Before she could move, Max gripped her wrist and held it tight. “For being gentle? Much as I enjoy having my ass kicked by you, I might enjoy this more.”
She didn’t jerk away. No elbows jabbed his gut. No fingers gouged his eyeballs out. No ninja legs squeezed his hips so tight they severed the flow of blood to his legs.
He was almost disappointed at that last one.
“I still miss you,” he said.
Her fingers moved in his hair again. And her center moved against him. Slowly, slightly, painfully. But he felt it, and he wanted more.
Her eyes were wide and dark, her breath coming in short bursts. “The owl addled your brain.”
“You addle my brain.”
“Max—”
“You’ve changed.”
“Everyone changes.”
“Are you happy?”
With a quick flick of her wrist, Merry freed herself. “I appreciate the concern, but—”
She started to scoot off him. Max grabbed her by the waist and pulled himself semi-upright. “I always thought you were happy when we were together.”
“You need to let me go.”
“But what do you need?”
He felt a tremble go through her body.
“Who are you, Merry? Who do you want to be?”
She sucked her lower lip into her mouth, and Max’s groin pulsed again.
It wasn’t smart, it wasn’t safe, but he wanted to take her lips in his mouth. He wanted to roll her onto her back and touch her and taste her and devour her. He wanted her to remember who they’d been last year. He wanted her to let him in.
He wanted her to be here for him.
Not for her mother.
Not because of her father.
He wanted to strip her down to just her, to learn her, to know her, to be able to trust her.
A shaft of light lit up her dark hair. “Merry? Is that—stop molesting my daughter.”
“Got this under control, Mom,” Merry said dryly.
Max’s groin twitched.
“Obviously his fault,” her mother said. “This isn’t how a nice young man behaves, is it?”
“Depends on how badly you want grandchildren.”
Her mother humphed. Merry slid off him, stood, and dusted her hands.
He rolled to sitting with a grunt.
“Have a nice evening, Max,” Merry said.
“Be nicer if you came home with me,” he replied before he could stop himself.
Not that he wanted to stop himself.
“Max—”
“Would’ve said goodbye differently if I’d known you were leaving.”
She visibly shivered, and her eyes went dark.
Good dark.
“Why didn’t you call the police last night?” she murmured.
“Last I checked, being in an alley isn’t a crime.”
“Meredith? Are you coming in before that questionable young man tries to do unspeakable things to you?”
“I’m coming.”
“I wish,” Max muttered. He shoved to his feet. “Still live in the same house. I’ll be home all night.”
She was bundled up in her coat, her back to him, but he could’ve sworn he felt the current of an intrigued shiver travel through the crisp air.
“Good night, Max,” Merry said, more firmly this time.
“Night, Merry.” He lifted a hand toward her frowning mother. “Nicky. Nice to see you again.”
Her lips twitched, ruining her stern librarian glare. “I’m still debating if it’s been nice seeing you again, Matt.”
Wasn’t hard to smile at the woman, even if she had interrupted the closest thing he’d had to sex in a year. “I’ll have to try harder next time.”
Merry stepped into the doorway with her mother. Max didn’t expect her to look back, but she did.
She turned those mocha soul-suckers on him, and instead of his blood pulsing south, it pooled in his chest, warm and weird as it wrapped around that organ under his ribs.
Merry Silver looked every bit a woman who didn’t need anyone to take care of her. She talked tough. She’d physically flattened him twice. Mentally and emotionally once, though he didn’t like to admit it.
But something had happened to her in the past year.
Something wrong.
And Max wanted to fix it.
The door shut, closing the two women into the house and Max firmly out.
He’d walked away from closed doors before. He’d walked away from opportunities. He’d walked away from women.
But he didn’t know how to walk away from Merry Silver.
* * *
The door had barely closed when Mom turned and peered out the peephole. “Have all of your ex-boyfriends been this handsome?”
Merry could count on three fingers the number of boyfriends she’d had. “Every last one.”
“He’s still standing there.”
And she could still feel his soft hair between her fingers, the pinging of her pulse, the searing heat of his gaze, the press of his hard length between her thighs. Max Gregory was a difficult man to walk away from. “The owl stole his brain.” Ooh, good one. Phoebe Moon and the Missing Brain. A Halloween book. Delirious Uncle Sandy could—
“Obviously,” Mom said. “I don’t know which of you is crazier. A jeweler, Merry?”
Merry caught a glimpse of her feathered dark hair in the mirror over the buffet in the entryway. She picked at the white fluff in her ears and over her upper lip. “I know. Not one of my finer moments.”
Was that a wrinkle furrowing her mother’s brow? “Such a shame. Too bad he’s not a banker. Does he know what happened? Why you left him?”
He’d suffered enough on Merry’s behalf. She didn’t need to saddle him with more. No matter how broad his shoulders, how solid his chest, how intrigued his eyes were, she had no intention of burdening him with the weight of her father’s secrets.
Or her own. “He knows enough.”
Trixie’s engine roared to life outside.
Merry’s heart twisted. “I need a shower.” She headed toward the stairs. “How’s Patrick?”
“Sleeping. I think the worst is behind us.”
“Good.”
