NOAH

Chapter 6

~ Dex ~

It was Saturday night and Nightfall was packed, sweaty bodies pressing into each other and grinding together in time with the pounding beat of the music. I was making my way to the bar, doing my best to convince myself that it was just another weekend and that I came here all the time. While I did frequent my brother's club, tonight was different. It was Noah's last evening on probation and if everything went well - as well as it can when one is serving the intoxicated masses - he'd get a permanent job here.

And I'd get to see a lot more of him.

Unfortunately, I was looking forward to that idea and not just because I literally owed him my life. I wanted to see him. I wanted to talk to him, I wanted us to laugh together at the same jokes, and I wanted to touch him.

Everywhere.

With my fingers, with my lips, with my tongue.

And that was a problem.

I was emotionally incapable to devote myself to a relationship with him or anyone else. As for a one-night stand: he worked here and things could get awkward. And I wasn't the type to wish him to lose his job just so I could spend a night with him.

There was one small blessing though: he seemed to enjoy my company, but he also kept a bit of a distance. Not only physical, but a mental barrier between us.

Don't get the wrong idea. That was what his body language told me whenever I found myself a little too close to him.

If he wasn't interested in me, than it would be easier to ignore how my body reacted to him. A smile appearing on his face, made one appear on mine. Him tilting his head to the side and exposing his neck made me lick my lips and dream of running my tongue over that sensitive spot. I wondered if that would make him moan. Would he wrap his arms around me?

Pull me closer?

Or push me away and slap me across the face?

I didn't fancy the last option, but it was safer in the long run. My cheek stinging was better than my heart shattering.

The bar was within view now and my eyes automatically searched for Noah's lithe frame. He was pouring a drink for a very attractive, slender blond and... Noah was smiling at him. Not the polite smile he usually gave patrons; a genuine, big grin as if the darkly-clothed youth being there was the best thing that could happen to Noah tonight. He slid the cocktail towards the blond, leaned across the bar and kissed the other guy on the cheek.

What the fuck?

I marched there, willing my fist to unclench, but by the time I reached the bar, Blondie was gone.

"Hey, Dex, what..." The smile fell off of Noah's face as he took me in. I attempted to relax my muscles, but it was already too late. He'd seen how angry I was. And why was I?

I wasn't with Noah; why should him giving a peck to someone's cheek mean anything to me?

"What's wrong?" He asked just as a somewhat drunken young woman plastered herself against the bar and demanded his attention. He made her two cocktails, pouring the drinks way faster than he usually did and he'd barely taken her money, when he hurried back to me.

"So, what's up?" His gaze scrutinizing, I let out a deep sigh and slumped on one of the stools.

"Nothing," I said, but it was too quiet for him to hear me over the thumping music, so I repeated my reply, louder. He didn't seem to buy it. He frowned, looking like he was about to call me on my bullshit, but a client came. Then another, and another. It was maybe half an hour - I was already nursing the second drink that Erik made me - when Noah found the time to talk to me again. I was much calmer and I even tried to invent a plausible excuse for my previous behavior - one that didn't involve him giving away kisses to strangers - but I came up empty.