94. Summer
Chapter Ninety-Four
Summer
A t the end of the day, Alice and I are walking home, and I’m enjoying the warm afternoon fall air.
“So you and Max made up?”
“We’re cool,” I say with a small nod.
“So are you berserker bouncing or Stranger straddling?”
“Neither,” I say, looking ahead. “I’m celibate.”
“Ah, a celibate Summer. My favorite,” Alice says, and I throw her a look. “What?” she asks innocently.
“I can hear the sarcasm dripping through your words. It’ll be fine.” I sigh. “I’m going to focus back on school. And on myself.”
“Self-improvement Summer arc? I can definitely get behind that.” She nudges me. “I’m proud of you, Sum. You know that?”
“And I’m proud of you,” I say, bumping my shoulder against hers.
Alice shakes her head and reaches out, pulling me to a stop. “No, I don’t mean?.?.?.” She thinks for a moment, and I turn to face her. “I know you didn’t want to be here anymore. For a long time.” Her eyes fill with tears. “So I’m proud of you.”
I pull her into a hug. For a while, I did want to die, and she knew it. She was painfully aware of it, and I can only imagine the terror she lived with every moment of every day.
“I know it was close,” she whispers, hugging me back, and for a long moment she just holds me before finally releasing me. “Sorry, emo moment. ”
“It’s nice to know I’m not the only one Connor made into a mushy weirdo,” I say, cupping her cheek.
Alice’s cheeks heat, and she shoves me playfully. “How dare you! I’m not mushy.”
I quirk a brow, and we start walking again.
“Shush,” she says, and my lips twitch as we walk into the house. Rafe is sitting on the couch, watching the highlights of a sports game on television. I drop my bag at the front door and sit down next to him.
“How was school?” he asks, though he doesn’t pull his eyes from the screen, obviously still moping.
“Fine.”
“Just fine? You didn’t get excited to be near the books and learning and get a knowledge boner?” Rafe asks, glancing at me with a frown.
“Shut up,” I say, rolling my eyes. Rafe chuffs, a smirk lifting his lips. His phone pings, and he lurches to grab it, reading the message before sitting back with a heavy sigh. “Still not heard from her?”
“No,” he grumbles.
“Maybe she has a bad signal?” I say hopefully with a small grimace.
“Or maybe she gave me the wrong number on purpose,” he says, scrubbing his hand over his face. “Maybe it was one way, and this is her nice way of blowing me off.”
Alice sits on his other side, slurping a pouch of blood. “Mira isn’t a nice girl, Rafe.”
“What do you mean?” Rafe asks.
I chuckle. “She fucked you on a public beach the night she met you.” Rafe looks at me, his cheeks darkening. “Nice girls don’t do that.”
“What do nice girls do?” Rafe asks, his frown deepening.
“Well, first of all, they make love. They don’t fuck, and they don’t fuck people when they don’t even know their name.”
“Well . . .” Rafe thinks.
“Plus, she came back for more and more and more?.?.?.”
“Okay, I got it, thanks,” Rafe says, glaring at me.
“I don’t even know how your dick is still alive,” Alice says, and Rafe shoves her.
“Gross.” Someone knocks on the front door, and Rafe sits up and looks toward it. “Who’s that? ”
“Probably Max.” I push at Rafe’s shoulder. “Do you want to answer the door for your boyfriend? I know you missed him.”
Rafe flips me off, but I stand up to open the door for Max. He comes in holding beer and food.
“We were going to order food?” I say, looking at the pizza box in Max’s hand.
“I owe you a pizza,” Max says with a smirk.
My lips twitch, and I haul myself off the couch to go make margaritas for Alice and me. Max and Rafe settle on the couch to watch the game. Alice joins me to give them time to catch up, and we chat happily as I make our drinks and she puts some raw brimstone-seasoned meat cubes on skewers for Rafe.
“Have you told him all about her?” Alice asks Rafe as we rejoin them, handing him his food.
“Careful, Max might get jealous,” I smirk at Max as I hand Alice her glass and set the pitcher on the coffee table.
“You know, we males discuss these things in our own time,” Max says, flipping me off.
Alice snorts, taking a deep drink of her margarita. “Please. Don’t act like you’re not dying to know.”
“It sounds like they aren’t going to let this go, Rafe. Might as well spill it so they will stop squawking at us like harpies,” Max says, popping open a beer.
I nudge Max’s legs as I grab a slice of pizza and move past him to sit in the armchair. Rafe rolls his eyes and sighs deeply before taking a bite of his steak. He looks at each of us as he chews, but then he starts talking about Mira and doesn’t stop for the next two hours.
Max proved on our last night together how averse he is to anything resembling commitment, but to give him his due, he listens carefully and gives some fairly solid advice.