Mom trailed her up the stairs. “Patrick has a nephew about your age.”
“Mother.”
“What? He does. I haven’t met him, but Patrick tells me Richard is in management for some technical company in Iowa. He sounds lovely. And he’ll be here for the wedding.”
“I’m not taking Patrick’s nephew as a date to your wedding.”
Mom heaved a melodramatic sigh. “I can lead you to happiness, but I can’t make you drink.”
“Pretty sure you’ve made me drink,” Merry muttered.
As had Daddy.
Merry had been eight when she’d first understood they were moving because of Daddy’s job, but she’d been eleven before she’d discovered that Daddy’s job had been stealing a classmate’s mother’s heirloom pearls after said classmate called Merry white trash.
She’d learned much later that he’d also stolen a ruby-and-diamond set from the mother of a kid who’d given her lice in preschool, and he’d taken a Rolex from her second-grade teacher’s husband after Merry had gotten a less-than-stellar grade in storytelling.
Daddy didn’t always replace what he took—he generally only bothered with replicas when it was a famous jewel or gem he was hunting for sport. Most of his heists were small-time thefts, vengeance grabs for perceived personal or societal wrongs. He pawned his ill-gotten treasures, and either used the money to put food on his family’s table or to help more needy families.
“Sweetheart, I just want to see you happy,” Mom said. “Preferably with someone who won’t be hurt by your secrets.”
She was talking about the secrets about Daddy, but Merry was suddenly back in Suckers, listening to Zoe drop Phoebe Moon’s name and wondering how they’d like her if they knew she was Amber Finch.
Mo
m wrapped her in a hug.
“Are you getting Patrick germs on me?” Merry asked.
“Families share everything, darling.”
Family.
Mom would always be her family.
But Merry had recently started contemplating the theory that people were meant to make their own families too. To fall in love. Get married. Have children who would one day give them grandchildren.
However, she couldn’t even share her real job with her family, because Daddy always managed to ruin everything.
Everything.
He’d discover she had money. Or he’d hear that Merry and her editor were having a disagreement about something, and said editor could kiss her jewels goodbye. If she had a spat with a publicist or fired her agent or God forbid someone from a national newspaper ripped a Phoebe Moon novel to shreds, Daddy would be there as the avenging angel, making everything worse in his misguided attempts to make everything better.
And if she couldn’t tell anyone how she made a living, how could she create a family of her own?
Mom stopped outside Merry’s door. “Love you, sweetheart.”
“Love you too,” Merry choked out.
Mom stepped across the hall to her room. And this time, when the door shut, she wasn’t simply alone.
She was lonely.
Chapter 9
“Wouldn’t you like to be me for a day, Phoebe Moon?” her evil twin said.
—Phoebe Moon and the Secret Sister
* * *
One year ago…
Before Merry met Max, she’d had only two real boyfriends—a failed prom date and the twenty-something college student who’d lived next door to her first apartment. She liked guys. But she’d had precious little experience with normal, healthy relationships. So after a few dates with her neighbor, she’d let him relieve her of her virginity. He’d stuck around until he graduated a few months later, sending her flowers, dropping by to hang out, bringing over a movie, sleeping at her place from time to time, but he had a job lined up somewhere on the East Coast, so one day he left and they amicably agreed to go their own ways.
Fine with her. He’d been fun most of the time, but he talked too much about how much money this company or that company had offered him, and he’d made the occasional snide comments about his professors’ love lives, and he’d always taken the last bite of any dessert they shared. In short, he was an experience in dating, but she hadn’t been in love with him.
After that, her secret life as Amber Finch had begun to get exciting, with book deals and deadlines and launches. After Mom’s wedding to Yo-yo, Merry had made a point to talk to her mother more. Yo-yo hadn’t been much of a stepfather—Mom had totally pulled out her cougar stripes when she married him—but he’d been different. Refreshing and interesting and entertaining. By the time Mom had gotten bored with her boy-toy and his love affair with geeky gamer cons, Merry had come to appreciate her mom in a way she hadn’t in her teen years, and they’d talked more after that. Gotten close in a way they hadn’t been since Mom had divorced Daddy.
Plus, of everyone in the world, Mom understood the complications Daddy presented in her life. So while Merry occasionally wondered what it would’ve been like to have a real boyfriend, her job, her online friends, an occasional date with an acquaintance, and her relationship with her mom kept her happy enough.
Until Max.
He made her laugh at the Spencer McGraw signing. At dinner afterwards, they talked about nothing at all, really, but she was captivated by his eyes. His hands.
His lips.
Merry Silver had a crush.
Accepting his invitation to the Cubs game was a no-brainer. As in, her brain wasn’t involved at all. But they hung out just like buddies at the game. He high-fived her when the Cubs scored. They talked about the players, about Wrigley Field, and Max told her a story about something going on with the Knot Festival committee in Bliss, but he didn’t kiss her.
He didn’t ask her out again either.
She left the game convinced that Max was simply looking for a buddy.
Heck, she didn’t even know what he did for a job. She assumed it involved weddings, but they hadn’t talked about it.
