Kristen Ashley - The Gamble

“Let me go.”

“Nope.”

“Let me go!” I shouted, Max gave me another shake but I kept pushing.

“You don’t look thirty-six,” he told me.

“Let me go.”

“Thirty, at a push.”

“Max. Let. Me. Go!”

“I was surprised, surprised enough not to believe you.”

“Let me go!”

“You wanna know how old I am?”

I gave up pushing since I wasn’t getting anywhere and it appeared Max was determined to have this conversation. If I’d learned nothing in the last week, I learned that when Max was determined to do something, he did it.

Instead of pushing, I glared at him again and said, “Not particularly.”

He ignored me and stated, “Thirty-seven.”

He was older than me. That was good. Not that it mattered if he was younger, really. Actually, not that it mattered at all since I didn’t care.

“Birthday’s May eighth,” he continued, breaking into my thoughts.

“Fascinating,” I drawled sarcastically even though it was because he wasn’t a year older than me, he was a year and a half and his birthday was only a month away.

Max went on, “Dad died when I was twenty-nine, took me six years to build this house.”

That was fascinating too. Six years was a long time. He must have been determined to do that as well.

Even so, I kept my mouth shut.

“He died of cancer, had it since I was sixteen, fought it back for thirteen years before it got him.”

That was also fascinating but in a sad yet inspiring way.

Still, I demanded, “Stop talking,” but he ignored that too.

“Don’t know why Kami’s such a bitch. Pretty much has been since I could remember. Mom, she fucked up, getting shot of Dad since she always loved him. They fought, fuck, you wouldn’t believe it. Even when they were divorced. But she always loved him. Told me that after his funeral. His death broke her. She was so goddamned stubborn, so fuckin’ proud, she let her life just slip away. Lived in the same town as the man she loved the length of it but only with him for eight years. Now, she’s bitter for it.”

Unwilling to let Max’s sharing breach my defenses, I latched onto something he said and called him on it. “Are you insinuating I’m proud and stubborn?”

“Don’t think you’re proud, babe, but you’re stubborn as hell.”

“I am not.”

“You sure as fuck are.”

“No, I’m not.”

“If you’re not then why, an hour ago, did you let me in, practically begged me to come in and locked me tight when I got there and now you’re doin’ everything you can to shove me right back out?”

This time I ignored him and suggested, “Let’s talk about your mother.”

I saw his jaw flex in irritation at my change of subject before he asked, “What do you wanna know?”

“How about you explaining why you’ve had breakfast and dinner with my mother and she lives in Arizona and your mother lives fifteen miles away and I haven’t met her?”

“This might have escaped you, Duchess, but we’ve been kinda busy.”

I found it tremendously annoying when he was right.

Max went on, “There’s also the fact your Mom showed up on the doorstep and then stayed.”

Yes, totally annoying when he was right.

Max continued, “Not to mention, you already met Kami twice and I figured that was enough of my family for awhile. I’m tryin’ to find ways to make you want to stay, not give you reasons to run away.”

This, too, was a good point.

“Perhaps we should stop talking and go back to relaxing,” I suggested the impossible. I was never going to relax for the rest of my life.

“Explain somethin’ to me, babe, why is it you always wanna stop talking when I’m winnin’ the fuckin’ argument?”

I decided to be honest. “Because you’re more annoying when you’re right than you are just normally.”

Max stared at me a minute, visibly astonished by my honesty then he threw his head back and laughed while gathering me close to his amazing, sweat-slicked chest.

“Jesus, you’re cute,” he murmured when he quit laughing and my face was stuffed into his throat.

“For the last time, Max, stop telling me I’m cute when I’m angry at you,” I demanded and he laughed yet again.

I shoved at his chest.

Max let me push back but unexpectedly I found myself suspended then maneuvered then I was straddling Max’s lap and my towel was whipped off.

I covered my breasts with my arms and snapped, “Max!”

One of Max’s hands was at my hip, anchoring me to his lap, the other one was gliding up into my hair.

“Been wantin’ to try this since you told me that first night your sinuses hurt,” he muttered, his hand in my hair pulling my face to his.

“What?” I asked on a whisper, all of a sudden enthralled with watching his mouth get closer.

“Try and see how creative I can get, helpin’ you work out that attitude of yours.”

Even in the sauna, a shiver slid along my skin.

“Max –” I started but didn’t say more.

His head slanted and his hand tilted mine the other way. Then he kissed me.

Then he got creative, helping me work out my attitude, an endeavor at which he was staggeringly successful for, after we were done, the only attitude I had the energy to adopt was calm and serene.

***

Max and I made love in the sauna then he took me to the shower to rinse off then he toweled me off then he took me to bed.

He didn’t like it when I put on my undies under the towel and tugged his t-shirt on over it before I pulled it free but when I explained I had never been comfortable sleeping nude, he didn’t say another word.

Then as I lay on my side in bed, he soothed ointment on my scrapes again while I tried with only small success to stay awake.

After he was done, he threw the ointment on the nightstand, turned out the light, tossed the covers over us and pulled me into his arms.

As sleep started its invasion, I snuggled closer and whispered, “I’m sorry your Dad was sick for so much of your life.”

