Читать книгу The Mills & Boon Sparkling Christmas Collection - Kate Hardy - Страница 57

CHAPTER TEN

HE’D GONE TOO FAR. Noah knew that the moment the words left his mouth. And if he hadn’t known the shock in Eloise’s eyes would have told him.

‘For tonight, I mean,’ he said, backtracking fast. ‘I couldn’t leave Morwen Hall without one night with you.’

‘And now you’ve had it.’ Eloise pulled away, and he resisted the urge to tug her close again. He wasn’t staying—this wasn’t love, wasn’t for ever. They both knew that, whatever the crazy attraction between them would have them believe.

‘So, what’s next for you?’ Eloise asked, putting a few inches of blanket between them as she propped her head up on one hand to look at him. ‘After you leave Morwen Hall, I mean.’

What was next? He had no idea. He couldn’t think beyond this bed, beyond this moment. Beyond her.

‘What’s this film where the director needs you to be celibate?’ she went on, and Noah breathed a sigh of relief. That was safe. They could talk about the film, about his career. That had to be less perilous than the spiral of feelings sleeping with Eloise had opened up inside him. Or the connection her confessions about her parents had started to foster between them. ‘More beating people up and saving the world?’

He huffed out a laugh. ‘No, actually. It’s more of a relationships movie. About a guy trying to move on after his wife’s death. It starts eight days after she dies, and follows him through to eight years later.’

‘Sounds deep and meaningful,’ Eloise said. ‘Both things I thought you tried to avoid.’

‘In my personal life? Sure. Professionally...it could be a good move.’ Except that wasn’t why he was doing it; Noah could admit that to himself, even if he couldn’t admit it to her. He needed something more in his life. More than the superficial and the meaningless.

He just wanted to do it on his own terms. That way, at least, he could protect himself from the dangers of feeling too much.

The problem was, when he was with Eloise he could feel himself wanting more. Suddenly everything he’d always relied on—a fleeting connection, the ability to walk away unchanged—wasn’t enough. And the other way lay madness—he knew that from experience.

‘You really want this part, don’t you?’ Eloise asked, and when he turned to her she was watching him too closely.

‘How did you know that?’ he asked, staring back. He hadn’t said how much it mattered to him, hadn’t even hinted at anything beyond a professional reason for wanting the role. But Eloise had known all the same.

‘I pay attention,’ she said. ‘So, what is it about this film? Why do you want this part so much?’

‘The script is...astonishing. It’s the kind of film that wins awards.’ But that wasn’t all and Eloise seemed to realise that. She stayed silent, waiting for him to say more. ‘It spoke to me, I guess. I just knew I had to make this film.’

‘The same way you knew you had to have me?’ Eloise shook her head, red hair tumbling over her bare shoulders. He remembered pulling the pins out of it one by one and watching it fall loose. The sight of her undone had taken his breath away. It still did. ‘This is quite your week for strange, compelling feelings.’

‘It is. I blame you.’

She laughed. ‘Why? For acting out Shakespeare with you and putting you in touch with your inner Romeo?’

‘Because ever since I saw you I’ve wanted something more than I have.’ He inched closer, resting one hand on her waist. ‘You know, I spoke to my agent about this part and she told me that if I wanted it I’d need to start looking deeper, start accessing the feelings I’ve locked away for years.’

‘As well as swearing off sex?’ Eloise shook her head. ‘She’s tough. But...maybe she’s right.’

‘Maybe she is. But that doesn’t change the fact that I don’t know how. It’s been years. But when I met you... I knew you were the sort of person who felt deeply. Who saw deeper, who found meaning.’

‘So you thought I could help you get the part?’ She frowned. ‘I’m really not sure how that would work.’

‘That’s not it,’ Noah said, at a loss for how to explain it. ‘I tried staying away from you, but every time I saw you it seemed more impossible. I tried keeping my distance anyway, tried keeping it just physical. But the moment we kissed...there was more of me in that kiss than in the last ten movies I made.’

