Within/Without

chapter forty-three.

Val

Noah tells me everything. He starts with the reason he's got a black eye and a bunch of other bruises all over his body, details the magnitude of the grudge these two former spies were holding against his cousin Larry, tells me how Simon refused to turn his back on the issue until Noah made him. And then he tells me that the two men who beat him up are dead. That Larry took care of them like he should have a long time ago, and now—now we can "rest easy."

After he's done talking (and it only took him four and a half minutes, actually), he just kind of sits and stares at me. Every once in a while he glances up at Jo, who's leaned back against the breakfast bar, her arms folded and her face unreadable. Then he looks to me again, pleading.

Silence fills the room for a moment, until Noah exhales loudly and rakes a worried hand through his hair and says, "Oh my God, please say something, Val. You're killing me. You are absolutely killing me."

By the look on his face, I don't doubt that. "What do you want me to say?"

"Say you'll forgive me. More importantly, say you'll forgive Simon. Even more important than that, say you'll talk to him because he won't pick up his phone and I get the feeling he would if you were the one calling."

I roll my eyes. "Noah, it—"

My words falter when I hear the tap tap tap of tiny footsteps; a moment later, Charlie, still in her nightgown, toddles into the kitchen. She looks at Noah with a lingering gaze, then looks at her mother, then looks at me.

I swallow. "Hey, Charlie. Aren't you supposed to be asleep?"

"This is the one, isn't it!" Charlie exclaims, suddenly shaking all her sleep deprivation from her shoulders. She jumps forward, and because she's seven and has little use for physical boundaries, immediately starts prodding at Noah's face. She pokes too close to the bruise underneath his eye and he audibly squeals. "The shapeshifter, the one you told me about! Is this his usual face? Hey, mister mister, do the thing! I wanna see it. I wanna see it."

Noah is trying in vain to keep Charlie's fingers off of him. I shoot him an apologetic look, just as Jo steps in and scoops Charlie up. Charlie giggles as Jo tickles her tummy, hoisting her up and carrying her up the stairs. "It's back to bed with you, little one, or the tickle monster will attack! Rahhh!"

Charlie's carried all the way back upstairs in a cacophony of giggles and snorts. Jo gives me a quiet glance, frowning, before she disappears around the corner. Almost as if she's telling me, Be careful.

"Sorry about that," I say to Noah once they're gone. The night grows ever darker outside, a shiver going down my spine. Though I've met Simon's older brother before, I've never been alone with him. Frankly, I'm not sure I trust him. "That's my niece, Charlie. She's seven and her imagination is insane."

"Your seven-year-old niece knows you're dating a shapeshifter?"

I shrug. "At the time, no one else would believe me."

"Fair," Noah agrees. Another moment of silence passes where neither one of us know what to say, and Noah's just watching me, so much hope held in his golden brown eyes that I have to look away. "So? Are you gonna call him?"

In the hotel room, such a blind, unfathomable rage had come over me. Some directed at Simon—for lying once, for lying again, for breaking my trust and mending it just to break it again—and some at myself, for being stupid enough to walk into his trap. Now, hours later, my heart and my mind have begun to cool off; my heart doesn't race, my eyes no longer sting. I may not be all that mad anymore, but I am still careful. I have to be careful for my own good. No one else can do that for me.