17. Max #2
But I still worried that Draven was putting himself back into the lion’s den just to help me .
I’d told them there were plenty of nice hotels in Nashville or out in Memphis—even fancy ones that would meet their standards—but they were set on making a trip to Montana.
The first plane trip of my life.
As the plane began to board, we got on first, due to Dominic’s frequent flyer first class whatever-the-hell miles. I was already hesitant by the time we stepped onto the airplane but as we sat down in the seats, I felt like I was going to panic.
“Hey,” Draven said from the seat next to me. “You’re going to be okay.”
“I’m not sure.”
He hummed, leaning in to squeeze my thigh. “Never known a man who is more afraid to get on a plane than to be shot at with a gun,” he murmured. “You’re special, Max.”
“I don’t feel special. I feel like I’m going to jump out of my skin and run back into that airport.”
“Try to relax. The view as we take off should be pretty.”
I was surprised as he reached down and took my hand in his, squeezing it.
He kept it there as the rest of the plane boarded. By the time the plane began to taxi along the runway, it was still there. I gazed down at his rose tattoo, and I was struck by how comforting it was to see it, now.
The same place I’d bitten him when we first met, because I thought he was a threat to my life.
Now when I saw that tattoo, I relaxed, my gaze tracing the gentle curves, the black lines, the crimson ink on each petal.
And when the rumble of the engines revved up and the plane began to take off, Draven squeezed my hand tighter.
“I’m right here,” he said.
The same thing he told me earlier.
I leaned up against the side of his body, every muscle in my body tensing up as the plane moved faster and faster until it lifted up into the air.
I was flying.
I couldn’t look out the window at first but when I finally did, I felt my heart drop like I was on a looping roller coaster.
My home. My city.
The lights looked beautiful overhead. A dark night with the twinkling lights of the city below us. Somewhere down there, miles away, was Bestens. Everything I’d ever known and loved.
Everything that had seemed so stable until recently.
There was a tight feeling in my throat like there had been earlier, but I wasn’t crying. And the higher we got up into the air, with each increasing mile, I felt calmer.
Surrender.
Another thing Draven had been teaching me, without even trying.
There was so much I couldn’t control. So much I wasn’t aware of—like when I’d just wanted to share my videos online, never knowing what that simple desire could lead to.
I managed to doze off during the flight, my body resting up against Draven’s the entire time.
His scent felt like a second home to me now, even though I knew that was just another naive thing about me.
I was getting too used to him. Needing him by my side.
Needing his touch, his protection, his scent.
This is all going to go away, too .
My life had been nothing but too much change lately.
I picked at it in my mind like a hangnail I couldn’t ignore. I wanted to pretend it wasn’t happening. Pretend my life was as simple as it had always been. I didn’t want to think about the biggest inevitable change that was coming my way.
Draven was never meant to be permanently mine.
The plane started to make its descent, after I’d already made my reckonings with mortality and thought it through too many times: if I die, I’ve lived a good life. 22 ain’t so bad. People will know what I loved.
The wheels touched down and it was as if I’d been born anew.
“I didn’t die,” I told Draven as we waited to deboard the plane.
He smoothed my hair with his hand. Gentle dark circles had appeared below his eyes, and he looked calm in a way I wasn’t used to seeing.
“You lived.”
“And now I’m a person who has flown.”
“Do you feel different?” he asked. “Like you’ve lost your virginity?”
“I’m a new man. A wiser man,” I joked. “But mostly I just feel like me , still.”
A black SUV picked us up. After driving for almost an hour, the driver pulled over to drop off Dominic in front of the nicest house I had ever seen in my life.
And then, not too long after, we pulled up in front of our destination.
And I realized I had a new standard for nicest house I’ve ever seen in my life.
I stepped out of the SUV and the first thing I felt was the air. It was nearly three in the morning in Big Sky, Montana, but no matter the time, it wouldn’t have felt like this back in Bestens.
