RYAN'S POV:
I watched her walk into her own house, and she seemed more comfortable outside. She looked around before setting her things down on the couch.
I followed her, taking off my boots since I knew they weren't as clean as her floors looked. I set them by the door and turned to see her moving into the kitchen. Halfway to her house her stomach growled so loud that she had turned a delicious shade of pink.
She had looked pissed when she woke up and saw the nurse laughing at the foot of her bed with me, but she had calmed down a bit when she didn't come back in. I had spent the night in a light sleep, waking up when they came in to check her vitals, her breathing, her IV bags to keep her hydrated.
Somewhere around 3 am I could not fall back asleep, so I stayed up and watched her sleep for a bit. I also watched a bit of TV and talked to Luke and made plans to take her home today.
She wasn't questioning too much, which was good, I didn't want to have to tell her that I couldn't tell her things. She was going with our flow and I was glad. She seemed laid back and relaxed, and maybe that was because she usually works with the kids and they always do and ask and probably say a whole lot of ridiculous things.
She went into a pantry and I moved to look inside too. She barely had anything, but I did see some things I knew how to make. She sighed like she didn't see anything and turned to me. "Takeout ok?" She asked me and I laughed.
"I can make something." I told her and she started to tell me how she didn't have anything but I walked over, opened the pantry back up and took out the can of plain tomato sauce, the pasta that was kind of a bit of everything mixed together. There were elbow noodles, the bowtie ones, and some small macaroni noodles. I set them out and she looked confused, so I went over, looking in a couple other cabinets before she cleared her throat and opened a drawer that had all the spices in a line.
I took out the ones I needed, and she took out the pots. I got the things all set out and I looked over at her. "I can't believe you know how to cook." She looked at me and then what I had pulled out and she sighed. "I guess it isn't that hard."
"I am the only son and my mom taught me how to cook for myself before I moved out." I told her and she nodded.
"So, I guess you have sisters since you said son and not child." She told me and I nodded. "How many?"
"Two, both younger." I told her and she nodded again. I remembered what she had said about her brother and I knew it was not my place to ask, but I wanted to know if she was okay after that. "Tara is close to me, she works at the bar in the club house on weekends and at the one near our shop every weekday."
"She works 7 days a week?" Noelle asked and I nodded, and she seemed to think about it before shrugging.
"What?"
"Is she in a relationship?"
"Oh no. No, not her." I shook that off right away. Tara isn't supposed to date. Neither is my baby sister but thankfully she was still living with my mom and my mom didn't let her go out much.
"Too young?"
"She's older than our baby sister, but she isn't allowed to date." I told her, knowing that Tara didn't date, and the reason being is because if I found out I would have one of the brothers follow her and tell me all about it, and maybe meet them at her house when he brings her home.
"Why?" I didn't know why, but I didn't like why she seemed confused over something simple. Didn't her brother and dad not want her dating men, or rather boys, when she was young?
"Because she's too young and I won't let her choose some guy that is just going to break her heart." I explained slowly, yeah, that sounded good.
"Is she still in high school?"
"No, she's actually graduated from management school." Her eyes turned into a comical smirk and I didn't like it. What did she think she knew?
"Why do you have that smirk?" I asked and she looked at me and smiled this time like she was about to laugh. "What's funny?"
"You think your grown sister, who sure, might be younger than you, aren’t dating even though she just graduated from college?" She laughed this time, and I clenched my jaw and crossed my arms.
"She isn't. I would know." I told her and she laughed a little bit harder before she started to cough and grabbed her arm like it was hurting. "Noelle." I grabbed her when she stopped laughing and sucked in a deep breath.
"Sorry, it was hurting too bad." She rested against the counter and I just moved closer to make sure that she wasn't going to get dizzy like the doc said she might. "Come on." I moved my hands to her hips and lifted her up and she squeaked and I had to keep the small laugh about the sound to myself as I walked her into her living room and put her on the couch.
"You didn't have to lift me." She said and gulped hard and looked at her legs as I pulled the blanket from the back of the couch over her.
"I wasn't going to let you walk." I told her and she sighed.
"I'm too heavy to lift, don't do it-" I stopped listening. She wasn't heavy. She was soft, curvy, sexy as sin. The perfect woman didn't come in a size two. Noelle was a little bombshell, big t**s, wide hips and a perfectly round ass. Her thighs matched her and so did her stomach, so you knew nothing on her was fake.
"You aren't heavy, in fact, you are perfectly sized." I told her and saw her blush, and she stopped talking and just watched me. I knew I had to get back to the pasta. She kept her head down as I walked away, and I had a s**t eating grin on my face. She was all woman, and if she hadn't been hurt when I first saw her, I would have appreciated her entire body for what it was. I sure as hell would have hit on her if I had known Cami's teacher was hot.
I stayed in the kitchen, finding the shallow bowls and then heading to the living room and giving her a plate before moving to sit beside her feet. She had a little wrap around her ankle the doctors did before we left, they taught her how to do it, but I made sure to watch and listen too.
As I sat down she fidgeted and eventually turned on the TV, and there went the news, her face wasn't on the screen but her name was going through the bottom scrolls, they said the school she worked at, grade she taught, basically everything but her phone number and social security card.
