Only Love Read online

  Jed nudged him. “Okay?” He said it out of the corner of his mouth, keeping his eyes on Tess, who was fidgeting in his lap.

  Max nudged him back in answer, attributing the shockwave of sensation to the crackle of sexual tension between them.

  It had been a few weeks since their alfresco dalliance at the top of the mountain trail, and even longer since the early January night Jed came home from Phoenix, and though they’d spent every night of the past month together, entangled in a snake pit of arms and legs, kissing until Max fell asleep, Jed had subtly put the brakes on their physical relationship. Max didn’t mind—not often, at least, but that didn’t make Jed’s close proximity any easier to bear. Each and every day, he found himself speculating if this would be the day Jed broke the unspoken embargo.

  The church organ cut through the quiet chatter of the guests, signaling the start of the ceremony. Max nudged Jed again, caught his eye, and grinned. Jed grinned back and snuck a hand out to squeeze his arm, albeit briefly. Max stood with the rest of the congregation, suppressing another pleasurable shudder, and turned his attention to the bridal procession beginning to filter up the aisle of the church.

  Maybe today was the day after all.

  MAX TOOK a long pull of a cold Corona. It was his third, and with midnight fast approaching, he felt more than a little tipsy. Lucky he had Flo back with him, really, considering Jed was preoccupied with an overtired, overstimulated Tess.

  “Yo, dude.”

  Dan dropped down beside him, carrying a sleepy-looking Belle. Max wanted to take her and let her burrow into him, but he didn’t trust himself after a long day topped off with a few beers. Instead, he held out his hand and let her twine her fingers in his.

  “Coop still stuck?” Dan asked.

  Max inclined his head across the decorated high school gym to where Jed sat with a wriggling Tess and Anna Valesco. “Yep. Your mum won’t let him go.”

  Dan laughed, making Belle giggle too. “She’s always been like that with him. There were days when we were kids when she would’ve quite happily traded me for him. My aunties were all the same. Everyone loves Jed. The dude don’t even have to try.”

  Max could believe that. When his mood was right, Jed possessed an irrepressible charm. He glanced Max’s way and caught him staring. His eyes twinkled in the low light of the room. Max swallowed and looked away. It was nice to see Jed relaxed again. There’d been a brief moment in the church, a moment Max thought he’d imagined until Jed had abruptly taken Tess outside. The storm had passed by the time Max found them after the service, but it had stuck with him all the same. He hadn’t noticed Tess becoming particularly fractious.

  “Want another beer?”

  Max accepted the fresh bottle from Dan with a rueful sigh. “Sure.”

  A little while later, he jumped into Jed’s truck for the short drive home. It was late, far later than he usually stayed up, and, like Tess, he felt a little hyper.

  Jed slid into the driver’s seat. “Are you drunk?”

  “Maybe.”

  “I knew I shouldn’t have left you with Dan.”

  Max rolled his eyes and laughed, though the joke wasn’t all that funny. “It’s not his fault I’m a lightweight.”

  “Hey, I’m not judging you. You’ve seen the state of me after a couple of tramadol.”

  That was true. It hadn’t gone unnoticed that both times Jed had truly opened up to him, he’d been under the influence of heavy narcotics.

  The truck’s engine rumbled to life. Flo clambered over Max and stuck her head out the open window. The wind was cold. Max shivered, but didn’t have the heart to close it. Instead, he scooted closer to Jed… close enough to absorb the warmth from his body without touching him.

  “What happened to your tie?”

  “Huh?”

  “Your tie,” Jed repeated, amused. “You had it, like, a half hour ago. What did you do with it?”

  Max looked down, noting that he had indeed lost his tie. Damn. Kim was actually going to kill him—a thought he found hilarious.

  Jed shook his head, but he couldn’t hide his grin as Max broke into a fit of uncontrollable laughter. “You’re going to feel this tomorrow. What the hell did you drink? You weren’t this funny last time you hit the beer.”

  “Yeah, well, look what happened then.”

