“Uh…I just saw the show…and…”
“How old were you there?” he spat as he held the picture close to his eyes to examine. “Twelve?”
“Hey!” she grabbed the frame from his hands. “That was nearly three years ago. I was nineteen, I’ll have you to know.”
“For crissakes…at least you were of age…so I can tell you that you were adorable without getting arrested.” With one hand, he pulled at his curls and with the other, he stole the photo back from her clutches. “But…we met before?”
Now that comment amused her. He was more concerned about her age than her weight.
“Well, obviously, we did, Drew,” she said, unsure of whether she should laugh or scream.
“You know, Maxine…for a while here this morning…I thought Ben was the one with a crush on me…”
“Ben?” Her fit of laughter rang out rancorously in the short distance between them, but she was thankful for the diversion. “No, he was just likely being nice.”
“He was checking me out, Maxine.”
Oh, no. It is I who holds the crush. But damn Ben to hell for eyeing up her perspective…lover?
However, she refused to allow her composure to waver—at least on the surface. “He does that with any half-naked man he sees.”
“I can’t fucking believe this!” he said, comparing little Maxine in her makeshift toga before him with her younger counterpart in the photo. “Would you be pissed if I said I don’t remember you?”
So he wasn’t angry after all, just entertained by the sardonicism. “After last night…” Maxine took a step back as if pondering just to make him wait. “I guess I can forgive you…”
“Just don't start hiccupping here again, alright?” he teased her in an attempt to dispel their collective embarrassment. Maxine didn't need to know that he was quite charmed by the whole scenario.
“Ben told you, didn’t he?” she spat, her anger rising. He relayed every detail of my little dalliance with you at the stage door…she just knew it!
From affection to downright haughtiness, he’d run her through the gambit of emotions, and it wasn’t even ten in the morning.
“Ben told me what?” he shook his head.
“That I got the hiccups after that photo was taken!” Pouting, she placed her fists on her hips, only to have the blanket drop to reveal those little rocks into which her nipples had transformed. “Oh!”
However, Drew was quick to cover her. “You got the hiccups after you met me?” his incredulity rising. “Same as last night?”
“You didn’t know?”
“For fuck’s sake!” he laughed, then placed his hands on her shoulders, forcing her to face him. “Tell you what, little one…right after I make reservations for this evening, I’m going to Google ‘chronic hiccups’ and we’ll find a solution for you.”
“This isn’t funny!” she stomped behind him, tracking him to the door. All the while, she hoped Ben wasn’t on the other side listening.
“Oh, yes, it is,” he said, “and maybe later tonight, you’ll sit back and laugh at it. But for now, I do have to go…”
His exit, while imminent, still filled her with sadness. Their date was only hours away, but she felt so greedy for his presence. She had to be an adult and allow him his time away from her. They both needed to think. Too much had happened since that party. A breather was necessary, and she didn't want him to leave her on a sour note.
Rising on tip-toe, she reached out to tug on those infamous curls. “I love these…” she said. “I always wished I had naturally curly hair.”
“Courtesy of my mother,” he said. “But I’m not a natural blond…”
Now it was Maxine’s face that washed in shock. “You’re kidding!”
“Nope. Light brown with faint auburn highlights about the color of your hair, little one,” he admitted. “Being a blonde has just garnered me more roles.”
“Really?” She couldn’t decide whether she should be intrigued or disappointed.
“Think I’d be playing Joe Gillis with dark hair?”
“It worked for William Holden in the film,” she reminded him. Judy so loved old Hollywood classics from the forties and fifties, with Sunset Boulevard being her favorite, and she'd passed that adoration on to her daughter. It broke Maxine's heart to know that her mother would never see him in the show.
“Not in these modern times, it wouldn’t,” he said and placed one single chaste kiss right in the middle of her forehead, leaving her longing to kiss his lips. “Oh, little one…”
“Drew?”
“Yes?”
