Blood Ties Book Three: Ashes To Ashes. Jennifer Armintrout

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СКАЧАТЬ her. Are you sure you don’t want to fuck her?”

      “No, but if we went to bed now, you wouldn’t be fucking me.” I jabbed my finger into his chest, not merely to make a point but because touching him just seemed good.

      He grinned again. “Believe me, this isn’t about Bella.”

      “It is.” I slid my hands across the front of his T-shirt— Max has great pecs—and gave him a shove.

      Rolling his eyes, he held up his hands. “Okay, it’s about Bella. Peri…peri—you know, when you see out the corner of your eye?”

      “Peripherally.” I nodded. “How so?”

      He linked his arms around my waist and pulled me forward so I stepped on his toes and our feet tangled dangerously. “I like women. Everyone knows it. I don’t fall in love with women, though. So, how come I haven’t had casual sex since Bella?”

      “Because that wasn’t casual sex. You really liked her.” I leaned against him, purely to regain my balance, I’m sure.

      “You’re insane. You women all are. You think men have to be in love to stick their cock in somebody.” He inclined his head for another kiss, but halted. “You know that’s not true, right?”

      I quirked an eyebrow. “Gee, we’re drunk, we both just got dumped—”

      “You got dumped.”

      “Whatever.” I rolled my eyes. “Do I think you love me? No. I think you’re trying to get laid to prove to yourself you don’t care about Bella.”

      “Is that so evil and wrong?” His lips were a millimeter from mine.

      I shrugged. “I guess not.”

      He kissed me again. Max is an insanely good kisser. But there was desperation in it, and sadness. I didn’t need a blood tie between us to feel it.

      “Let’s do this, Carrie,” he whispered, sinking his fingers into my hair. “Let’s just have fun.”

      It made an insane sort of sense. As we tumbled through the door to land on the Persian rug in the foyer, I convinced myself that this wasn’t terrible. People did this every day.

      Max’s mouth never left mine as he rolled us both over so that I straddled him, still fully clothed. With a chuckle, Max sat up. I felt him, hard and eager, through his jeans, but he didn’t appear uncomfortable. In fact, he seemed more at ease and himself in this intimate situation than he ever did while doing mundane things. I wondered if I was with the real Max now, or just another character. Maybe that was part of his practiced magic. I pitied the women who didn’t see it for what it was, because they could fall in love with a man like Max, who made them feel they were the most important woman he’d ever touched.

      Luckily for me, I couldn’t fall in love with him. I was already in love with a man who didn’t find me very important at all.

      As if on cue, the phone rang.

      Max glanced at me, half imploring. Then guilt crept into his expression, and I couldn’t look at him anymore.

      I groaned and climbed to my feet, more wobbly than I had been when I’d been plastered. The realization that I had been about to have sex with Max forced the rest of the alcoholic haze from my system, leaving awkwardness it its wake.

      “Hey, while you’re up, can you get that?” Max asked sheepishly.

      “Fine. But if it’s one of your girlfriends, I’m not going to be very good cover.”

      I was surprised anyone would hang on the line for as long as it took me to reach the telephone in the kitchen. Every ring seemed sure to be the last, until I picked up the phone and said tiredly, “Hello?”

      “Carrie?”

       Nathan.

       Two: Reconnected

      “Carrie?” Nathan repeated over the crackling of the line, his soft Scottish accent curling around my heart like a possessive hand.

      I swallowed the lump in my throat and tried not to focus on the fact I was standing in Max’s kitchen wiping his kisses off my neck. “Yeah, it’s me.”

      There was a long, heavy pause. “It’s good to hear your voice.”

      My throat went dry. I will not cry, I will not cry.

      But my emotions were too raw. The alcohol left me with nothing to buffer them. I wiped at my eyes and prayed my voice wouldn’t fail me when I spoke. “It’s good to hear from you, too.”

      “I tried to get ahold of you earlier. You must have been out.” He probed gently at the edge of the blood tie, and I shut him out firmly. He laughed softly. “Got something you don’t want me to know?”

      “I’m a little tipsy, is all. We just got in.”

      “Ah.” Nathan didn’t sound as though he believed me.

      He hadn’t yet offered any information about Bella. The suspense had me twisting the phone cord around my arm. It would be better to do it like a Band-Aid, I decided—as quickly as possible so the pain wouldn’t last. “I tried to call you earlier.”

      He cleared his throat. “Yeah, that’s what Bella said.”

      I rolled my lips over my teeth, pressing them until they were numb.

      “She said you hung up.”

      I managed a tight laugh. “Yeah, I thought I had the wrong number. I didn’t expect her to be there. Do I still have a room?”

      My chuckle sounded so lame, if it had been a horse, some farmer would have shot it.

      “Of course you do,” Nathan said, his voice so soft I had to strain to hear it over the static. “Listen, has Max heard anything from the Movement?”

      I tried to stay out of Max’s personal business, but I did remember the comment he’d made on the Ferris wheel. “No, he said he hasn’t heard anything lately.”

      “Bella has.” His casual use of her name sent spears of agony through my heart. “There’s too much to explain on the phone. We’re headed down there right now.”

      I imagined her in the seat next to his, looking gorgeous and out of place in the rusty old van. “I’ll tell Max. I don’t think he’ll be happy about her coming here.”

      “Why not?” Apparently, Nathan had gone brain dead.

      Then I remembered he’d been possessed by the Soul Eater’s evil spell the whole time, and probably missed the weird dynamic going on between Bella and Max. Still, she should have had the common decency to clue Nathan in. “No reason. Forget I said anything.”

      “Okay…” He cleared his throat again. “Listen, we’re about an hour out of the city. We’re hoping to get to Max’s before sunrise, but if we СКАЧАТЬ