“I wasn’t. But I got a call from a hysterical woman and I thought maybe I should come tend to my home.”
I gulped, my stomach sinking. “Max, I—” I didn’t know what to say. I’d been cruel to Lilly, purposely trying to hurt her, while lying through my teeth. None of what I’d said had been true, but I’d wanted her to hurt.
Looks like it worked.
The very thought made me want to vomit again.
Max stood, and I stepped back. He was still in his suit from work, the top button of his shirt undone, blonde curls peeking out from underneath. Had he come home becauseof Lilly’s call and started drinking? I wasn’t sure which was worse; him coming home to address me, or him having been already home, in hopes that he’d be able to fix things between us.
“No, come into the room. Shut the door, Daisy. I think maybe we have that talk early.” He came forward, his arm reaching out behind me and grabbing the knob. He slammed the door shut, and I flinched when he tried to touch me.
“What talk?” I asked, my eyes shooting to the ceiling, where directly above us was the nursery he’d designed. I knew exactly what he wanted to discuss. “I was heading to bed. Can we talk tomorrow?”
“Why wait? I think you made it clear with Lilly what our plans are. Why not hammer them out now? I can have the news run it in tomorrow’s paper.”
The very thought made bile rise in my throat. I swallowed the nausea down as Max reached me. He leaned in for a kiss, and I ducked.
“What? Does your fiancé not get a kiss?”
“Max,” I sighed. “This is silly. I shouldn’t have said anything to her. I don’t know what came over me.”
“Easy, you were jealous.” He let out a laugh. He wasn’t mad? He went to the bar on the wall to the left and refilled his drink. “I think it’s sexy. I didn’t think you could feel such a way toward me, Daisy. I really didn’t.”
“I don’t want to talk about this. I’m tired, Max.” I sighed deeply, my shoulders curling in. Setting his drink down, he returned to me, sliding behind me. He put his hands around my middle and pulled me into him. He grew hard, and I blanched.
“Well then, let’s get you to bed, Daisy, my love,” he whispered in my ear. The whiskey on his breath wafted to my nose, and I frowned. His fingers played with the bottom ofmy negligee top. They slid under the lace and touched my skin. It was like ice water. I jerked forward, but he dug his fingers into me, keeping me in place. “I’d like to join you.”
“I can get to my room myself. Thank you, though.”
“Yes, but what’s the fun in that?” He chuckled. “If I’d known how you really felt about me, we would have been doing this a lot more.”
“Doing what?” I snapped and brought my empty hand to one of his, trying to pull it away to no avail. Instead, his hand went in the other direction, slipping past the waistband of my shorts. “We’re not doing anything.”
“Oh, I think we are. After my phone call earlier, I got to thinking. What if we moved the timeline of things around?” He moved his hand over my panties, his fingers running down the line of my sex. I closed my eyes tightly. “We could be married by fall.”
This wasn’t happening.
Flashes of my day with Gatsby exploded in my mind, and two single tears slid from my eyes silently. Just like before, we’d only gotten one day before it was all taken from us.
He continued to stroke me as he spoke.
“I don’t want to do this...” I whispered.
“There’s already one kid. I need a son.”
He’d thought I’d meant this, right here. Sex. My confession was more than that. Gatsby’s smile crossed my mind. I needed to figure out how to get out of this. All of this. This was more than just the moment of time we were in.
“Max, please...” I pleaded. “I just wanted some water.”
He pulled his left hand out from under my shirt and reached for the water. He tried to take it, and when I wouldn’t give it freely, a low growl came from his throat and he slapped it out of my hand. The glass fell to the floor with a loud thud and water splashed everywhere. I let out a sharpcry of surprise as I watched it roll away, but quickly shut my mouth. His hand in my shorts grew aggressive, cupping and squeezing me until I whimpered.
“Oh, I love hearing you scream. You’ll be doing more than that here in a bit. I’m confused. Do you want me or not, Daisy? Did you lie when speaking to Lilly?”
“Does my body not tell you enough?” I snapped.
He pulled his hands back, spun me to face him, and squeezed my shoulders, pushing me backward until I tripped, and we fell onto his oversized settee.
“You know, she begged me to fuck her on this couch?” Max climbed on top of me and roughly squeezed my breast over my shirt. He pinched my nipple hard, and I closed my eyes again, begging for this not to be real. He pressed hot, wet, drunk kisses on my jaw, moving down to lick my neck and collarbone. “And I almost did. I was tempted to, I really was. But it felt wrong to do such an act in the house I’d be sharing with my wife.”
