Aiden
He might have reached a whole new height of stupid
Rhys
Impossible. Can’t beat the time he flung himself out of a driving car because he was too drunk to notice we were moving
What about the time I drove through a No’easter to save a girl I can’t confess my feelings for?
In related news, I think I might have scared Noelle off by sleeping with her…
Rhys
I stand corrected.
Jace
What??? HOW???
Mason
There’s so much to unpack here
Kai
Didn’t you confess your feelings last night on that live or was that a nightmare
It was a dare. I did everything you guys suggested, and it went well
But then this morning she got up before me and now she’s being weird. I think I might have gone too far this time
Mason
Why can’t you ever be normal?
Because it’s her.
The ringing of Noelle’s phone pulls me from my thoughts, and my gaze shoots up to where she’s sitting. Her brows furrow when she picks up the phone, and in the span of a minute my best friend deflates into a hollow shell of herself.
I have never seen a more terrifying sight.
“Thank you, for letting me know,” she says, and as her voice breaks so does my heart. The phone slips from her hand to land on the couch.
Fuck giving her space.
I’m at her side in a second, cradling her face in my hands. She has every chance to push me away, but she doesn’t. “What’s wrong? What happened?”
“That was my neighbor, Mrs Hawthorn,” Noelle says, and even in the dim morning light it’s hard to miss the tears in her eyes. “She said she heard a loud crash in my apartment. She thinks something may have fallen onto the roof, and it caved in. Or maybe the hole made the structure instable and the weight of the snow was too much for it to bear, I don’t know.”
Fucking hell. I had a feeling this was going to happen, like a nagging sense of dread in the pit of my stomach. I’m so fucking glad I got her out of there, no matter how moronic it was to drive through that storm. I would rather have died by her side than have to live knowing I could’ve saved her.
“I’m so sorry,” I say, and immediately hate myself for not having something better to say. I’m a man of action, not words. But right now, there is nothing for me to do.
Noelle avoids my gaze. “It’s gone. It’s all gone. What if it damaged the café? What if I lost everything I worked so hard to build?”
“Then we can rebuild. Wewillrebuild. It will be a minor setback, not the end of the line.” I glance out the windows, seeing the pause in snow for the first time in two days. The plan comes at lightning speed, and it’s probably my dumbest one yet. “I’ll go out, assess the damage. You stay here—please,please stay here. I don’t want you outside until it’s safe.”
This catches her attention. Her eyes snap to meet mine, fully clear and burning with fear. “You’re not going anywhere. This ismyproblem, Cole. Not yours. Letting me stay here is bad enough. You’ve done too much for me already. I can handle this.”
