The Gamble

by Kristen Ashley

  “You forget that again, you call me, I’ll remind you,” Max said to Mindy then demanded, “Promise me that, babe.”

  “Okay,” Mindy whispered.

  “I want to hear you promise,” he ordered and I watched her fingers clutch his shirt.

  She hesitated a heart-stopping second before she said, “I promise, Max.”

  He paused too before he replied, “All right, honey.”

  He pulled away but caught her face in both of his hands, touched his lips to her forehead, turned then took over for Brody holding me up.

  Both my arms slid around his waist and both his arms slid around my back as Brody lifted his shoeless sister into his arms and carried her down the steps and across the gravel to the Subaru. Max and I held onto each other as we watched first Barb and Darren execute a three-point turn and drive down the lane then Brody and Mindy.

  I waved just in case Mindy looked back or Brody looked in his rearview mirror. I couldn’t know if they did but I kept waving even after they turned into the road.

  Max’s arms gave me a squeeze and I sighed.

  “Gettin’ cold, darlin’, gonna snow,” he said and I pressed my cheek to his chest and looked at the view, both my arms again around him. He was right, the clouds were covering the sun and there was a definite chill in the air.

  “You okay?” I asked his chest even though I knew the answer.

  “No,” he answered honestly.

  “I’m so sorry, Max,” I whispered.

  “Me too,” he whispered back.

  We stood there awhile silently holding onto each other. I was staring at Max’s view and I knew he was too but he was doing it with his cheek against my hair.

  It was then I wondered if things would have felt differently if Max had been around when Charlie died, if I’d have had this, maybe not the view, but his strong arms around me, his cheek to my hair, if I’d had him to hold onto.

  I figured it wouldn’t have hurt less, losing Charlie, but it would have hurt less, knowing after I did that I wasn’t alone.

  And I realized then that losing Charlie was when the loneliness crept in and I had been in such grief, I hadn’t been able to beat it back. So when I met Niles not long after and he’d been kind and in his way attentive, I’d fixed myself to him because with him I was no longer alone.

  The problem was, I never stopped being lonely.

  Max broke the silence when he asked softly, “This how you feel all the time?”

  I tipped my head back to look at him. “I’m sorry?”

  “Charlie.”

  I closed my eyes then opened them and nodded the truth.

  “Honey,” he whispered, his face getting soft, his eyes getting warm but there was something else there, an understanding that rent my heart.

  “But you have a different ending, darling. She’s going to be okay,” I promised him.

  “Yeah,” he replied, giving me a squeeze.

  “Nina’ll freeze to death, you keep her on the porch much longer,” Cotton called and we both turned to see him leaning out the front door. “Anyways, we got pictures to hang, son, get your hind end in here.” Then he pulled back but left the door open.

  The moment was broken so I decided it was high time to lighten the mood.

  Therefore as we walked, our arms around each other, to the open door, I said, “I think Cotton is trying to singlehandedly increase your gas bill by two hundred percent.”

  “Did I say he was a pain in my ass?” Max asked loudly as we moved into the house and Max closed the door.

  “I give him my pictures, he calls me a pain in the ass,” Cotton complained to my mother who looked alarmingly like she was cooking and I hoped the mood to concoct was assuaged at breakfast because she’d also been to the grocery store which meant her ingredients could easily have taken a creative therefore alarming turn.

  “Children these days,” Mom said back, “no gratitude.”

  “Max, Mom called you a child again,” I told on my mother even though Max heard it himself.

  “Yeah but she’s making her Mexican casserole,” Steve said, I sucked in an excited breath, Steve grinned at me then looked to Max. “Nina likes her mother’s Mexican casserole.”

  Max stopped me at the end of the counter and I looked up at him and explained, “You will too. You taste it you’ll think nothing but ‘Ambrosia of the Gods’.”

  Max smiled down at me and I was relieved to see this one was a little bit more like Max’s normal, beautiful grin.

  “Never thought those four words in my whole life, Duchess,” he informed me. “In fact, I don’t even know what one of them means.”

