by J. K. Coi
He’d tried, but Max had had an answer for his every excuse. Jackson had been in remission for months and had been cleared by his doctor. They even had a note—which he found out later had been forged by Jackson himself on a “borrowed” sheet of his physician’s prescription pad. The hotel room had already been reserved and paid for. They had saved enough money to cover all expenses.
He’d taken them.
He’d gotten in so much shit when they got back that his mother had refused to speak to him for a month afterward.
Baron shook his head at the memory.
“You had a blast. Jackson had a blast,” he corrected her. “I had a coronary.”
“Hold on.” He remembered something now. “This secret you’re talking about…was that about the same time you started following me to football practice, but when I asked why you were skulking around and wouldn’t just come watch in the bleachers like everyone else, you denied even being even there?”
She laughed, her voice full of bright, impish amusement that caused his chest to tighten painfully. “Yep,” she chuckled. “Are you kidding? Like I would ever admit to watching one of your games, admit to being like one of your groupie cheerleaders.” Max put her hand to his chest, flexing it against his bare pec like a cat testing her nails before settling down for a nap. “That was just the time you caught me, though. Did you know I also followed you to work at Jerry’s Hardware? I would park my bike around back in the alley beside Mrs. Marshall’s café and sit at a table, pretending I was on a stakeout while I did my homework. And did you know that I paid your friend Steve Krendell to go through your locker in the men’s changing room?”
He blinked, speechless.
“No, I guess you didn’t.” She laughed and licked her index finger, then dragged it down in a line through the air between them. “Point for me. Even back then, I guess I was a pretty good detective.”
He didn’t doubt she was a good one now—not many people could have found Baron Silver after he’d decided to disappear, but Max had done it.
“So you want to tell me what that was all about?” Baron still couldn’t figure out what secret she thought he and Jackson had kept from her.
“Well, it’s kind of embarrassing now.” She hesitated, but with a cheeky smile.
“Spill it, woman, or I’ll have to use my extraordinary talent at sexual torture to get you to talk.”
Her smile widened and his heart lurched. If only things could always be this way. If only he could always make Max feel safe and happy enough that she would smile like that.
“Okay, okay. Well, my cousin Sally—do you remember her?”
“How could I not,” he said with a groan. “She was dating that guy who thought he knew so much about cars. He was trying to sell me his beat-up Honda for almost a year. Finally some other poor sucker bought the piece of crap off him.”
Max grimaced, her expression rueful. “Yeah, his name is Stan. They’re married now and he’s still trying to pass off crappy cars to everyone in town since he started working at Lou’s Used Car Dealership about two years ago.”
Baron barked with a shout of laughter. “Really? Well, at least you know better than to buy anything from him.”
“Well, that’s another story,” Max muttered under her breath. “Anyway, I started following you all around town. It was funny, because I think everyone else saw me but you. It got to be a running joke now that I remember. People knew I was offering a reward to anyone who could give me good intel on your movements whenever I had to be in class. God, some of the stories I heard about you…”
“You what?” Damn. Baron tried to remember what kind of shit he was getting himself into that year that he wouldn’t have wanted anyone else to find out about. Luckily, he had been pretty focused on school—it had been the one thing that had managed to distract him from the constant guilt of being attracted to his brother’s best friend.
“Anyway, Sally came to me one day and said she’d seen you at the mall with Deb Dewson and that you two had been pretty chummy in the jewelry store.”
She was watching his expression, waiting. But for the life of him he couldn’t remember—
Oh.
Now he remembered.
Max must have seen the flash of recognition cross his face because she nodded her head and continued. “Right. I still didn’t know if it had anything to do with the secret you and Jackson were keeping, but I thought it was interesting. I mean, not many boys would have admitted to dating Deb ‘the Skank’ Dewson, and they certainly wouldn’t have taken her out in public, much less to a jewelry store. At least not unless she was blackmailing them with something. So I watched you both. Figured even if I didn’t find out the secret, it would still be eye-opening to discover just what you saw in a woman like her.”
“Jeez, Max.”
“What? Like you wouldn’t have done the same if the situation had been reversed.”
His gaze narrowed. Baron didn’t want to think about what he might have done if he’d had to watch Max with some pretty boy, maybe letting him kiss her and feel her up in a public place. Thankfully, that had been the least of his problems. Max had never seemed interested in spending time with anyone but Jackson.
She laughed at him again and swatted his fingers, which had been drawing invisible circles on the inside of her elbow. “Don’t get your chest hairs tied in a knot. Or don’t you want to hear the rest of this?”
“Go on.” He grabbed the hand that had smacked at him and started rubbing her palm with his thumb, feeling oddly content in a way that he hadn’t in a long time.
“I even had your mom spying for me. She was my eyes and ears every time you picked up the phone.”
“Holy crap.” He hadn’t had a clue. Then again, now that he thought about it, Baron had been dealing with some pretty heavy shit back then. He’d been trying to decide whether he was going to continue with his college program or go ahead and enlist, knowing that if he did he’d be gone for good.
