Chapter 41
MAX
It’s been months of back-and-forth—Hanover to New York, New York to Hanover—and for the first time in a decade, I’m living my days to the fullest, hoping Isla will be proud.
Working with the counselor isn’t a magic fix for all of my issues, but the sessions are helping.
Even the trips to see my parents are becoming manageable.
We don’t just sit in a room of polished marble and heavy silence anymore.
We talk. It’s not deep conversation, but at least it’s more than the stilted water cooler stuff from before.
There are still no new breakthroughs on Isla, no digital breadcrumbs leading anywhere concrete, but the search has shifted.
I’m scouring the web in a way that’s far less taxing.
I’m leaning on hope instead of the raw, jagged rage that used to fuel my midnight marathons.
And having my friends’ security teams on board gives me confidence that at any given moment, anything could change.
Life is still not easy. I’m heartbroken by every single minute she’s gone.
However, I try to remember the girl I loved, the one who squealed the loudest when I got into Princeton.
She’d want me to go after my dreams in a healthy way.
Isla would want me to continue fighting for her, sure.
But not at the expense of living a life with the woman I adore.
I pull up to the brick apartment building in downtown Hanover and kill the engine. I check my reflection in the rearview mirror. My suit jacket has been ditched, Eddie Bauer button down sleeves rolled up. My uniform, Cass calls it. Casual Max.
Then the front door opens, and the smile that inhabits my face as Cassidy steps out is probably cartoon-like. I love that the pink is back. It’s filtered through her blonde locks, more concentrated on the ends. It’s vibrant, bold, and perfectly her. How can a fucking color affect me this way?
While she still spends a great deal of time with Sebastian’s family at his gated castle, I’m glad she has her own space. It’s a small, sunlit apartment with incredibly tight security. I should know. I bought the building three weeks ago through a shell company.
Okay, so I can’t entirely help myself. I’ll tell her one day. After we’re married, and she has to think really hard about leaving me. But I will tell her.
For now, I watch her walk toward me. Cassidy is so much stronger. The timid, paranoid girl is gone, replaced by a woman who holds my gaze without flinching.
“Hi,” she greets, leaning in for a kiss. “I can’t believe we’re doing this. I’m so excited.” She claps, sliding into the passenger seat.
“Always ready to lose a hundred dollars trying to win a prize at a rigged ring-toss. Absolutely.”
“Oh, hush. It’s only money.” She winks, throwing my catchphrase back at me.
The Hanover County Fair is sensory overload in the best way possible.
Not that I gravitate to this environment, but watching the way my girl’s face is glowing under the lights of the midway is making me fall even harder for her.
The air is a thick, sweet slurry of fried dough, livestock, and diesel fumes from the generators.
We stroll the center pathway with our fingers interlaced, our shoulders bumping as we navigate the crowd. For the first time in my adult life, I don’t feel like I’m merely existing. I’m not a hunter. My CEO hat is off. I’m merely a guy with his girl enjoying a night at the fair.
Okay, so everything hasn’t changed. I’m still shamelessly protective, keeping a hand on the small of her back as we weave through the teenagers and strollers. But it’s not the frantic, crowd-scanning protection of the past. It’s chivalry for the woman I love. It’s making sure she has a clear path.
Well, and the ever-present need to touch her.
We ride the Ferris wheel, and as we crest the top, the lights of the fairground look like a fallen galaxy below us.
I watch the glow reflect in her eyes and feel a surge of something so pure it almost hurts.
How had I managed to find this precious phoenix, rising from the ashes in a member’s only gentlemen’s club?
Get your shit together before you start bawling like a baby, you sap.
“I’m winning you that,” I say, pointing at a massive, pink stuffed bear at the ball-throw booth.
“Max, you don’t have to—”
“Yes. I have to.” I chuckle. “Or they’ll take away my man card.”
Three bullseyes later, I’m proudly lugging a three-foot-tall plush animal under my arm, and Cassidy is laughing so hard she has to lean against my shoulder.
I feel like a kid. It’s like the days long gone when another blonde would giggle beside me at the fair.
The memory of that version of Max that Isla remembers brings a melancholy I can’t explain.
Yet it’s no longer guilt. Just love.
As we make our way toward the exit, the scent of the cotton candy stand wafts around us like a sugar tornado.
That airy sweetness that has always made me think of her.
Walking over to the booth, I buy a massive cloud of the pink stuff.
Handing it to her, I watch as she pulls a sticky tuft away and pops it into her mouth.
My throat goes dry.
“You okay?” she asks, her lips stained a faint, sugary rose.
“Honestly?” I lean in, my voice dropping so only she can hear it over the carnival music.
“The very thought of that stuff turns me on. For months at the club, when I was alone at night, I used to imagine you tasted exactly like that. I’d lie there imagining your hair.
