Chapter Twenty-Seven Max
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Max
Keely, stretching, her shirt dipping low to reveal the neckline of her sports bra. Her cheeks flushed with exertion as he chased her around the track, his second home.
Her smile pressed to his own. The curve of her neck.
Her.
Max stumbled, then cursed.
“Dude.” Nolan pulled away a few paces, wiping at his forehead. “It’s no fun if you let me win. At least try a little.”
They’d agreed to stay half an hour after their usual practice ended. Max was normally gassed by this point, but kissing Keely this morning had lit a fire under his ass, and he needed something to burn off the excess energy.
Something that wasn’t “run to Keely’s door and lock it behind them.”
The memory of Keely’s plush mouth on his own, her hands clutching his back as she squirmed underneath him and moaned against his neck. He’d have her anywhere, anytime, just to hear those sounds again. His chest still reverberated with it, the same way energy lingered in his legs long after a race.
“I was trying,” Max grumbled under his breath, catching up to Nolan with a few larger strides.
Nolan threw a flat look at him. “I’m patient, not stupid. You want to tell me what’s going on sometime today, I’ll be right here.”
Max still wasn’t used to this blind faith.
The openness Nolan gifted him—hell, gifted everyone.
Vulnerability wasn’t natural to Max, the way it seemed to be with Nolan.
He’d been on his own for so long, head down to focus on his footsteps, working toward his goals.
He didn’t know how to let someone else in.
He’d given his all to one thing; there wasn’t usually any left over at the end of the day.
His stomach tugged with the urge to keep it locked in, to shove his feelings down into his legs, convert it to that energy Keely always raved about.
“Any time would be great,” Nolan said again.
Growling, Max feigned right like he might trip him. Nolan laughed, jumping out of the way.
“Can I ask you something sort of. . .” Personal was what Max wanted to say. He settled for, “Different from what we usually talk about?”
Nolan nodded, shoulders tensing before he pressed them down and resumed his stride.
Good form. Max copied him, pushing his own shoulders down. He opened his chest and hips until he settled into a natural groove.
“Do you date?” It wasn’t what Max really wanted to ask, but he’d had his head buried in the sand for so long, he didn’t know where to start. For all Max knew, the guy just got out of a toxic ten-year relationship.
“Not in a while,” Nolan said. His words bounced with his footfalls. “It’s been maybe four months.”
They had different definitions of “a while.” Max hadn’t been with anyone seriously since sophomore year. Release had become an obligation to him, something done in the shower each morning to quell energy and flood his system with natural endorphins before practice.
“How do you find time for everything? Practice, homework. . .”
“Sex?” Nolan tacked on cheekily. “If this is about Keely, you can tell me. It’s not like I didn’t see her sneaking out of the locker room before break. Or see the two of you after practice this morning.”
Max’s lungs burned, and he exhaled sharply, hoping to break loose the words he really wanted to say. Why was this so hard?
“It’s not. . . not about Keely.”
Nolan hummed, and maybe it was the wind, but Max swore he heard him laugh, too. “Got it. Well. Whoever I want to spend time with, I make sure I’m present with them. Not thinking about racing or schoolwork.”
“Can’t be that easy,” Max huffed.
“You’re telling me when you and Keely—sorry, when you and someone are doing your thing, you’re thinking about how to improve your hurdle stability?” Nolan’s eyebrows bounced.
“I. . .” Hadn’t Max just been thinking about kissing Keely again, seconds before this conversation began? “I see your point.”
Nolan’s head bobbed in time with his steps, which were a hell of a lot faster than when they’d started.
“Isn’t it stupid to start something you know has an expiration date?” Max wondered aloud. “The end of the semester is a month away.”
“I’m pretty sure it’s already started. Locker room, remember?”
“Stop reminding me. Running with a hard-on blows, even at a jog.”
“But we’re not jogging. We’re sprinting.”
Max clocked their speed. They were flying, almost at race pace, around the track. The stadium whizzed by in his periphery, bright colors and sharp lines.
A surprised laugh burst from his mouth. “How the hell are you so wise?” Max pegged him in the shoulder. “You’re only twenty-two.”
Nolan breathed on his fingernails and buffed them where Max had shoved, going faster still. “I’ll tell you when you’re older.”
It was simple, but those words held promise. That Max and Nolan might be friends when they were older and this wasn’t some situational, mutual understanding between them.
And for the first time, Max welcomed the feeling instead of shoving it down into the box where he kept all the hard things. His dad being sick. Not living up to the standards and dreams that had been laid at his feet since he was old enough to run.
If he could do it with Nolan, someone he’d wanted virtually nothing to do with at the beginning of the semester, why couldn’t he do it with Keely, too?
Max veered off course, heading across the field where the pole vaulters practiced. Maybe he’d get lucky and catch her between classes.
“Where are you going?” Nolan shouted.
On a whim, Max threw the middle finger behind him. “Like you don’t already know.”
· · · · ·
Keely’s now-familiar peppermint scent lit up his brain like a neon sign. It was all he’d tasted during their kiss this morning. Probably all he’d ever taste again.
He’d been on his way to Davidson in search of her and had cut through the Q. He was lucky for a change, because it served up Keely Sinclair on a golden platter, just for him.
