Chapter 6
Chapter Six
Isearched everywhere for Max, but I couldn’t find him. His phone went straight to voicemail, and he didn’t answer any of my texts. After waiting in his room most of the night, I got worried.
Gia answered my video call out of breath and sweating. It concerned me enough to stop the hole I planned to pace into the carpet. Resting Skeptic Face firmly in place, I cocked my head and gave her dewy skin and flushed cheeks a once-over. “Are you working out?”
She pressed her lips together and shook her head. Guilt—a rare, equally concerning emotion—splashed across her features. Then a door shut in the apartment behind her.
Gia adjusted her position, angling the phone to keep her face firmly within the screen as she sat up in bed. “Don’t look at me like that.”
“Nooo.” A groan, and slight gagging noise, followed. “We said we wouldn’t call it that.”
“You said. Now, spill it, please.”
She rolled her eyes and blushed. “P-town. A midnight booty call to work off some steam.”
“Work off some steam? What do you mean?”
Waving her hand in the direction of the bathroom, where I assumed he was hiding, she buzzed like she was swatting away flies. “I don’t know! That’s his drama, not mine.”
I shot her a look. “Gia, you eat up other people’s drama like it’s live-action trashy reality TV. Fess up.”
She had the audacity to roll her eyes again. “Fine.” She huffed and pulled her knees into her chest, setting the phone on top of them and frowning. “I’m trying not to…get attached.”
That caught me by surprise. More so than how she said the words like she had eaten something foul. Because Gia didn’t get attached. Or, if she did, she didn’t worry about it.
“Attached? Like, seriously attached?”
Wrinkling her nose, she side-eyed the bathroom door. “It’s stupid. He’s stupid. All of it is just…”
“Stupid?” I grinned so wide my cheeks hurt.
Gia groaned. “Why exactly did you call me again?”
“Because boys are stupid.” I pouted. “Or I am. I’m not even sure anymore. But I figured you’d sort me out like usual.”
“Trouble in anti-paradise?”
That was all it took for the whole saga to spill out of me: the end of the third challenge, the realization I had right before mine and Kingston’s unexpected intruder showed up, meeting Max’s half-brother which quickly led into the giant fight between my three broody assholes. And everything I’d learned on the lawn.
I threw my hands up as I finished. “See. Boys are stupid.”
“We should really just throw rocks at them.” She nodded in solidarity.
“Amen, sister,” I muttered.
Genuine concern and sympathy followed. “You’ll talk to him, Quinn. You guys will make it right.”
“I should have told him. He—”
“Yeah, sure. He deserved to know, but can you ease up a bit on the self-flagellation there? That’s my best friend you’re being overly harsh toward.”
“Well, maybe I should be. I played stupid games, I won stupid prizes, right?”
“Or…you had a ton of really heavy information thrown at you in a short period of time. You found out Landon doesn’t remember huge chunks of his life, Max has ties to his high school sweetheart that aren’t easily cut, and Kingston has been abused since he was a child.
All while trying to do your best in the escape rooms, one of which sounded creepy as fuck, find a way to fight for them, and watch out for the biggest threat. ”
“Catching feels?” I joked. “I’d say that ship has sailed.”
Gia smirked. “That ship is so far out to sea it’s practically circled the globe.
I meant his psycho dad, lurking behind the scenes.
Kingston is the only one who really knows what his dad is capable of, so, of course, you followed his lead.
He’s the only one with the answers. Half of which you don’t even fully understand when he gives them to you. ”
“I guess it sounds a little better when you put it like that.”
“Because I’m looking at it objectively. Even if I’m slightly biased as your best friend, I’m serious about this, Quinn.
Anyone in your position—even Max Dread—would’ve made the same decision.
You were doing what you thought was best, and yeah, it was a teensy bit hypocritical, but your intentions weren’t malicious or meant to hurt him. ”
I frowned, accepting what she was saying, but unsure if it was enough. “What if he doesn’t forgive me?”
“Then I’ll come down there and set him straight. Give me fifteen minutes with the big guy. He’ll see reason, or he’ll be so done listening to me talk, he’ll agree just so I shut up.”
A laugh escaped me before I could stop it, and Gia smiled.
“You’re human, Quinn Everly. Even if you were born to be their Queen.
I know they think the sun shines out of your ass, and for that, I allow them to live, but if any of them actually expect you to be perfect all the time…
” She shook her head. “Talk to him when you see him. You guys will make it right.”
