PLAY (21 page)

“Honestly, I’m not sure why I’m here.” I reached for another pool cue from the rack on the wall.

“You still upset about Claire?”

I picked out a ball and lined up my shot. An easy one, but the sound of one ball cracking on the next was satisfying even before the dull ‘thunk’ of the four sinking into the side pocket. “I just can’t picture her leaking information to one of your competitors.”

I rounded the corner of the table to pick another shot. Max leaned against the side, watching while I missed.

“It wasn’t to a competitor. It was Christina. Claire had been sharing info for months, but I wasn’t willing to make the call until I knew for sure. Last week Claire got sloppy and we found out.”

My brain clicked slowly, trying to put the pieces together. “Why would Claire do that? She loved working here.”

His gaze flicked across the surface of the table, picking his next target. “Maybe she did it for the money. Or because she and Chris used to be friends. If it puts your mind at ease, she admitted it yesterday.”

Crack-crack.

Thunk.

I let that piece of news wash over me. I felt betrayed, which was selfish, because I couldn’t imagine what Max would be feeling after working with her for years.

“I’m sorry,” I offered.

Max straightened. Instead of taking another shot he set the pool cue on the table, rounding the corner to me. I did the same with mine and when he stopped just a foot away, I gazed up at him.

“Me too. But in this industry you live and die on every game you put out. It pays to be paranoid.”

“But why didn’t you just tell me about this in San Diego? Or on the boat?”

Max blew out a long breath, reaching up to rub the back of his neck. “Because you’re my escape, Payton. You’re the good place I get to go when I need to forget about work, and all the shit that goes along with it. And, maybe I wanted to keep you out of the darker bits of my world.”

His words surprised me, and touched me. “Max?”

“Yeah?”

“I kind of want to be in all the bits of your world.”

His dark eyes shifted on mine. The nod that followed was all but imperceptible.

“My first game was so much simpler.”

“Oasis?”

“Albatross.” A smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “It was about this bird that flew around on the ocean. Like in the poem.”

I remembered the one he meant. We’d studied it in high school English class. “You played a sailor?”

“You played the bird. But you had nine lives, like a cat. If the sailor hit you enough, he turned into Blackbeard. But if he only hit you once, you could come back and haunt him. If you survived, the sailor turned into a barnacle and you got to take over his ship with a bunch of pirate birds.”

“And this was your first hit?” I eyed him skeptically.

Max’s laugh warmed my insides. “Nah. Sales amounted to zero dollars and zero cents. Which was fine, since I made it when I was ten.”

Delight rushed through me at the thought of ten-year-old Max bent in concentration over his computer. I wondered what he’d been like then. The same seriousness. The same quirkiness. Did he have the same challenge in his eye, or had that come later?

I wanted to know, I realized. I wanted to know everything about him.

“Do you still have it?” I asked.

“Yeah. Somewhere.”

“I want to play it,” I decided.

“We’ll see.” He let go of my arms but didn’t make a move closer to me, or away. “So are we good?”

“We’re good.”

“In that case, come on. We’re going to be late.”

“Late for what?” I asked, but he was already heading out the door. I trailed Max down to the parking garage and got in his car, nerves warring with excitement. “At least tell me if I need to change.”

“Never change,” he replied solemnly.

“Wow. Says the guy who thinks romantic is letting a girl pick her avatar first?” I teased.

“OK. If you wanted to stop at your place and put on something obscenely hot, I won’t complain.”

His eyes darkened and a shiver ran through me. It was incredible that after being upset with him for twenty-four hours, I could go back to wanting him so fast.

As he maneuvered the car out of the garage and in the direction I gave him, I realized Max hadn’t been inside my apartment yet.

We found a parking spot around the corner from my house. Max followed me upstairs and I unlocked the door.

“This is me.” I turned in a circle, suddenly self-conscious after being in his giant apartment. Max shoved his hands in his pockets and wandered around the small living room and kitchen. I watched him survey my belongings, wondering what he saw. He stopped to touch family pictures of me and my mom. A crude painting of a flower I’d done in college.

“This is cool.”

“Yeah? I made it.”

“Seriously?” He looked impressed. He kept going and I kept watching him. Finally his gaze came back to mine. “I like it.”

I flushed for no good reason. “Thanks.” My heart started up in my chest under the weight of his stare.

“Payton?” he murmured.

“Yeah.”

“You’ve got twenty minutes.”

