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He turned to mouth
Riley
.

Of course Riley would be calling for an update. He was probably annoyed we hadn’t called him yet.

“What am I doing?” Max glanced my way and my eyes widened. “Taking a break.” He pushed off the bed and I watched him walk, naked, to his discarded clothes. “Uh-huh.”

He pulled them on, one by one. My heart rate slowed and my body cooled with every movement.

I could’ve predicted what was going to happen even before Max said “one sec” into the phone, then muted it.

“Hey. Riley’s got some information on the leak.”

I bolted upright. “Really?” 

“Yeah. I should deal with it now.” His expression was apologetic, but under the surface, I knew he was already thinking about Titan.

“Want me to get dinner? Maybe I can help.”

“It might take a while. Can I call you later?”

“Sure.” I gathered the pieces of the costume, strewn across the floor. Rather than put it back on, I threw on a robe from the bathroom.

Max caught up to me at the door, the phone back at his ear. I could hear Riley’s smooth baritone but couldn’t make out the words.

Max’s eyes ran over my face. It didn’t escape me that we’d said parted almost the same way last night.

I waited for Max to do something, or say something.

After a moment I gave up, wiggling my fingers and turning down the hall without waiting for a response.

Did I just wave at Max Donovan after we fucked?

Ugh.

I went back to my room and showered for the second time today, losing myself in the steam as I scrubbed my body.

It was hard to believe this afternoon had even happened. But the vague ache between my thighs insisted it had.

Sex with Max was like eating an entire chocolate cake when all you’d ever had for dessert was rice pudding. I was still riding the sugar high and ready for another hit.

But what did Max mean when he said he was worried it would “complicate things”? That he didn’t want any emotional strings? Maybe he didn’t realize what I had: that he was letting me in a little more every day.

The trade show floor was quieter tonight than it’d been this afternoon, but a steady stream of enthusiasts made it feel just as alive. I wandered the rows of booths, less of an outsider than I had been yesterday, but no more of an insider.

A media panel drew my attention and I lingered at the back of the crowd, watching a blond actress from a sci-fi series answer fan questions.

Comic-Con was a mysterious place. It was like each person could be themselves, with no concern about being judged. I envied them that—their ability to completely let it out.

But at the end of the week, it would all be gone. Packed up. Disbanded.

Maybe it wasn’t real. Maybe this, a few days of escapism and playing dress-up, was a momentary blip in the regular order of things. A way to let off steam.

I found one of the Mystique costumes for Charlie. If she’d bought me a vibe, I could buy her a sex suit.

When my phone buzzed, I whipped it from my pocket, expecting a message from Max. Instead it was a thank you from Dawn for filling in. I ignored the wave of disappointment.

At a loss for what else to do, I took soup over to her place, which was just down the road from the convention center. She opened the door a crack, dressed in pajamas.

“I sent the costume to be cleaned,” I said, handing her the soup and a piece of paper. “Here’s the slip. I’d pick it up tomorrow but our flight’s at six thirty.”

“You’re awesome. Thanks, Payton. You want to come in?” she offered.

I knew she was just being nice. Her pretty eyes were bleary and her hair was frizzed around her head.

“It’s OK, you better rest up. It was nice meeting you, though.”

“For sure. Maybe I’ll see you next year.”

I smiled automatically. “Sure. Next year,” I lied.

When I got back to the hotel, it was after ten. My phone had been silent the entire time.

A pang of disappointment accompanied the realization that I was still thinking of Max, while he had already moved on to something else.

Chapter 20

I’m glad you kids are using protection

“You did it.”

Familiar blue eyes speared me in the rearview mirror and I shifted to get more comfortable in the back of Riley’s Lexus. Max was conspicuously silent next to me.

“You two hooked up. Did you know there was a pool going?” Riley asked, his voice conversational as he navigated the mass of overpasses on the way out of the airport. “The coders have been betting on this for weeks.”

“Don’t they have work to do?” Max’s gaze was fixed somewhere out the window.

“The odds were three-to-one,” Riley went on. “Two-to-one when people found out you were going to Comic-Con. Now I owe Terry a hundred bucks.” Riley’s attention shifted back to me when he realized Max wouldn’t be baited. “Comic-Con isn’t the most romantic place in the world, Payton. You couldn’t keep it in your pants for another week?”

I stared blankly at him in the mirror. “Sorry.”

This morning I’d met Max downstairs in time to catch our early flight out. On the plane we’d ended up on opposite sides of the aisle. I caught up on magazines and he worked, glancing over occasionally to ask straightforward questions or provide one-word answers.

Basically we hadn’t talked—or been alone together—since the moment we’d both exploded in that king bed, shouting each other’s names.

Or, more accurately, the moment following. When he’d coolly dressed and got on the phone with Riley to talk shop.

“Sounds like you two did good work with Harmon.” Riley’s approving voice interrupted my thoughts as he pulled into the parking garage of Max’s building.

