Tori wasn’t weak. She was stronger than her parents. She was strong enough to take a chance on love and, if it didn’t work out, she was strong enough to part ways before it got ugly.
She just needed to be strong enough to face the man she’d hurt figuring it out.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Max wasn’t sure how long he looked at the photo of Tori on his phone after Josh left, or how many times he had to tap it with his thumb to keep the screen from going dark.
He hadn’t known when he took the photo that she’d be the woman he’d fall in love with. He only knew he’d been drawn to her friendly, funny nature and wanted to get to know her better.
But I do know she was wrecked.
He couldn’t shake Josh’s words. No matter how much it had hurt to watch her walk out the door without looking back, he couldn’t stand the thought of her hurting, too.
Before he could talk himself out of it, he hit the button to call her. Then, drumming his fingers on the island counter, he waited. It rang three times and he was already wondering if he was about to get her voice mail because she was working or if she didn’t want to talk to him when he heard her voice. “Hello, Max.”
“Hi. I...” Now he had no idea what to say. Maybe he should have called Colin first. Or Josh. “I want to make sure you’re okay.”
“I’m okay. Not great. But I’m okay. Are you?”
“I miss you.” He realized belatedly that could sound like pressure. “But I’m okay, too.”
“I guess okay is going to replace nice in the ‘words we use to avoid saying what we really mean’ category, huh?”
He realized at some point he’d stood and was pacing, and forced himself to sit down. “So you’re not okay.”
“I’m trying to be. I’ve been doing some thinking—some soul-searching—and trying to get my head on straight.”
“I’m sorry I pushed, Tori. I knew you weren’t ready, but I zeroed in on what I wanted, which was you. And I’m very direct. Too direct, I guess.”
“You didn’t do anything wrong. I never want you to hide how you feel about anything from me. Even if it’s how you feel about me.” She was quiet for a few seconds. “I’m glad you called. I’ve been thinking about calling you, but I wasn’t sure if I should.”
“You’re still my friend, Tori. I didn’t stop suddenly caring about you.”
“You haven’t been coming into town. I hate that you’re isolating yourself again and it’s my fault.”
“As much as I like eating at the diner, that’s your place of business. It would be wrong of me to show up there while you’re working.”
“I appreciate that. But you’re still my friend, too. I guess I haven’t been a very good one, but I mean it.”
He wasn’t sure what to say to that. It was nice to know they could still be friends, but he didn’t think he was ready to walk into the diner and face her over a cup of coffee and half a turkey sandwich.
“I miss you, too, Max,” she said quietly.
Fresh pain hit him like a fist and he swallowed hard. He wanted to tell her he’d stop into the diner or invite her over to watch another Marvel movie, but he couldn’t get the words out.
“Maybe I’ll call you tomorrow,” he said, which was the best he could do.
“I hope so. I’ve missed the sound of your voice.”
“I’m going to go now, but I’ll talk to you soon.”
“Bye, Max.”
He hit the button to end the call and set the phone on the counter. He was conflicted—part of him happy that she sounded okay and wanted to remain friends, and another part angry that she was okay because he didn’t want to be just friends.
Being conflicted made him anxious, so he rolled up his sleeves to do some cleaning. Anything to calm the jumpiness he’d been feeling since Josh had given him hope that all wasn’t lost with Tori.
It wasn’t until he went to take the garbage bag out of the can and saw the bulletin board on the fridge that he realized he hadn’t made out his lists for November. He’d been too busy getting ready for the Halloween party.
Staring at October’s lists, he looked at what he’d written over a month before.
Find a date.
He’d never even bothered to cross it off. Ripping the page off the bulletin board, he crumpled the paper in his fist and threw it across the room.
* * *
Tori walked out of her apartment not even five minutes after hanging up the phone. Now that she’d heard Max’s voice, she needed to see him. She had things to say that weren’t meant for cell phone conversations.
During the drive to his house, she tried to imagine what she might say to him, but it didn’t matter. She knew as soon as he opened the door and she looked into those intense green eyes, she would forget anything she rehearsed anyway.
All she could do was hope that when the time came, she’d find the right words to say.
When she’d hung up on her mother, the tight and suffocating fear had started loosening its hold on her. Love hadn’t poisoned her parents. They were, as Max had said that day in the grass, just simply assholes. Acknowledging it and cutting it out of her life had felt like cutting loose a cement block tied around her ankle, slowly dragging her under.
But it was seeing his name on her cell phone’s screen, and his quiet voice asking her if she was okay that had pulled her to the surface.
She pulled into his driveway and took a deep breath before getting out of the car. Then, hoping she wouldn’t get the same reaction she had the last time she showed up unexpectedly, she knocked on the door.
