Like choose a girl based solely on revenge purposes, and make her fall head over heels in love with you.
Because even as I wanted to strangle him for what he’d done, it didn’t erase the immense love I had for him in my heart. I would always love Jansen. I just didn’t like him very much right now.
“What a mess, babe,” Savannah said, shaking her head. “Sounds like there is a lot more to it than we know.”
I nodded, not able to argue with her about that. But it didn’t change the fact that I now had no clue if any of it had been real for Jansen.
The searing kisses.
The tender discussions.
The playful banter.
Maybe it was all my fault—I’d asked him to kiss me the first time as a distraction from my own panic. What kind of fucked up start is that? Maybe I deserved this…this crushing feeling sinking onto my chest.
“It’s fine,” I said, waving off the negative energy. “Like I said, I’ll just be like them. Sleep around, no strings, live my life.”
Savannah flashed me a pitying look but let me have my anger-fantasy.
“Maybe I’ll sleep with the next man who walks through that door,” I boldly declared—despite having no real intention of following through—as I glanced at the entrance to Scythe.
Savannah followed my line of sight as we waited.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” I grumbled when Maxim walked through the door. “Okay, the next guy—”
Caspian.
I resisted the urge to puke and turned back in my seat. “Never mind. I give up.”
“Incoming,” Savannah muttered under her breath. She raised a brow at me. “Want me to stop him?”
I didn’t know which him she was referring to, but I knew without a doubt if I told her yes then she’d shut down whichever man was attempting to speak to me.
I loved her so damn much.
“It’s okay,” I said, spinning on my barstool. Caspian stood there, an apologetic look on his face.
“Can we talk?” he asked, motioning to where Maxim had selected a table across the room.
I blew out a breath. I didn’t really want to talk to him, but he was my brother, and I knew we needed to have an honest discussion sooner or later. Might as well be after I’d had a bourbon for courage.
“Be right back,” I said, and Savannah gave me an encouraging smile. I knew she’d wait for me. Knew she’d have my back in an instant, and that was powerful. It gave me all the strength I needed to face Caz.
I settled into the chair across from Maxim and Caz, my eyes darting between them both.
“London,” Caz said, cringing a bit. “I’m sorry that I made you feel like you had to hide your relationship.”
I swallowed around the rock lodged in my throat. He’d made the first step, so I wouldn’t slam that door in his face. “It wasn’t just you,” I admitted, sighing. Maxim stared into his drink, his shoulders tense. “I didn’t want anyone to know. Not until I’d secured my position with the Reapers. I wanted to stand on my own. To be known for my work, not because I’m your little sister or someone’s girlfriend.”
“I can’t help who I am, sis,” he said.
“Not asking you to,” I said. “But you have to admit, you’ve been overprotective of me since that day I got trapped in the storm cellar.”
Caspian’s eyebrows raised, his eyes widening at my mention of the memory. I usually avoided bringing it up because it used to have the power to send me into a full-blown panic attack.
Not anymore.
Not since Jansen.
My chest felt like it may crack from the pressure.
“I need you to trust me,” I said. “As ridiculous as that sounds, it’s my choice who I give my heart to. And, apparently, who I allow to break it.” Maxim shook his head, but Caspian nodded. “You have to let me breathe, Caz.”
“I’ll do better,” he said, and his voice was sincere. “I don’t want you to feel like you have to keep things from me. You’ve been my best friend since the day you were born. I don’t want to push you away. I’ll be better, I promise.” He visibly swallowed. “But you have to admit, this looks bad. Sterling—”
“Is a selfish asshole,” Maxim cut in.
Anger sizzled in those fresh fissures over my heart.
“You don’t know the first thing about who he is,” I said with a lethal coldness.
Maxim’s eyes flared for the briefest of moments before he settled back into his default look—grumbly, determined, cocky. “And you do?”
I huffed a dark laugh. Maybe I didn’t know him as well as I thought I had, but I knew pieces of his heart. The ones he’d showed me that had scars from Maxim and his father written all over them.
And even if his intentions with me hadn’t been in the right place, that pain, the suffering, and the selfless way he’d risen to be the better man was real.
“I do,” I said, calming my racing heart. “Maybe I’d been blind about the reasons behind us being together, or his reasoning behind it, but I know him, Maxim. He isn’t whatever you think he is. He doesn’t deserve your hatred. He deserves your respect, and quite possibly your acceptance.”
A muscle in Maxim’s jaw ticked, and Caz let out a low whistle as he hid behind his drink.
I tilted my head, my heart no longer capable of feeling another ounce of pain. “Can you be honest with me for a second?” I asked, and he dipped his chin. “When did you want to ask me out? The first time the thought occurred to you, Maxim?”
He visibly swallowed, and I gave him a small, broken smile.
“When you saw how Jansen was looking at me after the elevator? The way he’d snapped in this very bar after that, way back before the season started? When he thought I’d shown up with you?”
When Maxim didn’t answer, I turned to Caz, who cringed.
I reached across the table, laying my hand over Maxim’s. He didn’t flinch under the touch, just simply held my gaze. “You may be pissed at Jansen, accusing him of using me to make you angry, but you were prepared to do the same thing. We’ve been friends for two years, and you never once said anything. Tell me I’m wrong.”
