I Run to You (26 page)

Madeline nodded. “I’ll find a way to talk to
her. To tell her about my own experience.”

He nodded and straightened. “She’s talked to
Brook about things. She doesn’t know, that I know anything. She has
some—preconceived ideas about me, and there is no way I can get
through those walls until she sees me from other people’s eyes.
Maybe—until she has a friend, who knows what she’s feeling.”

Madeline regarded him was a soft smile.

Max thought he probably looked scared
shitless for the first time in his life. His voice was a little
gruff as he supplied, “Got any advice?”

She came around the counter and hugged
him.

“Just be yourself.”

He laughed, hugged her, and then as he helped
her carry things out to the table, the women arrived out front.
Madeline left to meet them. He could hear the laughter and talk as
they were hanging out on the front porch.

Sauntering over where Mitch was manning the
grill, a beer in his hand, Max took a lawn chair placed there and
intended to appear relaxed, when they finally did come out
back.

Closing the grill top, Mitch sat down facing
him, those blue eyes going over his face before he drawled, “It’s
the O’Quinn girl?”

Mitch was so to the point. Max laughed.
“Yeah.”

Mitch grinned slightly. “Makes you wish they
were as impressed with you as all the other women have been? As
easy to charm as that kind usually is. Don’t it?”

“Yep.”

Mitch murmured, “They’re guarded and complex
and challenging. They can make you feel like you’re doing
everything wrong. Just fumbling around—most of the time, saying, or
doing the wrong things.” He looked down at the beer and added, “And
you love them for the very same reasons. Because they’re strong.
They’re survivors.”

When he glanced at Max, Max nodded.

Mitch held that gaze a little longer.
“Sometimes they’ve been so hurt, they’re afraid to ask to be held,
and loved. And you can’t go back in time and make that better, or
fix it, or love them then, and spare them.”

Listening, Max was fascinated by Mitch’s
words, realizing that what Mitch had gone through, what he saw in
Madeline, was similar to what he’d probably face with Jordan.

His father went on, “But if you love someone,
you’ll learn how to be the lover when she needs it. And how to be
the listener, and comforter. Does not mean the signals don’t all
get crossed at times. Because we can be pretty dense and
selfish—even if we don’t mean to be. But thankfully, women know
that already.”

Laughing softly Max supplied, “She doesn’t
even like me yet.” He told Mitch of their conversations—overlooking
Mitch laughing rather gleefully about it.

Mitch got up to flip the burgers over and
said, “Son, I love you. But you and Jason both get women too
easily. While I’m not ashamed to say, Madeline and me made a
handsome man. You have deserved all the success you have. You’d
never know if a woman was with you because of either of those
things—unless you did find someone who didn’t melt at your feet
every time you showed those dimples.”

“That did occur to me.”

Mitch had him hold the platter while he
filled it with burgers.

The women were coming out, so he said before
they joined them at the table, “The only big mistake is not even
trying.” Mitch shut the grill and took the platter. “Even if you
get hurt, even when it hurts—because love does sometimes. You at
least, have to try.”

Max went to the table with him, listening to
him joke and observing Jordan watching him kiss Madeline, before he
set the burgers down.

There was a lot of fixing plates, joking
around, flowing. Brook and Renee— Donna, all bringing Jordan into
the conversations, and in the good-natured teasing.

He met Mitch’s eyes across the length of the
table while they sat back, ate, and observed the women. Mitch
winked and grinned. Max made himself relax.

It worked—until after eating, Madeline was
carrying things in, and Mitch had his guitar out. He and the others
were sitting atop tables, talking about music. Madeline asked
Jordan to bring the platter in. They were still in there when Max
decided to walk down to the horse barn—and take his time walking
back.

He was gut tight. Part of that had to do with
Madeline talking to Jordan. Part had to do with him having to
eventually tell her what he had been up to via Sunny.

He was not sure how he was going to do
it.

Everything was falling into place. To a
point. However, nothing could proceed without her taking an active
role and advising Sunny on what she wanted, specifically.

