by J. H. Croix
My memory sharpened. “True. I don’t have any expectations. I just want you. Is that breaking a rule?”
I was genuinely curious. Even though it would take most of my discipline, if she told me to back the hell off, I would.
Harlow simply stared at me, her eyes widening. I could practically see the gears shifting in her brain. She waited so long to answer, the sound of her voice was a featherlight lash to the lust twisting inside of me when she spoke.
“No. I suppose it’s not. I just…” Her words trailed off as she cocked her head to the side.
I slid my hand down her forearm, resting it along the dip in her waist. The waiting was killing me. Because I wanted to kiss her. Fiercely.
“I don’t know if this is a good idea,” she finally confessed.
She was damn right. It was a terrible idea. I was already tangled up in her, the force of my need almost binding me to her.
There I was, a man who eschewed emotional attachments, carrying on a conversation that was all kinds of emotionally loaded. “What are you worried about?”
We couldn’t have been in the elevator that long when I realized we had already come to a stop on our floor. The door whispered open, and the sound of voices down the hall nudged me out of my half trance.
Without thinking, I was curling my hand around hers and turning. I simply expected her to follow me. Initially she did, but then she stopped, giving my hand a little tug. We were alone in the hallway now; the group of guests that had passed us by were stepping into the elevator behind us.
“What?” I asked.
“I don’t know if this is a good idea,” she repeated.
“I know. I just want to get somewhere private to talk.”
She must not have been expecting that because she laughed. “Um, okay. This is my room,” she said, gesturing to the door beside her.
Once we were inside, she walked to the windows. Her shoulders were tense, and she hugged her arms around her waist, looking out at the mountains in the darkness. The soft glow of the moon was cast across part of the view. The rest was blanketed in shadow from the tall trees along the slopes.
“So tell me why this isn’t a good idea.”
I stopped beside her, feeling the tension emanating from her. She was practically vibrating. She turned to face me, and the pain I saw in her eyes was like a knife slicing across the surface of my heart. I didn’t know who had hurt her, but I would gladly kill them on her behalf.
I almost laughed aloud as my feelings screamed out their thoughts. I was usually a rational man, certainly not one prone to emotional decisions. Chasing after an unknown person who may or may not have hurt Harlow most definitely fell into that category.
She tore her gaze free and gave her head a shake. “It doesn’t really matter. I just want to kiss you once more,” she said, surprising the hell out of me.
I didn’t know if I could handle just a kiss. But you might as well have dragged me through hell before I stopped myself. In a flash, she was stepping to me, sliding her hand up around my nape and arching into me as I bent to meet her. The moment her lips touched mine, hot electricity jolted me like lightning to my system. I didn’t know what she meant this kiss to be, but inside of a hot second, her tongue was tangling with mine and my hand was sliding down her spine to cup her sweet ass. She fit against me perfectly, just tall enough that my cock nestled at the apex of her thighs, and her breasts pressed into my chest.
Jesus fucking Christ. This woman set me on fire. I was hard as a rock and so hot for her I could hardly breathe. I dove into the warm sweetness of her mouth, loving how she matched me, stroke for stroke, nip for nip. She kissed wildly, throwing herself into it the moment it started.
Just as quickly, she broke free, stumbling back. “See,” she stated, on the heels of a gasp, “that’s why this is a bad idea. You make me crazy. I have a terrible habit of falling for men who ultimately don’t want anything.”
I wanted to ask her what she meant. But when she looked at me, and I saw the tears glistening in her eyes, I had a desire to tug her into my arms and shield her from the world, which was crazy.
“Harlow…” I started to say.
She cut me off. “Please, Max. I’m sure I’ll see you again, but if you don’t leave now, I’ll do something stupid. I really don’t want to do that.”
I wanted to beg her to do something stupid. I didn’t think she could be any more reckless than me. When it came to Harlow, reckless, crazy, wild desire stole my thoughts, took over my body, and made my heart want things I’d thought long forgotten.