He cleared his throat and shook his head. “You’re not,” he said. “But I still think we would’ve had fun together.”
I choked out a dark laugh, squeezing his hand. “Maybe,” I said. “But I wasn’t looking for fun. I was looking for something real.”
Maxim grazed his thumb over the back of my hand, an innocent gesture. “I understand,” he said. Then he flashed me a pitiful look. “And I may not know my brother like you do, but I know his hate. Understand it in a way you never will. And his hate? It’s strong enough to make him fake it with you.”
I thought my heart couldn’t shatter any more, but it did.
Completely.
I sucked in a sharp breath, releasing Maxim’s hand. I pushed back from the table, nodding to my brother who looked like he wanted to follow me, but knew better than to do so. And there wasn’t any maliciousness in Maxim’s words—he wanted to help me be smart, to realize the truth behind what Jansen had done—but it still stung like hell.
Savannah met me by the door, a silent show of support as we headed to her car. She drove me back to my apartment and stayed with me the whole night. Distracting me with movies and junk food and drinks until I’d finally been able to ignore what haunted me.
The fact that I’d let Jansen all the way into my life, my heart, my soul, out of a place of pure love and desire.
But him?
He’d come to me out of a place of hatred.
And I didn’t have a clue how to recover from that.
17
Sterling
The air had the distinct chill of winter as Mom and I walked through Reaper Village the day after Christmas. One winter in Maine had taught me to never take the milder southern weather for granted ever again.
“Maybe I should’ve gotten you a puppy,” she said, her brow furrowed as she shoved her hands into the po
ckets of her jacket.
“What?” I nearly laughed but didn’t. I wasn’t even sure I could laugh anymore. The world had taken on a dreary, gray overcast sky for the last two weeks. London hadn’t just taken her body from my bed or her heart from my hands—she’d packed up all the joy in life and walked away without a second look.
“You need something to come home to.” Mom looped her arm through my elbow. “Your house is beautiful, Jansen.” She glanced around us, taking in the quiet suburban neighborhood where the majority of my team lived. “All the houses here are beautiful. But there’s no life inside yours.”
“I’m gone too much to have a puppy,” I said, not even touching the rest of that statement. She knew what had happened between London and me.
“Fine. A Bearded Dragon, maybe?” She hip-checked me and smiled. “Or even a goldfish?”
A smile broke across my face.
“Ah, there it is.” She gave my arm a squeeze. “I’ve been waiting all week to see that smile. I was running out of ideas to get one out of you, but don’t worry, I’ll still make lasagna tonight. That was my last resort.”
“Food?” We crossed the street, and I switched sides with Mom so she didn’t walk next to the street. She was in her forties, and more beautiful than ever. I had Greg—my stepfather—to thank for that. Happiness looked good on her.
“It always comes down to food with you, Jansen Sterling.” She gave me a pointed look.
My smile slipped. “I’m not sure I can carb-load myself out of this one, Mom.”
She tugged on my elbow, stopping us in front of a house I knew all too well. “I’ve never known you to give up on something you wanted. Grades. Hockey. That Xbox you saved all summer for your sophomore year—you’ve never walked away from a little hard work.”
“Those were all attainable goals.” A muscle in my jaw popped as I struggled to breathe through the agony of losing London. It came in waves, some bigger than others, but the pain was always there, waiting to swallow me whole, especially at night. Fuck, I missed her at night, and not just for sex. I missed talking until we fell asleep. I missed hearing about her day and watching her scrunch her nose when something didn’t go right. I missed the feel of her body pressed up against mine, her breaths even and steady as she dreamed. I just fucking missed her.
“And you don’t think getting your girlfriend back is an attainable goal?” Mom cocked her head at me, narrowing her blue-gray eyes in my direction.
“I think there might just be too much damage, Mom.” I tugged my beanie hat over my ears. “She didn’t listen when I told her the truth. She chose to believe—” I snapped my mouth shut.
“Maxim,” Mom said gently. “You can say his name around me, Jansen. I won’t break.”
My stomach twisted even as my heart softened. There was no venom in her tone when she said his name. None of the animosity I felt toward him. She was so much kinder than I was.
“I hate him,” I whispered, even though I wasn’t sure that was true anymore, not after seeing Sergei get in his face after that game. Maxim hadn’t spoken to me since the incident in the hallway. Then again, neither had London.
Caz had stopped glaring at me last week, though, so there was some improvement.
“I know,” Mom said, squeezing my arm and nodding. Her complete and utter acceptance didn’t just crack my defenses—it shattered them.
“He took my house!” I motioned to the two-story modern home we stood in front of.
“I know.”
“And it’s not that I don’t like the new one, but I sure as f—” I barely caught myself from swearing and earned an arched eyebrow. “I wouldn’t have chosen the one next door if I’d known he was my neighbor. Trust me, there’s not a lot of borrowing sugar going on.”
“I know, honey.” There was so much compassion in her eyes that my chest ached.
“He took my team, and I know it’s still my team, but it’s like he’s this little spot of black mold on a cake, spoiling the rest of it and spreading his…moldiness.”