“Thank you…for everything,” she said, straightening the lapel of his jacket that was still slightly damp from the storm the night before.
“No—thank you, Maxine…”
“But I didn’t…”
Swirling just the tip of his finger over her cheek, he whispered, “Yeah, you did…and I’ll see you this evening…”
With that, he swept through her bedroom door. And as with any sweet dream, she hoped that he wouldn’t be gone forever.
Chapter Eight
“How dare that damn Drew McKenzie not fuck my luscious, gorgeous—and did I mention virginal—best friend?” Ben charged as they sat in the frilly surroundings of Alice’s Tea Cup that afternoon.
The perfect “girlfriend” spot for a Saturday afternoon, Alice’s boasted an array of brews from around the globe and a selection of scrumptious treats from scones to crepes. Set in an old townhouse nestled just off a noisy avenue on the Upper East Side, the restaurant had that same old New York charm of their own abode with its creaky hardwood floors and touches of antique kitchen furnishings and utensils displayed throughout. There were small groups of women clustered in the narrow space with little girls wearing fairy wings fluttering around. In fact, a baby shower was just about to begin on the second floor, and late-coming guests hustled through the door with their arms filled with pink packages.
Yes, it was indeed the perfect spot for Ben and Maxine to play a quick game of catch-up before she returned home to prepare for her evening with Drew. Flustered by the pages of offerings on the menu, Maxine nearly panicked over what to order as she nibbled and giggled with Ben, who was the only male aside from the expectant father in the entire place. However, he wasn’t making her life easy that afternoon.
“Will you hush?” she hissed, looking around them. No one seemed to have heard a word of their conversation, but she couldn’t tempt fate. “People might know who he is!”
“You know, Cap, I think you’re hiding something,” he continued on. “In fact, I think you’re lying.”
“Lying?” she popped her head like a chicken sticking its neck out over her pumpkin scone. “About what?”
Leaning in as close as he could with a teapot between them, he asked, “He slipped you some of that huge cock, didn’t he?”
“First of all, I wouldn't know about the precise measurements of his member because I didn't see it. Yet. Second, thank you for the kind warning.” She lifted her glass of iced Silver Needle Jasmine tea to her lips as she continued to seethe. “And how do you know how big it is?”
“Let’s just say that he had a bit of a boner until I interrupted him while he was trying to make you breakfast this morning,” Ben said. “Damn, girl. How are you walking around today?”
Their conversation, as it often did with Ben, was going nowhere beyond the toilet into which it had fallen. “You don't think that I would tell you if…if he…if we…”
“Really, Max?” Ben pressed. “He didn’t fuck you?”
Shrinking into her cardigan sweater that she pulled a little tighter around herself, she winced. “No!”
“You know, Drew’s right. You need to start drinking warm beverages.”
“Ben…?” she said, her eyes returning to the menu to figure out what she wanted for brunch although that scone could easily fill her appetite.
“What?”
“Shut up…”
Their banter continued on throughout their meal, and Maxine found herself relaxing at long last. For the first time since she arrived, she had a moment to stop and ponder—and to revel—in the goodness of her life. She was sitting in New York City on the middle of a Saturday, sipping tea with her nearest and dearest friend. A wonderful new job awaited her in just over a week’s time. And she had a date with one of the most enviable bachelors in town. Maxine could only hope that Judy was smiling down upon her as she found her way through the urban maze.
“How old is he, Max?” Ben wondered as he sliced into the last of his croque monsieur.
“He’ll be thirty-three on March twenty-first.” Of course, she knew Drew’s birthday. She knew everything about him…that he’d revealed to the public.
“He’s got over a decade on you,” Drew pointed out the obvious. “That’s not a problem?”
“Why would it be?” she asked. “Don’t men tend to love younger women?”
“I'm just playing devil's advocate here. I want this for you, but I also want you to be aware of what you're getting into,” he admitted. “It just seems like he's a confirmed bachelor. And I don't want you to have your heart broken.”
