Page 55 of Playing for Keeps

“All right, all right!” I called, while fumbling with the lock. “I’m coming!”

I pulled the door open.

Max Finnegan stood in the doorway, his eyes blazing with an intensity I hadn’t seen before, his jaw set, and his chest rising and falling as if he had just sprinted the last street. He didn’t look like the Max who had teased me in the bookshop months ago, not even the Max who had kissed me last week. This Max looked hunted and furious.

Before I could say anything, he pushed past me, brushing my arm with heat and strength. I shut the door and looked at him.

“Max, what’s wrong?”

“You should have told me,” he snapped and turned around.

“Told you what?” I managed, startled by the rawness in his voice.

“That you are seeing another guy.”

It was so absurd, I forgot to breathe for a second. “I… what?”

“But I had to hear it from someone else,” he went on, words falling over each another. “Christ, Emma. Do you know what that did to me?”

“Max, I…”

He rubbed his hair with both hands, his shoulders were tight, his eyes dark. “I could’ve taken it if you’d told me. At least then I would have had a chance to prepare, take a step back. But this?” His voice dropped. “You blindsided me.”

The honesty in it hit hard. Blindsided. My chest tightened. The bathrobe suddenly felt too thin, too intimate for a conversation like this. I opened my mouth, but nothing came out.

He turned towards the door as if running away was the only thing he could do.

“No!” I moved before I could think, darting between him and the door, pushing my palms flat against his chest. “Max, wait.”

His heart was pounding under my hands. He looked down at me, his eyes still fierce but wavering.

“I’m not seeing anyone else,” I said, the words coming out in a rush. “I don’t know why you think that, but it isn’t true. I wouldn’t do that to you.”

He just stared at me and I saw his anger fading. Confusion slid in, then something bare and unguarded.

“You mean it?” he asked, his voice hoarse.

“Yes, of course.”

He kept watching me, uncertain, his shoulders tense, until something in him eased and he let out a quiet breath. He cupped my face, hesitant for half a second, and then his mouth crashed against mine, stealing whatever words I had left. For a heartbeat I froze, and then my body caught up with him.

It wasn’t tentative. It wasn’t careful.

It was desperate.

The knot of the belt slipped just enough that the robe opened at my collarbone, cool air hitting exposed skin. The soft cotton didn’t do anything against the hard line of his body. I gasped and his tongue slid against mine. Slow and deliberate at first, then deeper when I opened to him, matching hunger with hunger. I grabbed his shirt and dragged him closer. His low, rough groan made my knees go weak and sent a tremor through me.

When he pulled his mouth away from mine, he didn’t say a word. Our foreheads stayed pressed together, our breaths ragged and fast, my hands still on his chest. The silence buzzed between us, charged and messy with all the things we both felt.

Once I could catch my breath, I whispered, “Why did you think I’m seeing someone?”

He swallowed and tightened his jaw. “Grace saw you yesterday. In the lecture hall. She thought you were kissing some guy. She said he mentioned… something about Quebec.”

“Oh,” I said, the breath leaving me in a different way. “God. That was Henri.”

He frowned.

“He’s a colleague. He was at the gala, and yes, one of the academics at the conference in Quebec. He’s been… persistent. Far too handsy. I’ve been trying to be polite about it because we work together, but I’ve told him no.”