  “Food of the Gods,” I informed him.

  “Then what you’re sayin’ is your Mom’s casserole is good.”

  “The best.”

  “And, it was one of my concoctions,” Mom put in snootily.

  I got up on my toes and informed Max in a loud whisper, “A rare hit.”

  “I heard that!” Mom snapped.

  Steve intervened by saying to Max, “We’re gonna have to rig up some kinda hoist, you want that picture over your bed. It isn’t gonna go up those spiral stairs.”

  “No problem, had to do the same with the furniture,” Max replied and concluded. “I’ll go to the barn, get my tools.”

  “I’ll go with you,” Steve offered and slid off his stool.

  “I’ll stay warm,” Cotton declined participation and slid on a stool.

  “I’ll frost the cake,” I announced and started to pull away from Max’s arm but it tightened then I started to tip my head back to look up at him but stopped when his lips hit my temple.

  Goodness but I loved it when he did things like that.

  “Be back in a second, baby,” he said softly, giving me a squeeze with his arm.

  I loved it when he said things like that too. And when he gave me a squeeze.

  He let me go, Steve joined him and I watched as they walked away.

  “He’s a keeper,” Mom noted, her eyes on the space where we last saw Steve and Max.

  She wasn’t wrong but I was too emotionally depleted to deal with that fact right now or to process what I was going to do about it.

  “Sweetie,” Mom called, I looked at her and my hand came out to clutch the edge of the counter at what I saw in her face.

  “Come here, Neenee Bean,” she said softly.

  “Mom.”

  “Before you frost that cake, I want a hug.”

  “Mom, you know –”

  “Come here, Nina,” she demanded firmly and I did what I’d done since I was a child and I heard that tone from my mother. I obeyed and walked into her arms.

  They came around me and the tears hit my throat, slid up my sinuses and then leaked out my eyes. I couldn’t control them and in the safety of my mother’s arms I didn’t try.

  “Mom,” I whispered, holding on tight.

  “Lots of bad stuff coming up for you today and you can’t hold it in, darling, you just can’t.” She held back just as tight and went on, “So you have to give it to your Momma.”

  I stuffed my face into her neck and like I’d done countless times before from falling off my bike to getting over terrible boyfriends, I gave it to her.

  However this time was different for about halfway through me doing that, her arms went loose, her hands went to my shoulders, my head came up in surprise but I didn’t see much partly because she was blurry but also because she turned me and I found myself in the safety of Max’s arms.

  Yes, the jury was now out. Verdict: Mom liked Max for certain.

  Max’s arms were different mainly because they moved, they lifted me, they carried me across the room and they settled me into his lap when he sat in the armchair.

  “You… you need to hang the pictures,” I snuffled into his neck, hiding my face from view.

  “Later.”

  “No, I’m okay,” I lied, wiping my hand along my cheek and then letting out a hiccoughing sob.

  “
Later.”

  My head came up and I protested, “Max.”

  My head went right back into his neck when his hand cupped the back of it and forced it there.

  “Duchess, I said later.”

  Max was obviously determined and I knew what that meant.

  “Oh all right,” I gave in tearfully but also grumpily.

  Max made no response.

  I slipped my arms around him and let his warm, solid body cradle mine.

  Never said this, Nina, never thought I’d have the chance, Charlie whispered into my head and the only response I could give was to hold Max tighter, I’m so sorry, sweetheart.

  A new sob slid from my throat and Max held me closer.

  * * * * *

  After the pictures were up (yes, pictures for Mom, Steve and Cotton all demanded that mine be hung between the two doors under the loft, no one let me get a word in edgewise and Max sure as heck didn’t intervene, not to mention, once up, they looked amazing); after Mexican casserole which was even better than I remembered and Max, who had two helpings, obviously thought so too; after three beers (for Max) and two (for me); and after coffee and yellow cake with fudgy, chocolaty frosting from a tub and a scoop of ice cream that Mom, Steve and Cotton got from the store, Max and I stood at the front door saying good-bye to our guests.

