“It’s okay,” I assured her.

“It’s already a crime scene, my house.” She was still whispering. “I can’t go to the utility room. It’s roped off with yellow tape.”

These words made my heart hurt for her and my stomach pitch in revulsion at the knowledge she shared with me. So without hesitation this time, I covered her hand with mine. She turned hers so it was palm to palm and her fingers curled and, when they did, so did mine.

“You do this as you have to do it,” I said to her.

“I don’t want any more of this in my house.”

“Then that’s how you’re doing it.”

She looked to the reception desk and back at me. “I’m sorry, Nina. Max has enough to do. Mindy, you, all the stuff he has to see to when he’s in town. He doesn’t need me adding to all that stuff.”

I gave her hand a squeeze and said, “I don’t think he minds.”

She looked over my shoulder and replied, “He never minds.”

No, she was right. Apparently Super Max was pretty content with taking care of half the town, such was his wonderfulness.

That, too, I suddenly detested.

Her hand gave mine a squeeze as her attention came back to me. “I promise Nina, because Curtis is gone this won’t get to be a habit. I’ve got people who look out for me, a lot of friends, family close, people who take me grocery shopping, a girl who comes in to clean the house, you know, stuff like that.”

“It’s okay,” I promised, wondering why she felt she had to reassure me about these things. Then again she lived in town and pretty much everyone in town, including Max, thought that he and I were going somewhere and we were doing it together.

“You should know something else too,” Bitsy said, calling my attention to her and she kept talking. “Harry came by yesterday. He’s torn up.” She shook her head but continued. “We won’t talk about that but anyway, he said he met you and so did Shauna.”

“Yes,” I confirmed, she gazed at my face and I knew she read my opinion about Shauna because our eyes locked and we shared a silent moment of keen understanding about Shauna Fontaine.

Then her hand squeezed mine and she carried on, “He told me what Shauna said to you and, you should know, it isn’t true.”

“Sorry?”

“Max,” she went on. “He takes the jobs out of town because he makes really good money doing them. He’s never gone long, three months, sometimes six or eight, but not often and he never takes the big ones that last forever. He likes to be home and, sometimes, even when he’s on a job, he’ll come home for weekends and stuff.” I nodded, she kept tight hold of my hand and continued speaking. “He doesn’t rent that house for the money, like Shauna said. He’s got money. Not only does he make good money but he’s also got some besides, from, um… you know,” she hesitated then finished, “a little nest egg.”

I didn’t know and I didn’t get to ask, not that I would have, she continued.

“It’s just that he’s smart. If he’s going to be gone all that time, why not rent the house? He makes a bucketful when he rents it, he can get top dollar and he demands it. I would too. I mean, who wouldn’t? His house is great.”

I didn’t want to be in another conversation about Max’s finances, especially considering the reasons why I was in another conversation about Max’s finances, so I said, “Of course,” hoping that she’d be reassured and we could stop talking about it.

She nodded and went on, “The other thing…” She paused and her hand squeezed mine, not comfortingly, spasmodically, a reflexive action communicating something else entirely. Then this action was explained when she said in a low voice, the words coming fast and I knew it took a lot for her to utter them, “Beware of Shauna. I know why she was with Curtis and I know why she was with Harry. I’m guessin’, from what Harry told me, that you figured it out so you gotta know, she was with Max for another reason. She wanted him for a long time before she got him and she made no bones about it and when I say that, I mean a long time.” She paused to let that penetrate, before she finished, “She still wants him, maybe even more now that she’s lost him.”

Considering the fact that I’d recently decided to go home to England as soon as humanly possible and never come back to Colorado again in my life, it was unnecessary for Bitsy to give me this warning. Although I didn’t tell her that since her doing so was also kind.

“Thanks Bitsy,” I said and then told her the truth knowing, even so, she’d not understand my true meaning, “I’m not worried about Shauna.”

She smiled at me, it was again small, her face had not fought back the grief but she wasn’t letting it consume her, something else I admired her for, and she gave my hand a final squeeze before letting it go.

“Sucks,” she started, looking back at the reception desk and I saw her eyes lock on something and I looked to see Max and Mick were heading our way. “Finally, he’s found someone he’s into and it’s during all this crap.” I felt her eyes come back to me so I looked back to her and she was again smiling. “But we’ll get to know each other.”

“I’d like that,” I said quietly, even though I knew we wouldn’t.

“Me too,” she replied with feeling, not sharing my knowledge and making me feel guilty because she appeared to be looking forward to it.

“Bitsy,” Mick greeted as he stopped in front of us and I stayed seated. I did this out of habit. It was something I did for Charlie, keeping myself at his level, not making him look up all the time, reminding him of what he’d lost.

“Hey Mick,” Bitsy greeted back.

“How’s things, Nina?” Mick asked me.

“Interesting,” I replied and Mick smiled.

“Max, would you stay with me when they talk to me?” Bitsy asked and then said to me, “Or, sorry Nina, I should ask you. Do you mind?”

I shook my head and smiled at her. “I’ll just go get a coffee or something.”

“Thanks,” she said softly. She nodded at Mick, started wheeling away and Mick followed her.

Max stayed with me and I stood.

“Bitsy wants you,” I reminded him.

“Somethin’s up,” he said straight out, watching me closely.

“You better go,” I encouraged him, evading his subject. “Do you want me to bring you a coffee when I come back?”

He got close, tilting his head down to look at me but he didn’t touch me.

