“Well?” I asked. He still held my hand, and I should’ve probably let him go before someone came in and saw us, but instead I curled my fingers around his.
He smiled down at me, the small private smile that I’d always claimed as mine. “I don’t have any answers for you. We’re just going to have to talk to people and see what we can get away with. Xen’s orders are… not exactly detailed.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, he told us we can only touch as pack members would.” He nodded at our still joined hands. “But we can do this.” He raised my hand to an inch from his mouth. “And it made me wonder…” He brushed a kiss over the back of my hand, a whisper of a touch, but I felt iteverywhere.
“Max,” I cautioned. “We stopped doing this for a reason.”
“I know.”
I closed my eyes as he kissed my hand again. “It hurts too much when we have to stop.”
He sighed. Warm breath skated over my skin, his scent wrapping around me, weakening my resolve enough that I didn’t protest when he nipped the tip of my thumb, drawing it into his mouth.
My breath hitched, blood rushing south so quickly I felt dizzy with it. Voices sounded far enough away that they wouldn’t be here any time soon, but it was enough to bring me to my senses.
Max too, judging by the way he dropped my hand and sat back, away from me.
“Sorry,” he murmured, his eyes full of everything he wanted to say but couldn’t.
“Me too.” I took a moment, closing my eyes and trying to calm my racing heart. Fuck only knew what it smelt like in here. Not that it was against the rules to get involved with someone we worked with, but the station was like any other job. People gossiped. If word got back to Xen or Frost, then we’d be in trouble for sure.
“Sooo, I met your new partner,” Max said after a while.
I opened my eyes to look at him. Hard to gauge what he was thinking because his expression gave nothing away. It stung. I was used to reading him easily, and suddenly not having that depth of connection hurt in a way I wasn’t prepared for.
Maybe it was for the best while we navigated this path between friends and lovers. Maybe Max was doing me a favour, or maybe he was protecting himself. Either way, the middle of the office wasn’t the place to dissect it.
Forcing my voice to sound normal, I asked, “What are they like then?”
“Hot,” Max answered with a shrug. “You’ll like him.”
Eyes narrowed, I stared at him for a beat too long, because what the fuck did that mean?
He exhaled like he’d been holding his breath for years, his shoulders slumped with it, andthere, there was the Max I could read like a book. “Fuck. I don’t know why I said that. Not that he isn’t hot, because he is.”
“Fae.” I agreed with a shrug of my own because I’d yet to meet one who wasn’t striking in some way.
That drew a smile and Max huffed out a laugh. “True.” It faded just as fast, replaced by yet another sigh, and I hated seeing him like this. Max was sunshine ninety percent of the time. Warmth and laughter, a solid rock for everyone he cared about. Anything other than a smile on his face always seemed wrong.
Admittedly, the last couple of months had been tough, but selfishly I missed his infectious good moods, needed them to keep me sane. Maybe it was my turn to be the one to keep our spirits up when everything was going to shit around us. “Tell me about him,” I said, swivelling in my chair to face him better and plastering a smile on my face. “Apart from being hot, what else should I expect on Monday?”
Max hesitated, then between one breath and the next, he shook off whatever had been on his mind and took my cue to act as normal as we could. “Well, apparently he and Dathal have history.” He grinned, not as open and genuine as I was used to, but not far off. I’d take that.
“That should go down well with Nick then.” I wasn’t an expert on fae joining pacts, but if they were anything like shifter bonds, then possessiveness was a huge factor.
“He wasn’t happy.” Max relaxed the more he spoke, easing into our usual back and forth and it was like sliding into a warm bath—relaxing, comforting, familiar.
“Oh, he was there?”
“Yep. And got quite pissy until Dathal brought up Axel.”
I laughed, couldn’t help it, and I felt a million times lighter after it. “I’d forgotten about that.”
Max chuckled. “I imagine there’ll be a lot of possessive sex action going on in the Vharin-Parker house tonight.”
And just like that the tension snapped back into the room, so thick I could almost feel it on my skin.
