“Yes.” When I look up at him, I see such raw disappointment in his expression that my stomach squirms with guilt. “But if you’re not ready to accept that, then there’s nothing I can do. I can’t force you to take a chance on me.” He swallows and shakes his head. “Go get dressed. I’ll take you home.”
I look at him for a moment, feeling more lost and confused and … small than I ever though possible. He’s asking me to open a door that’s been closed my whole adult life, but not only do I not have the key, I have absolutely no idea where to even look for it.
I turn and head toward the bedroom. Just before I reach it, he says, “Do you know why you avoid real connections, Eden?”
I look back at him. He has his hands in his pockets, and he’s staring in my direction but not looking directly at me.
“Why?”
“Because it’s easier for you to think being alone is a choice rather than admitting you might be unlovable.” He looks me in the eyes. “Let me tell you, you’re not. Not even a little. The man who made you think that – whoever the hell he was – couldn’t have been more wrong.”
I hold his gaze while trying to lock down a storm of emotions that are filling me up in unfamiliar and painful ways. And when he gives up waiting for me to change my mind
and looks away, I head into the bedroom and gently close the door.
*
Getting back into my dress by myself is difficult. Honestly, I’d rather just curl into a ball on the massive bed and sleep for a week, if only to forget about everything that just happened. Instead, I awkwardly zip myself up as best as I can and bite my tongue every time I even think about calling out for Max to help.
I’ve just finished pulling on my shoes when I hear a buzzing noise. I turn to see his phone on the nightstand, screen bright in the dim room as it skitters and vibrates.
Unable to resist, I walk over and check the screen. A text message is there from someone called Dyson:
<Hey, buddy. Me & Rosco will be at the warehouse at 7am tomorrow to grab furniture. Should make it to markets by 8. See you then.>
The warehouse? God, I’d almost forgotten he’d arranged for Nannabeth to sell his furniture at her stall tomorrow. And they’re picking it up at the warehouse? Intriguing.
I glance at the door, but it’s still safely closed. I shouldn’t be thinking about showing up and seeing what I can find, right? I should wait until he’s ready to level with me about what he’s hiding. But judging by how tonight has gone, the day he trusts me with his secrets may never come.
I grab my purse and exhale before pulling open the door and walking out. When I get out to the living room, Max is seated, fully dressed at the desk, staring at his computer screen. When he sees me, he closes the lid and stands, his face unreadable. “Ready?”
“You don’t have to take me home.”
“Yes, I do. This was a date night. The least I can do is escort you to your door.”
After the world’s most awkward elevator ride, we head out into the street and he flags a taxi. We’re both silent as we ride through Manhattan and across the Brooklyn Bridge, and it feels wrong to be on one side of the cab while he’s on the other.
I glance at his hand splayed on the seat next to his thigh as he gazes out the window. I have the strongest feeling that if I just reached over and slid my fingers between his, this revolting tension would melt away, but maybe things cooling down between us is for the best. One of the first things I learned as a journalism student was to beware of getting too close to my sources, and now I know why. I’ve gotten so close to Max I’ve lost every ounce of my objectivity, and that’s unacceptable. I’m supposed to report the story, not become part of it.
I shake my head at how miserably I’ve screwed everything up and go back to staring out the window. There’s no danger of me being too close to Max anymore. Right now it feels like the distance between us is growing wider every minute.
The whole journey passes without either of us saying a word, and it’s not until we’re standing outside the door to my apartment that we even make eye contact.
Max gives me a tight smile before lifting my hand to his mouth and kissing it. “Thank you for your company tonight, Miss Tate. It was a pleasure.”
It bothers me that he’s gone back to calling me Miss Tate. It feels wrong now. Cold.
I take my keys from my purse and try to look happy. “Thank you, Mr. Riley. Despite everything, I ... I had a really great time.”
He smiles, but I can’t help feeling he’s being someone else right now. Someone who I haven’t disappointed and hurt.
He takes my keys and leans over to unlock the door, but before he does, he stops.
“Eden ... the man who hurt you. Was it your father?”
He doesn’t look at me, which is good. Maybe I can try to be honest if we don’t make eye contact. “Why do you think that?”
“I went back and looked at your questionnaire. When you were asked for a paragraph about your parents, you said a lot about your mother but didn’t mention your father once. If it was him, it would explain why you distrust men so much.”
He unlocks the door and hands me back the keys. “Plenty of women are hurt by men, but the deepest wounds are left by our parents.” He says it gently, like he’s afraid of how I might react.
He doesn’t understand how many times I’ve practiced being unaffected by my father’s actions.
He clears his throat. “What did he do to you?”
I don’t know if he’s expecting some shocking tale of sexual abuse, but that’s not what happened. There are dozens of hideous ways to ruin a child. My dad used the simplest one.
“He ignored me. Saw through me like I wasn’t there.”
I’ve never admitted that to another person. Telling Max doesn’t feel good, but it does feel right.
“I always thought fathers had to love their kids,” I say, staring at the buttons on Max’s shirt. “Like it was a requirement or something. But whenever I tried to hug Dad or get him to play with me, he treated me like an inconvenience. Like my existence annoyed him.” Even now, with all the time that’s passed, those memories have surprising power to hurt me. “Mom would say ‘Daddy’s just tired’, or ‘Daddy doesn’t like to play’, but I knew. Kids always know.”
I hear a noise, and when I glance at Max’s face, he looks just as furious as he did earlier on the phone.
“Tell me everything,” he says, his voice gentler than his expression.
I shrug. “When Asha came along, he was a completely different person. She was his angel, and I was just ... the other one.”
“Do you have any idea why he was like that?”
I look at the window down the end of the hallway. “Once, when Mom and Dad were fighting, I heard my name. Mom was saying that he couldn’t treat me like nothing and Asha like everything … that it wasn’t fair. He countered by saying I was the chain Mom used to keep him with her, so how could she expect him to love me?”
“Your mom was pregnant before they got married?”
I nod. “Once I found out, it explained a lot. I wasn’t his daughter. I was the weight around his legs, drowning him in his own life.”