So This Is Love

chapter Sixteen

While taking one car to pick up the keys to her apartment was a good idea, Emma was acutely aware that she would have to eventually return to Max's place, and then what? Was what had happened between them a one-time thing, or a one-night thing? Because there was still a lot of night left.

It would probably be smarter to end things now.

Then again, it would have been smarter not to start up anything at all.

But she'd told Max she didn't regret it, and she didn't. In fact, she'd really, really liked being with him. A small sigh escaped her lips at the memory.

Max stopped at a red light and glanced over at her, a question in his eyes. "Are you okay?"

"Yes, I'm fine," she said quickly.

"You're awfully quiet—for you."

She had to admit she wasn’t feeling in the mood to talk. "You should be happy about that," she said lightly.

Silence followed her answer, then Max said. "Should we discuss what happened?"

"No. Let's not talk about it. Let's just let it be. We said no promises, no regrets. What else is there to discuss?"

"You're right."

She glanced out the window, trying not to read too much into the relief she'd heard in his voice. She knew men. She had five brothers, and she'd worked on a firefighting crew for six years. She'd heard a lot of locker room stories, and the last thing most men wanted to do after sex was to talk about it; next on the list were cuddling and sharing feelings.

Max had been lucky to escape all three. She, on the other hand, kind of wished they'd had more time for the cuddling part. She'd liked being in Max's arms; she'd liked it a lot.

They got to her new apartment in no time. Max opted to wait in the car while Emma got out to meet Alicia. Her friend was waiting on the sidewalk with the keys.

"Thank you so much," Emma said, as she handed over her deposit check. "I can't believe I got this place. I owe you big time for finding me such a great deal."

"I'm happy it worked out. The place is all yours. There's no electricity, so you'll have to get that turned on as soon as possible."

"I'll do that tomorrow. I can't wait to move in. This is going to be so great."

Alicia tipped her head to the car. "You're with Max again?"

"I told you, we work together."

"At eight o'clock at night?" Alicia asked with a laugh. "I'm not judging. I'm actually a little jealous. He's gorgeous. Have you taken him home to meet the family?"

"No," she said, no longer bothering to deny what was apparently quite obvious. "It's nothing serious."

"Too bad."

"It's not too bad. It's just right. It's what I want."

"If you say so. Don't forget to invite me to the housewarming."

"I will," she promised, then walked back to the car.

"All set?" Max asked as she got into the passenger seat.

"Yes. I should be able to start moving in this weekend. You know, I might need a little extra muscle."

"Don't you have a bunch of brothers for that?"

"They usually disappear when I need to move something."

"I might be around," he said half-heartedly.

"Then you might be able to help me. Think of all the great exercise you can get carrying boxes up three flights of stairs."

He gave her a smile. "You can put a positive spin on anything."

"I prefer not to dwell on the negative."

"So tell me something—how did you and your ex-boyfriend decide to live together? Was it love at first sight? Did you move in together right away?"

She was taken aback by his questions. Max usually made it a point not to ask her anything personal, and she kind of wished he hadn't changed that philosophy now. Living with Jon had not been her proudest moment.

"I moved in with Jon a few months after we started dating," she said. "It happened in a roundabout sort of way. My roommate was getting married, and her parents owned our condo, so she wanted to live there with her new husband. He was in. I was out. Jon suggested I stay with him until I figured out what I wanted to do, and that's what I did."

"Not the romantic story I expected to hear from you," Max said, giving her a thoughtful look.

"I suppose it was more practical than romantic," she admitted. "We were spending a lot of time together, so why not share expenses?" She frowned. "It was better than I'm making it sound. It was fun in the beginning. But it wasn't long before I realized that things weren't so good. I just didn't want to admit it. I was working a lot, and so was Jon. I regret that I didn't take a stand and choose to leave, that I let things go. That was a mistake, but I can't change it now. I can only move forward and try not to make the same mistakes. What about you, Max? Do you like living alone?"

"Yes. I've had my own apartment for about eight years now. I shared a house with a couple of guys right after college, but there was way too much partying. I was always hung-over. I needed to make a change, so I moved out, and I have not missed having a roommate."

"You don't get lonely?"

"I keep busy."

"And you've never been tempted to move a woman in to your place?"

He glanced over at her and smiled. "Not for a second."

"Right. No promises, no commitment, no regrets. I got it."

"Where do you want to eat?" he asked.

"I'm starving, so wherever you want to go is fine with me."

"There used to be a good burger place on Divisadero. I forget the name, something about a hat."

"The Mad Hatter," she replied. "Burgers and all kinds of toppings. It's still there, and it's delicious. Good choice. If you take the next left, I'll show you a shortcut."

* * *

Max followed Emma's directions, and fifteen minutes later, they entered the restaurant. It was eight-thirty, and the dinner crowd had thinned out. They ordered at the counter, grabbed two beers from the bar and then sat down at a table next to the window. Max hoped their food would come fast, not just because he was hungry, but also because they were now face to face again, and one look at Emma's sweet mouth made him remember how good she'd tasted.