I got out first and went around to the trunk. “So far. But there’s no guarantee yet.”

We got our bags to the elevator and Max just hit the button for the tenth floor.

Riley looked between us. “Dammit, guys. Comic-Con’s supposed to be fun. What the hell’s wrong with you?”

We dropped our luggage in the foyer while Riley crossed to Terry’s work station and tapped him on the shoulder. The man’s eyes lit up as Riley produced his wallet.

“I won?”

“This is not happening,” Max muttered, making a break for the stairs up to his suite.

Riley trailed his friend, tucking his wallet away. “Hold up. We need to talk.”

The rest of Titan greeted our arrival with only mild interest. None of the other staff seemed to care that Max had appeared and vanished just as fast.

The Pit had its own rhythm, and today, it was a hive of chaotic activity. Despite the outbursts, the arguments, under it the Titan staff were like birds that flew together. I knew them all now, and no matter what confusion was happening with me and Max, this somehow felt like coming home.

“Hey, Payton.” Claire approached me, one hand cupping a giant Hello Kitty coffee mug. She leaned a denim-clad hip on the wall. Her dark hair was straight and shining and fell to the top of her red silk t-shirt. “How was Comic-Con?”

“It was…an education,” I decided. “How’s Phoenix?”

“We’re into rapid prototyping. Evolve’s done and it’s holding up great. Tomorrow we’re popping champagne. You better be here.”

“I wouldn’t miss it.” I smiled. “Hey, can I ask a question? How long have you worked at Titan?”

She screwed up her face. “Going on three years. I sat in for the final work on Oasis. It was my first gig out of school.”

“How about you?” I asked Jenna, who’d materialized beside us.

“Two years. I was with another company before. It’s a small, incestuous world.”

“So why did you come here?”

Jenna lifted a slim shoulder. “Because he’s a genius.” I knew without asking who she meant. “None of the big companies are turning out the ideas he is, or can execute them the same way. Max has this way of knowing what you need to make a game and what things we take for granted. Then he strips back all those things and builds it up from scratch, re-envisioning what the whole game play experience could be.”

Claire nodded. “Do you want to see something we’ve been working on?” she offered.

“Sure.” I agreed, partly because I was interested and partly because I was ready for the Max Donovan love-fest to be over.

“I better keep slogging away.” Jenna waved as she went to the kitchen to fill up her coffee cup.

Claire and I crossed to her workstation, where she entered a few keystrokes. A sequence popped up in which a red-haired girl wrestled with a giant on the edge of a cliff. After a few more commands from Claire, I watched the girl transform into a bird, her wings spreading as she lifted off to sail over the canyon that appeared below her.

“Wow, that’s amazing.” I meant it. It was beautiful—like you were watching art, not entertainment. I’d known the game would be impressive, but it was another reminder of Max’s brilliance.

“Thanks. It’s nice to hear, because it took us two weeks to get that right.” Claire smiled. “I better get back to work.”

I glanced up as Riley breezed through the Pit, heading for his office.

“I’m sorry I lost you a hundred bucks,” I offered as I followed him inside.

Riley took a seat in his task chair, folding his arms over his chest. “The money doesn’t matter. There’s enough money in this business to go around.”

“I feel like there’s a ‘but’ coming.”

Riley watched me a long time, the serious expression out of place on his baby face. “But, what worries me is you and Max. What gets in his head affects what happens out there.” He gestured toward the door.

“I know that, Riley. And not that it’s any of your business, but we got…caught up in the moment.” I dropped my bag beside my desk.

Only it wasn’t my desk anymore.

It was like Riley’s, sleek polished wood, except where his was nearly black, mine was light. Cherry, maybe.

“What is this?” I asked.

“Max ordered it for you.”

“But—I don’t even work here.”

Riley shot me his “duh” look.

Max bought me a desk?
I ran my hand over the smooth, cool surface. It was definitely my style and more beautiful—and probably expensive—than the one I had at Alliance.

I sat in the task chair, unable to completely lift my hand off the beautiful wood as I did. “We hooked up,” I repeated softly. “It’s something people do.”

“It’s not something he does.” Riley’s voice was pointed. His gaze flicked back to the desk, taking in the sleek lines. “You know he ordered that two weeks ago? He wanted it to be a surprise.”

I held up a hand. “All right, so he bought me a desk. He bought you one too, and you didn’t sleep with him. I hope.”

“That’s my point. It’s not about sex, Payton. I know he acts tough, but I can’t remember the last time he was interested in someone.”

I rubbed my temples. “OK, Max is important and complicated. Message received. Now can you do me a favor and worry less about my sex life and more about yours? Speaking of which, you still going out with that girl?”

Riley’s expression softened. “Yeah. Maria’s pretty great.”

I was glad to see Riley happy with someone, and didn’t even mind when he started a one-sided conversation about their latest date.