“Hey. I was looking for you.” He smiled.
Until he looked her in the eye, and the smile slipped right back off.
Keely’s eyes were puffy, bloodshot; the tip of her nose was pink and raw. She trembled, and he didn’t think it was a good thing this time.
“What happened?” he demanded, ducking his head. She wouldn’t look at him.
His question made her shake harder. “I’m fine.” She shrugged out of his grip, and his hand fell limply at his side. “It’s nothing.”
The last time he’d seen her, she was blushing, eyelids fluttering with pleasure as he learned the curve of her neck with his teeth. Had he done this? Did she regret what happened this morning? His gut turned to stone.
“Is this. . . is this because we kissed?” He took a half step back.
She pursed her lips. They were quivering too, and Max’s own foundation shook. Around them, students and staff meandered to their afternoon classes and early dinners. The weather was mild, sunny and mid-sixties, but Max was frozen on the spot.
“No,” she breathed.
That was the answer he wanted—so why didn’t he feel better? Why was he still panicking, searching for the solution to all her problems?
“I got in a fight with Zoey earlier.” She stared at the ground. The tips of their shoes were touching.
It wasn’t close enough for his taste. He reached up, wiping at the moisture pooled under her cobalt eyes. Her tears made them glisten like sapphires.
A gem. Keely Sinclair was a goddamn gemstone. “Can I fix it?”
Those gemstone eyes closed, and she leaned her cheek into his hand. “No.” She blew out a messy breath, and pride nipped at his heart because she’d let herself be this way with him twice in one day. “Not unless you have a dozen bid-worthy auction prizes tucked in your back pocket.”
His brows furrowed. “Auction?”
She pulled her phone from her pocket and groaned at the screen. “I promise, I’m not trying to run away from you again. But I have to pick up my allergy medicine before Campus Health closes or I’m going to start sneezing and never stop.”
That explained some of the redness in her face.
Some, but not all.
“I’ll walk with you.” He nodded in the direction of the health center. “Lead the way.”
Their shoes scuffed on the dirt-and-grass paths between the buildings, trodden and packed down with years of use. He wanted to grab her hand but settled for bumping his pinkie against hers a few times. Would the ink transfer?
He sort of hoped so.
“I really dropped the ball with Zoey this semester,” Keely said. The congestion clogging her words was more apparent now.
“Zoey’s your roommate, right?”
“And my best friend.” A wry laugh. “We’re also the president and vice president of the Women in Science Society. We founded it together.”
She had a T-shirt with WIS on it, didn’t she? She wore it to the shelter sometimes.
“We plan a fundraising auction every spring that pours directly into the next year’s budget. Since we’re graduating, we wanted to go all out, leave them off on a very good note. But I’ve been a little. . . distracted this semester.”
The nuance in her words stirred his stomach. “Because of me? Our sabotage games?”
Why was it so much easier for Max to request honesty from other people, but impossible for him to give it himself?
If he were being honest, he’d tell Keely he wanted to kiss her again and never stop.
“And the Science Olympiad,” she said, lifting a finger and hooking her opposite pointer on it. “And the scholarship work, and my parents’ divorce, and moving.” She switched hands. “And the new extracurriculars, and my thesis, and—”
She was going to run out of counting fingers. He hooked her thumb with his pinkie and pulled it down. After this morning, her skin burned where it grazed him. She cut off mid word.
“I’m sorry,” he said, and dropped her hand.
The claw clip holding her hair back slid down a few inches as she shook her head. “It’s not your fault, Max. I should have been able to handle it all. I’ve gotten pretty good at juggling.”
“Key.” His heart tugged behind his ribs. “How many things can you juggle when you only have two hands?”
Her steps faltered, and she stared at him for a second before she picked up her pace. “As many as I need to. This ball just slipped. It hasn’t hit the ground yet. There’s still time to catch it.”
“When’s the auction?”
“Um.” She let out a nervous laugh. “Saturday night?”
Max sucked in air through his teeth.
“I know.” She moaned, and his spine tightened.
She must have heard how it sounded, because she cleared her throat. “I’ll figure it out.” She threw him a blinding smile.
It wasn’t her real one, though, the one she’d worn when teaching the children at the school or whenever Biscuit brought her a toy. The one he’d seen glimpses of and savored like his cheat day meals, never quite sure when his next one was coming.
The conversation with Nolan fresh on his mind, an idea sprouted, but he didn’t want to bring it up until it was more fully formed.
He wanted her to rely on him, and this was an opportunity to show her she could.
He could help her juggle some responsibilities.
Take something off her plate so she didn’t have to work so hard all the damn time.
When they reached Campus Health, Max touched Keely’s shoulder, spinning her to face him. “Do you trust me?”
She bit her lip, staring up at him.
Please, he wanted to say. Please trust me as much as I already trust you.
Her chin dipped. “Yeah. More than is advisable, probably.”
He nodded too, holding her gaze. Tentative hope shined there now. “Let me see what I can do. I’ll sell an arm if I have to.”
Keely’s mouth twisted, and Max’s heart did the same inside his chest.
“Now that,” she said, wrapping her hand around the door handle, “I’d pay to see.”