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I remembered his sister’s cruel taunts. I didn’t know exactly what he’d been through, but Max had suffered enough. The pain he must’ve experienced when he was branded with that awful scar must have been excruciating. And now he would forever carry the mark of that pain, unable to hide the severity of his trauma, no matter how much he might want to.
I didn’t know much about Max, but my few intense encounters with him suggested that he abhorred weakness. He’d scorned my pity, and he’d been at his most unstable when I betrayed a hint of sympathy.
Max had been beautiful once. Now he believed he was a monster. And I suspected that for all his warnings about dangerous men in organized crime, his monster lived on the surface of his skin, not in his soul.
I squared my shoulders, resolute. As I approached, Max straightened from his casual pose where he’d been leaning against my front door. He moved closer to the streetlight, so the illumination caught on his sharp cheekbones and jaw. That skull-like mask had terrified me in the basement. Now, I knew what lurked underneath: a damaged man who preferred to hide in shadow rather than expose the mark of his pain to the world. He’d rather frighten people away than let them get close enough to see his scarred face.
But I’d been close enough. Not only had I seen the scar on his flesh, but I’d watched his awful sister inflict deep wounds with her cutting remarks. How many times had she slashed him with her sharp tongue? Max had said that she’d served as his legal guardian for five years. His mother had been dead and his father imprisoned. My heart ached to think about an abandoned, tormented teenage Max living in that grand house with rot at its core.
Had he been scarred even then? How long had she been tearing into him with that particular emotional lash?
He must love his father very much to put himself at such risk to defend his family from the false threat posed by my dad.
I lifted my chin and joined him on the stoop, meeting him squarely in the eye. The streetlight flashed over the black pools, tiny pinpoints of light in a sea of darkness.
“Sorry if I scared you.” His voice was a deep, soothing rumble, as though he was speaking to a spooked doe.
I’d thought Bambi was a derisive nickname, but maybe there was more to it. I still believed that he was keeping an emotional barrier between us, but he’d also protected me. He’d saved me from being hit by that car and insisted on seeing me safely to my door. Even though his actions tonight had been deranged, he’d thought he was defending me.
We needed to sort this out right now.
“You didn’t scare me,” I replied honestly. “I’m scared for you.”
He drew back ever so slightly, as though I’d shoved the brick wall of his hard chest. “Nikolai Ivanov doesn’t scare me.” It was a rough growl.
I blew out a sigh. “Yeah, I kind of got that from how you were snarling at him.” I gestured to the concrete step in front of my house. “Can we talk?”
He lifted a brow in challenge. “Don’t want me to come inside?” The sneer that tilted his lips let me know that he fully understood why I didn’t want him in my sanctuary: the last time he’d been in my home, he’d drugged and kidnapped me.
I fixed him with a cool stare and sat down on the step, waiting for him to join me.
He let out a sigh of his own and settled down beside me, his big body moving with predatory grace. Suddenly, an image of a panther slid through my mind: sleek and powerful, with sharp teeth that could tear apart anyone who threatened him.
The beast was a rest now, his shoulders relaxing. A shiver raced over my skin, and he frowned.
Before I could formulate my first argument against his continued vendetta, he shrugged out of his leather jacket and draped it over my shoulders.
“You don’t have to do that,” I protested, even as I was enveloped by the warmth of his residual body heat. Unlike Niko’s tux, Max’s jacket didn’t smell like expensive cologne. The earthy scent of the leather mingled with something deeper that was purely masculine and uniquely Max.
“I do if you insist on sitting outside,” he retorted. “That dress sure as hell won’t keep you warm.”
My blush descended all the way down my chest, further heating my skin. It suddenly felt far too revealing, and I wrapped Max’s jacket more tightly around me to hide the redness that colored my pale skin. I didn’t want my body to betray the fact that he’d elicited such a strong reaction with his single, incisive remark.
