadlocked. Neither of us moved.
I realized then that Noah would never move. He would never back down because he didn’t want to win.
And I wouldn’t lose him. So all I could do was refuse to play.
“I won’t be what you want,” I said then, my voice low.
“And what do you think that is?”
“Your weapon of self-destruction.”
He went still. “You think I want to use you?”
Didn’t he? “Don’t you?”
Noah inhaled slowly. “No, Mara.” My name was soft now, in his mouth. “No. I never wanted that.”
“Then what do you want?”
“I want—” He stopped. Tore his fingers through his hair. “Never mind what I want.” His voice was quieter, now. “What do you want?”
“You.” Always you.
“You have me,” he said, his eyes meeting mine. “You inhabit me.” His face was stone but the words issued from his lips in a plea. “You want to know what I want? I want you to be the one wanting me first. Pushing me first. Kissing me first. Don’t be careful with me,” he said. “Because I won’t be careful with you.”
My heart began to race.
You can’t hurt me the way you think you can. But even if you could? I would rather die with the taste of you on my tongue than live and never touch you again. I’m in love with you, Mara. I love you. No matter what you do.”
My breath caught in my throat. No matter what. The words were a promise, a promise I didn’t know if anyone could keep.
“We’re only seventeen,” I said quietly.
“Fuck seventeen.” His eyes and voice were defiant. “If I were to live a thousand years, I would belong to you for all of them. If we were to live a thousand lives, I would want to make you mine in each one.”
Noah knew what I was and what I’d done and he wanted me anyway. He saw me. All of me. With my skin peeled back, my heart bare. I was inside out for him, and trembling.
“All I want is you,” he said. “You don’t have to choose me now or ever, but when you choose, I want you free.”
Something inside me stirred.
“You’re stronger than you believe. Don’t let your fear own you. Own yourself.”
I turned the words over in my mind. Own myself. As if it were that easy. As if I could walk away from grief and guilt and leave fear and everything behind.
I wanted to. I wanted to.
“Kiss me,” I whispered.
Noah’s fingers traced the column of my spine, exposed in the dress. Heat bloomed beneath my skin.
“I can’t. Not like this.”
Noah started this chase and I stood before him, waiting to be caught. He could have me, but he refused to move.
Only now did I realize why.
He wanted to be caught. He was waiting for me to chase him.
I lunged for his shirt and pulled him to me. Against me. My hands became fists in the cloth but his were stone on either side of my rib cage; they rose and fell with each hard breath I took but didn’t move. Mine did. My fingers wandered beneath his dress shirt; his breath quickened when they met his pale gold skin. They traveled over ridges of muscle and sinew, hard and hot beneath my palms. I tried to reach his mouth with mine, but he was too tall and he wouldn’t bend.
So I backed down onto the sand. And I pulled him down with me.
The hem of my dress touched the water but I didn’t care, not then. The earth gave way beneath my body as Noah moved over me and slid his knee between mine, stoking my flame. His arm slipped beneath my back and his mouth moved over my neck, his lips brushing my collarbone and the hollow beneath my ear. My arms twined around his neck, my fists curled in his hair. My heartbeat was wild. His was still calm.