My jaw dropped. “What?” He smirked and I dashed for the bathroom.

“You sure you don’t want to tell me where we’re going?” I hollered, swiping a dry razor at warp speed over my legs. I cursed when I cut myself.

“I’m sure,” he called back amiably.

Hair would have to wait, I decided, looking in the mirror. I’d straightened it that morning, and only a bit of its natural wave was sneaking back in. I applied some mascara and lip gloss, then dashed from the bathroom to the bedroom to rifle through my closet.

No.

No.

Maybe.

Hmm…

When I emerged, Max was standing on the far side of the room, inspecting the titles on my bookshelf. The jeans he wore did great things for an already remarkable ass. His hair was more or less tamed, and when he turned, the barbell in his eyebrow lifted.

I waited for him to say something. The red splurge was tight and conjured cleavage from nowhere. The slinky fabric skimmed my curves and hit at mid-thigh. The bright color set off my pale skin. I’d topped it off with strappy nude heels and a matching clutch.

I started to cross the distance between us, focusing on staying upright despite my higher-than-normal heels. I wasn’t usually self-conscious, but something in his gaze made me that way.

I stopped in front of him. His throat bobbed as he swallowed, his eyes running from my face down my bare shoulders to my chest, my hips, my legs, my feet.

“I wish you’d say something,” I murmured, shifting as his gaze came back to mine.

“Right now, I’m kind of a font of nothing.” He reached a hand behind my neck, tangling in my hair and pulling me against him. There was no resistance in me and I clung, kissing him back with everything in me.

Two hours ago I’d been viciously conflicted for what he’d done to Claire. Now that I knew why he’d done it…I couldn’t think about anything coming between us. There was nowhere I wanted to be other than with him, right now.

When he pulled back we were both breathless.

“You know that if we didn’t have somewhere to be right now, we’d be naked on your floor.” Max took my hand before I could respond and I followed him out the door and back to the car.

“Your place suits you, you know,” he said as we slid in. “I like that I can learn things about you by walking around.”

“Oh really? Like what.”

He navigated through the streets. I’d given up guessing where we were headed.

“Like you have good taste in music posters,” he commented. “The Raiders,” Max prompted when I looked at him blankly.

“Right! I saw them once in college before they got really big.”

“Your mix tape introduced them to me.”

I flushed. “I told you. It wasn’t a mix tape, Max, it was a playlist.”

“A mix tape is just a playlist with intentions.” His voice was a self-satisfied purr.

“Whatever,” I snorted.

“You’re saying when you gave it to me, you weren’t trying to seduce me? And be honest.”

I mumbled an incoherent response and Max grinned. “Actually,” I started, trying to steer us onto a better topic, “I think the Raiders are supposed to be in town this month. I tried to get tickets but everything was sold out.” Or a zillion bucks.

“Right.”

Suspicion dawned. “Max, you didn’t…”

We pulled up in front of the hall. Max gave his keys to the valet, who looked skeptically at the rusting car, but my attention was already riveted by the sign in front.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” I glanced down at the ticket he handed me before starting up the stairs into the throng that was swarming excitedly to get in.

“Happy Birthday, Payton,” he said, his voice barely audible over the swelling volume of the crowd.

Chapter 24

You’re the only one I see

“But—how?”

Max raised a brow. “Come on. I knew you liked them. But just to be sure, I checked with Charlie. I think her words were, ‘She’d pee her fucking pants.’ Not exactly the physical reaction I was hoping for.” His mouth twisted wryly as he steered me into the line of traffic heading toward the doors.

It was hard to picture the two of them having a conversation. But Max had actually contacted Charlie…

A lump formed in my throat. This band had gotten me through everything with my mom. It was like they were the soundtrack to my life. And I was about to see them live.

Charlie’d been right. This was exactly where I wanted to be.

The line moved quickly and we wound our way through the crowd on the first floor up to the third.

When we found the box, I was stunned silent. It was dead center and had a killer view of the entire hall. I couldn’t imagine what these tickets had cost.

“Well?”

I crossed to the middle of the space and turned a circle. I could’ve laid down and not come close to touching any of the walls.

“It’s incredible,” I said, stopping facing Max. His hands were shoved into the pockets of his jeans, his head cocked just a little.

“You’re worth it.”

I grabbed his surprised face and pulled it down to mine. Max kissed me back, his arms going around my waist to lock me against him.