  “Where are you staying?” I asked Mom as I gave her a hug.

  “Steve found a last minute deal on a condo someone cancelled. It’s on the other side of town. We got it for a song. We’re here all week!” Mom declared, my gaze slid to Max and I watched his eyes close slowly before he shook his head.

  “That’s great, Mom,” I said pulling away but holding onto her hands and I actually did think it was great, mostly because I missed my Mom and I didn’t get to see her that often.

  I hugged Steve next and then Cotton, who Mom and Steve were driving home. Snow flurries were falling as was night and Cotton had walked there because, I’d found out, he was Max’s neighbor.

  “I’ll walk ‘em to their car,” Max told me then his eyes going to my stocking feet, he ordered, “You stay here.”

  I didn’t argue, I’d had a tough day, instead I said, “Okay.”

  “’Night, Neenee Bean, see you in the morning,” Mom waved, bouncing on her sandals and then she turned to Max and declared, “I expect to be carried to the car by my daughter’s mountain man hunk, seeing as I might break a heel in this snow.”

  “Mom,” I snapped, “none of it has actually stuck yet.”

  “Don’t spoil my fun!” she snapped back and then she screeched with delight when Max obliged her demands.

  Steve grinned at me and shook his head. Cotton stared at Mom and Max and also shook his head, though for different reasons than Steve.

  I watched through the windowed door for awhile then I wandered to the armchair, plopped into it and stared at the roaring fire, thinking Max was good at building fires.

  Then again, he seemed good at everything.

  I waved through the window when I heard the honking car drive by and then watched Max walk through the door.

  “Max, you shouldn’t give into her nuttiness, trust me, it only makes her more nutty,” I called.

  “Your Mom wants to be carried to her car, I can carry her to her car, I’ll carry her to her car. Not a big deal,” Max replied, bending and pulling off his boots.

  “Whatever,” I muttered and turned back to the fire.

  I felt him come to me rather than heard him and then I scrunched to the side as he sat in the chair beside me and propped his feet up on the ottoman.

  I was about to open my mouth to say something, what I had no idea, when Max slid an arm around my shoulders and spoke.

  “Two miracles occurred today. My woman saved the girl I think of as a sister’s life and it’s eight o’clock, we’re alone and you’re not sick, drunk or asleep.”

  “Max,” I whispered and he turned from gazing at the fire to look at me.

  “Never, Nina, never in my fuckin’ life will I forget you racin’ down that incline, jumpin’ in the goddamned river and bent over, breathin’ life into Mindy.”

  I closed my eyes but opened them again when Max’s hand came to my face and his mouth touched mine.

  He pulled back an inch and murmured, “Thank you, baby.”

  “Max –” I started softly and he cut me off.

  “But, you ever even think of jumpin’ into a river again, I’ll tan your ass.”

  I felt my brows snap together just as I felt my body jerk. “I’m sorry?”

  Max’s arm dropped across my lap, his hand at my hip and he stated, “You scared the fuckin’ shit outta me.”

  “Max –”

  “Seriously, Nina, swear to God, I watched you go into that river, you didn’t fuckin’ hesitate, and my goddamned stomach dropped. I thought you’d both go.”

  “Max –”

  “There’d be nothin’ I could do, that river took you, it wanted you, it’d have you and I’d lose you both.”

  “That didn’t happen,” I reminded him, trying to keep my patience.

  “No, thank fuck, it didn’t. Coulda, but it didn’t.”

  “I had to get to her.”

  “I know you did.”

  “So I got to her.”

  “Yeah, you did, nearly lost your life doin’ it.”

  “That isn’t true.”

  “A river’s unpredictable, babe, you don’t know that but I do. Especially in spring. You shoulda waited for me.”

  “Waiting wasn’t an option.”

  “Not worth talkin’ about now, it’s done and thankfully everyone’s all right.”

  “You brought it up.”

  “I brought it up in case you get a wild hair which you seem to do a lot.”

