Filmed_ An Alpha Bad Boy Romance(58)

I blinked at him, shocked. I couldn’t imagine a father so cruel as to threaten his son with his dead wife’s memory. My father may have been distant and strange, but he was a saint compared to Mr. Carterson. And I couldn’t exactly blame him for getting fucked up from that: Noah clearly still cared about his mother and missed her, and his father probably knew exactly what strings to pull and when.

“That’s terrible,” I said softly, not wanting to break the flow of his story.

“It is, but it’s worse that I let him get under my skin again. I fucked up pretty bad for a while there.” He laughed ruefully, looking away from me. “When I got your voicemail, I was about to get fucked up again. Basically the one thing I’ve done for the last month.”

“Why didn’t you?”

He looked back at me. “Because I let myself listen to your voice.”

I didn’t know what to say. The idea of him falling back into his addiction broke my heart, but the fact that it was my voice that brought him away from it, even if for a brief moment, was enough to put it back together again, even if it was still bruised.

“Why are you saying this, Noah?”

He shook his head. “I don’t expect anything from you, not after what I did. But I wanted you to know that I’m going to an AA meeting tonight with Ellie, and I’m going to get clean. You reminded me about what it could be like, if I was clean.”

“I’m really happy to hear that.” I felt suspicious, but if he was trying to turn his life around, I wasn’t going to argue.

“And I want to work on this project with you. It can be something decent in my otherwise pathetic, fucked up life. Miss H deserves to have her story told, and I want to do her justice.”

“Your life isn’t pathetic.”

He grinned, and suddenly he was back to his old self. The fatigue I had seen on him earlier in the day was wiped out, and the awkwardness that had boiled below everything we did dissipated. He was just Noah, with his cocky smile and his perfect lips, probably preparing some dirty joke at my expense. And I found myself not caring about what had happened. Even though I was still shattered and barely holding myself together, I was happy that he was around, happy that he was going to get help, and excited to make something with him.

“Thanks for that ringing endorsement, dots,” he said.

“I’m just saying, you’re not pathetic. Getting clean takes a lot of strength.”

He started walking again and I matched his pace.

“Whatever, let’s talk more about this film idea.”

For the rest of the day, we walked around campus, stopping only to grab a bite to eat, and I completely lost myself in planning. I forgot about what had happened, I forgot about his drugs, about how he had disappeared, everything. Part of me was still reeling over what he had said, but I purposefully shut that down and concentrated on the task in front of us. I wasn’t ready to let myself open up to him again, no matter how badly I wanted it, body and mind. I knew he was dangerous, and could fall off the wagon at any time. I needed him to prove himself to me before I could possibly give him the ability to hurt me again.

But in the fading light of the last nice day before winter, I knew that there was a chance. I could see it in his earnest smile, in the way he walked and laughed and joked. I could see the potential in everything we did, and for the first time since he had disappeared I was looking forward to the future.





Chapter Twenty


“So he like, just showed up?” Chris asked, incredulous. We were sitting on the stoop the next day eating Chinese food. It was our usual post-big-news ritual. Nothing beats greasy food on a north Philly stoop when you’re trying to talk through a really weird situation with your best friend.

“Just like that, appeared out of nowhere.”

Chris shook her head, mystified. “That’s completely bizarre to me, especially coming from a guy who cut you out of his life.”

“I know, I felt the same way.”

“And then he acted like nothing had happened?”

I shook my head. “No, we talked about it a little bit.”

“So, what’s his excuse?”

“I told you about his crazy dad, right?”

She nodded.

“Well, basically his dad threatened to take away his trust fund if he kept seeing me, and the only way he thought he could stay away was to cut me out completely, I guess.”

Chris didn’t look convinced. “If he cared about you that much, why didn’t he just tell you what’s up from the start?”

I shrugged. I had thought of a million different reasons since I last spoke with Noah, and none of them were satisfying. The truth was, though, that I could never entirely understand Noah’s relationship with his father, no matter how much I wanted to. I had never experienced something like that. By comparison, my family was the epitome of a healthy loving relationship.