Full custody, visitation. It was a lot
dealing with family services, and social workers, if her parents
did not cooperate. If they could work it among themselves, things
would go swiftly, smoothly.

That was Sunny’s hope. That the parents could
be persuaded to allow her in the child’s life. It was best for the
child, because even though Jordan was her mother, she didn’t know
her, outside whatever the parents had told her. Avoiding trauma to
the child was imperative. Right now, Jordan was living in a rundown
motel, in the worst part of town. She had a steady job, which was
good. Nevertheless, Sunny told him, everything about her would be
pre-judged in court, her looks, assumptions about her lifestyle,
everything.

In the South, Jordan verses her conservative,
religious, family, was not going to be a fair shot. Thus, it was
better if Sunny could convince her parents to work something out
with Jordan.

Max had his own hopes for someday. Despite
telling Brook, he had all the time in the world. He was not feeling
that. He wanted things to be progressing faster. Hell. He had no
guarantee she would ever give him a chance either.

He thought about the time he had with her,
back stage, at the Tavern. Even though she’d been nervous, probably
scared, she’d ran through the song, watching him as he’d ran
through some of the riffs himself.

“You can play this, so why—”

“—Not like you can.” He’d held her gaze. “I
play classical, a lot of other stuff. I have never seen anyone
“feel it” like you do.

They’d had to sit close while he held the
sheet up for her to see the tablature. There were some moments
there, after she ran through it, that he had been talking to
her—trying to relax her tension because he had sprang it on her
like that. Sitting so close, their shoulders were touching. He had
lost his train of thought for seconds. Lost himself, when her gaze
was on his, and he thought, she could tell it.

At some point, with the sounds of the stage
so close to them, the band playing, people talking, he’d had to
lean and put his lips close to her ear, for her to hear what he was
saying. Max had breathed in her feminine perfume. He’d felt that
heat that comes from attraction sizzling over his body.

He had wanted to put his lips to that
vulnerable spot, just under her ear. To slide his mouth down over
that bare shoulder. He had stayed with her, walked her onto the
stage, before going to the front.

Watching her play, hearing her perform, was
amazing.

Walking slowly back toward the house at
present, Max reached the side yard and cut up to to the back.

Madeline and Mitch were at the far end of the
table, sifting through a box of CD’s with the girls. Apparently,
they had wanted to add a last minute song—or rather begged Brook
to. So while they were searching out Sheryl Crowe, Jordan was
seated on his end— a short cigarette in on hand, the other leafing
through one of Madeline’s old photograph albums.

Max’s eyes went over her bare legs. All the
women were in shorts because it was a hot day. Jordan wore cut offs
with a white tank and light blue sports bra. She had on cloth
converse. Her hair was colored— apparently, for the debut the next
day, a snowy white, with jade green streaked in the front and side
bangs. He liked it. He honestly found it sexy. Yeah cute and hip.
But sexy—like he didn’t expect to.

She flipped the album closed and then looked
up.

He said the first thing that came to mind, “I
was just going in to get coffee for everyone. Mind helping?”

Her look was skeptical but she hopped down,
crushed the cigarette, and scooped up the album. He watched her
unwrap peppermint and pop it in her mouth before catching up with
him.

Inside, Max went to the kitchen, Jordan to
the den first— where she replaced the album. She came back and sat
at the rustic counter, forearms the surface, and fingers fiddling
with a pen that had been laying there.

While the coffee brewed, the sounds of Donna
playing an acoustic and Brook singing drifted through the window.
Max move to stand across from her. Watching her hands a moment
before he reached and captured one, turned it over, and lightly
brushed the calluses on her fingertips.

“Sore?”

“A little.” Her body language was immediately
guarded.

“Nervous about playing at the Mill?”

“Yeah. What we do there, may decide if we get
booked at clubs. Depends on if people like us enough to come out
and see us, too.”

“You blew people away at the Tavern. They’re
talking about you already. You have word of mouth, people who told
others. And they’ll come out—”

“Thanks, like I need more pressure.” She
snorted.

