“Noah? What are you doing here? Where’s Beckett?” Marcus’s questions were identical to Ricky’s as he stepped up to the bar from somewhere in the swirling mass of club-goers.
The fact that Noah hadn’t even noticed Marcus—or Blaise, as Jasper Werther called himself when he was in drag—sitting at one of the tables he’d passed on his way to the bar was an indicator of how much things had changed for him. He finished the whiskey Ricky had brought him, then slowly turned to face Marcus.
He waited to speak, gauging his feelings and studying his inner reactions to the man he had set so much of his heart on for so long. He didn’t feel anything when he looked at Marcus—not the wild, blinding, false love that had fueled him for so long, and not the encompassing, beautiful, soft affection he felt when he thought of Beckett. The only thing his heart and mind whispered to him now when he looked at Marcus was shame.
“I’m sorry, Marcus,” he said, lowering his eyes.
A long pause followed, before Marcus inched closer and said, “What?”
Noah lifted his gaze to his old lover. The club was rather loud, and it only seemed to be getting louder. His ears were ringing with confused, distracting sounds.
“I’m sorry,” he repeated. “I’m sorry for everything. I…I was out of my mind. I was wrong. I never should have….”
He stopped and lowered his head again. He never should have what? Tortured Marcus with his fits and episodes? Never should have come to New York to find him? Never should have burdened the man with his love in the first place?
Of course, Marcus hadn’t loved him. He wasn’t loveable. No one would love him.
Noah jumped when a hand closed on his shoulder. It took him a moment to realize it was Marcus, that Marcus had stepped even closer to him.
“Noah, where is Beckett?” Marcus asked, a strange note of compassion in his voice that Noah wasn’t used to. “Did he come with you?”
Noah had to think for a moment, then he shook his head. “No, he’s at home, sleeping.”
“Does he know you’re here?” Blaise asked, kindness and worry in her expression. “Should we send someone to fetch him?”
Noah shook his head. “No, please don’t. I don’t want him—” He stopped, suddenly anxious that if he told Beckett’s friends he didn’t want Beckett to know where he was, they would become even more alarmed. Instead, he said, “He shouldn’t be disturbed. He’s had a long, tiring week, and he needs his rest.”
He needed more than that, he needed to be released from the burdens that would cause his life to be a misery.
“I don’t know,” Marcus said, studying him closely. “You don’t look right. We should send someone for Beckett.”
“I’ll go,” Ricky said, dashing out from behind the bar, ready to help as always.
Noah shook his head. “Don’t bother. Don’t bother him,” he rephrased the question. “I’m not staying here anyhow. I just wanted to come down here to say…to say I’m sorry.”
He glanced mournfully up at Marcus. All of the embarrassment that he should have felt in London and when he’d first come to New York pressed down on him. Marcus looked confused, which was only right and fitting. Noah’s behavior had been confusing from the start. It had probably been terrifying.
“I’m sorry,” he repeated when Marcus just stared at him. “For everything I’ve done, for all the ways I’ve made your life hell.”
Marcus shifted anxiously, glanced to Blaise, then let out a heavy breath.
“You’re not well, Noah,” he said. “You haven’t been well for a while. It…it was my fault for not recognizing that, or rather, for holding it against you. But you’ve come so far. Beckett has been so good for you.”
“Beckett is good,” Noah said, nodding in agreement. “Beckett is too good. He shouldn’t have to put up with me. He deserves someone better.”
His gaze flashed across the bar to where Graham Ravenswood had left what he was doing to come over and listen to the conversation. He wore a look of concern that made him seem almost handsome. Maybe Noah did see what Beckett saw in him after all. Maybe, once he was gone, Beckett would be able to pursue Ravenswood again, and now that Ravenswood could see how kind and wonderful Beckett was, their love story would unfold differently.
He wanted Beckett to be happy. That was all he wanted. He wanted the man he loved so desperately to live a full and happy life, not to constantly be made miserable by someone else’s madness, someone he couldn’t save. Beckett didn’t deserve that, he didn’t—
“Noah?” Marcus’s loud voice shook Noah out of his thoughts so abruptly that he jerked and nearly fell off the barstool. Of all things, Marcus looked relieved and puffed out a breath. “We thought we’d lost you for a moment there.”
Noah wasn’t sure what Marcus was talking about. It didn’t really matter. He shook his head to clear his thoughts.
“I just wanted you to know that I’m sorry,” he said, standing. “That’s all. It was wrong of me to ruin your life the way I did. No one should be burdened with that, no one.”
“I’m not so sure of that,” Marcus said, glancing anxiously to Blaise, and then Ricky, and even Ravenswood. Almost like he didn’t know what he was doing. “Maybe I wasn’t the right man for the job, but Beckett cares about you. He understands you very well and knows how to help.”
“Yes, but he shouldn’t,” Noah said, glancing down. He wasn’t certain whether he was speaking aloud or not when he said, “It isn’t fair to him. I don’t want to drag him under with me.”