  I pulled back as far as I could which wasn’t very far and glared at him. “I’m not going to jump into rivers willy nilly, Max, I didn’t even jump in today. I just, kind of, walked in.” His brows went up and I gave an inch. “Okay, ran in.”

  He shook his head then declared, “We’re done talkin’ about this.”

  I continued to glare. Then I started to push up from the chair but his arms tightened around me and he pulled me back down to him.

  “Max, I’m going to go read or something.”

  “You’re pissed I laid it out and you’re gonna go nurse your snit.”

  Seriously, he was so annoying.

  “Okay, so I’m going to go nurse my snit.”

  “No, you aren’t. You’re gonna sit here and we’re gonna enjoy the fact that we’re breathin’, alive and alone.”

  “Has anyone told you you’re domineering?”

  “Nope.”

  “Well, let me be the first. You’re domineering.”

  He turned more fully to me and ran his forearm down the backs of both my legs, hooking them at the knee and pulling them over his legs on the ottoman. If I hadn’t been in a snit I might have noticed, firstly, that he did this gently so as not to hurt my scraped up leg and, secondly, that I was far more comfortable in this position.

  But I was in a snit and he was talking so I didn’t notice.

  “First, babe, seriously?”

  “Seriously what?” I asked.

  “If I got somethin’ on my mind, you want me to keep it to myself?”

  Well, it didn’t sound very good when he said it like that.

  “No, but ��”

  “Especially if it’s important?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Second, you get pissed at what I say, you want to go off in a huff rather than talkin’ shit out?”

  That didn’t sound very good either.

  “Well –”

  “Yes or no.”

  “Maybe, yes,” I snapped and his face grew dark.

  “You’re shittin’ me.”

  “If I go off in a huff, as you put it, I might have a chance to get my head together so we can talk it out, not argue about it.”

  “Babe, you
’re not kidding anyone. You want the chance to pull away, not get your head together.”

  Why was he so annoying? I was angry enough to ask.

  “Why are you so annoying?” I snapped again.

  “Because I’m right, you’re wrong and you know it.”

  I shouldn’t have asked.

  I looked to the ceiling and told God, “God, next time I want an adventure, strike me with lightning. You have my permission.”

  “You know what sucks?” Max broke into my conversation with God and I looked back at him.

  “No, what sucks, Max?”

  “It sucks you’re so fuckin’ cute even when I’m pissed at you.”

  My eyes rounded, my temper flared even as my heartbeat spiked with a weird but palpable fear.

  “You’re pissed at me?”

  “Duchess, you ran into a raging goddamned river and gave me attitude when I called you on it.”

  “Max, I ran in after Mindy who was trying to commit suicide like my brother did three years ago and I wasn’t going to let that happen again! Not to Mindy, not to Brody and not to you!”

  His face gentled but I wasn’t done.

  “And I don’t get a wild hair a lot.”

  “Babe,” he said low, his gentled face now looked like it was desperately trying not to crack a smile.

  “What?” I snapped.

  “You flew out to Colorado, drivin’ into mountains you’ve never been to by yourself and harborin’ a flu. You were alone, in a snowstorm, in the middle of nowhere in a house with a man you’d never met and you got into it with me. And, I’ll just say, you might have a mouth on you, babe, but physically I can take you. Then you took on Shauna on what amounts to our first date. Then you took on Damon, who’s a dick, could also take you and, worse, would. Then you took on Kami and then Shauna again. You took one look at Jeff, decided he was a good guy and threw Mindy at his feet. You didn’t think for even a second before gettin’ into it with your Dad, just threw back the covers, blew from the loft, ran down the fuckin’ stairs and got right in his face. And this mornin’ you acted out a hilarious but obviously practiced head to head with your Mom.” I was back to glaring silently at him since his facts made a pretty damning case but he wasn’t done. “And we won’t get into you jumpin’ on the back of an ATV a coupla days after you shied away from a fuckin’ snowmobile then jumpin’ off it like you’re a Hollywood stuntwoman.”