“Maybe I’ll be the one to break his,” she suggested.
“How about we shoot for zero heartbreak instead?”
Raising her glass to his teacup, she said, “Deal!”
“So Mandy called me this morning,” Ben continued on. “She's requested our attendance next weekend for brunch at the mansion.”
The Worthingtons really didn't live on some grand estate—merely an apartment in a luxury building four blocks away from the townhouse—but Ben loved to joke about his parents' often overblown sense of importance.
Of course, Maxine would go with him. Her presence sometimes softened the snark factor with Mandy and Mike. However, her thoughts got ahead of her, and she wondered if she’d still be in Drew’s thoughts, of if he’d decide to move on again by the time Mandy’s party rolled around. Seven days allotted such a short time in which to get to know someone, and she worried that he’d drop her just as quickly as she fell into his life.
“What are you thinking about?” Ben asked suddenly. He could always read her moods, but Maxine couldn’t tell him the truth. He’d skewer Drew if he knew that he’d offered her a trial run.
“Just everything…”
“It’s a bit much, isn’t it?” he empathized. “Too much going on…”
“I went from having nothing to do but a part-time job proofing classifieds at the local newspaper to having an actual life,” she reminisced.
“Enjoy this, Max.” No one was happier than Ben to see Maxine coming into her own at long last. “It’s your time. And you deserve this.”
“Ben…I’m afraid…” she said, staring down at the crepe she had no intention of finishing.
“Aw, shit, Max…” he took her hand and held it tight. “What are you scared of?”
Maxine couldn't allow herself to cry randomly in the middle of the restaurant. However, her emotions had simply throttled into overdrive. Moving to New York still hadn't had its chance to sink in. What seemed like only hours ago, she had been sitting on the couch in her parents’ living room, paying zero attention to some reality show, when she received Jillian's e-mail, offering her a job. In that time, she had two weeks to gather her life as she knew it and to hop on the bus to New York.
Meeting Drew McKenzie wasn't on her agenda, and now she found her world turned on its axis in a matter of hours. Even just sitting there with Ben, knowing how much their friendship meant to him, left her feeling touched to the verge of tears.
And every second, she missed Judy more. Her mother was always the one she picked up the phone to call with her latest news. She told her everything and never skipped a detail—at times, even before she confided in Ben. Now she had so much to tell her mother and nowhere to turn but to her photo. She just needed to hear Judy’s voice, assuring her of the right path to take.
Drew’s discovery of those photos that morning stuck in her mind. Of course, he found humor in the shot of the two of them, but what she hadn’t anticipated was that raw empathy he exuded over her mother. His gentle caresses and sweet words of sympathy soothed her like a lullaby, and for once, someone had managed to convince her that all might be right in her life after all. Her greatest fear, though, was that he was simply being nice. She hoped he wasn’t acting.
“I’m scared that everything will just disappear in an instant,” Maxine finally answered him. “My mom was fine one day, and then within a month, we were all at the hospital…seeing her suffer—watching her die. I feel like every bit of good that’s happening in my life right now will fade away just as quickly as it was given to me.”
“Max, granted, the good times don’t last forever, but neither do the bad,” he said. “You’re due some happiness here. So what if Drew McKenzie doesn’t stick around? Lose your virginity to your teenage idol, and laugh about it later. Not many women could tell that story.”
“You’re so damn focused on sex,” Maxine shuddered.
“You should be, too, Captain,” Ben added. “It’s the best diversion!”
Pushing her food around on her plate, she attempted to change the subject. “Want some of this?”
“No, because I’m not taking food out of your mouth, Miss Maxie,” he insisted.
“You sound like Drew…”
“Drew, Drew, Drew…be still my beating heart…and my dripping little pussy,” he teased, affecting the air of a forlorn young woman in love with an untouchable man.
“Enough.”
“OK, if you didn’t sleep with him, per se, will you at least give me a little clue about what went down in that bedroom of yours last night? He was barely dressed this morning!”
