We Make Mayhem [boyxboy]

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Noah stopped talking, but he hadn't finished the story.

"Whose name did she see?" I asked Noah.

"Decker Lord, of course."

Of course. The way she had felt when they kissed, and how she'd loved Decker from afar the moment she'd seen him. Of course it was him.

But that meant...

"Did he specifically go out and find her match?" I asked. "Take his body so she'd fall in love with him?"

Noah nodded. "It was part of the experiment."

Fuck. I leaned back in my chair, feeling ill. It was so fucked up—this all-knowing alien taking a liking to a human girl and purposely taking a body she couldn't resist, all so he could use her as part of his sick human experiment. His wife, his kids... it was like they were all just playthings, to him. Part of the game.

I pushed my hands through my hair. "Shit, Noah. I don't know what to say."

"Neither did I, when she told me."

"Is she going to do anything about it? Are you?"

"What could I do? He's a fucking supervillain. We're all powerless, compared to him."

"Does he know you know? Does he know your mom knows?"

"We've never told him." He laughed humorlessly. "But that doesn't mean shit."

So this was why Decker Lord kept such an iron fist around his family. All the pieces fell into place. If word got out that he was a fucking alien... I didn't even know what would happen. It would be some War of the Worlds shit. What if people thought the rest of the family were aliens, too?

If people found out, Noah could be in danger.

"I just keep thinking about the real Decker Lord," Noah whispered. "He's in there, somewhere. Dormant. What happens if he wakes up and finds he hasn't been in control of his body since he was seventeen, and now he's thirty-five and has four kids, a wife, and several billion dollar companies? Oh, and he's been possessed by an alien the whole time?"

"I don't know," I said, because that was literally the only answer I had. "I don't fucking know. That would be horrible."

"Yeah. And what if... what if my real dad is a really bad guy?"

It wasn't his real dad I was afraid of being a bad guy, but Noah looked so afraid, so miserable, that I didn't say it. I put my arms around him and pulled him into me. He burrowed his face into the hollow between my neck and shoulder.

"It's okay," I said. "It's all going to be okay, Noah. I won't let anything happen to you."

Noah nodded against me, even though that was clearly a load of bullshit. How could I protect him? I was a gnat compared to Decker Lord. He could squash me if he wanted to.

Noah pulled back and we just... looked at each other, in this room. It felt so warm and safe.

"I don't want to leave," I told him.

"Me, either. Why don't we sleep in here?"

That sounded perfect. The bots formed a bed on the floor and I turned the lights down, but not off. I always loved the soft, orangey glow of the studio lights when the fader was turned almost all the way down. Under silken blankets with Noah cuddled under my arm, the studio truly felt like heaven.

If we had slept anywhere else, my thoughts would have raced all night, but in our room of safety and truth, I could forget about everything except Noah's warm body beside mine.