The Bachelor's Promise (Bachelor Auction) by Naima Simone Page A

myself.”
    He hefted the top carton and headed for the door. “Don’t bother. We’ll put everything in mine.”
    “That’s not nece—”
    “My car has more space. You can follow me in yours.”
    She threw up her arms, frustrated. “Follow you where?”
    “My apartment. You’ll stay with me,” he informed her before disappearing from the apartment without even a backward glance.
    She gaped at the empty doorway. What in the hell just happened?
    “Soooo,” Chancey drawled, “should I have your mail forwarded to his address…”
    Shooting the other woman a glare, Noelle charged after a dead man walking.
    …
    Three. Two. One…
    “You’re out of your damn mind!”
    Aiden stowed the cardboard box in the rear of his Escalade with a sigh. He happened to be in agreement with Noelle’s assessment. Since leaving her flooded apartment seconds earlier with a box of her property in his arms, he’d been questioning what strain of crazy had prompted him to offer his place. He snorted. Offer? More like ordered.
    Shit. Maybe the god-awful fumes in that apartment had momentarily poisoned him. Maybe he’d temporarily blacked out.
    Whatever the reason, seeing Noelle standing there in that small kitchen filled with boxes, her arms folded around herself while that stubborn chin pointed toward the ceiling, he couldn’t leave her there.
    In that moment, he’d been transported back in time to fifteen years earlier. He’d no longer stood in a flooded Boston apartment but in the dry living room of his childhood home in Chicago, meeting Frank Rana for the first time. Frank had pumped Aiden’s hand, his loud, overly jovial voice declaring how glad he was to finally meet Caroline’s son, his large frame nearly filling Aiden’s vision. Nearly. Over Frank’s shoulder, Aiden had glimpsed the slight, petite figure hiding by the front door. His mother had told him Frank’s daughter was eleven—five years younger than Aiden—but the little girl with the wild tumble of black curls and ice-blue eyes that almost swallowed her elfin face had appeared closer to eight than eleven. And she’d stared at him as if calmly waiting for his rejection. Expecting it. With her skinny arms wrapped around her, and her chin hiked into the air, she’d seemed braced for it.
    And he’d given it to her.
    He’d ignored her, dismissed her, because even then, whiskey fumes from her father had stung Aiden’s eyes.
    That had been the sixteen-year-old’s reaction. But as he’d stared at Noelle in her water-logged apartment with the image of the child superimposed over the woman, the thirty-one-year-old couldn’t abandon her.
    Damn .
    Dragging a hand down his face, Aiden slammed the Escalade’s door.
    What a clusterfuck.
    He’d driven to the address supplied to him by the private investigator Bay Bridge had on retainer with the sole purpose of telling Noelle he would pay for her tuition. That his obligation to her—his mother’s wish—would be fulfilled with the payment he intended to make to Boston University’s finance office on Monday. Then he’d planned on walking away with no further need of contact between the two of them. No need to constantly rehash the past in a relentless loop. No need to be reminded of the loss that could never be regained or healed.
    But that goddamn road to hell. Not only was it paved with good intentions, but the best-laid plans and a bunch of delusions.
    Turning, he faced the glaring, five-foot-four-inch bundle of righteous anger shivering on the sidewalk.
    Again, that defiance, that challenge shouldn’t be so fucking hot. As if drawn by a powerful magnet, his gaze dipped to the long legs bared by her running shorts for the umpteenth time in fifteen minutes. Slim, toned, and smooth, honeyed skin, just as he remembered. But the profusion of shocking color was new. As new as the attitude. His gut clenched, and he ground his teeth together at the twisting sensation. He should be used to that particular wrenching by