Crazy for Love (12 page)

Her heart beat so hard that it drowned out even the cries of the gulls around them. Elliott had only been waiting for a sign, it seemed, because any sense of innocence in his touch stopped in that moment. His lips brushed hers, parting just enough that she knew he wanted to taste her. When she opened for him, his hand crept up to cradle the nape of her neck. He held her and tasted her, his tongue rubbing slowly over hers as the wind caressed her skin.

Elliott's body was just as solid as she could've imagined. He was a rock, steady and strong, holding all her weight as she sighed and tried to take him deeper. He kissed just as she'd expected, too. Serious and focused, with a sensitivity that matched the sadness in his eyes.

By the time he drew away, she could barely catch her breath.

He brushed his thumb over her cheek, sliding a strand of hair behind her ear. “I'm not the kind of guy you normally date.”

She shook her head.

“But this is still a date.”

“Okay,” she whispered.

He slid his fingers between hers and they walked, and for a moment, Jenn thought that maybe everything would be all right.

 

C
HLOE WATCHED
M
AX'S ASS
as he walked toward the bar. His shorts were baggy and too worn to reveal much, but now that she knew what his butt looked like naked, she only needed the highlights to picture it perfectly. It was taut and muscular and so pale compared to the rest of his skin that the sight of it had made her laugh. Max hadn't even minded; he'd just flashed a smile over his shoulder as if he knew exactly what she found funny about his backside.

God, he was adorable.

Sighing, Chloe watched him lean against the bar with a sort of confidence most people never found. The kind of self-assurance that drew your eye. No wonder he found it so easy to control people. In that moment, she felt she'd do anything for his approval.

As she watched, Max spotted a glass too close to the edge of the bar and edged it toward the middle, his relaxed expression not budging an inch.

Her heart clenched with bittersweet desire. It didn't unclench even a smidgen when a waitress in a very short skirt approached him with a very friendly smile. He smiled back and his eyes swept down her long legs, lingering on the spike heels as he spoke. Then he used his foot to scoot an off-kilter barstool out of her path before she could trip.

In that small moment, Chloe became seriously worried about her heart. It had been broken not a month before—or maybe only bruised?—but now it was swelling with frightening tenderness. The perfect dichotomy of the man fascinated her. His beach bum looks and charming smile gave no hint of the tortured soul beneath.

The waitress brought his beer in record time, and he rewarded her with a wink that, literally, made the woman's eyelashes flutter before she made her way back behind the bar to wait for Chloe's piña colada.

My God, that man worked hard.

“Oh, my word!” a woman's voice crowed from a few feet away. Chloe barely registered it.

“I can't believe it!”

She glanced idly toward her right, then did a double take when she realized that the grandmotherly woman was staring right at her. “Pardon?”

“You're Chloe Turner! Oh, my God, my friends are never going to believe this!”

Chloe had been so removed from the circus that it took a moment for her brain to decipher the words.

She'd forgotten about the life she'd left behind. So when the awful warning behind the words finally sank in, the force of it hit her like a giant fist. “No,” she managed.

“Hold on a sec. Let me get a picture for proof.”

Pure panic speared down her body like lightning. “No! I'm not that person.”

The woman's delighted smile hung on. “You are though, right?”

“No. My name's Jenn. Not…who did you say?”

The smile snapped to a frown as the prospect of a lost story reared its ugly head. “Chloe Turner. The Bridezilla.”

Chloe shrugged, trying to keep her eye from twitching.

“The one whose fiancé crashed his plane on purpose!”

“Ooh. Right. No, that's definitely not me. I'm from Florida.”

“Florida?” The woman's hand finally emerged from her purse with cell phone in grasp. “Why would someone from Florida come out to a Virginia island?”

“Oh…” Chloe's eyes rolled wildly as she tried to think of a plausible lie. Her gaze landed on Max, propped against the bar, eyes locked on a car race on the television. “You know…an illicit affair.”

The woman's eyes slid toward Max and widened. “Oh!”

“Yeah.” She cleared her throat and shifted with the need to jump up and sprint from the building.

“Well, you look just like her. Maybe a little thinner.”

Nice. Chloe forced a smile as she shrugged and searched out the nearest exit, just in case. But as her gaze shifted, she noted that Max was no longer at his place at the bar and snapped her eyes back to where he'd been. He was halfway back to the table, beer in one hand and piña colada in the other.

Chloe jumped about a foot and spun toward the stranger. “Okay, go on now. This is a secret affair. If he thinks someone knows about it, he'll bolt. Go on!”

The woman's overplucked brown eyebrows fell to
a hard frown, but she headed back toward her table in a huff.

Chloe swung toward Max with a smile that felt as if it might shatter at any moment. “Hey!”

“Hey, yourself. What's wrong?”

“Nothing! Why? What?” She snatched the glass from his hand with a strangled giggle.

