He stands there, reading the text messages, his body getting tenser and tenser by the minute.
“It’s four-twenty,” he whispers, his voice stricken. “It’s nearly sunrise.”
I sit up all the way, draping my arms over my legs.
“It’s nearly sunrise,” I agree, and watch as Maxx precedes to go through the same series of reactions that I did.
“I can’t do this,” he warns me, putting the phone back down on the desk. “Not just because of Maxine. Not just because of Parrish or Chasm. Dakota, you’re sixteen; I’m nineteen. I won’t do it.”
Oh. That thought hadn’t occurred to me.
Shit.
“Parrish is going to die,” I tell him, choking on the words. “You met that man today: does any part of you believe he’s bluffing?”
Maxx just stares at me, and then he turns and storms out of the room. I scramble out of the bed to chase after him, but he isn’t going very far. He ends up in my room, chucking my phone on the desk as he moves over to the wall of windows. I make sure to close the door softly behind us.
Maxx puts his palm up against the glass and looks out, at the very beginnings of a sunrise.
There’s just enough light for me to see his face by.
“We’re technically only two years and three-hundred and sixty-two days apart, that’s less than the four-year legal limit. There’s an age gap provision; you couldn’t be charged. It’s called a Romeo and Juliet law, and besides all that, the age of consent in Washington state is sixteen.”
He turns his head very slowly to stare at me like I’m a crazy person.
“First off, how do you know that?” he whispers, still clutching the condom in his opposite hand. “Second, do you think it was only the legal ramifications stopping me? It isn’t right. You’re in high school; I graduated last year. It’s not right.”
“Parrish dying isn’t fucking right either!” I snap back at him, cheeks and boobs flushing red. “And I know that because Danyella wrote up an opinion piece about age of consent; she thinks it should be a federal law rather than one that varies state by state.” I’m blushing so badly right now that my face feels like it’s on fire. “Don’t let the boy we both love die over your stupid morals.”
“Stupid morals? Not wanting to sleep with a sixteen-year-old isn’t stupid: it’s normal. Normal people don’t want to sleep with sixteen-year-olds!” He growls this out at me as I grind my teeth together in frustration.
“Chasm warned me about you,” I toss out at him, so frustrated that I could scream. “He said you had weird morals, and that once you decided something, there was nothing that could be done to change your mind. So I guess Parrish dies then. He dies because of you!”
I’m whisper-yelling which is totally a thing.
“Whoever said he was going to die?” Maxx snarls right back at me, stepping forward and fisting his hand in the back of my hair in a way that makes me gasp. He isn’t pulling hard, just putting pressure on my scalp in such a way that my body buzzes at the contact. “Do not wake up Tess. She’ll kill me. Literally. I won’t even have to worry about the Slayer.”
“You’re … you’ll do it?” I whisper, and then, because I’m an idiot, I add, “you’ll do me?”
Why did I say that? What a weird thing to say. Fuck.
Maxx blinks at me, licking his lips and releasing my hair so suddenly that I nearly stumble. He turns away from me sharply and stalks across the room, pausing briefly to flip off both phones.
“You’re a sick fuck,” he says, still clutching the condom as he flicks the lock on my door, and my pulse goes into hyperdrive. Maxx turns to look at me, studying me with a hungry gleam in his gaze that wasn’t there before. “To be clear: this is a onetime thing.”
He huffs out a breath and closes his eyes, turning away from me for a moment to catch his breath.
The angel wings tattooed down his back catch my attention. He’s so goddamn muscular. Like, his muscles are some of the stupidest muscles I’ve ever seen in my life. He looks like a fitness model or something. And those arms? Those calloused hands?
Every single impulse I’ve ever had toward Maxx ‘X’ Wright, the ones that I’ve tamped down through sheer willpower, the fires that I’ve doused over and over again, it all comes raging through me like an inferno.
When he turns back, I can see it. He’s decided. Actually, he knew right away that he was going to do this, didn’t he? He just needed a chance to process it, to explain himself, to protest.
There’s a strange sense of freedom in letting go of everything and giving in like this.
