He moved his hand up from Connor’s ass to the middle of his back,pulling him in just a little closer.
Connor smelled of rosemary and mandarins. That was the scent, Maxdecided.
It was sweet, but it was unmistakably masculine. There was nopretending Connor wasn’t a man.
Max didn’t even want to. Not really.
It was okay that Connor was a man. He knew that. He lived inHopeSprings, he was used to the idea that some people were gay.
He had a whole lot of questions for himself, and he suspected heknew what the answers were, but he wasn’t ready to set them in stone. Wasn’tready to voice them at all, even inside his own head.
For now, he just wanted to enjoy the moment.
“Feeling better?” Connor asked, shifting his weight to getcomfortable.
Max chuckled. “Yeah. That was, uh…”
“Intended to cheer you up,” Connor finished for him.
Max was grateful that Connor wasn’t turning this into a big deal.Or asking any awkward questions.
He was just letting Maxbe, which was probably what Maxliked so much about him. Connor was easy to just exist around.
“Consider me cheered up,” Max said.
Connor groaned, leaning back and looking Max in the eyes. Hiseyelids were heavy, eyes still glazed and unfocused, and hair a mess.
It was a good look on him.
So was the slow smirk spreading over his lips.
“I’ll get a washcloth or something to clean us up. You just…relax.”
Max nodded, letting Connor go and watching him hitch hissweatpants back up over his ass as he walked away. The tiniest twinge ofarousal hit him, but he was too spent for it to do anything other than fizzleout.
All of this had been really,reallyhot. Max had never beenso worn out after coming, so deeply satisfied. His worries were quiet for thefirst time in a long time.
All he could think about right now was how much he wanted Connorto come back and snuggle up next to him. Maybe they could even take that naphe’d offered earlier.
Everything else could wait.
Chapter Seventeen
Connor’s stomach felt like one big knot as he pushed open the doorto the bookstore, the bell above suddenly deafening.
He’d woken up this morning to find that Max had slipped awaywithout a goodbye, and he’d been waiting anxiously for ten o’clock to rollaround so he could go and see him.
Then he’d stood pacing in front of his door for twenty minutes,worrying that he’d screwed everything up and Max wouldn’t be happy to see him.
What if Max regretted last night? What if he wanted to pretendnothing had happened?
What if he hated Connor now, or felt like he’d been takenadvantage of?
Thankfully, the store was empty except for Max behind the coffeecounter. Ash and Declan had taken to letting him open up while they had lazymornings, which Connor thought was about what he’d do if he owned a bookstoreand had someone as reliable as Max to run it.
Taking a deep breath, Connor approached the counter, where Max waswiping down the coffee machine. The morning rush had clearly subsided, so inhindsight, Connor’s twenty minutes of pacing had probably been a good thing.
“Hey,” Max said, glancing up at him.