“That was worth it, too,” he murmured, his gaze still on my mouth when he pulled back.

Max’s hands tightened on my body and I realized we were alone here. Surrounded by thousands of people, sure. But here? In this box? It was only us.

“I have to say,” he went on after a charged moment, “I’m a big fan of the dress. But somehow all I can think about is what you’re wearing underneath.”

I smiled sweetly up at him. “Since we’ve agreed to be transparent with each another, I should tell you that there’s nothing underneath.”

The groan was audible over the din of the crowd below us. “Payton, fuck the concert—”

“No way.”

Before he could protest the crowd erupted as the opening act came out and I pulled reluctantly out of his arms.

The strain of the last two days slipped away. Max and I drank club sodas and gave ourselves up to the music like a couple of teenagers. I’d never heard him shout but when a particularly good song drew to a close, he leaned against the front of the box and hollered his approval right alongside me.

“Did you ever go to concerts when you were a kid?” I asked.

“Not really,” he admitted. “You?”

“Yeah, but nothing like this.” I’d gone out, gotten drunk with my friends, but nothing meant as much as this night. Being here, with Max, after living the last five years of my life gave me a whole new appreciation for moments like this one. Moments so perfect you wanted to take a picture and preserve them forever. 

When the Raiders came out, first the lead singer, trailed by the other musicians, I lost my mind. I gripped the front of the box, grinning so hard my face hurt.

They started to play, rich harmonies that filled the huge room, and the familiar music moved me body, bypassing my brain entirely.

“You need to be dancing!” I shouted at Max over the music.

“No, I really don’t.”

My chin bounced like a bobblehead. “Yeah, you do.”

I grabbed his hand. He followed along reluctantly while I tried to teach him the words. I was doing some version of the sprinkler when he grabbed my hand and lifted it over my head, tugging. I went spinning the other way until his hand in mine jerked me back toward him. I landed dizzily against his chest and stared up at him in delight.

Max’s shirt was rolled up to the elbows. His hair was messy from dancing, but it was the look of exhilaration in his eyes I noticed most. In my heels our bodies almost lined up. I pressed forward into my toes to settle my mouth on his again.

“Thank you,” I murmured as I pulled back.

“For what?” he asked, bemused.

“For being you.”

The rest of the concert was a blur of music and joy and lights. By the time we got back in his car I was sore from laughing and my feet ached from the shoes, but I couldn’t remember a better night in my life.

“I have so much energy and I’m exhausted. How is it possible to be both at once?” I giggled.

“Does that mean you’re too tired to come over?” Max’s voice was husky.

The laughter in me died as fast as the heat sprang up. “I’d have to be in a coma not to come over.”

After the roar of the crowd, the silence of Max’s apartment created a cocoon around us. I took a moment to linger in the hall, stepping out of my shoes and returning my mom’s text with birthday wishes before trailing Max to his bedroom.

The space was big, masculine and dark, like the rest of his apartment. There were no personal touches that would distinguish it as Max’s. I wondered whether he’d picked out the navy bed linens, the dark wood dressers, or whether someone else had.

None of it mattered, though. I wasn’t here for the furniture.

Max stood in front of the floor-to-ceiling windows, still and thoughtful. He looked different here than he did in his office. Despite the quiet confidence in his stance, something about him was almost lonely.

I padded up behind him and pressed my breasts into his back, standing on my toes to look over his shoulder.

“Your view is incredible,” I murmured.

He continued his slow scan of the horizon. “I spend every day building fantasy. This is how I like my reality. At a distance.”

“Not all reality’s bad.”

“No,” he conceded. “It’s just…impermanent. Fantasy never disappoints. Sometimes I wonder if the only thing you can count on are the good moments in life being too short.”

His philosophical tone threw me. “Come on, Max. That’s not true.”

“Your parents didn’t last, Payton. Mine were strangers in the same house by the time I graduated high school.”

“Lots of relationships last. I hate that you don’t believe it.”

He turned toward me, letting out a sigh. “I love that you do. You going to get married someday, Payton? Have kids? Maybe a dog?”

I couldn’t speak.

“I hope you get all those things, if they’re what you want. I thought it was I wanted once too. But it’s not going to happen. That part of me’s gone.”

My heart hurt for him as he turned toward me, taking my arms in his hands. Max swivelled me against the window. I tensed as the cold glass touched my shoulders. “Afraid of heights, Coyote?”

“Just falling.”
In more ways than one.

