Mad About Max. Penny McCusker

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СКАЧАТЬ the window down. “I wish you’d called, though.”

      Sara tried to defend herself, but she had to put her head down first. Jack Daniel’s, loyal and thoughtful guy that he was, suddenly wanted to come to her rescue, and not in a good way. Then again, throwing up at Max’s feet would definitely send him running in the other direction. Or maybe not.

      Considering the kind of man he was, Max would almost certainly see her tucked up safely in bed, maybe sit with her for a while to make sure she wasn’t going to get sick and choke on her own vomit. The picture that went along with that thought—minus the vomit—had her sitting up in her seat. Smiling. Max in her bedroom, inches away from her bed. Within easy touching distance. All she’d have to do was take his hand, invite him into her bed and indulge every fantasy she’d ever had. It might mean losing him forever—or it might mean that he’d finally acknowledge her real feelings and consider the possibility that he could grow to love her, too. It was a risk she’d never been willing to take before, but with Jack Daniel’s to help her…

      Jack was supposed to help her do something else, Sara thought fuzzily, something entirely different. Wasn’t he? Her head spun like a roulette wheel, risk opposite caution, fear across from courage, all of them separated by big sections of necessity. By the time Max knocked on her window, necessity had shoved all those other pesky options out of the picture.

      Sara took a deep breath and looked up at him. Her heart lurched like it always did, but only a little. It was too heavy to give a really good lurch.

      He opened the door and offered to help her out. Sara ignored his hand. She waited until he dropped it and stepped back before she levered herself out of the car, awkwardly but on her own.

      “You okay?” he asked, all concern, from the deep timbre of his voice to the slight frown between his eyes.

      She nodded.

      “I was getting worried, Sara. After this afternoon…” He reached for her again.

      She held up both hands to ward him off, bending into the car to gather her purse and her courage. And then her balance. She had something to say to Max. It wasn’t going to be easy, but it had to be done or he’d never give her the space she needed to get over him. Just once, she told herself. If she did it right, she’d only have to do it once. She straightened slowly, grabbing on to the open door so she wouldn’t have to wait for her head to stop spinning. “Max—”

      “Why don’t you come in the house? We’re eating popcorn and watching The Mummy for the umpteenth time.”

      The Mummy was one of her favorite movies, but not for the action or the really amazing special effects, or even the bumbling hero and endangered heroine. She always found herself hoping those two dead Egyptians in love for thousands of years would find a way to be together.

      “Come inside,” Max said softly, homing in on her indecision. “Joey is worried about you, too.”

      Sara closed her eyes, stifling the intentionally rude thing she’d been about to say. She’d forgotten about Joey. Max would eventually understand why she’d had to stop being his friend until she could be only his friend. But she was going to have to be very careful about how she alienated the father if she was going to avoid hurting the son. She turned to face him, taking a step forward so he couldn’t possibly misunderstand her. “I don’t wanna watch a movie. I’m going t’bed.”

      Max took a step back, waving a hand in front of his face. “Are you drunk?”

      And she’d enunciated so carefully, too. “Maybe just a li’l.”

      He glared over at Janey. “This is your idea of making her feel better?”

      “Now I have somewhere else to be,” Janey said. She slid into the car and fired it up.

      Max took Sara’s purse and slid his hand under her elbow, steering her out of the way as Janey peeled off in a small shower of gravel. “Leave it to Janey to get you drunk.”

      Sara wrenched her arm out of his hand, then had to catch herself before she spun completely around. “It’s not Janey’s fault. I got myself drunk.”

      “She should’ve called me. I’d have come to get you.” He tried to take her arm again.

      Sara stepped back and, just for good measure, snatched her purse from his hand. It took her two tries, but it still felt good. “Janey’s not responsible for me, Max. Neither are you.”

      He stopped in midstride. “I know that, Sara,” he said, his voice very deep and solemn. Hurt. “But I think of you as a—”

      “Don’t say it!” She winced as her own screeching voice cut through her head like a railroad spike. Apparently she was getting started on the hangover already. Great. That meant she was sobering up. But drunk or sober or somewhere in between, she had to finish what she’d started before Jack deserted her entirely. “I’m not your sister, Max. I’m thirty, no twenty-nine, years old and more’n capa-capa—I’ve been making my own decisions and my own mistakes for a long time.

      “Of course, noooobody forgets the mistakes, but why can’t you remember that at least eighty—seventy—” She stopped and thought really hard, but she seemed to be having an awful lot of trouble with numbers tonight. “Most of the time I manage to live my life without tripping over anything or gluing myself to anyone. But does anybody notice that? No, you all congregate at the Ersk Inn—and by the way that’s the stupidest name I’ve ever heard for anything—and you sit around and drink beer and talk about when Sara Lewis is going to damage the town again.”

      Max rubbed at the spot on his chest where she’d been poking him to make her point, his handsome face creased in lines of confusion. “I’ve spent my share of time at the inn, Sara. You got the sitting around and drinking beer part right, but mostly we just watch whatever sporting event is on the big screen. Hardly anyone ever brings up your name, and I’ve never bought one of those squares.”

      “No, but you always seem to be around when someone wins.”

      “So it’s my fault?”

      Sara sank her teeth into her bottom lip, realizing what she’d said. If Max figured out that he played some role in her clumsiness, he’d wonder why. It was a question she didn’t want him asking. Not now that she’d finally found the strength to let go of her dream instead of sitting around waiting for it to come true while life passed her by. The decision made her sick to her stomach, but empowerment was so liberating—it was as if she’d taken her first deep breath after a lifetime of struggling for oxygen. “No, Max, it’s not your fault. I just want it to stop. I can’t live like this anymore.”

      “Aw, Sara.”

      She almost stepped into Max’s outstretched arms, one last brotherly hug that she could fantasize meant something else entirely. Instead she stepped around him and headed for her front door. “Just go away, Max.”

      “But—”

      “Please, just leave me alone.”

      She slipped inside and closed the door behind her, then leaned back against it as tears started to stream down her face.

      Jack Daniel’s was a whiz at courage, but he wasn’t very good at deadening the pain.

      MAX SCOOPED UP one last bucket of grain and СКАЧАТЬ