Chapter Five
“Do you want to tell me what’s going on?” Dylan asked.
Max took a quick glance up at his best friend, before getting back down to work. They had several membership requests for Ménage that he needed to get through. They’d been sitting on his desk for a few weeks, and seeing as he or Dylan had to accept them, he decided to get to it.
“I’m working.”
Dylan sighed and stepped into the office, closing the door. “They said you were hiding in here.”
“By they, I assume you mean our employees.”
“Okay, something is bothering you,” Dylan said, taking a seat. “What gives?”
“Nothing gives. We have businesses to run.”
“And we’ve got the woman of our dreams waiting for us at home. You’ve been … off since the other night, and don’t say you haven’t. I’ve noticed. Raine’s noticed. Seeing as you left first thing yesterday and haven’t talked to her all day. You were gone this morning.”
Max put down his pen and turned his attention to his friend. “Your point?”
Dylan pursed his lips. “What the fuck?”
“I have work to do.”
“I get the robot routine. I always have. I get it. It’s all part of your charm, but Raine is freaking out.”
This made Max tense. “Excuse me?”
“So that has your attention. You’re not pissed off at Raine for being with us.”
Max sat back.
“And now you’re frowning.”
“I’m not good at … everything else,” Max said.
“You’re not good at communicating, that’s for sure. What are you not good at now?” Dylan asked.
“Afterward.”
“So?”
Max stood and started to pace the floor of his office. It wasn’t a large space because he didn’t like to work in clutter. There were a few pieces of artwork on the walls, but again, nothing to distract him from actually working.
“You know I’m not good at being the kind of man women want or even need. I’m not built that way.”
“Hold on a second, you’re giving Raine the cold shoulder because you don’t know how to handle being a simple human being?”
“Now that you say it like that, it sounds wrong.”
“Because it is wrong,” Dylan said.
“It’s not supposed to be wrong. This is … this isn’t what I meant,” he said. “Raine is a beautiful, amazing woman.”
“I know this.”
“I don’t want to screw that up.”
Dylan ran a hand down his face. “And you think being a cold man who ignores her is going to achieve that?”
Max tapped his fingers against his thigh. “You’ve always dealt with the women … after.”
Silence fell in the room.
Seconds passed. Which turned into minutes.
Dylan burst out laughing. “Holy fucking shit, I can’t believe you are doing this to me.”
“Doing what to you?”
“Raine isn’t just some woman we got off on. She’s not suddenly going to turn her back on us and ignore us, Max.”
Max moved to the edge of his desk. “I know.”
“Then you need to get your ass home, and you need to talk to her.”
“I’ve got work to do.” The thought of going home and facing Raine terrified him, but he wasn’t a cowardly man. He was used to going after what he wanted. Raine was the woman he wanted, and having her tight cunt wrapped around his dick had been the best feeling in the world. Better than he ever thought possible.
Then like everything in his life, reality set in.
Raine was a woman full of passion. That he could understand. He spoke that language, but everything else in between, he was … not used to.
Emotions.
Feelings.
Saying the right thing. Knowing what his woman needed.
The women he and Dylan shared in the past hadn’t stuck around. They only wanted a bit of weekend fun. Raine was different.
To start, he cared about her. He wanted to see her soar. He craved all her smiles and took great pleasure in her laughter. There was no chance he ever wanted that to stop.
He knew deep in his heart that if he stuck around, he was going to hurt her. Saying the right thing didn’t come easy to him.
Dylan slapped the desk with his hands. “You’re scared of saying or doing the wrong thing. I get it. But you’ve got to know Raine isn’t like other women. She isn’t going to hate you.”
“I have work to do.” Working was easier than having this conversation.
Dylan lingered in the office for a couple more minutes before finally giving up and leaving with the appropriate door slamming.
He collapsed back in his chair, throwing his pen onto the tabletop.
“He’s a weirdo.”
“No one is going to want to be friends with him.”
“Can’t you just be normal?”
Max ran fingers through his hair and sat up.
People had always been complicated to him. Apart from Dylan. His best friend had been there through thick and thin.
Picking up his pen, he looked down at the three member requests. There were no red flags on any of the applications, and he’d checked over the background checks they all had to submit to. He signed off on all three and once he was done, he sat back.