And as more time had gone by, and the more interaction I had with Maxx, I knew, deep down, that Kristie’s fears were well founded. I was crossing the line. I was being inappropriate. My feelings for Maxx were beginning to cloud everything.

But that didn’t mean I was ready to call it a day. I would fight for the life I wanted with everything I had—even if that meant a hefty dose of denial, denial, denial.

“What do you mean?” I asked hoarsely, trying to keep my voice even, but my emotions were a runaway freight train, and I couldn’t stop my lip from quivering as I tried to control my burgeoning tears.

Kristie put her hand on my shoulder in what felt like a condescending gesture. “I just mean that this is a tough field. Not everyone can hack it,” she explained and gave me a smile that was too placating to be genuine.

I had thought Kristie was a nice and competent counselor. Competent she may have been, but she was also a tad on the judgmental side. And it was obvious she was being very judgmental about me.

I didn’t bother to respond. I grabbed my things, put on my coat, and with a mumbled good night, I left.

“Hey.” I started at the sound of the deep voice. Maxx was leaning against the wall, hands in his pockets, a gray beanie pulled down over his hair. My stomach flipped at the sight of him, but my brain wasn’t so easily swayed.

I gave him a curt nod and continued walking down the hallway, my shoes clacking against the tile loudly.

“Aubrey, wait,” Maxx called out, but I didn’t slow down. Maxx was a bomb about to go off. He had destroyed the part of me that thought, however briefly, about throwing caution to the winds. He was a liar. He was a fake. And he was the one person capable of ruining my entire life.

“I’ve got to get going. I’ll talk to you later,” I called over my shoulder, picking up my pace. I heard his footsteps speed up, and then his hand was wrapped around my arm, bringing me to a stop.

He pulled me down a dark corridor, his body blocking my exit. Seeing him like this in the shadows, I again felt like such an idiot for not recognizing him sooner.

“Why won’t you talk to me?” he demanded, sounding hurt by my dismissal. The guy was a pro. He could play emotions like they were the real deal. Too bad I had no idea whether what he was showing me was sincere.

“What’s there to say?” I asked tiredly, trying to push my way past him. Maxx moved to the side, his hands still locked around my upper arms, our chests brushing against each other. Maxx was quite a bit taller than me. It would be so easy to wrap my arms around him and lean in, nestling my head underneath his chin.

My body remembered all too well how it felt to touch him. It yelled at me to stop being so stubborn and to give in. But I wouldn’t—not now that I knew the truth.

“I think we have a lot to say to each other. I want to spend more time with you, Aubrey. Please,” he pleaded, his voice low and coaxing. His voice was like a sedative. It would be so easy to fall for whatever line he gave me.

I shook my head and tried to take a step back, but Maxx held me firm, not letting me move. “Let me go, Maxx,” I said firmly, struggling against his grip.

“Why are you acting like this? I thought last Saturday meant something. It did to me,” he murmured, loosening his hands and then dropping them from my arms. His chin dropped, and damned if he couldn’t pull off heartbroken with the best of them.

I snorted, causing him to look up at me in surprise. I rolled my eyes and smirked, even as my heart thudded in my chest. “You’re good, I’ll give you that,” I bit out coldly.

Something in Maxx’s eyes shattered, then shut down, and he turned away as if he couldn’t bear to look at me. “Wow, that hurt,” he said quietly, pulling his beanie off and running a hand through his hair.

“If I thought anything you said was the truth, then maybe I’d believe that,” I retorted.

Maxx lifted his face, his brows knitted together. “What’s that supposed to mean?” he asked, beginning to sound frustrated.

I rolled my eyes again and attempted to back away, but Maxx wasn’t having it. He grabbed hold of me again. “Stop moving away from me. I thought you and I had the beginnings of something. What changed? Is it because I left you at the movie theater? Because I get that was a dick move. I just had somewhere I needed to be . . .”

“Like Compulsion?” I asked, cutting him off. Maxx’s face instantly went blank.

He affected such a convincing neutral expression that if I hadn’t seen him with my own eyes at the club, I would have believed him to be innocent when he asked, “What are you talking about?”

I leaned in and dropped my voice to a whisper, even though we were completely alone in the darkened hallway. “I saw you there. After you left me standing outside the movies. You were at Compulsion, and you weren’t selling Girl Scout cookies,” I told him, raising my eyebrows, feeling my anger simmer to the surface again.

This time it was Maxx who took a step back. He let go of me as if I had burned him. He folded his hat into his pocket before burying his fingers into his hair and gripping his scalp. “I don’t understand what you’re saying,” he denied, though it was obvious my statement had him panicking.

What a pair we were—both denying everything even when faced with the truth.

I laughed humorlessly. “I was there, Maxx. I saw you selling those tiny little pills that people couldn’t get enough of. I also saw you take those same pills, and I know they weren’t Tylenol,” I accused, crossing my arms over my chest. “I followed you around for a while. I saw it all,” I admitted and watched as a multitude of expressions crossed Maxx’s face.

Surprise. Anger. Indignation. And then something seemed to break inside of him. He covered his face with his hands and sank down to the floor.

My mouth gaped open, and I didn’t quite know what to do. I was not expecting this reaction. I anticipated the denial, a witty comeback about how I was imagining things, or even an arrogant confession. Maybe I even expected an apology. But what I hadn’t counted on was Maxx falling apart.

I was horrified with myself that I had led him to this. Where had my sensitivity gone? Where was the woman who wanted to help people? And wasn’t Maxx, sitting there, looking lost, a person who needed my support?

