Page 23 of Lust & Lies

NOELLE

AIDEN PLACED ME ON the couch in the living room, then knelt in front of me. Clasping my hands, he stared up at me. I swallowed, feeling as if I’d somehow betrayed his trust, diminished his love for me.

Had I cracked the pedestal he’d placed me on? My heart told me I had. I’d definitely diminished my own trust in myself. My actions had been a red flag. It wasn’t just about almost hurting someone.

It was the fact that at that moment, the idea of doing it hadn’t made me sick. If anything, I’d been calm. And if I were honest with myself, I’d been a little thrilled. My heart had raced, not from fear or adrenaline, but from excitement.

I’d wanted to do it. What did that say about me? Aiden thought he was protecting me. He’d rushed to my side and focused solely on my needs. And Dolores thought I’d been startled. She’d assured me that it wasn’t my fault, taking all the blame onto herself.

Had neither of them noticed what I’d done? Did they not care about how fast my mind had gone to the darkest place possible? Murder. What if that darkness wasn’t because of the movie from yesterday?

What if it had always been there, just waiting for the right moment to come out? Or what if it was only hiding because I had amnesia? What if there were parts of me that even Aiden didn’t know about?

Parts that couldn’t be trusted. Parts that weren’t worth loving. If that was true... then maybe the real danger in this house wasn’t Aiden at all. Maybe it wasn’t my memory loss or the people I’d forgotten.

Maybe it was me. In the hospital, I’d been so worried about going home with a husband I didn’t know. I’d been wary of him, afraid that he would hurt me in some way. Maybe he should’ve been worried about bringing home a wife he didn’t know.

Or did he know? I thought back to the first dream I’d had about him. He’d insisted on telling others about our relationship, while I’d been hesitant. I’d feared others finding out, others who hadn’t wanted Aiden and me to be together.

There was a chance I was the reason they hadn’t wanted us to be together.

Those people could’ve been trying to protect Aiden from me.

If that was the case, it was possible that the things I’d done before I lost my memory were worse than this.

Worse than pinning our cook to the wall and placing a knife to her throat.

Aiden squeezed my hands. “Noe... sweetheart, say something.”

I stared down at our intertwined fingers, noting the way his thumb brushed over my knuckles in small, soothing circles. A lover’s touch. A husband’s comfort. More tears spilled down my cheeks.

Releasing my hands, Aiden cupped my face. “Noe, look at me.”

I blinked and tried to focus. But even his gaze that was brimming with love couldn’t quiet the rising terror inside of me.

“Baby, you’re scaring me,” he told me, brushing tears from my cheeks. “Don’t scare me like this. Talk to me. Tell me what’s wrong.”

I swallowed, attempting to pull it together. I wish I could be like him and Dolores. I wished I could ignore what I’d done and move on. Claim it wasn’t my fault. But I couldn’t.

“You saw it...” I whispered before clearing my throat. “You saw what I did.”

“What did you do?” he asked, looking confused.

“My... My first reaction was to grab a knife.”

He frowned. “What?”

“When I thought someone was in the house, my first reaction was to grab a knife.”

“Of course it was,” he told me. “That’s what anyone would do.”

“But...” I swallowed, not knowing how to explain myself. “I’d had these thoughts.”

Violent thoughts. Thoughts of blood and murder. Thoughts of covering up the crime. Thoughts no normal person, no sane person should have.

“What kind of thoughts?” he asked.

Should I tell him? He needed to know.

“I...” I stared down at my lap, not wanting to reveal that dark side of me. Not wanting to watch the adoration in his eyes fade into caution.

“Look at me, love,” he whispered.

I shook my head.

“Noe, look at me,” he insisted, tone leaving no room for argument.

My gaze rose to his.

“Love, you thought someone had broken into our home. You proceeded to protect yourself and our home. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. I would’ve done the same thing had I thought there was someone dangerous in this house, in the house my wife lives in, the house the woman I cherish lives in. ”

“I know, but...”

“No buts,” he interrupted. “You did the right thing.”

“Aiden, listen to me.”

“First, tell me that you understand you did nothing wrong.”

I shook my head, not understanding why he couldn’t see that what I’d done wasn’t right.

“Aiden, you don’t understand. You keep acting as if what I did was fine, but it wasn’t. Not for me. Not for anyone. There was nothing natural about how I’d felt in that moment.”