‘I felt it,’ Eloise murmured. ‘So why not finish what you started? Look deeper. Feel more. Be the guy you need to be to get that part. I’ll listen.’

‘I showed you mine; you show me yours?’

‘Basically. Isn’t that part of what looking deeper means? Dealing with your past? You’ve heard all my childhood traumas. What are yours? It has to be more than disapproving parents, right?’

Noah’s jaw tightened as the memories flooded over him, so intense even after all these years that he worried he might be swept away by them. It felt wrong even thinking about Sally now, here, in bed with Eloise. But he had to admit she was the first woman he’d slept with that he’d ever considered talking to about what had happened.

Could he do it? Should he?

He’d be leaving in a few days. Whatever this connection was between him and Eloise, it would be over the moment he left Morwen Hall. He didn’t worry about Eloise spilling all to the Internet, or trying to make money by selling her story. He might have only known her a couple of days but he knew she wasn’t that person. Especially now she’d told him about her mother.

Eloise was safe. And if he wanted the part, maybe this was what it would take.

‘There was a woman,’ he started, then stalled.

‘Isn’t there always?’ Eloise asked sadly. She moved out of his arms and, for a moment, he thought she was going to get out of the cosy, safe cocoon they’d made in her bed. Then she settled against the headboard, still naked, and tugged his arm until he curled up against her side. She settled her arms around him and waited for him to continue.

Noah kissed the top of her breast and rested his head on her shoulder. When was the last time he’d been so close to a person, when they weren’t actively having sex? Had he ever been? If he had, he couldn’t remember it. Not even with Sally...

He was supposed to be telling Eloise all about Sally.

‘She was my best friend,’ he said eventually.

‘The one you moved to LA with?’

‘Yes. She was...she was my family, more than my real family ever were. They didn’t understand me or the life I wanted to lead. Sally did.’

‘She sounds great.’ Noah listened for any hint of jealousy or envy in Eloise’s voice, but it wasn’t there.

‘She was. We got a flat together to start with, but then she met this guy. She’d won a part on a TV show, and he was one of the other actors. She was crazy about him. But he wasn’t a good guy. I couldn’t put my finger on exactly what it was about him, but I knew he was wrong for Sally.’

‘What happened?’ Eloise asked. ‘And when did you realise you were in love with her?’

Noah sighed. It said something about his levels of emotional understanding that, even seven years later, Eloise knew after five minutes what it had taken Noah years of friendship to realise.

‘I think I was always in love with her. Right from the day we met, back at grade school.’ She’d walked straight up to him, stuck out her hand and said, ‘I’m Sally. You’re my new best friend.’ And that was all it took. ‘But I guess when we hit high school, I realised it for real.’

‘And you didn’t do anything about it?’ Eloise asked, surprise clear in her voice.

‘I wasn’t Noah Cross, Film Star then, remember. I was nothing. And Sally...she was all I had. The only person in town who understood me—who I was, what I wanted, what mattered to me. I couldn’t risk losing that.’ The idea of her walking away because she didn’t feel the same way had been far too terrifying for him to take the chance.

‘So what changed? I mean, I assume something did.’

‘Yeah. She moved out of our flat and into his house, and I realised I’d missed my chance.’ He’d waited too long and he’d lost her. It had felt like the end of the world—until he’d learned what real loss meant. ‘But I figured she was happy, so I should be happy for her. But then she showed up one day with a black eye and I knew I had to get her out of there.’

Eloise stayed silent but her arms tightened ever so slightly around him. He put his hand over hers and squeezed. Even after all this time, the horror he’d felt as he’d seen the bruises marring Sally’s perfect skin could still make him feel sick to his stomach.

