He leaned back in his chair and folded his arms across his chest, studying me. “So you’re worried that what, exactly? That you have some deep, dark secrets that I won’t approve of and will be a deal breaker?”
Yes. Exactly. “Not secrets, necessarily. Just not common knowledge, and definitely things the kid I was, the person you used to know, would have never considered doing.”
He gave another unconcerned shrug. “So tell me.”
Fear shot through me. “Now?”
“Do you two need a refill?”
I looked at the waitress, astounded anyone could be so stupid as to interrupt this moment.
Thankfully Noah had more class than I. “No. We’re good. Thank you, though.” As she turned away, Noah looked back to me with a raised eyebrow. “Yeah. Now. Not all of them. Just one of them. Tell me one of these horrible things you’ve become. I’ll let you know if I need to run.”
I hesitated. No way. No fucking way. I couldn’t ruin us already. We’d barely started our second date.
“We can make it a game. You tell me one of yours, I’ll tell you one of mine. Who knows. Maybe you’ll be the one to run.”
I snorted. “I wish.” God, I hated this. As much as I’d dreamed of Noah coming back, even though I never thought he would, I hated this. I hadn’t felt ashamed of anything in years. It almost made me angry at him for making me feel this way.
“Fine.” I tried to take a breath, but it didn’t work, so I blurted out the biggest. “I’m a slut. A huge bottom-boy slut.”
It was big, but not the biggest.
Noah laughed. Actually laughed.
I gaped at him.
Still laughing, he managed to speak. “Sorry, Randall. I know you don’t need me laughing, but I wish you could see yourself. You said, ‘bottom-boy slut,’ and your entire face went as red as a stoplight.”
I felt tears prick my eyes. Which was stupid. And pathetic.
He uncrossed his arms and leaned forward again. This time he did take my hand. “You’re adorable.”
To my surprise, my voice didn’t crack when I managed to speak. “I tell you I’m a slut and you say that I’m adorable?”
He moved his thumb in slow circles over the back of my hand. “You ready for my secret now?”
No. No. No. I was ready to run. Run the fuck away.
I nodded.
Noah waited until I met his gaze before he spoke. “I’m a slut too.”
I flinched. “No, you’re not.”
He gave another chuckle. “Excuse me?”
“You’re not a slut.” Even as I launched into my diatribe, my brain screamed for my mouth to shut the fuck up. “Mom said that you’re a preacher or something. That you went to seminary and that the church paid for your school. You don’t have to pretend to be something you’re not. You don’t need to pretend that I’m good enough for you.”
Though he leaned back slightly, he didn’t let go of my hand. He was quiet for a moment, and when he spoke, his voice was strained. “Huh. I thought we were supposed to only share one of our dark secrets tonight. You’re making me tell two.”
“I don’t understand.”
Noah didn’t hesitate. Didn’t even take a steadying breath like I would have. He dove in. “I did go to seminary. I came back to Seattle to help Mom get settled after Dad died. I finished my senior year. She ended up getting married again within months. I don’t think she could handle being alone. And I couldn’t handle her with another man. At times I hated my dad. So much. But yet, he’d just died, and to see her get married so quickly….”
I started to tell him he didn’t need to say anything else. That I didn’t need to know, but he wasn’t looking at me. Well, he was, but he wasn’t seeing me. He was lost somewhere else. And I did need to know.
“I went to seminary. I was going to be a missionary. Like Dad. Like I’d always planned on being. It was so stupid. I went into the seminary at the height of my anger with God. I’d lost everything. God had taken everything. My dad. My dad who put God before everything else. Before his health. Before Mom and me. And still God let him die?” Noah’s gaze sharpened, seeing me again. “And God took you. I couldn’t have you.”