I found myself zoning out after a few minutes. His probing pointed to a truth I’d been dancing around on the plane ride home. Was our hookup at Comic-Con just that? Escapism, a moment of doing what we couldn’t do here? Or was it a truth we’d both been dodging all along?

When I crossed to the door to look out into the Pit, Max was talking to Jenna in a corner. He straightened when he caught sight of me.

“You leaving?” he asked as I started toward the door.

“Yeah. I need to get an Uber home and then run some errands.”

He shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans and trailed me to the door. I felt his gaze on me while I put on my coat and organized my bag.

“Do you want to go out on the boat?” Max asked, and my hand stilled on the door handle. “I need to get out. Clear my head.”

“You want to play hookey?”

Max lifted a shoulder. The casual move did nothing to diminish the fact that his attention was completely on me for the first time all day. “It’s Saturday, and it’s my company. There better be some perks.”

We needed to talk, and this wasn’t the place to do it.

“Sure.”

“OK. Let me change.”  I followed Max out the door and we took the elevator up to his apartment. He disappeared down a hallway I’d never noticed before while I lingered in the living room.

In addition to the fireplace, the big white leather couch, and the SUV-sized TV, there was a bookshelf along one wall. The walls were bare except for a framed poster of Oasis.

There were no photos. Not of his family, not of Christina, though I guess that made sense.

So what did he care about besides his games?

My stomach shifted uneasily.

“My mom texted,” I started when Max reappeared wearing jeans and a navy sweater that hugged his body distractingly. “I borrowed her camera for the trip and she needs it back. If it’s easier I can meet you in a while?”

“Why don’t I come with you?”

“To my mom’s?” I swallowed my surprise.

“I’ll wait in the car.”

“Uh. Sure.”

I’d never seen Max’s car before and, like so much about him, it surprised me. The gray compact sedan had to be ten years old. Where Riley’s said ‘look at me’, Max’s was purely functional.

I waited while he leaned over from the driver’s seat to press a button on the passenger door before getting in. “Power locks broke awhile ago.”

“No problem.”

Giving him directions to my mom’s was easy. Finding a topic of conversation that didn’t involve what happened yesterday was harder.

“So Claire says the prototype for Phoenix is looking good.”

Max palmed the wheel with one hand, his gaze casually scanning the road ahead of us. “We’ll have it ready to show when we get the next meeting with Harmon.”

“They’ll love that. Speaking of Phoenix, was there any news on the leak?”

Max rubbed a hand over his face. “We’re still working on it.”

The rest of the car ride passed quickly as we stuck to safe topics. We pulled into the visitor parking at my mom’s building and I reached for my seatbelt.

“I’ll be quick.”

I was out of the car before he could say anything.

My mom’s building was townhouse-style and contained a couple of dozen units. Though they didn’t have the views of the high-rises, this one looked out on a beautiful maple tree in the back yard. I used to imagine climbing out my window and sleeping in it when I was younger.

When my mom’s door opened, the confusion from the past couple of days receded.

“Paybear.” She hugged me tight to her. “It’s so good to see you.”

“You too. I’m sorry I can’t stay long.” I pulled the camera I’d borrowed out of my bag. “I hardly had time to use it, but I do have a few good pictures from Comic-Con.”

“How was your trip?”

I started to reply but her gaze shifted over my shoulder. I turned to find Max hovering on the landing.

“Your phone rang the second you left. I thought it might be important.”

“Thanks.” I glanced down as I took the phone from him. Charlie’s name flashed on the screen as I pocketed it. Probably a voicemail declaring I’d been back all of two hours and had the nerve not to catch up with her. Or that she’d found a new and awesome way to prank Avery.

“Payton, you didn’t tell me you were bringing a friend.” My mom’s voice was laced with curiosity.

I shifted on my feet. “Mom, this is Max. I—we just stopped in to say hi.”

Max would be uncomfortable under my mother’s scrutiny. But now that he was here…there was no way I could send him back downstairs.

“Nonsense. Come in, have tea. Or wine?”

I shot a helpless look over my shoulder and Max just shrugged.

“Tea’s perfect,” I said.

“So you’re a friend of Payton’s?” my mom asked as Max and I settled on the couch in her small living room.

“Yeah. We just got back from San Diego today.”

Stop going red. It’s not like your mom knows the noises you made when he fucked you.

Max’s knee brushed mine and I jumped. When my mom got up to fix tea I glanced at Max out of the corner of my eye. I’d been trying to avoid the topic, but of course it was going to come up.

At the most awkward time imaginable.

Max raised the pierced brow. “Does she know what happened? Maybe I should’ve worn a cup.”

“No way,” I grumbled, shifting back in my seat. “She’d throw you a parade if she found out.”

“Even if she knew the details?” His voice warmed and I wondered if he was remembering the way I’d begged him to move inside me. Or how he’d come groaning my name.

Warmth tingled between my thighs. I crossed my legs, avoiding Max’s gaze. “Especially if she knew the details.”