Max opened it, and his expression gave her nothing to go on. Somehow that was even worse than horror. His hair was tousled and his sleeves were rolled up, which was probably the most disheveled she’d ever seen him outside of bed.
Knowing he was probably trying to process the fact she was standing on his step rather than being rude by not saying anything, she smiled. “Can I come in?”
“Oh. Of course.”
She followed him into the house and closed the door behind her. He leaned against the stove, his hands clasped.
“I’m sorry, Max. I’m sorry I let a relationship that had nothing to do with us torpedo ours.”
“It didn’t have nothing to do with us. They’re your parents.”
“I told her I didn’t want to hear it anymore. I hung up on her.”
“That was probably very hard. I’m sorry she made it come to that, but I think you’ll be happier.”
“I already am. I realized, afterward, that I’m not even capable of being like her. I could never behave like that to anybody. Especially you. And it was always about me and my fear of becoming my mother. I was afraid I’d hurt you, but I never believed you’d hurt me. I hope you know that.”
“I know that sometimes things happen in life that cause fears that don’t make sense to anybody else, but that doesn’t make them any less real. I hope recognizing that what happened between your parents—and you—isn’t normal helps.”
“It did. But it was you. I freaked out and was totally unreasonable—and yes, I admit that—and I hurt you, but you still called to make sure I was okay. I trust you and you helped me trust myself.
“I love you, Max. I’m sorry I was too afraid to tell you that. I was so afraid to admit it to myself. But you are...amazing. There’s nobody else I’d rather spend time with and you’re not only my friend. You’ve become my best friend.”
Finally, he moved toward her. Putting his finger under her chin, he tipped her face up and looked her in the eye. “I love you, too, Tori. I’ve waited my whole life to find you.”
Relief flooded through her, making her knees weak.
Max was hers. Sweet, shy, sexy Max who hated the way she loaded his dishwasher but didn’t say so because he was willing to make room for her in his regularly scheduled life.
“I guess Operation—Makeover Max is a qualified success,” she said.
He winced. “It had a name?”
“Of course. Everything’s more fun when it has a name.”
“Why is it qualified?”
She grinned. “Well, I was supposed to make you over, not the other way around.”
“I got a date to agree to let me take her home while I was wearing a Hannibal Lecter mask. I’m calling it a win.”
Laughing, she threw her arms around his neck as he lifted her up to kiss her. Not until they needed to come up for air did he set her back on her feet.
He tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “So, my fair lady, is this the part where I push you up against the wall, kiss you until you can’t breathe and then bang you right here on the floor?”
“Let’s get off this ceramic tile and you can ask me again.”
* * * * *
About the Author
New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling author Shannon Stacey lives with her husband and two sons in New England, where her two favorite activities are writing stories of happily ever after and riding her four-wheeler. From May to November, the Stacey family spends their weekends on their ATVs, making loads of muddy laundry to keep Shannon busy when she’s not at her computer. She prefers writing to laundry, however, and considers herself lucky she got to be an author when she grew up.
You can contact Shannon through her website, shannonstacey.com, where she maintains an almost daily blog. Visit her on Twitter at twitter.com/shannonstacey and on Facebook at facebook.com/shannonstacey.authorpage, or email her at [email protected].
Also Available from Shannon Stacey and Carina Press
The Kowalskis
Exclusively Yours
Undeniably Yours
Yours to Keep
All He Ever Needed
All He Ever Desired
All He Ever Dreamed
Taken with You
Holiday Sparks
Slow Summer Kisses
Mistletoe & Margaritas
Snowbound with the CEO
Harlequin HQN
Be Mine (anthology with Jennifer Crusie and Victoria Dahl)
Harlequin Anthologies
Snow Day (anthology with Jennifer Greene and Barbara Dunlop)
And Coming Soon from Shannon Stacey and Carina Press
Her Holiday Man
Where no great story goes untold.
The variety you want to read, the stories authors have always wanted to write.
With new releases every week, your next great read is just a download away!
Keep in touch with Carina Press:
Read our blog: www.CarinaPress.com/blog
Follow us on Twitter: www.twitter.com/CarinaPress
Become a fan on Facebook: www.facebook.com/CarinaPress
ISBN-13: 9781426898778
Falling for Max
Copyright © 2014 by Shannon Stacey
Edited by Angela James
All rights reserved. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.
All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.
This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
® and ™ are trademarks of the publisher. Trademarks indicated with ® are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Canadian Intellectual Property Office and in other countries.
www.CarinaPress.com
Falling for Max: Book Nine of The Kowalskis Page 23