His eyes slid to the side. “Who's that woman?”

Perched on the edge of her chair, Chloe swallowed a big gulp of sweet slush. “Who?” she rasped.

“The woman who was over here. The one who's taking your
picture
right now.”

Christ on a cracker. Chloe tried not to look in the woman's direction, then realized that would be a singularly strange reaction and snapped around to look.

“Her? Oh, she was asking about my hair. I guess she likes it.”

The dilemma Max faced wrote itself in broad strokes across his features as his gaze flicked over her hair. Yes, her hair looked like a twiggy nest that had been ground into his pillow for a good hour. But could he say that to a woman he'd just started sleeping with? No, he could not.

He cleared his throat. “Also, you look upset.”

“Nope!”

“Chloe, you're pale as a ghost.”

Shit, shit, shit. They should've stayed at his cabin.
They had food and drink there, but he'd looked so boneless and relaxed that she hadn't wanted to subject him to the dangers of the old stove. She'd been the one to suggest that they skip cooking and come to the bar for a burger. What an idiotic idea.

Now she couldn't very well backtrack and ask for the steaks instead, not when he suspected that something strange was going on. “I'm just really hungry all of a sudden. Low blood sugar.”

His eyes went round, as if she'd just smacked a sensitive part of his body. “Low blood sugar? Why didn't you say something?” He snatched her drink from her hand and shoved the menu at her. “Let's get you some food. They've got bowls of pretzels at the bar, I'll grab one of those, all right?”

“Sure,” she answered his empty chair. Max was back and banging the bowl of pretzels on the table before she could even sneak another sip of her drink.

“What do you want to eat?”

“Guacamole burger,” she answered after popping a pretzel obediently into her mouth. “Will that pair well with a piña colada, though?”

“Not funny,” he muttered, then took off for the bar at a jog. This anxiety issue of his could really pay off under the right circumstances.

Still pretty damn anxious herself, Chloe stole a glance toward the evil grandmother. She was gone.
The sight of the vacant table should've capped the fear bubbling inside Chloe's chest, but somehow everything just solidified in the space behind her heart.

This wasn't good. It wasn't good at all. This was a small community. The woman would talk to a friend. The friend would call the girl she used to babysit who now just happened to work at the front desk of the resort. The room was registered under Jenn's name, but a quick Internet search would reveal that Jenn Castellan was a name that showed up in interviews about Chloe Turner. Someone would call a gossip rag for the excitement or for the $500 tip-off prize. Either way, this vacation was over. Island Chloe was going home.

M
AX STRETCHED HARD
before collapsing back into the pillows. He didn't open his eyes. He couldn't. Whatever time it was, it was way too damn early. Chloe had spent the night, and between talking and making love over and over again, he was so exhausted he felt slightly beat up. In fact, his back still stung faintly with the evidence she'd left with her nails. Hell, yeah.

That memory perked him up, and Max dared to open his eyes against the glare of sunshine pouring through the white curtains. White curtains. A complete waste of material.

At first he could see nothing but brightness. Then he registered the pillow mounded about two inches from his face. A slight shift of his head revealed the rumpled sheets next to his arm. There was no naked woman curled into them. Damn.

A few minutes later he summoned the energy to turn his head the other way to check the time. No
wonder the sun was so darn bright. It was almost eleven o'clock. He watched the second hand make a few sweeps around the face of the old-fashioned alarm clock and then he pushed up and forced his feet to the floor. He stretched until his spine popped in all the places he was starting to feel his age.

Sure, he was only thirty-five, but he'd spent a lot of those years on the sea lifting heavy tanks and being banged around by storms.

Another reason he needed to get off that damn ship. With a groan, he launched himself from the bed and grabbed a T-shirt and shorts from the floor.

Elliott glanced up from his paper, but wisely only raised an eyebrow in greeting as Max headed for the coffeepot.

“Thank God,” Max muttered when he saw the steam rising from the pot. He poured a cup and collapsed into a chair at the table.

Half the cup was empty by the time Elliott folded the paper and cleared his throat. “So, you and Chloe?”

“Yeah?”

Elliott shrugged. “You seem to be hitting it off.”

“I guess we are. What about you and Jenn?”

“What about us?”

Max rolled his eyes at the stiffness in his brother's voice. “You seem to like her.”

“Of course I like her. She's pretty and sweet. But…she's out of my league. I'm not going to make that mistake again.”

Scowling, Max raised his gaze from his coffee to his brother's face. “What the hell are you talking about?” Jenn was nothing like Elliott's ex-wife, as far as Max could tell. She was modest and had a quiet strength about her…along with a lot of nervousness.

“We went out and we had a nice time. That's it. No big deal.”

“You gonna ask her out again?”

“I don't think so.”

“Why?”