I stay quiet and listen, smiling a little as I watch them.
Connor would love to see Rafe confide in someone like this.
Max is truly more like a brother to Rafe than most of the other Morningstar boys, and I know Connor would be relieved that Rafe has found another safe space that isn’t Alice and me and our craziness.
Max catches me staring and winks at me, making my cheeks heat a little. I take a deep drink of my margarita, knowing it probably isn’t a good idea. Alcohol plus new celibacy leads to nothing but bad decisions.
Alice catches my eye and mouths, “Berserker bounce? ”
I shake my head and stand up, deciding to make another pitcher of margaritas. Perhaps if I drink enough, I’ll fall unconscious before I make a stupid decision.
I am pouring a little extra tequila into the glass pitcher when the door swings open behind me. I already know it’s Max before he leans against the counter next to me.
“You know, Rafe looks different,” he says.
I glance at him. “I know.”
He watches me with such intensity that I have to look away. “You sure this Mira isn’t blowing him off?”
I nod, stirring the margarita mixture. “She was as obsessed as he is.” Max watches me skeptically, and I throw him an unimpressed look.
“I know what an obsessed female looks like.” Though I wish I didn’t.
Granted, Mira didn’t look Aqua-obsessed, but she looked like me when I caught myself in the mirror thinking of the stranger.
“Good. Because it would suck if the first time this happened for him, he got?.?.?. you know, blown off.”
“I know,” I say, squeezing another lime into the cocktail.
“Being blown off sucks,” he says, and there is a major shift in his tone.
I glance at him, and those brown eyes are watching me. “You think I blew you off?”
Max tilts his head. “I think I blew you off,” he says, and isn’t that the truth?
I shrug and cut another lime.
“I knew you’d be feeling a certain kind of way,” he says, but I keep my eyes on what I am doing. “And I got into my head a little. I acted like an idiot.”
“A certain kind of way?” I ask, quirking a brow.
Max rubs his hand along the nape of his neck. “About it being me, and you know, not him.”
“Wait, what?” I ask, blinking up at him.
“You know,” he says, not looking at me, “that it’s me and not Connor.”
I stare at him, confused. “Max, what are you talking about?”
“I know we’re not committed or anything, but I didn’t want you to feel like I was trying to step into his place.”
“You think I was trying to replace my fiancé with you?” I ask with a frown.
Max shakes his head quickly. “No. I didn’t want you to think I was trying to do that. ”
“By freaking out because I bought you a succulent?” I ask, stirring the cocktail again. “Don’t worry, you’re marked safe from whatever the fuck you think you’re in danger of.”
“Sorry,” Max groans.
I sigh and turn to face him. “Max, I already told you. We’re cool.”
“You’re important to me,” he says. I frown and tip my head, watching him. “Is that okay?”
I nod. “You’re important to me too,” I admit.
Max pulls me into his arms, and I’m a little startled at first, but then I hug him back.
“Missed you,” Max says, squeezing me.
“You too.”
Max slowly releases me, and there’s a faint spark of green in his eyes before they darken.
I don’t pull away as he leans in, my gaze flicking to his mouth.
My lips part a little, and as I sway toward him, my phone buzzes against the counter.
I clear my throat and step back. Max looks away, and as he passes me to go back to the living room, he brushes his hand over mine.
I grab my phone and look at the message.
Unknown
Friends over?
I bite my lower lip. I should have told Max about my celibacy. Why didn’t I tell him? Is my heart racing in my chest at the stranger’s message? Did I want to kiss Max? Or did I want some evidence that I didn’t belong to the stranger?
With every second we’re apart, I feel the panic sinking in.
I miss him more and more with every breath.
I crave him, but when I was with Max for that moment, the safety of distance was present again.
The difference between how I feel about Max and how I feel about the stranger is so glaringly obvious.
Summer
Just Max to see Rafe.
It’s not a lie, but it still makes me feel uneasy.
Unknown
Hm.
His reply makes my heart stop for a moment. Is this just jealousy from me seeing Max for the first time since All Souls?
Summer
What?
Unknown
Nothing.
His reply is sharp, and I feel the lie in it. I push my phone into the waistband of my skirt and go back through with my new pitcher of margaritas.
I drop onto the couch next to Max, and he takes a deep drink of his beer. “So, how was All Souls?”
“It was really good,” I say, though it feels like a cruel understatement. “How was the Samhain party?”
“Oh!” Max says, more expressive than I’ve ever seen him. “I have gossip.”
I lift an eyebrow, and Alice finally looks up from her phone at the hint of some juicy gossip for her to weaponize.
“There was a huge brawl,” Max says. “The headmaster was furious and shut the whole thing down. The power coming from him was crazy. I heard he had to expel a bunch of incubi.”