His hands moved over my skin, distracting me from the free-fall until my breathing was shallow and my body lit up under his touch.

“The concert was amazing,” I murmured, needing him to know how much it was true. “No one’s ever done anything like that for me before.”

I was willing to bet that if I hadn’t shown up, Max wouldn’t have breathed a word about the wasted tickets after. The entire night had been for me—not for him to score points.

Dark eyes that were becoming as familiar as mine roamed my face as Max’s fingers squeezed my hip.

“I was watching you tonight. Dancing like no one else was there. And the thing was, there might as well have been no one there. Twenty thousand people, Payton, and you’re the only one I see.”

I wanted to put my heart in his hands. To trust that it would be safe there. I wondered if his words meant he wanted that too.

How can you trust him when he doesn’t trust himself?

I shook off the voice. “Do one more thing for me tonight, Max,” I murmured.

“Anything.”

“Don’t fuck me.”

His hand stilled at the hem of my dress. “What?”

Max started to pull back but I reached for him, needing to make him understand. “I don’t want the games. I don’t want a distraction from the world out there. But I do want you.” I took a deep breath. “I want all of you, Max. Because that’s my fantasy, but I want it to be my reality. I want you to be my reality.”

The light went out of his eyes. “Payton, I can’t.”

“Why not?”

“You know my damage. I can’t give you what you want. I wish to hell I could but it’s not in me to give.” Even if I didn’t hear his words, the look of regret on his face was enough.

I swallowed painfully. I needed this. A sign that I wasn’t hanging off a building, alone. My shaky fingers reached up to stroke the stubble forming on his jaw. “Then for tonight, just pretend. You said it yourself. You create fantasies for a living. So create one for me, Max. Make me believe it.”

He didn’t move and neither did I.

Finally my hand dropped from his face.

Tonight had been romantic as hell and swayed me into thinking this was going somewhere. Now I’d confessed my feelings, and Max had nothing to say.

Maybe he really did have nothing to give.

I stiffened, sliding out from between him and the glass.

The backs of my eyes burned as my feet carried me toward the door. I fought the agonizing tightness in my chest, desperate for breath.

“Payton.”

I was halfway through the black, vaulted living room before he caught up to me. Strong hands found my shoulders and forced me to stop.

“Payton, stop.”

Trapped by his grip I couldn’t move, but I refused to turn around. His forehead dropped to the crown of my head and it was that, not his hands, that made my body start to shake.

“Let me go, Max.”

“No. You’re not leaving like this.”

“I can’t stay like this,” I whispered, my voice cracking in the darkness.

The only sounds were my heart hammering in my chest and his low breathing at my back.

Finally I felt his mouth ghost over my ear, landing on the side of my neck. It skimmed down, slowly, gently. The barbell traced a cool line against my hot skin and my eyes closed as my head fell back.

Max.

He moved around me and before I could react, lifted me in his arms.

My hands grabbed for his neck on instinct. “What are you doing?”

“I have no idea.” Max’s face was unreadable in the darkness as he carried me back to his bedroom, the wood floors creaking beneath his feet.

He set me down in front of the windows. The moon cast shadows across his face, but his eyes…

His eyes were full of fear and determination.

He’s afraid of falling as much as you are.

Max pressed me into the glass, his lips hovering over mine for a trembling moment before they found their mark.

His kiss was new. The drugging intensity I craved came wrapped in a gentleness I’d never experienced. His hands stroked down my sides with unusual thoroughness, like it was his mission to touch me everywhere.

Max turned me to face the glass and I gulped at the sheer drop inches from my nose. But I swallowed my fear. He was swallowing his.

My dress unzipped slowly, the sound the only noise in the room besides our slow breathing.

Max’s mouth found every inch of skin exposed to the cool air. He rained kisses down my spine, placing each one carefully before pushing the last of the dress off my hips to pool around my feet.

I turned back to him, suddenly feeling exposed in a way that had nothing to do with the fact that every inch of my body was now on display.

Max’s eyes were solemn as I undressed him, one button at a time. My shaky fingers memorized the fabric of his clothes, because in a moment it would be his skin under my hands. Then he would be the only thing I’d touch, and feel.

Max let me go at my own pace, pushing the shirt off his arms. Pulling the tee over his head. Working the button on his jeans. Slipping, recovering.

His eyes never once strayed from my face.

My throat tightened as I pushed down the last of the clothing between us.