28. Max
MAX
The knock came in the middle of the afternoon, loud and deliberate.
It didn’t sound like Will’s tap-tap-rap or Lucas’s fast staccato when my nephew came by.
This one carried some weight to it. When I opened the door, Grace was standing there, with her arms crossed and a tight face.
She looked like she had bad news written all over her.
“Hey,” I said, stepping aside. “What’s up?”
She walked by me without saying anything and went straight to the couch, sitting down as if trying to steady herself, which made me nervous.
“Okay…” I closed the door and joined her. “What’s wrong?”
She didn’t say anything right away, just fiddled with the strap of her purse, while doing her best not to look at me. “Max, I need to talk to you about something. And I don’t know if you’ll thank me for it.”
My stomach dropped. “Just tell me, Grace.”
She hesitated, then asked, “Have you seen Emma since Sunday? At Will’s place?”
The mention of Emma’s name lit up something in my chest. “No. We’ve been texting and talking on the phone while she was in Quebec, but I haven’t seen her yet.” I frowned. “Why?”
I knew it was serious when Grace let out a slow breath. She doesn’t do that unless something’s really wrong.
“Max… I don’t know for sure, okay? I need to start with that. But yesterday, I had a free afternoon and decided to stop by one of Emma’s classes. She’d invited me once, but I hadn’t gotten around to it yet. She didn’t know I was going to be there.”
My heart started to race. “Okay…”
“When I got to the lecture hall, she was up front and this guy went straight to her. And Max, it looked… intimate. It looked like they were kissing.”
“What?” The word came out too harsh.
“I’m not saying they did for sure. I was coming in from the side, so I only saw her back. But the way she leaned in and the way they were standing made it look like a kiss. And then he mumbled something about their time together in Quebec.”
Quebec. The word hit me like a body check.
“So I thought…” Grace stopped talking and watched me closely. “I thought she might have been there with him. That maybe they’re together.”
My first instinct was to laugh it off. “Grace, come on. Emma wouldn’t…”
“I know. That’s why I wasn’t sure if I should even tell you. I almost went right up to her and ask her myself. But you’re my brother. If there’s even a small chance she’s not being honest with you, I thought you should know. Max, I don’t want you to get hurt.”
I stared at her and tried to make sense of it.
Emma, kissing some guy? With him in Quebec?
No. She had been texting me. She had sent me pictures of the snow outside her hotel window, the books on her nightstand, and even a pastry she’d tried because it looked ridiculous. Those hadn’t been lies. Right?
But Grace wouldn’t make this up. She doesn’t embellish. And if she said she saw something…
I rubbed my jaw, and the tension in my chest grew stronger.
“Max, I’m not sure,” Grace said again, softer now. “It could’ve been nothing, but it looked real enough to make me worry.”
I swallowed hard. “Thanks for telling me.”
She squeezed my hand. “I hope I’m wrong.”
Then she left.
* * *
I sat there for a long time after, not moving, just staring.
Emma.
She wouldn’t do that.
She wasn’t someone who used people when it suited her. Emma was different. Smart. Warm. She had looked me in the eye that night at Will’s place, right before she left, right after that kiss, and there was nothing fake in it. I had felt it. Hell, the whole room had probably felt it.
But Grace… There was no reason for Grace to make this up. And if she was sure enough to come here and sit me down like that.
Christ.
Maybe this was why Emma wouldn’t say yes to a date. Why she had been so careful with her words, pulling back every time I tried to push a little further.
I stood and paced through the living room, fast enough that the floorboards creaked under my feet. I shoved a hand through my hair and spun around, hitting my shin on the edge of the coffee table. Pain shot through me, sharp and grounding, but it didn’t to a damn thing to calm down my heart.
No. Emma wouldn’t use me like that. Not for fun. Not for research. Except…
Hadn’t she told Grace she wanted to write about something truly Canadian? That she didn’t know anything about hockey? And then Grace had put us together, and all of a sudden I was the perfect window for her to see the sport. Easy access. Convenient.
Fuck. Was I just convenient?
I remembered how Emma had looked at me at the gala. How her legs had touched mine on the couch at Will’s. How her laugh made a part of me I thought was frozen feel like it was finally cracking open.
No way that was fake.
But Grace saw what she saw. And Grace doesn’t exaggerate.
My hands curled into fists.
I dropped into a chair with too much force.
It scraped loudly against the floor. I bent forward, elbows on my knees, pressing my palms into my eyes.
If Emma had been stringing me along while another guy was kissing her in lecture halls and reminiscing about Quebec…
then I was an idiot. Worse than that, I was a fool, letting myself believe in her eyes, her smile, and the way she leaned into me like it meant something.
My chest burned.
How could she do this?
How the fuck could she do this?
And yet, beneath the anger, a whisper still tried to tell me maybe Grace was wrong. Maybe Emma had an explanation. But the whisper wasn’t loud enough to drown out the image of her standing close to some guy, letting him talk about Quebec like it was theirs.
By the time I went to bed, I was still nowhere near calm.
All I knew was that I couldn’t stop seeing her face when she kissed me. I couldn’t stop hearing Grace say that she had seen her with someone else. I couldn’t stop thinking that maybe, just maybe, I had been building a story in my head that was never mine to begin with.
And that thought gutted me.