“I was playing tonight,” Max abruptly continued, “my hands moving over the keys, and all I could think about was running them over this beautiful body of yours.” He slid a little further inside her, and Bo inhaled sharply. “I was stuck for hoursafterwards, making small talk with people who I’m sure are very important and well-to-do, and all I could think about wasyou.”
He slammed into her suddenly, and Bo arched her back to meet him.Fuck, that’s deep,she thought, her mind and body no longer her own, but controlled by him and the lust he inspired in her.
“Do you know how much I thought about you after our first night together?” Inexplicably, Max was still talking. He was balls-deep inside of her andmonologuing,Bo realized with a stab of annoyance. She wanted him to get on with the act that would bring them both release. She didn’t want a David Attenborough-style narration of their situationship. She wriggled a little, hoping to spur Max on, but he laid a palm on her stomach, stopping her. “I thought about you all the time,” he confessed, and abruptly, the hand on her stomach grew soft, stroking her skin and making her pause. “You have no idea how much I wanted to do this again. How much I wantedyou.”
Bo listened carefully now. Max was never normally this open with her; never normally this raw and honest. Without thinking twice, she brought her hand to meet his, taking hold of the fingers that still stroked her skin and holding them tight. Max’s eyes travelled to where their hands met, and something in his face changed.
“Max,” Bo whispered, “Max.”
There was nothing more she could say though. As if aware he’d shared too much of himself, Max began to move above her, each thrust hard and determined, as if he could erase the feelings he’d experienced within her and her body. His hand still held hers and hers still held his, and something was different this time, with Max’s eyes locked with her own. She wrapped her legs around his waist, wanting him as close as he could be, and something wet, hot and needy began to build within her.
Max’s movements grew faster, almost frantic, and suddenly, it all felt like too much for Bo. There was too much behind the gaze in his eyes, too much in the caress of his hand in hers, too much ofthemand too much of Max in her mind and body. Willa had warned her: she got attached too easily, and Bo knew she was right. She and Max weren’t meant to be likethis.They weren’t meant to be holding hands or locking eyes or sharing feelings. They were meant to be casual. It was merely an arrangement. A bit of harmless fun for them both.
This didn’t feel harmless though.
This was beginning to feel like something else.
Wrenching her hand from his, Bo pushed herself away from him, taking deep breaths. Max looked at her in surprise, and she shook her head.
“From behind,” she said, turning onto all fours. She needed a position that was impersonal. One where they couldn’t lock eyes or touch hands.
Max obliged, although something in his body changed. He was harder, more demanding, one hand snaking around her body to rub between her legs. Bo felt her orgasm being wrenched from her, the rapturous response of her body at odds with the now-detached atmosphere between her and Max. It was reminiscent of the first time they’d slept together, when they’d truly been strangers. Since then, she thought she’d wanted to know who Max really was, but it hadn’t occurred to her that she mightlikethe person behind the concept. That thought terrified her. She did get attached too easily, and with that attachment normally came hurt. Her father, her brother, Oliver, Geoffrey . . . these were men she’d attached herself to and they’d all left her. She’d lost her father to cancer, her brother to warzones and the trauma that followed, Oliver to another woman and Geoffrey to his broken heart.
The whole point of Max is that I don’t get attached,Bo reminded herself.He’s not even my type. It’s meant to be sex without any feelings; fast-food orgasms.
When Max cried out behind her, his body sagging slightly with relief over her back, Bo came back to herself. Without saying a word she stood, her legs shaking slightly, and picked up her towel from the back of the door, pulling it around her naked body. Max watched her quietly, before he also stood, pulling off the condom. Bo held out her hand and took it wordlessly, turning to dispose of it and giving Max a moment to dress. When she turned back, he was once again wearing the terrible-but-still-kind-of-sexy chino shorts with sandals on his feet. He was shirtless though, the garish purple shirt in his hands.
“You should probably go,” Bo said, trying to give every impression of being the kind of woman who could do this and do it well. She could keep this casual. Keep this to the arrangement. Of course she could. She wasn’t going to be clingy, or needy, or — God forbid — catchfeelingsof any sort.
“Yes,” Max agreed, his voice chilly with new politeness. “I should let you get back to sleep. Thank you.”
Thank you?!Bo felt her stomach sink, because this was awful. Awful, awful, awful. More than that, it was awkward. So unspeakably, terribly awkward. Bo flushed red, and in the absence of knowing what else to do, offered her hand out for Max to shake.
Max looked at her hand for a long moment, before looking back up to her face. “Bo,” he said calmly, even gently. “We haven’t just made a deal on a long-term Volvo lease. We had sex. I’m not shaking your hand.”
“Right, right.” Bo reddened even more. Before she could lower her hand however, Max pushed his purple shirt into it.
“I told you that you could keep it,” he explained, “and I always keep my word.”
Abruptly, with his hands now free, Max pulled her towards him for a kiss. It was long and hard, his lips moving possessively over her own, and if Max’s hands hadn’t been around her, Bo might just have stumbled to the floor. When Max pulled away, he traced her lower lip with his thumb for a moment.
“I have a performance again in two days,” he said. “Will you be up?”
I can’t do this,Bo suddenly panicked.I can’t. I like him. I really, really like him.
“Will you be up?” Max asked again, his voice lowering a little. He kissed her once more, this time sucking on her lower lip softly, and it was like magic, in a way.
“Yes,” Bo said, nodding confidently. “I’ll be up.”
Chapter Twelve
Willa called the next day, waking Bo early from what she had intended to be a late sleep.
“It’s seven in the morning,” Willa stated, when Bo mumbled a sleep-crusted hello down the phone. “You’re normally up and bouncing around the garden by this point.”
“I’m not working today, and I had a late night,” Bo replied, stifling back a yawn. “I needed to catch up on some sleep.”
“A late night? Hm. Let me guess . . . Mr Two out of Ten again?”