I was acting like a scorned girlfriend instead of the counselor I was learning to be. Maxx’s addiction had a strong hold on him; that was obvious. But it wasn’t the using that bothered me, though that was bad enough.

It was the selling. Pushing that nasty stuff on other people. Sure, he wasn’t standing on a street corner selling drugs wrapped in bubblegum wrappers to schoolkids, but in my mind he was taking advantage of people at their most vulnerable, people like my sister.

That’s what made me sick.

But mostly, I was pissed because I had started to see the man he was underneath. And it was so much more, so much better than the guy who sold drugs to a bunch of strung-out college kids. I took a step toward him, then another, until I was standing over him. He wouldn’t look up at me. I didn’t know if it was because of shame or guilt, or that he just didn’t want me to see exactly what he was. But I already had.

I kneeled down in front of him. “You come into support group every week giving the same sob story. You need saving,” I said harshly, losing all filter over my thoughts, my emotions taking over. “Who are you trying to fool? Kristie? The other group members? Me?” I asked. “Or maybe yourself. Because you can’t like the person you see in the mirror. You can’t enjoy selling drugs to support a habit that will ultimately kill you. Wake up, Maxx!” I said, my voice rising.

Maxx’s head shot up. “You don’t know who I am, Aubrey! You have no fucking clue!” His face was flushed, and his eyes flashed. I had never seen Maxx so worked up, and it was intimidating.

But I wouldn’t back down. “Oh, stop it. So you think because you have it rough, that gives you the right to sell that shit? To take everyone down with you? You lie each and every time you come here! You’re not trying to get better! You’re not looking to get clean! Just be honest with yourself and everyone else,” I yelled.

Maxx leaned forward, getting within an inch of my face. “If that’s what you really think, if that’s who you believe I am, then why the hell are you still here?” he demanded, his face darkening.

I swallowed and got to my feet, putting space between us. But Maxx was on the offensive now.

“You are so fucking naïve, Aubrey. So egocentric. You think you can stand there and pass your fucking judgments. I know that you don’t get it. That you feel betrayed,” he bit out. “What you don’t understand is that at least when I’m being someone else, when I’m that messed-up guy at the club, then I don’t have to be me!” he barked.

“And what’s so horrible about being Maxx Demelo?” I asked, wanting him to be honest, just for a moment. I was looking for that breakthrough so he could see what was at the root of all of this.

“Because I’m a fucking failure!” he screamed. He scrubbed his hands down over his face and then balled up his fist and hit the wall with a force that made me yelp.

Tears slipped down his face, and he hit the wall again. He covered his face with his arms and yelled, the cry muffled by his sweater. I could feel myself softening toward him; that twinge that only he could give me was starting to replace the anger. I looked around, relieved that we were still alone.

Maxx dropped his hands and stared at me with eyes that were haunted and utterly lost. “I’m a failure,” he whispered. “And anyone who expects me to be otherwise will only be disappointed.” He looked at me sharply, and his meaning was clear.

Don’t expect more from me than this.

“It’s nice to feel wanted. To have people need me for something that I can actually give them. I like knowing I can take a pill and none of this matters. I don’t feel the guilt. I don’t feel the weight of all this shit,” Maxx growled, pulling at his shirt above his heart.

He narrowed his eyes at me. “So don’t talk to me about what you think I should be doing or not doing. Because you don’t know a fucking thing about me.”

I was at a total loss about what to say. I was no longer standing there as Aubrey, future counselor. I was Aubrey, a young girl trying to save a sad boy I had, against my better judgment, come to care about.

“I can’t save myself, Aubrey. I know that. I’m a lost fucking cause.” He was so angry. He stalked toward me, grabbing hold of my face, and froze me with the strength of his glare. I couldn’t tell if he was pissed at me or himself. Most likely it was a little bit of both.

He shocked me by slamming his mouth to mine with such bruising force that I tasted blood. He pulled away just as suddenly as he had kissed me. He was wild and out of control. He was totally impulsive and unreadable. I wasn’t sure what he would do next.

He continued to hold my face tightly between his hands. “I want you, Aubrey,” he said in clear, succinct words. His fingers dug into my skin, and I tried not to wince.

Maxx held me tightly, as if he were worried I’d run away. A conflicting, rational part of me was still contemplating doing just that. I knew better than to get mixed up in whatever Maxx was. He was hands-off in every possible way. But that didn’t change the charge I felt around him—or how the destructive, broken man called out to the woman who wanted nothing more than to fix him, to save him, to make his world right again.

“Don’t leave me,” he whispered, his words making me shiver.

I covered his hands, which held my face, with mine and stared up into eyes that pleaded with me to stay. “You scare me,” I told him honestly.

He leaned down and rested his forehead against mine. He took deep, raspy breaths. “I scare myself,” he said. I reached up and put my arms around his neck as he dropped his hands to my hips. We breathed in each other, our eyes closing shut, letting the truth of our words hang in the air between us.

“You have to stop, Maxx. You’re on probation. If you get caught, you’ll go to jail,” I reasoned. Maxx nodded, his nose brushing against mine.

“I know. I can’t be that guy anymore. But he’s hard to let go of. I’m not sure I can do it by myself.”

“You’re destroying yourself. That stuff killed my sister. It could kill you too,” I went on. He didn’t deny anything I was saying. He didn’t get defensive. He didn’t tell me to mind my own business.