“Sleepy Nina,” he murmured strangely, his hand had gone up the t-shirt and his fingers were drifting along my back. If I wasn’t so sleepy, I would have keenly registered how incredibly nice his hand felt, drifting restfully along my back. Instead, I vaguely registered how incredibly nice his hand felt, drifting restfully along my back.

“What?” I asked.

“Sleepy Nina is Sweet Nina,” he said quietly. “I see I got Sleepy Nina.”

“No,” I told him. “I’m Three Orgasms One in a Sauna Nina. That Nina is always sweet.”

His hand stopped drifting, his arm wrapped around me and he gave me a squeeze.

“I’ll be sure to remember that,” he muttered while he did and his mutter sounded like it came through a smile.

Sleep kept encroaching and I didn’t have the strength, or will, to fight it.

But, for some reason, my mouth kept talking. “Max?”

“Yeah, honey?”

“You scare me.”

I felt his fingers tighten against my skin before he said, “I know I do.”

“Every day it gets better which makes it worse.”

I felt him give me another squeeze as I pressed closer and wrapped my arm around his belly.

“Quit fightin’ it, it’ll just get better,” Max advised.

I felt my weight settle into him as slumber slid over me.

But even so my mouth kept moving. “What if it doesn’t?”

“Life doesn’t give you promises, baby, I can’t either but we’ll do the best we can.”

“Mm…” Finally, my mouth started to go to sleep too.

But my mind didn’t, not for a few seconds, while his words penetrated.

I didn’t know for sure but I didn’t think I wanted promises, not if they were empty. Honesty felt a whole lot better.

“Sleep, Duchess,” Max urged.

“’Kay.”

I got another squeeze and my mind processed this too, mainly how much I liked it.

“’Night, baby,” Max whispered, rolling toward me and wrapping his other arm around me, holding me close, holding me tight.

“’Night, Max,” I whispered back.

Then I fell asleep in Max’s t-shirt, in Max’s bed, in Max’s house and in Max’s arms and I did it before it fully penetrated my brain how I felt.

Not scared at all.

My eyes drifted open and I saw the wall of Max’s chest.

I was held tight to his side, my cheek on his shoulder and my arm was draped across his belly. It was either dawn or clouds were covering the sun for it was morning and there was light but it wasn’t the sunny Colorado mornings I had swiftly become accustomed to.

It struck me that I felt rested, not like I’d spent the craziest week of my life, but like I’d just had a week on a beach with nothing to do but sit in the sun, read a book and, if the spirit moved me, go play in the water.

And I knew it wasn’t the three orgasms (one in the sauna) that I’d had last night.

It was something else, or a bunch of something elses.

And I knew all of them, every last one and I decided to take that quiet me-awake/Max-asleep morning time, finally, to sift through them in my head.

Those something elses included Max calling me Duchess, not as if he’d christened me that name eight days ago, but like he’d called me that since birth.

And they included Max holding me while I was gripped in a fever, trembling with the chills.

It was Max making me oatmeal and telling me he’d never give me a reason to take a timeout and, if I took it anyway, he’d phone.

It was buffalo burgers and the fact that he ordered them for me, not because he was domineering (or not entirely) but because he knew they were delicious and he wanted to give that to me. Coupled with that, it was the fact that he made sure I had an ale when he found out I didn’t drink lager.

It was Max sharing his beautiful bluff and having his picture taken with me, a picture where he did, indeed, look happy. And so did I.

It was Max teaching Damon a lesson after Damon hit me.

It was him taking care of Mindy, talking to Bitsy for the police, on his back under his Mom’s sink because she needed it fixed.

It was Max hearing me tell Sarah I liked her earrings and going to buy them for me and, after finding out I’d already bought them, bringing home the ring.

It was his voice when he spoke of Charlie, as if he respected him and he’d never even met him.

It was because he had my back with my Dad, found my Mom amusing and got along with Steve.

It was because we fought all the time and he was right, I enjoyed it. It was challenging, he made me think, kept me on my toes. He wasn’t boring, staid and predictable. He didn’t let me walk all over him. He was honest and if something was on his mind he shared it even if it would anger me or he was calling me out on one of my many neuroses.

It was also because Max seemed not only to have patience with my many neuroses but most of the time he thought they were cute.

It was because he knew how I took my coffee, he held my hand, he kissed my forehead and he draped his arm along the back of the booth when we were sitting together.

It was Max telling Mindy she was loved; she just didn’t get how much.

It was because he was a good kisser and better in bed.

It was because he held me when we slept, like right then, his arm under my body, wrapped around me, holding me to his side as if, even in sleep, he had no intention of ever letting me go.

Even with all that, I knew I would never be the love of Max’s life. I knew someplace deep he’d already had that and in that deep place it also hurt knowing I’d never be that for him. If it worked out with us, I wouldn’t ever be the love of anyone’s life. But that wasn’t what bothered me. It was that I wouldn’t be that person for Max. Especially Max.

But I also knew it had taken him ten years to find someone he’d like to explore sharing his life with again. And he’d made it clear that someone was me.

So I would never be what Mom was to Steve.

But being Max’s second chance at something good was better than anything else I’d ever experienced. Nothing else even came close.

If I gave it a chance it would be settling, definitely.

But I decided, pressed to Max’s side, in his bed, in his A-Frame in the Colorado Mountains, after living the craziest week of my life and going through what we went through yesterday and still waking feeling rested and safe, I could settle for that.