The Things We Leave Unfinished Yarros, Rebecca (reading like a writer .TXT) 📖

lowered my foot to my previous foothold. “See? That wasn’t so bad,” I muttered. The line was tight, offering me support as I moved my hands and then my left foot down.

Then I shrieked, my voice high and loud, as my foot slipped and I fell. It was only a matter of inches before the rope caught my weight, and I hung suspended, parallel with the wall.

“Are you okay?” Noah asked, his voice pitching slightly.

I sucked in a full breath, then another, willing my heartbeat to settle at an acceptable, nondramatic level. The harness dug slightly into the skin just beneath the curve of my butt, but other than that, I was perfectly fine.

“A little embarrassed,” I admitted reluctantly, heat flooding my already flushed cheeks. “But otherwise fine.”

“Do you still want to climb down the rest of the way?” Noah asked without judgment.

I lifted my arms, raised my hands to the holds directly in front of me, cringing as they shook. The truth was, if he was going to drop me, he would have done it by now.

“So I’m just supposed to sit back in the harness?” I asked, silently praying that he wasn’t an I told you so kind of guy.

“Put your feet against the wall,” he ordered.

I lifted them slightly and did as he asked.

“Both hands on the rope.” Another order.

I followed it.

“Good,” he praised. “I’m going to lower you, and I want you to sit back into the harness and walk your way down the wall. Got it?” His voice was strong and steady, just like the man himself. What did it take to ruffle a guy like Noah? Sure, I’d pricked his temper a few times, but even through the most uncomfortable of our arguments, I’d never seen him actually lose it, at least not in the door-slamming, screaming way Damian often did when things hadn’t gone his way.

“Got it,” I called down, offering Noah a shaky smile.

“I don’t want to startle you, so we’ll go on three. Slow and steady.”

I nodded.

“One, two, three,” he counted us off and lowered me enough to fully sit back. “Good job. Now let’s walk you down the wall.”

Slowly, steadily, Noah let the rope out, lowering me down the climbing wall. A few seconds in and it wasn’t half bad. Defying gravity came with a little adrenaline rush, especially when I boldly emulated another climber farther down the wall, taking fun little hops.

As I got closer to the ground, I glanced up at the bell I had just rung. It seemed so high, and yet I’d been there, all the way up at the top.

All because Noah had been determined to earn my trust—and he had.

I was all smiles when my feet met the earth. “That was amazing!” I threw my arms around Noah, and he held me tight, lifting me right back off my feet.

“You were amazing,” he corrected me.

He held me so easily, as if I weighed nothing, and smelled so good it was all I could do to not put my nose to his neck and breathe deep. His scent was a unique combination of the sandalwood and cedar of his cologne mixed with soap and a little sweat. He smelled like a man was supposed to, all without faking it. Damian would have paid thousands of dollars to smell like Noah did effortlessly.

Stop comparing them.

I pulled back slightly, just enough to look in his eyes. “Thank you,” I whispered.

His smile was slow and the sexiest I’d ever seen. “What are you thanking me for?” he asked as his gaze darted to my lips and back. “You’re the one who did all the work.”

Oh, shit. He really wasn’t an I told you so kind of guy, and that only made me like him more. Made me want him more.

The energy between us shifted, pulling taut, as though we were connected by more than just this rope. There was something here, and it didn’t matter how hard I fought it or how frequently we bashed heads about the book—it only grew.

His gaze heated and his grip tightened.

There were only inches between our lips—

“Are you guys done?” a small voice asked.

Blinking, I looked down at a girl who couldn’t have been older than seven.

“I was hoping to do this one next, if that’s okay?” she asked with hopeful eyes.

“Right, of course,” I replied.

Noah set me down and unhooked my harness from the rope line with quick, efficient moves. God, could his arms be any hotter? The muscles of his biceps strained against the short sleeves of his athletic shirt. Good thing it stretched, or he probably would’ve busted through.

“Thank you,” I said again as he unhooked from the line.

“That was all you. All I did was keep you safe.” The low timbre of his voice warmed my entire body.

“On belay,” another voice said. An older girl, probably in high school, had taken Noah’s place, and the younger one had already tethered herself to the rope. “Climb on.”

“Climbing,” the little girl answered, and then scurried up the wall like she’d been bitten by a radioactive spider.

“You have to be kidding me,” I muttered, watching the girl take only minutes to do what had taken me a half hour.

Noah huffed a soft laugh. “A few more times and you’ll be just as good as she is,” he assured me.

I shot him a look of pure skepticism.

“You didn’t fall once on the way up,” he remarked, reaching for my face slowly, giving me a chance to shy away. I didn’t. “That’s pretty amazing.” He took a slightly sweaty lock of my hair that had escaped my ponytail and tucked it behind my ear.

“I’ve never had a problem reaching for things I want,” I replied softly. “It’s the falling that gets me into trouble.”

And that’s exactly what this was, I realized. It was one thing to joke with Hazel about a post-divorce rebound, but quite another to like more than just his body, even though it really was incredible. It would be all