Max took a puff, then blew out a white veil of smoke. “You were wearing my pajamas.” The smoke cleared and I could see the lines of worry etched on his face. My throat tightened and I swallowed hard. The cat jumped up into my lap, turned in a circle, and settled down, the purr starting up again.
Max still didn’t look at me. “I see you’ve met Julia.”
I put my hand on her head and stroked her. I would have laughed because it was funny, how I’d worried about his Julia. As it was, I felt tears prick the backs of my eyes and my breath catch. “Max, about the papers. I—”
“There’s no need to talk about it.” He stood abruptly and pulled open the icebox. It was empty but for a bottle of milk he emptied into a saucer on the floor.
“You deserve an explanation. After everything you did for me.”
“What I did for you?” He sounded like he really didn’t know. He leaned against the sink and crossed his arms.
“Taking me on, trying to help me.” I waved toward the pile of newsprint, trying to figure how to explain. “I owe you, Max.”
Maybe I shouldn’t have said that last part because his face went from puzzled to rock hard, his mouth thinned into a line. “Is that what you thought? That you owed me?” The bitterness in his voice cut, and I knew he was talking about the night at the beach.
It wasn’t that simple, I wanted to say. There were other reasons. His smile. The waves. The way he knew the real me no matter how hard I tried to hide. But my throat had filled with tears. “You saved me, Max,” I choked out.
He shook his head. “I wish I could have saved somebody.”
I guess he meant Maria Carmen. Or maybe Roman and Angel. I didn’t deserve to be saved, but they did. The percolator gurgled, the dark aroma of coffee drifted through the silent kitchen.
“You want to know what bothers me the most?” Max finally said, looking down at his feet.
I wasn’t sure I did.
“That you thought I was like the rest of them.”
I must have tightened my grip on Julia, because she stopped purring and jumped from my lap, abandoning me for her breakfast. I couldn’t say I blamed her.
“Didn’t you get what I was telling you all those times, Mina?” He looked at me finally, and his eyes were filled with something like anger and sadness all at once. “Nobody in this town is walkingaround whole, without regrets. If they are, they’re kidding themselves. Some have done worse. I’ve done plenty worse. I thought you knew...” He swallowed hard. “I thought you knew you didn’t have to hide from me.”
What he meant was that I should have trusted him. But I’d learned my lessons well in this far-off land. That no one could be trusted. That everybody wanted something. I didn’t know he was different until it was too late.
“I wish...” He ran an agitated hand through his hair.
He wished he’d never met me. He wished he hadn’t tried to help me.
He met my eyes then. “I wish I’d known—” he flicked his hand at the papers and his voice broke—“when we were at the beach house.” His shoulders rose and fell. “It would have changed things.” He wouldn’t have wanted me, then, knowing what I’d done. That’s what he meant. And who could blame him? He looked down at the newspaper, where Louella’s accusations shouted in inch-high letters. “I’m not... I don’t want to be this to you.”
“You aren’t,” I choked out in a rush, standing up quick. “Nothing like.” A flush burned up my neck, and I wished I could disappear into the floor. How could he not know he—being with him—was as different from the others as a kiss is to a punch in the mouth? But how does a girl talk about a thing like that?
I looked up at him, seeing in his eyes more than I wanted to see. Everything that could have been. Maybe he would have kissed me then. He looked like he might. But I couldn’t let him. One thing I wouldn’t do—I promised myself—was hurt him again.
The moment—whatever it was—was gone, and he shoved his hands in his pockets. “I tried to save you from Roy. Did you know that?”
I thought I knew what he meant. “You told me not to—”
“Not then. Later.” Then he told me what he’d done, putting Seconal in Roy’s drink.
“But I drank it.” My throat closed so I could hardly get a breath. Hehadsaved me. Even when I’d been so cruel, when I hadn’t listened to his warning. It might have been the nicest thing anybody had ever done for me. And one more reason why I had to do the right thing now. For him and for his family. I managed one good breath and then said, “Max, I need you to do something more for me. One more thing.”
His face took on that guarded look. “What is it?”
I told him my plan.
He stiffened, and that little muscle on the side of his jaw twitched like it did when he didn’t like what I had to say. “No,” he said. “Absolutely not.”
I knew he’d take some convincing. “It’s the only way,” I said. The only way I could live with myself.
