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Max blew out a hard breath. “Well, that would never have happened because my Rach is the most lovable woman in the world. But if she hadn’t been able to tolerate Rye’s eccentricities, then I would have picked her. You have to pick your wife. If you love her, really love her, you pick her every single time.”
He wasn’t going to have the chance. “Well, I don’t think I’ll be doing any picking at all.”
“You are going to be stubborn,” Max said with a shake of his head. As if he’d known it all along.
“I’m not being stubborn. She told me to go away.”
“Did she tell you to stay away?”
Well, she hadn’t said that exactly. “She said she changed her mind.”
“Then change it back,” Max advised as though that was the simplest thing in the world. “Go after her, and this time do it without Van. If he wants time to think, give it to him. See how long he likes that.”
He’d been willing to go it alone when Van said he wouldn’t date her. Of course he’d been talking about her at the time. They just hadn’t known it. When he’d woken up this morning, he’d thought Van was being his scaredy-cat self. Nothing more. Things had gotten deep the night before.
It was hard for Van to get close to people, especially women. His family had moved so much when he was a kid—sometimes four or five times a year. He’d never been taught how to make long-term relationships work. Not that Hale had either, but he was willing to give it a shot.
“I am not good with women.” He wasn’t good with people period, but he’d felt comfortable with Elisa.
“You looked like you were doing okay last night. You managed to convince that gorgeous woman who obviously has not led a wild life to go to bed with you on your first date, and to let your best friend join you. That’s some pretty smooth talking. And from what I heard she’s even seen you dance, so…”
Was he going about this the wrong way? Should he have stayed in bed with Elisa and let Van figure his shit out on his own? He’d panicked at the thought of losing his best friend, but sometimes when a man held what he cared about too tight, he strangled the very thing he loved.
He would never have said he was capable of smothering anyone, but hadn’t he been doing that to Van this morning? “I’ve never dated anyone without Van around.”
“Then it is time, brother. I’m going to be honest, I rarely dated without Rye. Not until I met Rachel and knew that whether my brother was with me or not, she was the right one. Guys like you and me, we’re not players. We’re not smart enough to play games. Guys like you and me are going to fall once and never again. You willing to let that go because you might make a fool of yourself?”
“No.” The answer was super easy. “And she felt it, too. I screwed it up because I followed Van thinking I could have everything I wanted, when I wanted it, the way I wanted it. I did this and I have to fix it. Between me and Van, and definitely between me and Elisa. But Max, I’m terrible at starting relationships. I don’t even know how to make amends for being a dumbass.”
A light sparked in Max’s eyes. “Oh, but I do. You have come to the master of amends. See, the key is you gotta get the woman to think that the way you make up for doing something stupid is to give her a whole lot of sex. Do not fall into the ‘I’ll clean the house, baby’ trap. You just gotta do that. No amends required. It is going to come as a surprise to you—I know it did to me—but when you live with a woman, she wants you to do a healthy part of the chores, and dear god, when you have kids with her she definitely wants you to be a part of that. Something about you living in the house, too, so you should help keep it up. And do not say you’ll babysit because that will start a whole other fight. It’s not babysitting when you provided half the DNA. Even if you can’t prove which of you actually provided the DNA. She will not listen. So the key is to start groveling in a way that makes her think of oral sex.”
That wasn’t a terrible idea. Could he turn this thing around? The thought of dating without Van made him ache, but he would ache more if he didn’t try with Elisa. It might still all go to hell, but he had to give it a real shot, and that meant changing his mindset. “All right. How do I make this work?”