“What’s up?” he asked.

“I’ll get Bitsy a coffee too. Do you know what she likes?”

His finger went into my side belt loop again.

Then he said in a low tone, “Not gonna ask twice, Duchess.”

God. Seriously. He was so annoying.

“I’m fine.”

“You’re lyin’.”

My eyes narrowed, I yanked my hips away but his finger held fast and instead of tearing my loop, I settled and repeated, “I said, I’m fine.”

“Bullshit.”

I leaned in and hissed my lie, “All right, Max, I’m going out for coffee and my Dad’s in town. I don’t want to run into him and have another scene, this time in public.”

His finger in my loop drew me closer as his face relaxed.

“Just stay at the Station,” he suggested. “I’ll ask Mick to get someone to bring you coffee.”

“Police coffee?” I asked, sounding horrified.

“Yeah, Duchess,” he returned, grinning. “You think your system could stomach that?”

“No,” I lied again.

His grin got bigger and he muttered, “Christ, you’re cute.”

I sucked in breath, feeling those three words pummel me like blows to the gut.

Then I reminded him, “Max, they’re waiting for you.”

“Stay here, you want coffee, we’ll get coffee with Bitsy after. She’d like that.”

“Max, as I said, twice, I’ll be fine.”

He shook his head and his finger in my loop brought me even closer, inappropriately closer for a public place, a closer that was almost, but not quite, as close as making-out-in-the-kitchen close.

“Now you explained it,” he said, “I don’t like the idea of you runnin’ into your Dad in town without me havin’ your back. So I want you to stay here. Yeah?”

I decided it was probably better to give in because Max wouldn’t let it go and I needed distance immediately. What I did not need were more indications of all the reasons he could easily be the love of any woman’s life.

I decided this but I also decided not to give in gracefully.

So I did it on the release of a heavy, annoyed breath. “Oh, all right.”

His grin came back, his finger left my loop but his hand lifted and curled around my neck, giving me a squeeze then he turned around and walked away.

Not five minutes later, a lady who introduced herself as Jane brought me coffee and when I took a sip it was just how I took it.

Yes. Max was so annoying.

***

We were on our way back up to the A-Frame.

It was after Bitsy’s police interview; after Max took us to lunch, again at that little caf�� by the river but this time it was warm enough for us to sit outside close to the rushing, snow-melt swelled river; and, after lunch, we took Bitsy home where she insisted we stay for a thank you mug of her homemade lattes which she created in a fabulous kitchen that also had a load of extra counters that had been built so she could reach them and, incidentally, her lattes were delicious.

Bitsy had been quiet and reflective through lunch and twice I caught her eyes filling with tears while she studied the river, though she never allowed the tears to fall. Max and I kept quiet with her, me because I didn’t know what to say and I was deep in my own thoughts, Max because, I suspected, he was leaving her be. When she went home, she seemed to perk up but I guessed this was because she wanted to entice us not to leave and I didn’t blame her. Being alone with my thoughts in my current predicament was less than fun. Being alone with hers would be torture.

Now I was studying the beautiful landscape passing me by wondering, if the cosmos had shined down on me and given me Max free and clear, if I’d have ever gotten used to the beauty of it and thinking at the same time that Max thought that we’d be spending the afternoon further exploring our relationship.

I was also trying to form a plan on how I was going to avoid letting him do that and wondering, if he touched me and, God forbid, kissed me, even if I did form a plan, if I could manage to be successful in my endeavors.

“Duchess?” he called at the same time I felt his hand wrap, warm and strong, around mine.

“Yes?” I answered, looking from the side window to the front but not at him.

“What’s on your mind, honey?” His voice was soft and he’d pulled my hand to rest the back of it against his hard thigh.

I hadn’t felt his thigh until just then but of course it, too, was hard, inviting touch. I decided this was most irritating even though my brain registered the feel was totally amazing.

I also decided not to fight at that juncture and leave my hand in his while I somewhat lied, though I thought of it more as not telling the full truth, “Bitsy.”

His fingers gave me a squeeze as he said, “She’ll be okay.”

“She loved him.”

“Yeah.”

I bit my lip then pointed out the obvious because he more than anyone knew. “That means she won’t be okay.”

This was as good a time as any, in fact, better than most, for Max to share about his dead wife.

He didn’t.

He just repeated, “Yeah.”

Jerk!

“I’ll talk with her later, after the funeral, maybe in a few weeks,” he went on. “Get her to sell that house. Too many memories, too big for her, hell, it was too big for them when Curt was alive.”

“Mm hmm,” I mumbled.

He gave my hand a squeeze before he let it go to downshift in order to make a turn. He left it resting on his thigh and I moved it away, linking it with my other one in my lap, hoping he wouldn’t re-initiate the contact as he said, “We’ll look out for her. She’ll make it through.”

“Mm hmm,” I repeated, hoping he meant “we” as in Wonder Max and the Townsfolk of Gnaw Bone, not him and me, something which would never be.

This was another decision I’d come to and I’d come to it in the silence over lunch thus me knowing that being alone with my thoughts was not fun.

I couldn’t live a life like the one I led with Niles.

I also couldn’t live a life knowing the length of it, even if it was good, that I was second best.

No, there wouldn’t even be a length to it because eventually, like everything else I’d risked, it would end in disaster. I’d had enough disaster with jerks, thieves, cheaters and beaters. I didn’t need the heartbreaking disaster that was all Max.