Not that she’d told him her job either, and the further they got from the book signing, the easier it was to conveniently forget that he’d bought her first Phoebe Moon book.
Still, when he called and said he had to be in Chicago for a meeting next Thursday and asked if she was free for dinner after, she shouted yes so fast she almost embarrassed herself.
When Thursday came, Max’s meeting went late. He still had to drive back to Bliss, so Merry met him at a Five Guys near his meeting. As soon as they ordered, Max pulled off his tie and popped the top button on his shirt, and she lost her words.
How had she never realized how potently sexy a disheveled man in a suit was?
She told Phoebe Moon to cover her eyes and ears and indulged in some seriously mature thoughts about the broad-shouldered, five-o’clock-shadowed man across the table from her.
His hair needed a trim, and she itched to run her fingers through it and then help him unbutton the rest of his shirt. To get close enough to sniff him, to feel the heat of his body, to test for herself if his arms and chest were as solid as they appeared to be.
He offered her an apologetic grin. “Sorry about this. Thought we’d be done two hours ago.”
“I’ll forgive you so long as Cosmo says I should.” She pulled a magazine from her bag, opened it to a quiz to help determine your perfect color palette, and tortured Max with demanding his answers.
He wanted to be buddies?
She’d show him how women did buddies.
“You’re neutrals,” she declared. “I suppose we can continue dinner. I happen to like gray. Moonrock is my favorite color. Plus, it’s compatible enough with my peach palette.”
His eyes went from sea-foam green to deep emeralds, and he dropped a fry. “That have any more quizzes about your peaches?”
“No, but if you’re having any gynecological issues, we should flip to page 167.”
“So if I want to know more about your peaches, I’ll have to do firsthand research?”
“Unless you want to go to the library and see if any back issues have peach quizzes.” She was a terrible flirt.
But Max’s full lips curved into a glorious, intrigued smile, and he leaned closer into the table. “I’m more of a hands-on type of guy.”
“Are you? So far, I hadn’t noticed.”
I’m not old enough to listen to this, Phoebe Moon said.
Eyes shut, ears closed, Merry reminded her.
“I’m picky about the peaches I touch,” Max said.
“You’re trying out multiple peaches?”
He dipped his fingers back into the fry bag with a laugh. “You ask me, there’s something wrong with any guy who wants that much drama in his life. One peach is all I can handle at a time. Maybe half a peach.”
“Ah. Commitment issues.” A mild sting of disappointment pricked something deep inside her. Not that she wanted to consider commitment either. Max probably didn’t have any jewelry of his own, but odds were good his mother and grandmother had some, and goodness only knew what Daddy would do if Max broke her heart. Nope, best to keep that little organ out of her love life.
Plus, Mom was queen of commitment issues. But she was happy. And Merry was happy. Why ruin a good thing?
Max shrugged and stared down into the fry bag. “I can commit to anything. Doesn’t mean I want to.”
The writer in Merry perked up. There was a story there. “Sowing your wild oats, then?”
“My gramps is…was…an artist. Can’t see any of it anymore though. He’s lost ninety percent of his vision. Gran has balance issues. We just put them in a nursing home, but I moved in with them about two years ago to help out. I was there in the middle of the night if they needed something, at meals, other times. Lot of responsibility, even with everyone in the family
pitching in when they could. I’d do it again in a heartbeat—meant the world to them to be able to stay in their own home as long as they did—but for now, I just want to be me.”
Phoebe Moon swooned.
So did Merry, if she were being honest.
Max offered her more fries as if he hadn’t just confessed to being Grandson of the Year, as if he hadn’t made her wish she’d known her own grandparents, and instead of giving in to the urge to hug him, she took a fry and smiled at him. “You tell all your prospective peaches that story?”
He grinned back. “Only if I’m sitting on two tickets to a wine and cheese tasting for Saturday afternoon.”
If you don’t want him, I’ll take him, Phoebe Moon said.
Dream on, brat, Merry replied to the fictional thirteen-year-old in her head. “I can clear my calendar for cheese,” she told Max.
When their dinner was over, he didn’t kiss her, and she decided taking things slowly was for the best.
But Saturday, after they spent the afternoon walking around downtown Chicago, trying out wines and cheeses in several little shops Merry hadn’t discovered yet, she tossed caution to the wind.
She slipped her hand into his and smiled a half-tipsy smile at him when the tour wrapped up. “I cannot in good conscience let you drive home like this. Let’s go hang out in the drunk tank for a while.”
He laughed, a beautiful, rich sound that tickled her soul. “You never fail to surprise me, Merry Silver.”
“You like surprises?”
“I do.”
“Then how’s this one?” She dropped his hand, grabbed a fistful of his blue button-down, slung her arm around his neck, and pushed up on her tiptoes to capture his lips in hers.
If he kissed her back, she was keeping him.
If he didn’t…
At least she’d know he wasn’t interested.
But Max didn’t hesitate. He pulled her against his hot, solid body, threaded his fingers through her hair, and opened his mouth to her. His tongue touched hers, and a raw hunger ignited in her bones.
She wanted him.
She wanted his body. She wanted his voice. She wanted his laugh. She wanted his affection. She wanted his trust.
Merried Page 8