‘I took her home and we talked. She told me it had been going on for months. I couldn’t believe I hadn’t noticed. I still can’t.’ He dipped his head, hiding his eyes from hers. She didn’t need to see the shame in them. The guilt. He’d been so busy thinking about himself—about how he felt, what he’d lost, his own emotional turmoil—that he’d missed what was right in front of him and let the woman he loved get hurt. ‘She agreed to leave him. And then...’

‘You told her how you felt,’ Eloise guessed when he didn’t continue.

‘Yeah.’ The feelings were all coming back now, whether he wanted them or not. Those deep, hidden feelings that he’d locked up for so long, because he knew what came next. Knew he couldn’t have all that hope and that happiness without the pain that followed. ‘Sally...she told me she thought she might feel the same, or that she could one day. We kissed and, just for that brief moment, everything was perfect.’ He stopped, just wanting one more moment of that peace, without the fear that snapped at its heels. They lay together in the quiet of the room, listening to the sounds of the hen and stag parties still going on downstairs, and for a moment Noah believed that could be the end of the story.

But then Eloise broke the silence. ‘I almost don’t want to ask what happened next. But I think I have to.’

With a sigh, Noah pulled away, out of her embrace. Sitting up on the edge of the bed, he stayed facing away from her as he spoke, every word cutting through him as it formed on his lips. ‘We agreed to take it slow. We’d already waited so long, and we had our whole future together to figure it all out. The next day, she went back to his house to pack up her stuff while I was out at a call-back audition. I asked her to wait until I could go too, but she wanted to get it done. He was supposed to be at work but...

‘I got the part—my first big movie role. I raced home to tell Sally, but when I got there the flat was empty. And then the police called.’

There was a rustle of sheets and then Eloise’s body was pressed up against his from behind, her warmth flooding through him as she pressed kisses against his shoulders. But those kisses couldn’t erase the guilt he carried every day. He should have been there—not just that day, but every day before that. He should have been looking outwards, not inwards. He should have been there for her.

But he wasn’t.

‘He’d beaten her. So hard she’d blacked out, they think. And when she fell...her head cracked open on the corner of the table. She died in moments.’

‘Oh, Noah, I’m so sorry.’ Eloise spoke against his skin, holding him tight to her. ‘So, so sorry.’

They were just words, Noah knew. They couldn’t fix anything. Couldn’t heal the searing pain that had cut through him that day and never fully gone away. His scar tissue might not show on the outside, but it was still there and he felt it pull most days.

But the thing about scar tissue was that it healed thick and hard, and painless. He might feel the tug around it, like healthy skin, but the dead area—his ability to love, to feel those deeper emotions—they didn’t hurt at all.

They couldn’t.

So he didn’t look inwards, not any more. He looked outwards—to easy, casual relationships, to films that focused more on explosions than feelings. And he pushed the guilt and the sorrow down beneath that scar tissue and pretended they weren’t there.

Until he’d met Eloise, and read a script that could change his career. And now all those emotions he’d sworn not to feel again were bubbling up, filling him, and he knew he had to beat them back down before they destroyed him.

He couldn’t waste emotion on himself. If he had to feel, it would be as a character—safe in another person’s fictional life, where the emotions couldn’t hurt him. If he felt that pain at all, let it be for the part, for his career. Because Noah Cross didn’t deserve to feel any of those things—love, loss, hope—ever again.

‘I know I can’t say anything,’ Eloise whispered, close to his ear. ‘I know I can’t fix it. But I’m sorry. And whatever you need right now—distance, alcohol, whatever. Just say. I can give it.’

There was only one way to forget, Noah had found, and that was to drown out the memories. Alcohol helped, so did work. But the best thing was sitting naked in bed beside him.

He turned, sweeping her into his arms in one fast movement. ‘You,’ he murmured against the skin of her neck. ‘Let me have you again. Let me forget.’

Eloise nodded, and he bore her down to the bed again, determined to block out the emotions once more.

He’d use them, if he had to. But not as himself. He’d save it all for the part.

He could give Eloise his body, even his memories, but that was all.

Everything else, he’d already given up.