His hands were still cupping my cheeks, his thumbs brushing softly over my skin. I could tell by his expression that he wasn’t truly comprehending what I was saying.

“Aiden, I didn’t just grab the knife and haphazardly plan to defend myself. I knew exactly what I was going to do with it. There was no hesitation. No thought to run and ask for help. No desire to go wake you up so you could protect me, protect us.”

Now it was time to reveal the part that truly bothered me.

My voice dropped lower as I muttered, “In my head, I planned out how I was going to kill her. I even plotted how I’d get rid of the body.”

Shame filled me as I braced myself for his reaction, for the look in his eyes to change. Aiden didn’t flinch. Didn’t look shocked. Didn’t pull away.

He simply nodded and said, “I understand.”

What the hell? What did he understand? Those words didn’t clarify anything.

“What do you mean, you understand?” I asked, growing irritated because I felt like he wasn’t truly hearing me.

“Don’t get mad at me,” he told me.

How did he know? He always seemed to know what I was feeling. If only he could tell me why I’d reacted the way I had. That would be great.

“I’m not mad at you. I’m mad at myself. And...” I paused, but decided to be honest. “Yes, I am mad at you. Aiden, I’m mad at you because it seems like you want to slide this under the rug. You want to treat it as if it never happened. As if I hadn’t almost killed someone.”

“I’m not sliding it under the rug, love. I truly understand why you’re feeling lost and afraid right now. The way you reacted to the intruder scared you because in your mind, you’re not someone who can protect yourself when a threat enters the room.”

I opened my mouth to speak, but closed it because I didn’t really know what I wanted to say. Was that how I felt? Before this, did I assume I couldn’t protect myself?

“Noe, you’re not weak. I’ve told you over and over again that you’re the strongest person I know.”

Yes, he’d said that. However, I’d thought he referred to me as strong because of the way I was holding it together in the face of my memory loss. Not strong, physically. Not strong enough to take a life if I had to.

I never imagined I was that kind of strong. Then again, I hadn’t only forgotten him. I’d forgotten myself, also. I did know me. And that was crazy as hell because how could I not know me?

“But...” I sighed, not even knowing what to say.

“You want to know why you’re this strong and why you can protect yourself and don’t need a man or anyone else to save you, right?”

“Yeah,” I whispered.

“Self-defense classes.”

What? “I took self-defense classes?” I asked, skeptical.

“Yes. You took... lots of different classes. That’s why your body knows how to react quickly to danger. You trained for it. Even with memory loss, you haven’t forgotten your training.”

I blinked at him, not buying it. “What made me want that kind of training?”

“Life,” he answered without missing a beat.

Hmmm... “Was my life so bad that I needed to train to survive?”

“No, silly,” he said, leaning in to kiss my forehead. He stared at me for a long time and then sighed.

“What’s the sigh for?” I asked, wondering if he was getting irritated with me.

“I didn’t want to reveal too much about your past before you healed and started remembering things on your own.”

I perked up at that. What was he about to reveal from my past? I was eager to know.

“But, I don’t want you going around thinking you’re some type of deranged killer.” He took another deep breath and released it slowly. “Noe, you’ve been like family to my family for a long time. Since we were kids.”

I’d picked up on that in my conversation with his brother, Ethan.

“And in my family, my grandfather insists on our learning how to protect ourselves. I don’t want to go into all the details.

I’ll just say this: my family came here during the Korean War.

My great-grandfather brought our family here for a fresh start.

But the family was met with a lot of racism and treated badly.

My great-grandfather was determined to make a life here for our family.

So, he changed our last name from Bak to Park.

He worked hard to start a business here, despite the racial slurs thrown at him daily.

Because of this, he was determined to instill a sense of pride in us.

Yes, he changed our name, but he used Bak when establishing our businesses.

That’s why the Park family owns Bak Industries and Bak Hotels and Resorts. ”

So that’s the type of business he was part of. I was finally learning more about my husband. And all it had taken was me almost stabbing someone to pull it out of him.

“Though future generations were given American names, all of our hotels are designed with Korean décor and offer Korean cuisine. Yes, we adapted to a more Western way of living, but my family made sure we could speak Korean and write Hangul, the Korean alphabet.”

I listened to him talk about his family, so caught up in his story that I almost forgot why he was revealing this all to me now.