But I didn’t beg. Somehow—hell if I knew how—I sensed I shouldn’t push. I could almost see her metaphorically pulling her dignity around her shoulders and holding it tight. I turned and walked to the door. She was polite and followed me over, standing there quietly.
“This isn’t over, Harlow,” I said as I looked down into her eyes.
Bending low, I pressed a kiss to her lips, bracing myself to withstand the lightning bolt of contact with her.
Returning to my suite down the hall, I took a cold shower, made do with a mechanical release, and fell into a restless night of sleep, wondering why the hell I didn’t want to run from Harlow.
Chapter Twelve
Harlow
The following morning, I woke in my bed at Last Frontier Lodge. Alone. My mind spun back to the night before, when I kissed Max and then came to my senses. Simply recalling the kiss had my lips tingling and butterflies spinning in my belly. The depth of my attraction to Max was intense, and ran deep as a river inside of me. I couldn’t quite believe I’d managed to break away to tell him the plain truth—it was a bad idea.
Tears pricked hot at the backs of my eyes. Annoyed with myself, I kicked back the covers and headed for the shower. I wasn’t on the verge of tears over Max. Rather, that well of emotion stemmed from regret over my trail of bad choices in men. Not that there had been that many, yet each and every one had been a repeat performance of me wishfully, desperately, hoping for something that wasn’t there.
The last thing I needed to do was hand my silly, foolish heart over to a man who I quite clearly knew didn’t want anything close to what I did. I kept recalling the gentle prodding of my last therapist, the one I’d gone to see after my miscarriage.
I’d been a bit of an emotional disaster at the time. My thoughts spun back.
Skidding sideways inside, unable to pull myself out of the slide, out of the emotional wreck I’d created within myself, I sat staring at my therapist. Her brown eyes were soft, but hard to read.
“Harlow, I know you want to find someone. That’s what many people want. But perhaps you need to stop looking for love in the way you have. To remember that no one can replace what you lost when your mother died and your father went on to treat you as an afterthought.”
She went on to say all this stuff about recapitulation, which was something about re-creating the same dynamic that I had with my father, time and again. I lost track of the details, but the concept rang a bell inside.
“You think that’s what I’m doing?” I asked with a sniffle. I was crying. Again.
At her slow nod, I managed to take a deep breath. Oddly, it was calming to gain some perspective on the painful pattern in my relationships, or lack thereof.
It was a bit of a miracle I’d somehow been able to instill some of her observations. I hadn’t had a train wreck of a relationship since then. Then again, I hadn’t had a relationship at all. I’d had a whopping total of a single one-night stand—the most intense sex ever in my life.
As I showered, the steam washing away the stinging pain in my heart, I actually felt a little proud of myself. I’d set a boundary for my emotional sanity and held to it. While I dressed, my thoughts poked at the sore spots in my heart. Max wasn’t an asshole. Even if I hadn’t known him via his long-term friendship with Owen, I sensed it. I knew from his own words last year, when I had set the ground rules that I needed for my own sanity, that he wasn’t loo
king for a relationship. He’d said as much. I needed to trust that he meant it and not hope for more.
Plus, I knew from what little I’d let myself look up online that he didn’t do serious relationships. He appeared to have nothing more than casual dates with women who were perfectly happy to be seen with him for a bit of social glitter.
I wouldn’t fit that bill. Not at all.
A while later, I made my way downstairs for an early breakfast in the lodge restaurant. I was quietly minding my own business, enjoying my coffee and a delicious omelet, when I felt Max’s presence before I even saw him. The hair lifted on the back of my neck, and a prickle ran down my spine, heat radiating through me.
He was there before I even turned around to see him approaching. He stood by the table, glancing down at me. His black hair was damp and his blue eyes bright. The strong, clean lines of his features were gorgeous. It wasn’t quite fair for a man to be as beautiful as Max Channing was. He exuded quiet confidence, strength, and elemental masculinity. There was nothing feminine about him. Sweet hell, I could look at him all day.