Elliott shook his head. “I don't want to date someone I'll have to worry about. Whether she's happy or bored or needing something better. I need someone who's not so…beautiful.”

“She seems really nice.”

“She is.”

“So you're going to set her aside just because of how she looks?”

His glare was so hot it nearly singed Max's eyebrows. “I don't mean she's good-looking. I mean she's beautiful, and that's too much for me right now.”

“All right,” Max offered, holding up his hands in appeasement. “I got it. Just don't start crying.”

“Jesus.” Elliott coughed in a half laugh. “I'll try to hold back.”

“Thanks.”

“What about you? You think you can talk about Chloe without getting choked up? Because you looked pretty damn starry-eyed last night.”

“Ha,” he laughed, even as his thoughts turned serious.

“She doesn't seem like the kind of girl you usually date. She's a little…too normal.”

“Yes.” His heart turned over at the words. “She is. She totally is.” Chloe. The thought of her name lodged in his chest and shook there like a crazed bird. She was normal, and she was earthy and sexy and curvy and calm.

And Max was headed back to the damn sea in a few weeks. The sea and people he'd known for years. Friends who had never seen anything past the show he put on for them. Nobody out there on the water was like Chloe.

“I'd better hit the shower,” he said, just as a man's shout floated through the front windows. When he glanced over, Max's head swam with discomfort. A few seconds later, he found himself still staring blearily toward the windows. Then a second shout came, this one a different voice.

Suddenly worried about the women, Max stood at the same moment Elliott did, and they rushed
for the porch together. The sight that greeted them was…strange. Alarming, yes. But not dangerous.

Two photographers stood on the sand about twenty feet away, their cameras pointed in the direction of the women's cabin. Another man held a professional video camera and panned the beach around them. All of them were weighted down with film and extra equipment. The videographer even had a steady-cam system. These people were a familiar sight to Max.
Paparazzi.

For a moment, he thought it had something to do with Genevieve. Ridiculous, of course. He hadn't seen her in nine months. And why would she be here, anyway? But Genevieve's insane lifestyle had been his only experience with paparazzi. Luckily, he'd stood on the sidelines for most of that, just as he did now.

“What the hell?” he muttered.

Keeping an eye on the cameramen, Max stepped barefoot onto the sand and stalked toward the other cabin. The cameras began to click when his foot touched Chloe's porch. “What the
hell?
” he repeated with a little more strength as he raised a fist to pound on the door.

It didn't open, so he knocked again. The sun bounced off the closed door and stabbed into his eyes like knives.

Finally, it snapped open. “Max,” Chloe said, a tension pulling her voice lower than normal.

“What's going on? Are you okay?”

“Yes,” she answered, which would've been ridiculous even if her eyes hadn't been red from crying. There were photographers outside, after all.

“Chloe, there are paparazzi on the sand!”

Her eyes flickered toward them, the intensity in her gaze flat and dark. “I know.”

“So what the hell is going on?”

As the clicking grew more frantic behind him, she opened the door wider and pulled him in. The door shut out the cameras with a slam. He swung to face her, holding up his palms and hoping an explanation would fall into them.

But Chloe's jaw was clenched tightly, as if she wouldn't give up the truth for anything. She looked exhausted and sad, but she didn't look shocked. She didn't look like a girl should look when confronted with her first pack of crazed photographers.

“Who are you?” he whispered.

Her gaze met his, hazel eyes unflinching as she stared him down. “You know who I am.”

“I don't think I do.”

“I'm Chloe Turner. That's all.”

He pulled his focus from her eyes and looked at the closed curtains shutting out the sight of the beach.
“That's not all you are, clearly. Can we please not pretend that I'm an idiot? What is all this about?”

A soft scuff distracted him from his growing anger, and Max turned to see Jenn getting up from the couch. Offering him a careful nod, she walked slowly toward her bedroom and closed the door behind her.

Chloe was still standing by the front door of the cabin, as if she were frozen to the floorboards. Her face was nearly as pale as the curtains behind her.

“Maybe you should sit down,” he offered, smothering his anger with concern.

She cut a hand through the air, seemingly impatient with his worry. “I didn't do anything wrong,” she said. A strange starting point.

He crossed his arms and looked at the floor, because he couldn't watch a woman squirm. He couldn't stare her down and watch panic inch over her face.

“I was engaged.” Her voice hitched on the last word.

Max felt his heart hitch, as well. “Engaged?”

“Yes. We'd dated for a couple of years. He asked me to marry him. Then, a month before the wedding, his prop plane crashed into the Great Dismal Swamp.”

He jumped as if someone had swiped a knife over his arm. “Oh, God, Chloe. I'm so sorry. I had no
idea.” He was stepping toward her when her bitter laugh stopped him.

“The plane crashed, but he didn't. Thomas jumped out with a parachute, then caught a bus to a beach resort in Florida. He faked his own death to avoid marrying me.”