Max took heart when she at least didn’t yank
her hand back yet.

Rubbing over each fingertip, he held her gaze
before he looked over her face and found himself confessing, “I
need your help with something.”

“What.” This time, she did move her hand. Not
fast, just easing it away.

Gaze locked with hers again, Max supplied
quietly, “I’m into you. This is not some line, or slick rich boy
move. I am out of my element with you. I won’t pretend not to know
why. Because, I never had to try to get women. This isn’t just
about that though…”

She dropped her eyes to the counter.

“I don’t want to screw up” He went on; “I
would be lying if I said I didn’t want to charm you, flirt with
you. But I don’t even think you like me. And I really want you
to.”

Her face flushed just a hint. She didn’t look
up. “It’s a waste of time, for both of us.”

“Look, Jordan. I hear what you’re saying. A
guy with plenty of girls to choose from. Just go find one of them
and forget about me. Thing is, I don’t want to. I’m not sure—I
can.”

She was shaking her head, saying almost under
her breath, “There are things you don’t know.”

“I want to—”

She got up abruptly, obviously upset as she
blurt, “I’m not just some—Harley riding, guitar chick, who waits
tables and wears leather. There are days—I can barely hang on.” She
took off, into the den, and Max came around the counter, following
her.

He said, “And I’m not so shallow that I’d
judge you, or take off because you’re not just what some people
perceive.”

He stood close, behind her. She had her arms
crossed tightly. Self-protecting.

“We’re all more than surface, Jordan. We all
have a past and shit, we deal with. Sure, if I want a woman for
good times, I know where they are. They see me the same. I don’t
let them below the surface— because that’s the line I’ve
drawn.”

“I’m not good with games, Max.” She turned
around, her expression vulnerable, emotional

“Look.” He reached out, hands cupping her
shoulders. “Give me a chance. At least that. I am not saying I
can’t be an ass, or make mistakes. But, you’ve already shown, you
can cut me off at the knees. Nothing serious is going to be smooth
and easy, all the time. I am not out to hurt you, use you, or just
have a thing, because you’re different from women I have been with.
I’m not playing some game.”

Looking up at him, her eyes probing so deep
Max felt tense all over, she rasped, “I don’t make sense for you.
And you damn sure don’t for someone like me.”

“You can trust me.”

“Right.”

“How can I prove it, if you won’t give me a
shot?”

“We’re not—a good idea.”

He groaned, sliding his hands gently up, to
the sides of her neck, his thumbs stroking her skin. His eyes were
searching hers this time. Max felt a little desperate. “You’re not
attracted to me?”

“Is that for your ego?”

“Yes.” He laughed softly.

“Yes.”

That simple admission sent a rush through his
blood.

Max tilted his head down... “Give me a
chance, Jordan.” He stepped closer, his fingers nudging her head
back. Inching closer to touching her mouth with his, he promised,
“I’ll be worth it.” His mouth touched, brushed hers lightly,
teasing, pressed easy and brief before he raised his head
again.

“You’ll be trouble.” She claimed huskily.

He grinned, gently, “I’ll be patient.”

“A real saint, huh?”

“No. But that’s what being up front and
honest will get you. Doesn’t matter if I don’t like your answer, or
your limits, you still have to express them. We males need the
verbal stuff.”

He pulled her into an easy embrace, still
watching her face. “I want you.”

Eyes heavy-lidded, shimmery despite her only
reluctantly putting her hands on his lower back, she murmured,
“That’s— a problem.”

“Why?” he whispered attending her expression
and her voice inflections closely. The puzzle. The enigma.

“I don’t.”

“You don’t—”He left it open, but pondered it,
because he knew what she meant.

“Guys get it, and drop you.”

“Guys? Or the guy who did you that way?”

“Long story.”

Max stroked her back. “How long ago?”

“Years…almost eight.”

He pulled her closer, his embrace snugger,
his head moved so he could say intimately in her ear, “You were
barely a grown up then. Guys are jerks. You haven’t had a boyfriend
since then?”