“I was getting desperate because as far as I could tell, there was nothing going on. Besides that one time when Sally said she’d seen you with Deb, I couldn’t find any evidence that you and Jackson had anything up your sleeves.”
“That’s because there wasn’t anything going on,” he pointed out.
“Ah, but then everything changed. I actually caught you in a lie.”
“What lie?” When had he lied?
“One day Jackson said you had gone to work, but I followed you to the mall. I figured I was finally going to catch you in the act—of what I didn’t know—but you just went back to the jewelry store.”
Baron smiled. Now he had a good idea where this story was heading.
“I didn’t dare go in after you, but I did notice that Debbie wasn’t anywhere in sight. I was walking back out of the mall when I caught up with Trevor Daniels. He asked if I was there to shop for a dress for the spring formal. I was stunned. I think I freaked him out because I just stared at him blankly for about two whole minutes.”
Baron watched the animation in her expression, the laughter in her eyes, in her voice. It was captivating to him the way she relived these memories with such clarity and enjoyment. “You see, in all the intrigue of spying on you, I had forgotten all about the dance. I was so busy trying to catch you sneaking around that I didn’t realize I had followed you to the tuxedo rental place and the flower shop, and your mom had filled me in on a conversation she overheard you having with your buddy James where he promised to let you use his Fiero for that Friday night.”
He chuckled, turning her body into his so he could spoon in behind her with his arms around her waist. “So was that when you figured it out? I was positive Jackson and I had caught you off guard.”
“Aha, so you do remember!” She turned and glared at him, but he just kissed her sweetly. She sighed. “You did catch me off guard,” she admitted with a wry grin, wiggling her rear in his lap. “I was positive you were going to the dance with Skank Dewson and that your
trip to the jewelry store was to get something for her. I was already planning my smear campaign. I was going to tease you mercilessly.”
“I’ll bet. I can’t believe you thought she and I were getting it on. Didn’t she go out with half the football team?”
Max chuckled. “At the same time too.” She paused and her smile faded. “When I went to see Jackson that afternoon and he started trying to talk me into going to the dance, that’s when I realized what all the secrecy had been about. I still can’t believe you guys even bought me a dress.”
“Mmm. It was that slinky pink thing, right? It looked great on you. I remember it perfectly.” He actually remembered taking it off her—at least as much of it as he could manage in the cramped confines of his friend’s sporty car.
By the end of that night, Baron’s self-control had snapped, despite the good intentions he’d started with. Somehow, the bodice of her dress had ended up pulled down to her waist, revealing her perfect breasts to him so that he couldn’t not kiss and lick and tease her nipples until she squirmed and whimpered beneath him. And somehow, the three or four layers of crinoline and silk had been pushed up around her thighs and his fingers were sliding past the silky barrier of her panties to delve into the incredible wet warmth of her pussy.
He’d kissed as much of her as he could reach, and they’d steamed up the windows until the car was practically a sauna.
They’d both felt awkward and uncomfortable afterward, but it had been beautiful all the same, because that night had been full of magic. Full of love. Full of youthful promises—all of which he’d regretted later, none of which he had lived up to, but which he would never forget.
“You looked beautiful that night, Max. And I guess you were able to figure out why I had been in the jewelry store,” he said, smiling.
“Yes.” She frowned and looked down at her hand. “I stopped wearing it after you left. I know it was supposed to be from Jackson too—a friendship kind of thing—but I felt…I knew you had picked it out, and…”
She shrugged.
He didn’t like it. But at least she wasn’t wearing another man’s ring in its place.
He cleared his throat and buried his face in the clean scent of her hair, unsure what to say.
“There’s one thing that I never figured out,” she continued.
“What’s that?” His hand smoothed her hair behind one ear so that he could nibble his way down the column of her neck.
She shivered prettily and angled her head to allow him better access. “Were you ever really with Deb Dewson in that jewelry store?”
“Well…”
“You were, weren’t you?”
“I was in there looking at rings, and I had picked the one that I wanted for you—that Jackson and I wanted to get you—but I didn’t have a clue what size you would wear. Debbie just happened to walk in and offer to try it on for me so I could see what it looked like. I think she was trying to get me to tell her who it was for.”
Max craned her neck to look at him and grimaced. “Ew. Are you telling me that Skank Dewson had her mitts on my ring before it was given to me?”
He frowned. “Um, is that bad?”
She just laughed and shook her head, turning back around to cuddle in closer, her back to his front. “You really are an ass,” she said, but without any real heat.
“That was a long time ago,” he defended.
“Right. And your point is?”
“I’ve learned a few things since then.” He shifted her in his arms so that she was facing him, her thighs cupping his thick, heavy erection. He palmed her breast in his hand and dragged his thumb over her sensitive nipple, watching for her hiss of delight. His kiss was as desperate as if he hadn’t just had her under him, his body just as hard.
“Again?” she said, chuckling as she wiggled in his embrace, clearly up to the challenge.
