Chapter Twenty-Three
THE NEXT NIGHT I STOP lying to both of us.
He's in the study because he's always in the study now, hiding behind a desk from a girl who couldn't hurt him if she spent a year trying.
Which is a thing I never once thought I'd see. My Maximo, the man nothing rattles, who runs a life the size of a country without blinking, rearranging his whole world so he never has to stand in a room with me.
I knock on the open door. He doesn't tell me to come in, but he doesn't tell me to go either so I take the opening and come in. I wait until he looks in my direction, and then I just blurt it all out.
"I don't need kissing lessons anymore."
The words have him stiffening, and I feel so pathetic when I realize I'm grateful even for that. He has me so confused, and so messed up, that I'm starting to lose sight of who I was before him.
"And I...I've decided that I need to stop lying and pretending. One of us should be brave enough to...to say the truth, and so—"
A muscle starts ticking in his jaw.
"I love you, Maximo."
My voice starts wobbling when all he does is look at me.
"I love you." I repeat it in hopes that he'll say something, but the silence just goes on like a song so awful you don't think you'll ever forget it.
"P-Please, Maximo—"
"If that's all you have to say..." He nods towards the door. "I've work to do."