With the utmost hesitation, she said, “We shared some foreplay…”
“You blew him?”
Again, she turned her head from side to side to determine if anyone had decided to listen to their conversation. She was so paranoid!
“I did not!” Drew wouldn't even allow her a chance to look, let alone touch. “This is the one downfall about having a guy as your best friend—you're a real guy sometimes!”
“It’s the penis, Maxine.”
“Speaking of penises, Drew said you were checking him out this morning!” she accused, but those green eyes batted playfully.
“Come on, dude is chiseled like a fucking Roman statue,” he defended his own curiosities. “I can’t ignore fine art.”
“Judy’s up there laughing at all of this right now, you know,” Maxine told him. “I hope she’s having a drink, too. She’ll need one.”
“Judy’s having a drink to celebrate the fact that her only child had the courage to pursue her dreams, Maxine,” he said. “She wanted you to be here, but you wanted it, too. Your happiness was her only concern.”
That was true. Her mother had seen her through so much hurt, getting bullied over the years at school. Judy always longed for the day that Maxine could escape all of that and discover the amazing young woman beneath the surface. Ben had indeed helped her along. He gave her the confidence she lacked in herself, and he was always her greatest cheerleader—next to Judy. With the two of them at her side, Maxine always thought she could conquer the world. But now, a crevasse bore into that determination with the absence of her mother. Maxine wouldn't give up. In fact, perhaps her mother's death fueled her desire to live her life to the fullest now. However, things had changed, and Maxine had to learn how to live again without Judy.
“She’s proud of you,” Ben assured her. “That I know for certain.”
“She told me once in the hospital…” Maxine stopped and blinked her eyes, but the tears began to fall. She dabbed her face with the linen napkin, glad that she wasn’t wearing mascara. “She told me that she could die in peace in knowing that I finally found a true friend in you, Ben.”
“Max…” Now he struggled with his tears. “She told me the same
thing. And I just…it hurt too much for me to tell you before. I couldn't…”
With a glance toward the ceiling, she said with absolute confidence, “I think we’ve both got an advocate on the other side.”
“I would agree,” he said. “She was one hell of a woman—as is her daughter. And I’m so proud to call her only child my best friend.”
Interruption came, however, with Maxine’s vibrating phone on the table. She usually packed that thing away in her bag when she went out and didn’t bother to answer, but she had a feeling Drew might be in contact.
“I’m so sorry, Ben…” she said, thumbing through her texts.
“I’m not!” he said, signaling for the waitress to bring their check. “Hey, I’m all about getting my bestie laid as soon as possible.”
Check ur e-mail for instructions for this eve. DM
“Ugh!” Maxine groaned as she flipped through her phone. “This man is so complicated. I feel like he’s sending me on some wild goose hunt for our date this evening.”
“Keeps it interesting,” Ben noted.
“That he does…”
“Come on, Max,” he said, passing over his debit card to the waitress before Maxine could protest and attempt to pay the bill herself. “Let’s get out of here, and let’s stop by Bloomie’s on the way home.”
“Oh, I hate to shop—especially when I don’t have any money!” she bemoaned.
“Uh…” he slipped a card across the table. “Open this.”
Touching her fingers over the fine linen envelope with her name written in Ben’s hand, she slowly looked up into the violet eyes he chose to wear that afternoon. “What’s…?”
“It’s a welcome gift from Mandy and Mike…and me,” he said. “Little something to spend at Bloomingdale’s. A few new pieces for your work wardrobe—and maybe a little something for this evening.”
“Ben, I can’t…” she tried to push the generously filled card back to his side of the table. “You’ve all done so much for me already, and I—”
“Hey, we outfitted your room at Century 21 and got some huge deals. Besides Mandy will not take kindly to a return,” he said. “And you know what Mandy’s like when she gets angry…”
WEAKENED: The Manhattan Bound Series Book One Page 11