It felt like we could almost touch heaven.
The mountains loomed dark in the distance, taller than any I’d ever known and already snow-capped even as summer eased into fall. The tension that had built up in my body over the past handful of hours—over the past many weeks —seemed to drop away for a moment, and the muscles in my body relaxed.
Wind-worn rock framed the backdrop of Draven’s house. It smelled like rain-wet rock and sweetly floral.
House.
You couldn’t call it that. Not in any world.
It was his estate , but really, it looked more like a resort, not a structure built for only one person. It was all stone and wood, sprawling over the land. Sconces glowed on seemingly every corner of the house, and I realized that while Draven had been gone, his house certainly hadn’t been empty.
He had staff. There was already a man coming down the curved stone path toward us, ready to greet us as we arrived, even at three o’clock at night.
Draven truly was royalty.
He took my hand again as we walked from the vehicle toward the front. I didn’t say a word as our shoes moved over gravel and stone, like I’d suddenly entered into a spell that I desperately didn’t want to break.
He didn’t say anything, either.
The floral smell became stronger as we approached the front entry, and I saw it, now: wild rows of rose bushes, lining the outer edge near the grand, wooden double front doors.
Hundreds of red blooms, gently lit from the ground, surrounding the entryway. A few petals had fallen along the edges of the stone pathway, dotting the way.
“It’s beautiful,” I told Draven, my own voice sounding far away, like I was in some surreal dream.
“I know,” he told me.
There was a hard edge to his voice, though.
Like he knew it was beautiful, but that there was a world of pain below that beauty. A dozen thorns to every rose.
And I knew that was true for him.
He led me through the inside and I felt like I was only seeing one narrow path in a home that was endless .
Draven knew I was beat tired. He took me up a set of curving stairs toward a second floor on one edge of the home, and when he pushed open another set of carved double doors, I thought we were entering his bedroom.
It was another hall.
One that led to his bedroom. Which was a whole new wing of the home, complete with floor-to-ceiling windows that looked out on the mountains. I could see the horse stables across the land, from up here. Just the area for the horses was bigger than most homes I’d ever seen.
“Beautiful,” I repeated again.
Too beautiful.
It was so much .
With every new corner, every opulent piece of stone or marble or lacquered wood, I felt something building in my chest. Something pressing down like it was crowding out my soul, or something.
Like I was becoming insignificant.
My throat tightened and I sat down in one of the tall bay windows, facing inside.
“Let me guess,” Draven said, stepping over. “You’re thinking it’s beautiful?”
“Yes, it’s beautiful,” I said. “And I’ve never felt so far away from home.”
I was surprised to see a look of pure sympathy in his eyes. Or maybe, it was true empathy. This was Draven’s home, but had he ever been able to truly settle, here? Even if he loved his land, his house, his horses, this place was tinged with pain.
He took off his cowboy hat, resting it on a bench in front of his bed.
“You’ve never been so far away from home,” he said, coming to sit next to me. He exhaled, letting out a long breath.
The weight of it was on him, too.
“I don’t know if I can do it,” I told him.
Everything in my chest felt tight. All night, I’d been pulled in so many different directions, and now suddenly, I was here , like an alien in a beautiful world.
“Travel isn’t easy on anyone, babe. I recommend ten minutes in my sauna, and then quickly crashing to sleep in my bed.”
“ No ,” I said, more forcefully than I’d expected. I sat forward, putting my elbows on my knees and leaning over. “I don’t think I can do any of it. I… I think the whole fucking Cocktail Bro page was a mistake.”
“Max.”
“What has it brought me other than trouble?” I said. “If it weren’t for that, none of this would have happened. I wouldn’t have online stalkers who I can’t tell if they’re just normal-creepy or dangerous-creepy.”
“No amount of creepy is ‘normal,’ sweetheart?—”
“I wouldn’t have to change everything about my life,” I said, my voice wavering as it got louder.
