Chapter Two
They say you can tell everything about a man by his hands.
I watched Noah's now. We were in the small garage-studio at the back of our house, the thick air with the scent of wood and the fine golden dust of his labor. He was hunched over a block of walnuts. His hands were moving with a terrifying, Beautiful precision. His hands are never fully still. Even when he slept, I'd feel his fingers twitch against the small of my back, mapping out visible structures in his dreams.
Anytime he holds a chisel, the frantic energy that hammered beneath his skin like a live wire finally found ground.
I stood in the doorway, staying in the shadows for a moment. I loved the way the single lamp carved out the shape of his face. He looks like something he would have designed, all sharp angles, reinforced bone. He is a man built to ensure, but when he looked at me all that hardness seemed to disappear.
"You're starring, Gwen".
His voice was a low rough sound that didn't reach my ears, it vibrated in my chest, He didn't look up from the wood
"I'm admiring," I corrected, stepping into the warm circle of light. I walked up behind him, sliding my arms around his waist, I pressed my cheek against his back, feeling the heat of his skin through his thin cotton shirt. He was solid, he's the only thing in my life that felt like it couldn't be broken.
Noah set the chisel down and turned in my arms. He didn't just look at me, his gaze consumed me, his hands came up to my face, his thumbs tracing my cheekbones with an intensity that made my heart hammer against my ribs.
" I spent my whole life looking at blueprints, Gwen," he whispers, his eyes dark and searching.
"Lines that were cold. Angles that are perfect but dead. then I found you." He learned in, his forehead resting against mine.
"You're the only curve in my world of straight lines. You're the only part of my day that makes sense and feels like breathing." He kiss me then, and it wasn't the soft, gentle kiss of an outskirts boyfriend. It was desperate. It was a man clinging to a life raft in the middle of a storm. He pulls me in, his hands sliding down my waist, anchoring me there as if he were afraid the floor might open up and swallow me.
"Where did you learn to be so precise, Noah?" I asked, my voice breathless as I pulled back enough to look at him. I ran my fingers over the faded scar at his temple.
"You never talk about the years before. Your family…. They must be craftsmen to teach you something like this."
The air in the garage shifted. It became colder, thinner, The "Noah" mask flicked for a heartbeat, and for a second, I saw a flash of something ancient and lethal in his eyes.
"My Father was someone that valued Family, Legacy and structure, but not in that order" he giggled. His face now facin6 the darkened window.
"But his structures were cages, I didn't like them. I didn't like being a bird in a box, his Legacy was too big a burden for me, Gwen"
"So you flew, I asked ?" He looks at me, his eyes darkening with a sudden, fierce possessiveness.
"Yes and I found my nest, I'm not leaving it, not for anyone, you are my SafeSpace Gwen". He kissed me again, deeper this time, a chaim rather than a request.
I let myself lost in the kiss, ignoring the tiny voice in the back of my mind that reminded me of the time. Ignoring the way my heart felt like it was breaking under the weight of his devotion.
"I have to go," I whispered against his lips but his hands were already deep into my blue stocked jeans.
"I'm late for the grocery store." I murmured with a sweet satisfying sweet sound but I didn't want him to stop and I made no move to step away.
"We're out of that coffee you like", I tried to snap out his love stocked genjutsu .
"Stay," he murmured, his hands tightening on my hips and down below.
"The coffee can wait. I can't." For a moment, I almost did, I almost let the world outside the garage dissolve. But then I remembered the vibrating phone in my pocket.
"Ten minutes", I promised, reaching up to tangle my fingers in his hair.
"I will be back in ten minutes, and I'm all yours." I kissed him one last time….., long, sweet, the kind of kiss that you want to keep on going and also feels like goodbye even when you meant it to be a promise.
As I walked out of my car, I felt his eyes on me through the garage window, I turned and blew him a kiss. He caught it like a child catching a candy from an adult, He has always been a sweet man.
I drove three blocks away before pulling over into the shadows of a car wash, I peered through my jeans and brought out an old phone that I don't use more often, on it appeared a text. "STAY STATIONARY. HE'S WATCHING".
I learned my head against the steering wheel, a single tear escaping. I looked at my reflection in the rear view mirror. I looked like a woman who had just been loved by the. Best man she'd ever known. I looked like a traitor, I tucked the phone back into its hiding place and shifted the car into drive. I had to get to the coffee. I had to go back and be his "Safespace". I had to keep this love alive, because if the foundation of our love cracks, I know what's waiting underneath. And it would burn us both to ash.
Noah is a man. I would risk everything for The Man of my dreams.