A part of him couldn't believe they'd actually had sex. He'd been thinking about making love to her since he'd met her three months earlier, and then tonight—suddenly it was happening. Emma was kissing him, putting her hands on him, urging him on.

Damn! It had been even better than he'd imagined. Emma was one of a kind, smart, beautiful and passionate. She lived her life with joy and generosity. He'd never met anyone like her. She drove him crazy in three-dozen different ways but she also made him feel things he hadn't thought he was capable of feeling.

Emma's cheeks turned pink under his scrutiny, and her tongue darted out to lick her bottom lip. He wanted that tongue, that lip, that mouth. His body hardened, and he told himself to get a grip. He needed to think about something else, but his brain didn't want to cooperate. His mind wanted to play back the memories of Emma's sexy body under his, her soft legs, the curve of her thighs, her breathy cries of passion. He'd loved watching her climax, watching her give into the desire and the need. She didn't do anything halfway. Whatever she was doing, she gave it her heart and her soul.

And that's what worried him. He didn't want her heart and her soul. That would be too big of a responsibility. He would hurt her. And he didn't want to be the one to take her down.

Emma cleared her throat. "So…"

"So…" he echoed.

"I went to the Second Street Deli for lunch today."

It took a minute for her words to register. "You saw Spencer."

"Yes. And you told him that he should apply for the job, like I said he should. I knew it was a good idea."

"Spencer didn't have a lot of options. How was he doing?"

"He looked comfortable at the cash register. Mary said he picked it up in no time."

"Spencer had a lot of jobs in high school. I don't think it was his first time collecting money, although I'm sure the systems are different now."

"Apparently not different enough to be a challenge." She paused. "He has a dry, bitter wit about him, doesn't he?"

"Why do you say that? What did you talk about?" he asked, feeling a bit nervous about the fact that Spencer and Emma had been talking. He'd known that would happen if Spencer went to work there; he just hadn't expected it to happen so fast.

"We talked a little about you."

"That must have been boring."

"Do you think you're boring?" she countered.

"What did Spencer tell you?" he asked, ignoring her question.

"Are you afraid he spilled some big secret?"

"No, because I don't have a big secret. And if I did, Spencer would be the last person to know what it was. Until this morning, we hadn't talked longer than a half hour in more than ten years. We'd grown apart long before he went to jail."

"That's sad."

He shrugged. "Not every family is as close as yours."

"I am lucky." She sipped her beer, then said. "What did you tell Spencer about me?"

"Nothing much."

Her gaze challenged his. "He told me that you said I was beautiful."

He frowned. "How did that come up in conversation? How did you two even start talking to each other?"

"I introduced myself."

"Of course you did," he said with a sigh.

"I'm a friendly person."

"A little too friendly."

"You didn't think that earlier," she said, giving him a mischievous smile.

He grinned back at her. "True. That was the perfect amount of friendly. And, yes, I did tell Spencer you were beautiful—along with stubborn, infuriating, and competitive. Did he leave those adjectives out?"

"There you go with the downside again."

"That's me. I'm the glass-half-empty kind of guy. And you're the opposite. You're optimistic and hopeful no matter the odds you're facing."

"That sounds like a compliment," she said slowly, giving him a suspicious look. "But with you, I always feel like there's another shoe about to drop."

"Not this time." He sat back in his seat as a waiter delivered their orders. Emma's thin patty was stacked high with grilled onions, mushrooms, olives, tomatoes and some kind of sauce. It was definitely creative and maybe a bit risky. He'd gone for more meat and less toppings, which pretty much described their personalities. He smiled at the thought.

"What's so funny?" she asked as she took a bite of the juicy burger and then immediately reached for her napkin.

"Nothing. How is it?"

"Awesome," she said.

He bit into his quarter-pounder and had to admit the burger was damn good. For a few minutes they just ate. And it was a companionable silence. They finished at exactly the same time, kind of like the way they'd had sex earlier.

As the memory ran through him again, he felt like a teenager, sex on the brain twenty-four hours a day, only it wasn't random sex it was sex with Emma. And it was quite possibly the best sex he'd ever had.

They weren't going to be able to go back to the way they were, not with all the sexual tension brimming between them. Their working relationship was going to be compromised. But at the moment he didn't feel much like working anyway, so he'd worry about that later.

"Did Spencer say anything else to you while you were at the deli?" he asked.

"Not really. It was a short conversation. He wasn't super friendly, which reminded me of you."

"Spencer used to be very outgoing. He was a fun-loving kid when we were growing up. He always had a lot of ideas in his head. Not all of them were good, but some of them were." He paused. "Spencer and I went surfing this morning."

"Ah, so you took another one of my suggestions. I am on a roll."

He laughed at her self-satisfied expression. Emma might think he was arrogant, but she was just as confident in her opinions as he was. She simply covered up her attitude with a lot more sexy charm. "Yes, you are on a roll," he admitted.