” I twirl a hot pink strand. “This exact shade of pink, spilling over my sheets and my pillows.”
I bend down, my tongue catching a stray crystal of sugar at the corner of her mouth. Groaning, I drop my hand to her ass and give it a squeeze. “I think I’ve been starving for a taste of you since the first day you strolled across the main floor of The Devil’s Playground.”
The neon lights of the midway blur into streaks of electric blue, yellow, and red as I pull her toward the shadows behind the giant slide.
The muffled music thumping in the distance replaced by the sound of our breathing.
I don’t care about the three-foot stuffed bear tucked under my arm or the fact that I’m a man who usually demands absolute decorum.
I pin her gently against the cool metal of a support beam, my hand cupping her jaw and pressing my firm erection into her. She still tastes like those airy, spun-sugar clouds. Sweet, fleeting, and addictive.
“You have no idea,” I mutter against her lips, “how many nights that scent haunted my mind and my body. It didn’t matter where I was.
” Kiss. “I’d be staring at lines of code, and all I could see was this pink.
” Kiss. I tangle my fingers into her hair, marveling at the silkiness of it.
“It’s not just a forbidden temptation anymore, Cass.
You’re all I want. And I’ll do anything I need to in order to keep you.
” I drag my tongue across her lower lip. “Mine.”
She kisses me back with a sugar-sweet ferocity that nearly levels me. For a moment, the survivor’s guilt, the board meetings, and the missing person reports don’t exist. There’s only the friction of her lips and the way she fits perfectly against me.
“Let’s get out of here,” she whispers, breathless, pulling back enough to look into my eyes. “I want to go back to my place.”
Fuck. I hope we’re on the same page here. Because I plan on sampling my own warm, wet, sweet pink snack. And will probably want seconds.
The drive to her apartment is a blur. Okay, it’s my apartment, though the secret stays buried in my deceitful vault until the timing is right.
This place is hopefully a whole lot of temporary.
I want her with me. Yet I know I need to stay the course.
I find myself checking the mirrors, but for the first time, it’s not to protect her.
It’s out of a desperate need to ensure nothing interrupts our trajectory.
I have my own cotton candy I’m dying to snack on.
We walk inside and I set the obnoxiously large pink bear on her sofa.
It looks absurdly out of place among her delicate decor.
A soft, woven rug covers the hardwood beneath us, and the aroma of vanilla and sandalwood, my scent, lingers in the air from a candle she lit when I was here last. A smirk curls my lips.
My girl loves my cologne filling up her space.
A pang of guilt hits me, causing me to wince.
“I know you’d probably rather go to your place. This is no mansion,” she says, watching my reaction nervously. “But it’s closer.”
“I’m happy wherever you are, Cass.” I turn to her, taking in the way the moonlight through the window catches the pink of her hair. It’s clear. This phenomenal woman owns my heart.
“I have something for you,” I say, reaching into my pocket. “It isn’t a ring. Not yet. I know it’s not very romantic putting that out there, but make no mistake, Cass. That day is coming.”
She beams at me.
“Until then, this is the next best thing.” I pull out a small, encrypted key fob.
“I’ve streamlined the search protocols. It’s a dedicated bridge to Secure Sphere.
Whenever you find something, or if you just want to see the progress I’m making for Isla, you have the same access I do.
No more secrets, Cass. Between us, the firewalls are down.
” My heart lurches, knowing I’ve said that while keeping the fact I own this place from her.
Her eyes fill with tears as she takes the fob, her fingers brushing mine. “You trust me that much?”
“Yes. More than anyone.” My head falls.
She steps closer, placing her hands flat on my chest, her face a mask of concern. “Then why do you look like that?”
“There’s something I need to tell you.”
She nervously swallows, and her hands fidget against my pecs. It’s slight, but enough I can tell she’s tensing, waiting for the blow.
I close my eyes. “I may or may not have bought this building.” Wincing, I narrowly crack open one lid and peer at her. She’s smirking at me.
What the hell?
“You knew?”
She giggles. “Yeah.”
“How?” I scratch the back of my head. I may have met my ideal match with this brilliant woman. “Wait. Did you hack me?”
Her hand covers her mouth as she tries to stifle her laughter. “No, no. When the guys in charge of the updates to the place arrived, he let it slip that the place had come under new ownership recently.” She stares at me deadpan. “I didn’t have to be a rocket scientist.”
Burying my face in her neck and her sweet hair, I growl. “I think someone might deserve to be punished for putting me through this.”
“Hmm,” she hums. “You might be right.” She doesn’t even bother pretending.
She loves every minute of our games. And instead of the cold, overbearing behavior I’ve exhibited in the bedroom before her, now my dominance is a reminder of how strong I know she is.
My girl isn’t broken. She’s my phoenix. Not only did she rise from the ashes, but she brought me with her.