"They really can just find me huh?" I looked over and noticed how scared she looked. I did not like that look on her face.
"And if they do, I will be here." I told her and she bit her lip, looked at me before looking at the TV again. She ate slowly, and I made sure her food was gone before getting up. She moved to follow me, but I took her bowl and told her to stay put before I went to do dishes.
NOELLE'S POV:
I sat there, hearing him doing the dishes and I felt like I should of told him not to bother with it because I would do them since he cooked, but my ankle was killing me, my shoulder was throbbing, and it was just sweet that he was thinking about doing it.
I rolled my good ankle and tried to get myself up off the couch, but my shoulder didn't want to help lift me and I didn't want to roll off like I was too big to sit up. I still couldn't believe what Ryan had said about me, let alone that he could pick me up and walk me all the way to the couch.
He called me perfectly sized. I knew I was big, and while I wasn't huge, I wasn't skinny. I was just under the average US size. I was a 14 in pants, a large in shirts, and I always felt embarrassed when I had to move up a size or down a size. I was usually in the same range, but at the same time I wasn't comfortable in my skin. When my brother died, I was a size 6 and would go through cute clothes like they were free. My brother spoiled me.
I got up and went into the kitchen slowly, making sure to make a little noise so he would hear me. I looked at him as I got some ice... his broad shoulders, thick arms, he could lift me up easily like had had done before. But that made me wonder how far and for how long he could carry me. Would he be able to lift me up and pin me against a wall? Carry me upstairs to my room?
I bit my lips, knowing he probably had a ton of women throwing themselves at him at his clubhouse. There had to have been women he liked more than me. He was being nice when he called me perfect.
I wanted to hit my head. I was going from embarrassed to feeling bad, to feeling good about myself, and now I was feeling stupid for thinking a man like him would want a woman to like me.
I went back into the living room as he turned off the water and I hobbled to the couch and set the frozen corn on my ankle that was still wrapped. "Noelle?" I looked up and over the back of the couch to see him standing there.
"Yes?"
"You said something about laundry, do you want me to bring it downstairs and do it?" He asked and I turned a bright red and he smiled as he came closer. "What? Something you don't want me to see up there?" He asked, his head nodding to the stairs and I gulped.
"I just need to sort it." I told him and he nodded. "If you can bring the basket and the towel from the bathroom down and I can make my way to the laundry room." I told him and my cheeks felt like they were only getting hotter. He nodded slowly before coming around to help me up. His hands went from mine to my sides and then down to my hips, I sucked in a breath and gulped hard as he lingered, and I made the quick move away to limp my way to the laundry room.
I heard his feet head up the stairs and I bit my lip hoping there wasn't anything on the floor, and the panties I was wearing before all this happened weren't just laying on top. I waited a couple minutes for him to bring everything in and when he started to dig through it with me, I almost snatched some panties from him.
"I can do this." I told him and he smiled wide. "Really. Ryan, you don't have to be in here to see me sort dirty clothes." I gulped and he nodded slowly but held up one of my skirts, and right then my bright yellow lace panties fell out and I reached for it but he grabbed them and tossed them where I had tossed the others, under the towel, but his had fallen right on top.
"Is that what you were worried about me finding?" He asked with a slight laugh and I bit my lip and went through the skirts and the pants before getting all my panties away from him. He started to laugh harder and then he was helping me from the laundry to the couch when I started all the black and dark colors together. I would have to do three different loads, but it would all be okay.
Hopefully, Ryan would let me do it all on my own when it was my delicates, but the way he seemed to enjoy my blushing and helping me around. His hands had gone from one side of my waist to the other and when he helped me sit back down his fingers grazed the side of my boobs and I had to remind myself that I wasn't wearing a bra.
I curled up and brought the blanket up and over my chest so he couldn't tell that my n*****s were hard, even after 20 minutes after his small little touch.
Every time a show ended, or a commercial came on I peeked over at him and if he caught me and held my stare. Before too long I got up and moved my clean clothes into the dryer and then moved onto my whites and bright colors.
Ryan went to make popcorn and I saw him looking for a bowl big enough, so I went into help him on my way back to the couch.
"So... no girlfriend waiting for you at home?" I asked when he kept the popcorn bowl in his lap, and he smirked and shook his head.
"Nope. No girl, just the brothers at the club, my sisters, and Cami every other weekend." He told me and I nodded slowly. He cracked his neck, moved to crack his knuckles and when I heard the beep for the dryer I got up and pulled the skirts out, laying them out so they didn't wrinkle before shaking out the pants and the two pairs of jeans. I put them all flat in the basket and moved to put the next load in.
The panties were the last load and would be done quickly. I put the little bit of soap in them before going right for the couch again. He was sitting there, movie paused, his phone out, and one arm around the back of the couch where I had been sitting. I sat back down and reached for the popcorn and he immediately put the phone down and hit the play button.
Halfway through the movie I felt his hand on my shoulder, pushing me to lean against him and I just let him hold onto me for a while. I was asleep before the dryer was done with the second load.
Ryan's chest might have been hard and muscled but that didn't mean it wasn't the most comfortable I had been in a long time.