“The stupid security cameras. You, always being inconvenienced, following me around or worrying about my safety. Life was easier when I just lived in a small town and stayed in that small town, working and going home. Why wasn’t that enough? Why did everything have to change?”
He put a hand on my back, running his palm up and down my spine. “You’re so tired. You really do need sleep.”
“The most complicated thing I used to think about was how to be the best bartender at the Hard Spot. That’s simple.
Easy. One bar, local customers. I used to always joke about there being a ghost cat there, because it was the only intrigue I had during most weeks.
But there was never any little ghost cat haunting the bar.
I was… reaching. Making stories where there weren’t any. ”
“I think there are plenty of stories at the Hard Spot.”
I let out a frustrated sigh, leaning back on the thick glass windows behind me. “Well, I don’t need any more, now. I just want things to slow down. All the change can just fucking take a pause, please and thank you.”
“You want to know something?” Draven asked.
I turned to look at him, a fresh anger hitting my veins.
He looked so fucking good, and I just wanted to kiss him.
“Yes. I want to know something,” I told him.
“Dominic has a young daughter.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Really?”
Draven nodded. “You won’t hear him talk about it much, but yes.”
“A daughter,” I said.
“A handful of years ago, his whole life changed forever, too. He doesn’t get to see her as much as he’d like, right now, but he’s endlessly working on how to fix it. The baby was a surprise to him and his girlfriend at the time, and their relationship ended pretty soon after.”
“Would Dominic be okay with you telling me all of this?”
“Absolutely. Dom was adopted by another wealthy family in this area. He was on a certain track in life, but everything seemed to come to a halt when he had his daughter. He didn’t want change, either. He was terrified.”
“I can’t picture him terrified,” I said. “He’s kind of like you.”
The corner of Draven’s mouth came up in a slight smile. “Like me? ”
“You two are like two marble statues in human form. You seem impervious to emotions, other than desire or confidence or power.”
“ Power isn’t an emotion.”
“Sure seemed like it was when you fucked my mouth for the first time,” I muttered.
He rested his palm on my thigh now, squeezing me there.
“The point is that Dom struggled with change for over a year. And then something just switched inside him. He realized that change wasn’t going anywhere. And he was going to ride it like a wave rather than drowning under the current.”
I sighed, rubbing at my eyes. “I don’t think I’m anywhere near surfing it like a wave . I don’t know if that’s possible for me.”
“Sure didn’t seem like that when you first throated my cock.”
He’d tossed back my own statement at me. I looked back up at him.
“I want to strangle you,” I told him.
“See?” he teased. “You wouldn’t have said something like that before all of this happened.”
“ You bring it out in me.”
“Or maybe it was already there,” he said, leaning in and kissing the spot below my ear.
The deep well of desperate frustration built inside me again.
He was so close. And I wanted one thing that should have been so simple, but instead, with Draven, felt like an impossibility.
I wanted that last bit of distance between us to be gone.
To move just a few more inches, and have his lips on mine , rather than on my neck, or my nipples, or on my cock.
As he kissed my neck I reached up, gripping his hair with my fingers the way I knew he liked it—a little rough, and deeply possessive. I moved backward a little on the seat of the bay window, giving myself more space.
And then I tipped my head back, moving roughly as I kept my hand planted at the back of his hair.
I could see a hunger in the green of his eyes. See how tired he was, just like me.
I fucking knew he wanted it, too.
I closed the distance between us and moved in to kiss him, knowing that this time, he was going to give it to me.
My lips were almost touching his when he moved to the side, biting down on the edge of my jaw instead.
My stomach hardened. I let out a breath and closed my fists in on themselves, biting back every word I wanted to say.
I pulled away from him, putting the distance back between us. I carefully controlled my tone as I spoke, holding back my anger like a dam about to burst.
“Still, huh?” I said.
Putting a crack in the dam.
Draven lifted an eyebrow at me. “You good, Max?”
The words were white-hot as they came out of me.
“I’m done.”