"How did the surfing go?"

"The waves were not very big, so we managed to ride a few in to shore. And in between, we talked for the first time in a long time. Surfing took us back to a time and a place when we were brothers. We needed to remember that relationship. And in a way we needed to remember who we used to be."

"According to the enormous trophy I saw in your apartment, you were a pretty good surfer at one time."

"My mom gave me that a few weeks ago. She was getting Spencer's room ready for him, and she found the trophy. She insisted I take it. I was going to throw it away, but I didn't get around to it."

"That explains why it was one of the few items not in a box. So does this morning's run mean you're going to be a surfer dude again?"

"Possibly. It was fun and freeing to be out on the water. It felt like my world got a lot bigger. I often have my head down, looking at the computer, at evidence, at case files; sometimes I forget to look up."

Her eyes turned thoughtful. "It seems to me like you've been in a metaphorical prison since Spencer went to jail. You couldn't get the charges dropped. You couldn't save him. You couldn't find a way to get him out on appeal, so you were stuck in that prison right along with him."

"I was not in prison. He was," Max said, not sure he liked her take on the situation.

"Let's examine the evidence."

"There is no evidence," he protested.

She ignored him. "Did you make any big changes in the last seven years? Did you move? Did you change jobs? Did you buy a new car?"

"I moved back here."

"Only because Spencer was getting out. What about before that?"

"I didn't move, but I lived in a nice place so that doesn't mean anything. And I liked my job. Why would I change it?"

"And your SUV? It looks at least ten years old."

"It's a good car."

"Let's talk about your relationships."

"Let's not."

"Have you made any new friends since Spencer went to jail?"

"I'm sure I have," he said vaguely.

"But no serious romantic relationships."

He frowned as he stared back at her. "You've made your point."

"I think you've been punishing yourself for not saving your brother. And it's time to stop."

"I didn't think I was doing that," he said slowly, but her words made him think. He had put a lot of things on hold for later—for down the road—for when he had more time. Had he been so caught up in Spencer's problems that he'd stopped living his own life? Or was there more to it than that?

"Maybe it was subconscious," Emma suggested. "Or I could be wrong. It happens rarely, but occasionally…"

"I can't believe you'd admit that you could possibly be wrong."

She shrugged. "I am only human."

"You might have a point, Emma, but I think I put the bars up long before Spencer went to prison."

"What do you mean?"

"My childhood was unpredictable. I never knew what I was going to find when I came home. Would my parents be fighting? Would my mom be crying? Would there be dinner on the table, or would everyone be too upset to notice I was hungry? Or that I was even home?"

Emma's gaze filled with compassion. "That's a terrible way to grow up."

"After my father left, things got better, or at least they got quieter. The fighting stopped, but my mom was depressed for years. Sometimes she didn't get out of bed. She'd work for a few months, then miss too many days, and she'd get fired. Spencer and I both got jobs as soon as we could so that we could bring in some extra money. My father gave my mom the house, but the mortgage payments came along with it, and they were tough to make some months."

He picked up his beer and took another drink, wondering why he was spilling his guts to Emma. But now that he'd begun, he wanted to finish. "Spencer could joke my mother out of her moods. He could always make her laugh. He was the one who kept her from completely withering away. She really relied on him. When he moved out to go to college, my mom and I didn't know how to connect to each other without Spencer around. When it was my turn to leave to go to school, I was relieved. In fact, I couldn't wait to get out of the house. I was tired of that old life. I wanted to meet new people, be someone different. I never looked back."

"But you are back," she pointed out. "And geography rarely changes a person. You are who you are no matter where you live."

"Maybe, but I was a better version of myself in L.A. I didn’t have to worry about her. I just had to take care of myself."

"How did your mother handle being on her own when both you and Spencer were out of the house?"

"It took awhile, but she finally bounced back. She got a job she liked. She made friends. I think she even had a few dates. Over the years I have tried not to ask, but she occasionally forces me to listen."

Emma smiled at his dry tone. "I'd like to meet her."

"You've already met my brother. Let's not get carried away. One Harrison at a time."

She leaned forward, resting her arms on the table. "Thanks for telling me a little about your life. Now I have a better understanding of why you're so guarded, and why you're so independent. You learned how to protect yourself a long time ago, and you've never stopped doing that. That's why you don't let anyone get close to you."

"You were close earlier tonight."

"To your body. But you keep your heart under lock and key."

"You don't seem in a rush to throw your heart on the line either," he said pointedly.

"That's true. Right now I'm more interested in having some fun."

"Got any ideas?"

Her eyes sparkled. "I always have ideas."

"Then we should get out of here."

"We still haven't talked about the case," she pointed out.

"If you had any ground-breaking news, you would have already told me. Anything else can wait. Right now, I think we should explore some of your ideas back at my apartment." He held out his hand and pulled her to her feet. "Let's have some fun, Emma."

"Sounds good to me. But this time, I get to be on top."

"You can be anywhere you want to be."