That was dangerous.
“Can I join you?” he asked.
I knew I should say no, yet I didn’t want to. I wanted him to sit down with me, have breakfast, then drag him upstairs to my room and take a few hours to get lost in him and the desire beating like a drum between us.
Crazy—I was that fucking crazy.
Just as I was stealing myself to hold the line, Delia appeared beside us, casting a smile between us. “Good morning, you two. Max, I think I should get you some coffee. If I recall, you like it black,” she said warmly.
“You recall correctly,” he replied, his mouth hitching up at the corner and promptly sending my belly into a quick flip.
It felt as if my hormones were doing a performance for him, a little dance, to let his hormones know just how happy they were to see him.
Now, it would be rude if I didn’t let Max join me, considering Delia presumed we were eating together; a natural guess, given our shared friends. I had just started to dig into my omelet, and it was quite obvious I wasn’t finished with breakfast.
“I’ll be right back with your coffee, and I’ll get you a refill,” Delia said, her eyes flicking to my half-empty coffee cup.
“That would be great, thanks,” I managed.
Max was polite enough not to sit down yet, but it didn’t really matter. I gestured to the chair across for me. “Go ahead, have a seat.”
Max’s mouth hitched at the corner again, and I almost laughed aloud. All the man had to do was smile and my nipples perked up as if to greet him.
The moment he sat down, I became acutely aware of how small the table was. I was seated at one of the square tables beside the windows. One end of the dining area in the lodge had large round tables and booths, while the other had scattered small tables. This table was, at best, two feet square.
Max’s knee bumped one of mine when he slid his chair forward, the brief point of contact sending a zing of electricity through my system. I decided right then and there that I would have to cut my weekend short. Max was way too tempting.
“How are you this morning?” he asked.
I took a fortifying gulp of my coffee and nodded. “I’m well, and yourself?”
He cocked his head to the side, glancing out the windows at the ridiculously stunning view of the mountains, with the sun just rising above them. His eyes cut back to me, immediately holding my gaze. Even though I hadn’t spent much time with Max, I was becoming accustomed to the fact that whenever he looked at me, it felt as though we were alone in the world.
“I’m well,” he finally said. “I’ve been thinking…” He paused when Delia came into view, crossing the restaurant with a tray and aiming straight for our table.
“Here you go.” She set a coffee on the table for Max and quickly refilled mine. “I’m guessing you’d like something to eat,” she said, her gaze flicking to him.
“Of course I do. I’ll take whatever you recommend.”
“Harlow is having our special this morning—a smoked salmon omelet with cream cheese and green onions.”
“I’ll take the same,” he said smoothly.
With a wink, she spun away, weaving her way through the restaurant and checking on a few other tables. I was kind of hoping Max had forgotten whatever he’d been about to say. Although, I was terribly curious to know what he’d been thinking about.
He hadn’t forgotten. The moment his icy blue gaze locked with mine, he picked up right where he left off. “So, as I was saying, I’ve been thinking. I’m not sure why you think this is such a bad idea, but I think it would be foolish not to see what happens.”
Though he didn’t specify, I knew precisely what this was. He was speaking to the wild, crazy, thrumming desire between us. I didn’t quite know what he meant beyond that.
“I’m not sure I understand.”
He reached across the table, trailing his index finger across my knuckles, and my grip tightened around my coffee cup. His touch was a blaze of fire across my skin. My pulse lunged, and my heart started knocking against my ribs.
“You said this was a bad idea. I’m not sure you’ll tell me why, but I have a guess,” he countered.
“What’s that?”
“I think perhaps, you think I only want sex.”
No, because I’m all fucked up inside my head and can’t get out of my own way.
I ordered my inner monologue to shut up. It was quiet for a few beats, and I felt held within the intensity of his gaze. Even though my body was flat-out acting crazy, somehow the look in his eyes comforted me. And that was even crazier.