“Hmmm.” Mom pressed her lips in a firm line, struggling not to laugh.
“And he’s an asshole!” I cringed. “Sorry for swearing, but he is! He’s arrogant and calculating, and he stole the woman I love!”
Mom’s shoulders fell, and she rubbed her hand up and down my bicep like I was eleven and just lost a game.
“And it’s not like they’re together or anything.” Bile rose in my throat at the thought of it. “But all he had to do was make one stupid comment in the locker room, and it somehow makes me the bad guy. And London believes him! She thinks I pursued her just to piss him off, and I didn’t!”
“Did you tell her that?” Mom asked.
“I started to in the hallway, but I was just so pissed, and even I can admit the timing of when I asked her out was suspicious. It’s all a complicated…jacked up mess.”
Mom nodded. “Do you really love this girl?”
“Yeah.”
“Then fight for her, Jansen.”
“It’s not that simple.” I shook my head.
“It really is.” She tugged my arm, and we started walking up the sidewalk to my house, where Greg waited. “I never gave you an opportunity to watch me fight for love. I didn’t love your father. You know that. And you were out of the house by the time I started seriously dating again, so you didn’t see when Greg and I would push past our arguments. But we do. You can push past this, too, Jansen. Just be honest with her. Lay it out on the line, and if she still doesn’t listen, then it’s on her.”
“Her brother is Maxim’s best friend. If London and I really, honestly make a go of it, he’ll be in my life, Mom. I don’t want that for you.”
Her grip tightened. “Jansen Marcus Sterling, don’t you dare use me as an excuse to hide behind.”
“What? I’m not!”
“I love that you want to protect me, honey.” She leveled me with the Mom look. “But whether or not you want to admit it, he’s always been in your life. Maybe not physically, but from the moment you knew about your father, he was there, too. You have two brothers and a sister. That’s not going to change, whether you’re with London or not. So why not be happy? Don’t let your hatred of Maxim steal away your chance with London.”
I sighed.
“Also,” she continued. “Stop taking him into account for my visits. I’ll come and see you whenever I damn well please, and I’m not scared of borrowing a cup of sugar, either. He might be an asshole, but he’s just a kid who was born into a situation he couldn’t control. Just like you.”
I didn’t want to admit that she was right, but as usual, she was.
Mom and Greg left the next day, which also happened to be the day Maxim got back into town. The timer went off, and I pulled the tray of lasagna from the oven, leaving the pan on the granite to cool. Mom had made me six pans in addition to the one we’d devoured last night. Four were in the freezer. I told myself I’d ration them until she came to visit again, but who was I kidding? I’d probably eat every single one of them in the next month.
The doorbell rang, and my heart jumped.
Calm the fuck down, it’s not her.
I checked the security camera app and tensed.
It wasn’t her.
It was Maxim.
He rang the bell again.
“Impatient asshole,” I muttered as I walked to the front door, trying my best to channel Mom’s kindness. Trying and failing. I opened the door, anyway.
Maxim looked as uncomfortable as I felt. His jaw was tense, and his hands were in his front pockets. He wasn’t wearing a coat.
“Did you need to borrow a cup of sugar?” I asked.
“What?” He gave me a what the fuck look.
“My mom,” I started, then shook my head. “Never mind. What do you want?”
“Can we talk?” He bit out each word like they were physically painful to say.
He’s just a kid who was born into a situation he couldn’t control. Mom’s
words from yesterday rattled around in my brain, softening me like nothing else could. “Yeah. Come on in. It’s cold out.”
Maxim nodded and walked in, shutting the door behind him. “It’s practically tropical from where I just came from.”
“Russia?” I guessed, leading him toward the kitchen. Offering him a drink was the appropriate thing to do in this situation, right? I motioned to the barstools that lined one side of the kitchen island.
“No. Saint Paul.” He took the seat as his gaze swept over the open-concept kitchen and family room. I got the feeling the guy didn’t miss much. “I’ve only been to Russia a few times, and those were mostly for funerals. Dad played out his contract for Minnesota, and we stayed. He’s actually an American citizen now. So is my mother.”
“Huh.” I took out two bottles of water and slid one across the island to him. “I knew where he played. I guess I just never really thought about where he stayed after his career finished.”
Maxim caught it and started to fidget with the lid. “Thanks.”
I leaned back against my counter, leaving the island and a metric ton of awkwardness between us.
He looked to my right, where a digital photo frame scrolled through pictures, and his expression changed, two lines appearing between his eyebrows.
“My mom gave it to me for Christmas,” I said, twisting the top on my bottle but not drinking it. “What did you want to talk about?” The game tomorrow? Our shared fence line? Our shared genetics? The awkward options were endless around here.
His eyes were still on the frame. Mom had uploaded her favorites, and my stomach tensed as he watched my childhood scroll by. His thumb picked at the label on his water.
“Maxim—”
“You look kind of like Nicolai in that one.” He motioned toward the frame. “How old are you there?”
I looked. “Four. Five, maybe. We were hiking up by my grandparents’ place.”
Sterling: A Carolina Reapers Novel Page 18