“What?
When?
”

She bit her lip and twisted her hands together. “A month ago.”

He stepped back so quickly that he almost fell over the couch.

“I know,” she hurried on. “But it feels like a lifetime ago. Honestly—”

“A
month
ago?”

“Yes, but…it's not as bad as it sounds.”

“Really? I'm thinking it's worse than it sounds, because none of that explains the photographers outside.” Max was shocked at the fury in his own voice. He had no reason to feel such intense anger, but there was a whole host of emotions brewing inside him, and they all seemed intent on pushing anger to the top of the pile.
Engaged?

“I…” Chloe's eyelashes fluttered and her hands hovered helplessly in the air, and the gesture stirred up that mass of emotions in Max's chest, revealing sympathy and fear.

“Chloe—”

“When Thomas was caught, he blamed me. That's
why the paparazzi are here. Because he's convinced the world that I'm the worst Bridezilla that ever walked the face of the earth.”

Max shook his head in confusion.

“I'm famous for being a crazy bitch, Max. Okay?
That's
who I am.”

The more she talked the less sense she made. Chloe wasn't a bitch. And she wasn't crazy.

The sound of the photographers' voices drifted past the closed windows, drawing Max's brow into a scowl.

“I'm sorry,” Chloe whispered. “I know I let you think… I just liked being here with you, pretending everything was okay.”

“That woman at the bar last night. She knew who you were.”

She took a deep breath, and when she exhaled, her body seemed to shrink. “Everyone knows who I am, Max. Everyone who hasn't been living on a boat for the past few months.”

“My brother—”

“He doesn't seem like the kind of guy who watches a lot of TV.”

Max looked around the room as if there were someone else who could help him debunk this ridiculous story.

Chloe walked past him and dropped heavily onto the couch. “Jenn brought me here to escape. We were
hoping it would be isolated enough to give me some peace. And it worked. For a few days.”

“This is… So this is the most important thing in your life right now, and you didn't mention a word of it to me?”

She winced. “It's not who I
am.
Or I didn't think it was. For the past few weeks, I've been lost and doubting myself, and here on the island, with you—” she snuck a glance at him “—I could be who I wanted to be. You should be able to understand that.”

Well, that was a fucking swipe if he'd ever heard one. “Not even close. I was trying to be myself with you. Big difference.”

“You only fessed up when you were caught.”

He ground his teeth together, telling himself not to yell. “That was before we had sex, Chloe. Are you seeing the distinction?”

Instead of fighting back, she looked down at her clasped hands. “I'm sorry. I know I should've told you, but I didn't want to.”

Max knew his limits. If he stayed, he'd sit next to her on the couch and pull her into his arms and tell her it was all right. He'd find some way to protect her from the tiny but virulent mob outside, and try to figure out a way to make everything better.

He couldn't do it. Not again.

“I've gotta go,” he said in such a rush that the words ran together into one desperate gasp.

Chloe's gaze flew to meet his, her face flashing disbelief…as if he'd slapped her. “Oh. Okay.”

“I'm sorry.” And he was. The muscles of his arms were twitching with the need to pull her close. Walking away didn't feel natural though, and as he turned and stepped away it felt as though he were trying to slip free of a spike impaled through his chest. It hurt. And he knew if he just stopped moving, he'd be able to breathe again.

But Max got his hand on the doorknob and turned it, and he stepped out of Chloe's cabin and left her behind. He had to.

 

T
HANK
G
OD FOR
L
EAN
C
UISINE
. Chloe didn't have to leave the cabin, didn't have to open the door. She and Jenn were fine for the day, but they couldn't live like this for the rest of the week.

“Maybe the guys will take us fishing,” Jenn said as she finished off the last of her chicken alfredo. “We could get out of here and the reporters wouldn't be able to follow.”

Chloe slowly shook her head.

“Max was just shocked. He won't stay mad for long.”

“He might,” Chloe murmured, wallowing in self-pity. “He should be.”

“Do you like him?”

She inhaled for a long time, trying to hold off tears, then let her breath out just as slowly. She set her empty Lean Cuisine tray on the coffee table and curled her feet beneath her. “You know I do.”

“So give him a couple of hours and then go talk to him.”

“What's the point? We're going to have to leave, and he's heading back to the ocean anyway.”

“You still shouldn't leave it like this. If you talk it out, you can get in touch again after all this has blown over. Next time he comes back to the States…”

Her heart thumped pitifully at the thought. Maybe Jenn was right. Chloe's life was a disaster right now, but someday it wouldn't be. Maybe someday they could see each other again, casually. Just for a few weeks while he was home.

She didn't blame Max for being mad. She'd pulled him into a maelstrom and he'd been totally blind-sided by the storm. He had every right to be furious, but he didn't seem like the type to stay that way for long. “I don't know. We'll see.”