I released a heavy breath and nodded, and then a throat cleared off screen. Gia whipped her head to the right and waved. Awkwardly.
“Hey, you…”
Smothering a laugh behind my hand, I waited for her to glance back at me, mimicked her awkward little finger wave, and mouthed goodbye.
When she winked, I hung up the phone. Setting it beside me, I thought over what she’d said. I watched the door for a bit, hoping Max would return soon, but he didn’t.
I waited so long, I accidentally fell asleep, and the next time I woke up, he wasn’t in his room or the bed beside me.
Anxiety gnawed at my gut.
Something was wrong, but I wasn’t sure if it was with him, or just between us. With everyone arriving at Pendragon that day, I feared I wouldn’t get the chance to talk to him. If we didn’t clear the air, I worried he’d slip farther away from me once everyone arrived.
The longer he took to show up, the more I spiraled.
Fear dragged up anger, and it worsened every time I glanced at the unanswered messages on my phone. I retreated to my room when the sun came up. Sitting in bed with my copy of The Princess Bride on my lap, I stewed and stared blankly at the pages.
My anger festered, and eventually, I was ready to burn the place down. But before I could, a door in the hallway slammed, and a loud bang came from Max’s adjoining room.
I startled, shutting the book and setting it beside me to climb out of bed. My feet moved on instinct, and I was at his door to make sure he was alright before I realized I was going.
Yes, we hadn’t spoken since the lawn.
And yes, he’d ghosted me for hours.
But I refused to leave him bleeding out on the carpet or on the floor like a fallen oak tree, if that explained the crash I’d heard. With no clue what was going on with him, I half-expected to find him transformed into an actual drunken bear stumbling around the room.
I didn’t expect to find him the way I did.
He paced the room, hunting for whatever he could find and throwing it as hard as possible. Hell-bent on destruction, he didn’t register the adjoining door opening or notice me standing there. Running his hands through his hair, he pulled so hard I thought he might yank it out in giant tufts.
“Hey, that’s my job.”
Midway through grabbing a lamp off the table and pulling back his arm to chuck it into the wall, he heard me and spun around. His arm was raised above his head, and fury slashed across his face. Thankfully, he noted my presence before he could launch the lamp in my direction.
I tried to squelch the fear rising inside my chest, but alarm bells fired off inside my head.
I’d never seen him like this.
Granted, we hadn’t known each other that long, but I hadn’t seen anything that led me to expect this.
Max flickered between hot and cold like the flame in a faulty pilot light. It was part of his charm.
But that fire inside him, one I’d been drawn to from the moment we met, was a single match compared to the incendiary rage coursing through him now.
Trying to appear casual, I leaned against the doorjamb. I kept my voice as calm as possible and shrugged. “I’ll share mine, if you share yours.”
He furrowed his brow, staring at me and huffing out heavy breaths before fixing his eyes on the lamp he had raised in my direction. He lowered his hand and set the lamp down.
But the tightness of his jaw told me answers might be off the table. “It’s not what you think.”
“I’m not sure what to think, Max,” I hedged. “Because you’re not telling me anything.”
He ran his hand through his hair, his movements rough and jerky. “I turned twenty-one this month.”
I blinked, unsure what to say. That wasn’t close to what I’d been expecting, and I wanted to ask him a million questions.
What day was his birthday?
Why hadn’t he told me?
Did he want to celebrate it later?
But since it seemed tied to his anger, I held back. “Oh…You don’t seem happy about that.”
“Vivian’s parents are coming.”
Even with what I’d learned about his mother and the inheritance, I didn’t understand the connection between that and his birthday, so I waited for him to expand.
Instead he gripped his hair again, his face screwing up with emotions I couldn’t make sense of.
Other than the rage, of course.
“Whatever it is, Max…you can share it with me.” I stepped further into the room. “No matter what happens—Or, happened between us on the lawn, I’m still here. Even if we disagree or fight, I want to be here for you. If you need me.”
The heartbreaking look in his eyes when they flashed to mine stole my breath, but he quickly shuttered his expression.
I took another step closer. “Maybe we can solve whatever the problem is together…”
He barked a laugh, so harsh it stopped my progress. “No, we can’t. I already know…” Scrubbing his hands over his face, he sat down on the edge of the bed. “You won’t get past this. No one could. But you?”
A sound from the back of his throat emphasized exactly how ridiculous he found the idea, and I raised my eyebrows. I didn’t particularly care for the response, but I had no idea what he thought he could tell me that would be that bad.