My eyes narrowed.
Max Dread, while volatile, was at least predictable in when his bursts ofattitudecame. He despised being alone with me, despised seeing me with Kingston, despised my existence.
I hadn’t done anything to warrant it. At least, not that I remembered, and yet, he was always there, glaring at me like I’d ruin his day simply by…being.
But I focused on what Quinn had shared.
About how I reminded him of what had happened last year, and the way he brought up the memories for me. About how he struggled with guilt, blaming himself because he didn’t save her—Desi.
And I needed to do this because I’d promised Quinn.
I had to broach the subject before we finished tonight. But I had a feeling he’d be more agreeable to my attempts to ease his conscience if I cleaned up more before I did it, so I swept the rest of the clippings into a pile.
It wasn’t stalling. It was attacking—no,approaching—a problem proactively.
“How’d she do?”
Max’s question came out of nowhere. He didn’t look at me. Refused to make eye contact when I turned to face him, but he’d asked me a question not laced with his normal derision.
That was good, right?
Things had been simpler before my memories started returning. Now, I had all these thoughts and extra feelings clouding my awareness. Analyzing situations and people had taken little effort at all before, but now…
“You deaf, Golden Boy?”
“Shit. Sorry.” I shook my head to clear it, forcing myself not to get lost in my thoughts, again. “She was…”
I pictured her at the table and smiled at the excitement that had been in her eyes, the fierce expression on her face when she defended her stance on the costar, and the way she’d worked with the other girls.
Aside from Elaine.
“She was perfect.”
Max narrowed his eyes. “They solved it all?”
“Yeah, they figured out every clue. Quinn took the lead on a lot of it. She pieced together a few of the bigger clues, too. How’d it go in yours?”
The second group of Ladies had been in a different cabin, overseen by Max, and with one of Quinn’s biggest rivals being on that team, I hoped he said they failed miserably.
“Every clue but one.”
“Damn.” That meant the scores would be close. Too close. “Well, I guess we’ll see what happens through the next two rooms. Quinn might get more points for time if Elaine ends up on the other team.”
Max chortled, barely suppressing his glee over my choices. “Still can’t believe you fucked that up.”
I kept my mouth shut because I still had to ride back with the jerk, and I didn’t need to go down that path again. Warring with myself. Racked with guilt over Elaine. In the end, I couldn’t regret the choices I’d made.
Max Dread could think whatever he wanted about that. About me. That was what he was good at, anyway.
“What? Got nothing to say about that?”
“I don’t regret what I did, Dread.”
“Of course, you don’t.” He scoffed. “If Elaine sticks around and takes your bestie out of the running, that means you only have one more obstacle to remove to get what you want.”
“If that’s what you think, you don’t know me.”
“Oh, that’s right. I forgot. You’re hisright hand. You’d give up anything forhim. And I’ll be waiting when you do.”
