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“No.”
Great. Another guy pretending to like her. Just fucking great. She was cursed. “Well,” she snapped, “I’m not going swimming, so you can go now.”
“It’s dark out here. I wouldn’t want to—”
“Just go! I absolve you of any responsibility, okay?” Wrapped up in her righteous anger, Chloe wasn’t expecting any response from him. She certainly wasn’t expecting him to shout again.
“It doesn’t work like that, damn it!” He took a deep breath and lowered his voice. “You can’t absolve me of responsibility, Chloe. If I leave you out here alone in the dark and something happens to you, it’ll be on me, because I left knowing it wasn’t right.”
She shook her head. “I’m an adult. You’re not responsible for me. I can do whatever I want.”
“That’s the problem!” His hands flew wide, gesturing around him, as if drawing attention to the whole world. “You can do anything you want, so I have to make you want something else.”
Her breath left her on a rush, leaving behind a painful void in her chest. Chloe pressed her palm to her heart. “That’s just cruel, Max.”
Though he’d been glaring in the direction of the lights of the cabins, Max’s head swung toward her. “Cruel?”
“You pretended to like me just to…just to get control over my beach fire!”
“That’s crazy. I was never pretending to like you.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. When you inserted yourself into my entire vacation, I guess it was stupid of me to assume you were flirting!”
“I was flirting,” he said simply, as if her voice hadn’t taken on the edge of hysteria. “I like you. It’s just hard for me to stop…thinking.” He crossed his arms and uncrossed them while Chloe tried to take in what he meant to say. He liked her?
He ran an impatient hand through his hair. “Do you want to go for a walk? I need to walk.”
“Why?”
“I’ve never had this conversation before.” He strode toward her and took her hand to tug her along the edge of the water. “It’s nice tonight. Let’s walk.”
He seemed to need to burn off some energy, and for once, his charm wasn’t on display. Max looked nervous and unhappy. And his fingers were wrapped tight around hers, distracting her more than even his most charming smile could. She kept pace with him, letting the occasional wave sweep over her toes, but he didn’t drop her hand.
“How could you have never had this conversation?”
One shoulder rose in a suspiciously casual shrug. Now that they were walking, he seemed disinclined to talk. Ironically.
“Max? Do you want to talk or is this walk just another one of your ploys?”
He stared straight ahead. “How did you see it?”
“See what?”
“How did you see what I was doing?”
“Well, I was kind of looking forward to hanging out with an international party boy, but then there didn’t seem to be much partying going on.”
He drew in a breath as if he meant to say something important, then let it out again, slowly. His fingers shifted, sliding in between hers. “You don’t seem like the type of girl who likes party boys.”
“Ha! No, I guess I’m not. That’s why I was intrigued. New experiences.”
“I’m sorry if I’m a disappointment.”
“I don’t know what you are. I can’t figure it out.”
Max finally smiled, his teeth flashing white in the moonlight. “Boy, are you selling yourself short. You’re the only one who’s ever called me on my…issues.”
“I can’t be the only one.”
