What He Commits (What He Wants, Book Thirteen) (An Alpha Billionaire Romance) Read Online Free PDF Page A

    In the morning, Noah appeared at the side
of my bed, dressed in one of his signature dark suits, his hair wet from the
shower.
    “Charlotte,” he said, setting a cup of
coffee down on the nightstand next to me, along with a bowl of oatmeal and
strawberries.   “It’s time to wake
up.”
    “Oh.” I sat up in bed, still naked,
feeling a mess next to him, so clean and put together.   “How long have you been up?” I asked.
    “A couple of hours.   I worked out and then showered.”
    “You went for a run?”
    “I used the treadmill in the gym.”
    “You have a gym?” I asked.
    “It’s nothing fancy, Charlotte.   Just a treadmill and some free
weights.”
    “Oh.”   I filed it away under the list of things I didn’t know about
him.   Of course, him not telling me
he had a home gym was nothing to get upset about.   It wasn’t like I would have expected him to mention
something like that.   But it was
just another surprise, however small.
    “Eat your breakfast and shower.   You’ll come to the office with me
today.”
    “I have school.”
    “You’re not going to school.”
    “I have to go to school, Noah.”
    “The hearing is today, Charlotte.”
    “It’s not until noon.   I should be able to make my morning
classes.”   I wrapped my hands
around the cup of coffee he’d brought me.   The mug was warm, the liquid hot – I could see the steam curling
off the surface.   But my hands were
freezing, my body was freezing, and I couldn’t get warm.
      “You’re not going to school,” Noah said.   “Josh will be there.”
    “I’m going.”
    He opened his mouth to protest, but I
shook my head.  
    “No.   Sitting around will do nothing except make me even more
stressed.   Besides, I have to keep
up with my schoolwork.   And Josh
won’t be in class today.   There’s
no way.   And even if he was, he’s
not going to try anything in front of all of those people.”
    I wasn’t going to budge. What was I going
to do if I didn’t go to class?   Sit
around and drive myself crazy with all the things that could go wrong at the
hearing?   And it wasn’t like Josh
could hurt me at school, if he even showed up.   There would be a million people there.
    Noah sighed, then leaned over and kissed
me on the forehead.   “Fine,” he
said.   “Get ready.   We’ll leave in forty-five minutes.”

 
    ***

 
    He insisted on driving me himself, not
wanting to ride with Jared.   When
we pulled up in front of the school, we sat in the car for a moment with the
motor idling.   I looked out the
window.
    It was a gorgeous day out.   The sky was bright shade of blue, the
sunlight slanting shallowly across the sky.   Everything was sharp and vibrant.   The green of the grass on the quad, the sleekness of the
briefcase in a professor’s hand, the soft morning shadows that the elm trees
cast onto the ground.
    Even the students seemed somehow more put
together this morning, their jeans cleaner, their yoga pants less faded, their
backpacks newer.   I marveled at
their lives, their worries, the fact that they were thinking about tests and
summer clerkships, about grades and recommendations and not about murderers and
BDSM clubs.
    “I’ll be done by eleven,” I said.
      Noah nodded and then began to unbuckle his seatbelt.
      “What are you doing?”   I asked.
    “Going in with you.”
    “Um, no.”   I shook my head.   “You can’t come to class with me.”   The thought of Noah walking into school with me was laughable.
    “Not class, Charlotte.   I’ll wait in a study lounge or library.
Surely there’s some place I can work where I won’t disturb you.”
    “Okay.”   I swallowed.   My
mouth was suddenly dry, and I reached for the handle of the car door.   “Can you just… can you wait a few
minutes before you get out?”   I
thought of the text Julia had sent me, about the reporter hanging out outside
of our apartment.   How could I be
sure the same thing wasn’t