“I warned you,” he answered. “All. Night. Long.”
Chapter Fourteen
Baron watched Max as she slept. He hadn’t been able to sleep himself, so he just held her in his arms, listening to her feminine snores and waiting for the dream to end.
He knew morning had come and was glad for the windowless room. It was easy to forget that his childhood love was now a vampire, what with Max lying so peacefully beside him, her body warm and pulsing with life even in sleep, but it was true nevertheless, and he wanted to make sure she was kept safe from the sun.
There were so many things that he should be doing right now, not least of which was going out with Alric to search for Devon.
And still he stayed.
He stayed and he remembered.
Baron had spent so many years doing everything possible not to think about Max or about what he had thrown away by leaving her. Now those memories bombarded him.
Surprisingly, it was a lot of little things that popped into his head. Like the way she had to peel off not only the skin but every piece of white stuff from her orange before eating it, or that she liked peanut butter and banana, but not peanut butter and jam. He remembered how Max had looked at his mother as if she’d hung the moon. He thought of the way she was with Jackson, never treating him like an invalid because of his illness, but showing him all the love and compassion of a true friend.
It was because of all those things that Baron had thought it would be best to stay far away from her. Especially after his transition. Being with her had been a mistake. He’d known that if he stayed, the two of them would eventually get together for real. He wouldn’t have been strong enough to resist her for long—even for Jackson. So he’d left, and he’d tried to pack the void where his heart used to be with other women. Lots of other women. But it hadn’t made a difference, only dulled the pain and filled him with self-loathing.
After his transition, Baron had poured all his frustration and energy into training with Rhys and Alric and the twins. It had seemed to work for him a little better than fucking every skirt in town. He’d focused his pent-up aggression and regret into gutting demons, and found he was damn good at it.
When he’d heard about his mother’s stroke, he couldn’t not go home. But even then he’d known it would be for the last time.
He hadn’t planned to see Max while he was there, but he should have known it would be impossible not to.
She was too capable and strong not to be right there with Jackson taking care of everything. Lorraine Silver hadn’t technically been her family, but that was just biology. All of them had taken Max into their home as a part of their family that first day she’d showed up with Jackson’s homework under her arm and made him her friend. Lorraine had once told her son she thought it was a miracle Maxine had grown into such a lovely woman, given the home she had been raised in. Baron had known it was probably a combination of Max’s determination and strength and Lorraine’s acceptance and love.
When Max’s own mother died, it had been Lorraine who’d helped her with the arrangements and Lorraine who’d told Max she could cry—even though to Baron’s knowledge, Max never did.
That was why he had been so surprised when he’d walked into Jackson’s hospital room that day and Max had started to weep in his arms. She, who never cried over anything, who hadn’t cried for her own mother, had cried for his.
He’d been holding on to his own pain by the thinnest of threads, and it had been all he could do not to fall apart then, but he’d known Max would force herself to push aside her grief and be strong for him, and he couldn’t let her do that.
Instead he’d taken her home and made wild, passionate love to her all through the night.
God, what a mistake that had been.
But he couldn’t regret it.
In the morning nothing had changed. He was still a new Immortal—she had still been human. He couldn’t stay.
Max had already been deprived of so much. Baron didn’t want to be the one who took more away from her. She deserved a good man, and he hadn’t wanted to disappoint her even more when she eventual
ly found out that he wasn’t one and that there wasn’t a hope in hell he ever would be.
Maybe he had been wrong.
Now he had Max here, now that she knew all there was to know, including what he was and what he’d done, did he dare to ask her to stay? It wasn’t something he’d thought he would ever consider, but now…
She needed him—there was that angle to work with. She dared not take blood from anyone but him. His Immortal constitution could safely feed her needs, could easily satisfy her hunger without bringing danger to anyone else.
She would fight it, he knew. But if he wanted her, what other choice did he have?
Baron had admitted the truth the moment he’d recognized her broken body lying on his front step. He didn’t know what the future held for them, but he already knew if he let her go again now, he might not survive it.
He glanced down at her face and found her watching him. “Hi there,” he said.
She smiled. “Hi yourself.”
Baron heaved himself out of bed, dragging her up into his arms. She squealed prettily in surprise, and he chuckled.
“Hey! You big muscle-bound jerk, what do you think you’re doing?” she cried.
He tossed her over his shoulder, ass in the air, and smacked her bare, fleshy cheek. “I’m going to wash out that mouth of yours and see if you show a little more respect.”
“You just try it, buddy.”
“Oh, I’m going to,” he promised, enjoying himself immensely. “I’m going to try a lot more than that.” He started walking to the adjoining bathroom with Max pounding playfully on his chest. He set her down right inside the glass-enclosed shower stall and turned the water on.
She screeched and shivered as the cold droplets hit her skin. “Oh! I’m going to get you for that.”
“I’m looking forward to it,” he taunted, stepping into the shower behind her when he was sure the water was hot enough.