When I didn’t say anything, he continued, “I won’t lie. I definitely want you, but I know the way we are together isn’t something that comes along every day. I propose we forget those ground rules and just see what happens.”
His finger trailed across my knuckles again. I couldn’t have looked away from his eyes if I tried. It was like being locked in by a tractor beam. Not that I knew what that felt like, but I’d seen my share of outer space television shows and movies.
Taking a shaky breath, I was relieved when he dropped his hand away to take a sip of coffee.
I surprised myself by speaking honestly. “It’s not that I don’t want you, but I tend to expect too much from men. I don’t have a great track record, and I’m guessing casual is the name of the game for you. I don’t do casual well.”
Max never once looked away, his eyes narrowing slightly at my last comment. I sensed he was considering his words carefully.
“I was in love once,” he said abruptly, startling the hell out of me.
“Huh?” was my brilliant reply.
His low chuckle sent a shiver chasing over my skin. “Yes, I was in love once. Things didn’t end well. I suppose my point is that I understand being careful.”
“Careful?” I didn’t know why he was telling me this. It was so surprising, it knocked me off-balance.
I wasn’t quite ready to delve further and was relieved when Delia reappeared and headed toward our table. She served Max’s omelet, topped off our coffees, and chatted for a few minutes. While she was there, Marley Hamilton came out. She worked at the lodge alongside her husband Gage, and they lived upstairs in private quarters. She had her cherubic toddler Holly in her arms, who had pink cheeks, wide mossy green eyes, and the same auburn hair as her mother. She was utterly adorable.
My heartbeat stuttered, reminding me that there was the kind of careful Max was perhaps referring to, and the kind of careful I needed to keep from getting hurt again. While Marley was chatting with us, I practically shoveled the rest of my omelet in my mouth, managing to stand and get ready to leave as soon as I was done.
I didn’t care if I was running. I was going to take this moment to say my goodbyes. I didn’t know where Max intended to go with this conversation, but I already knew I was barreling down a path with which I was far too familiar.
The chemistry I felt with Max was powerful, and the intimacy threading into it terrified me because I knew I would get hurt. I’d been envisioning a picket fence and two-point-five kids since I was a little girl, with any man that might serve as a stand-in. I certainly didn’t need to be doing that with a man I wanted as fiercely as Max. Because when the inevitable happened, I would then be facing the layered complication of our shared friendship with Owen and Ivy.
Marley looked to me as I stood, her smile warm. “So, how long are you staying?”
“Actually, I have to head back today for work tomorrow,” I lied. I’d been intending to stay all weekend. With Max down the hallway, that was a disastrous plan. “It was great to see you.”
Marley surprised me by tugging me into a quick hug, with Holly getting squished between us and catching hold of my hair as Marley stepped back. She giggled when I freed it.
I looked down to Max, ordering my cheeks not to flush. “It was good to see you too,” I said, studiously keeping my expression bland. His eyes coasted over me. I didn’t know how to interpret his expression, yet I sensed he was far too perceptive.
“And you. I’ll give you a call from Anchorage,” he finally said.
Chapter Thirteen
Harlow
Three days later, I was still wondering if Max even had my phone number.
I finally decided to fess up and tell Ivy about Max. She’d just called to check in and told me she thought I was lying when I left early. I had been lying. I felt bad about it, so I told her the plain truth.
“Ivy, I can’t deal with Max.”
“What do you mean? Max is a really nice guy.”
I bit my lip and took a deep breath as I leaned back into the cushions on my couch. I rented a small house on a pretty little lot not too far outside of downtown Willow Brook. Susannah offered it to me when she moved in with her now-husband, Ward. It was a cute A-frame cabin with decks on both floors. The downstairs living room area was bright and light-filled, with windows stretching from floor to ceiling in the front wall and offering a view of a field and Swan Lake in the distance. The kitchen was behind the living room with a bathroom and laundry off to the side. A loft with two bedrooms and a bathroom comprised the upstairs.