  “You left me hanging, that’s what happened.”

  Max coughed and tried to get a hold of himself. It was the first time either of them had mentioned the night he’d first kissed Jed. So much had happened in between, it felt like a lifetime ago. “Um, yeah, that’s the one. Hanging, eh? What would you have done if I’d stayed?”

  Jed leaned back in his seat and slung an arm round Max’s shoulders. “Guess you’ll never know, will you?”

  Max rolled his eyes, resisting the urge to sink into the casual embrace. He didn’t want to lose his buzz and get sleepy so close to home. Instead, he pondered Jed’s playful answer. Embarrassment aside, he was relieved he’d bailed from Jed’s room that night. From what he’d seen since, he was almost sure that if he’d jumped Jed then, he wouldn’t be here now.

  Timing was everything.

  Besides, there were days when he woke up surprised to find Jed’s boots by the door, and his things neatly ordered in his room. Despite the growing connection between them, he knew Jed was troubled… that on some level, he was deeply unhappy. No amount of sex could fix that.

  “Max, we’re home.”

  Max lifted his head. Despite his best intentions, he’d dozed off on Jed’s shoulder. “Hmm?”

  In answer, Jed slid out of the open driver door. Flo was already long gone. Then the passenger door opened and Jed held out his hand. “Do I have to carry you?”

  Max raised his middle finger, ignored Jed’s outstretched hand, and slithered out of the truck. “Very funny. You want to put me over your shoulder like a fucking caveman, you’ll have to catch me first.”

  Jed shut the truck door with a bang. “Ask me again in a few months.”

  Intentionally or not, the words were loaded. Max paused in the action of stretching his arms over his head. “You’ll still be here then?”

  “Where else would I be?”

  Jed sounded closer. Max could feel his warmth again and smell his clean, fresh smell. “You smell like trees.”

  Jed laughed. “You’ve said that to me before.”

  “I have?”

  “Yeah. After you had those seizures in bed.”

  Oh. “It must be true, then. I always let things slip when I’m in that attractive, postseizure, dribbling stage.”

  Jed took Max’s face in his hands, surprising him with a firm kiss. “Shut your mouth.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Don’t do that. Don’t put yourself down.”

  Max resisted the urge to be flippant. “I’m not. I’m stating a fact.”

  “Stop it.”

  “Make me.”

  Max’s back hit the truck door with a dull thud. He put up no resistance as Jed caged him in his arms and kissed him senseless.

  It wasn’t always like this between them. Sometimes they could kiss all night, and though the desire to go further was there, Max could ignore it. But sometimes, things exploded between them, exploded in a way he couldn’t control, and on those occasions, it fell to Jed to pull away. And pull away he did, almost every time, but not this time. This time, he pressed Max hard against the truck and kissed him with more force and intensity then he ever had before.

  Max let him have his way, enjoying the contrast of the icy-cold truck against his back and Jed’s warm body beneath his roaming hands. Jed made him forget himself, forget they were outside in the freezing, wet, muddy yard, forget everything, except….

  An unwelcome thought flashed into his mind, breaking through the haze of Jed’s scratchy chin and hard, unyielding muscle. “The boat shed.”

  Jed released him and raised an eyebrow. “You want to go in there?”

  Max laughed.
“Not at this time of year. I don’t know if I locked it.”

  Jed stared at him for a moment, then stepped back. “Go inside. I’ll check.”

  Max watched him go, unmoving. “Hey, Jed?”

  Jed turned and walked backward. “Yeah?”

  “Can you see if I left the cordless phone in there? I think I’ve left it somewhere really stupid this time.”

  Max left Jed’s infectious laughter behind and let himself into the cabin. It was dark and cold, but he left the lights off and made his way to the kitchen, tipped food into Flo’s bowl, then put the kettle on the stove for the morning. He expected Jed to reappear any minute. When he didn’t, Max got impatient and stamped back into his boots to go looking for him.

  He picked his way across the yard, taking a detour to check he’d shut the chickens away. He had, obviously, or else Jed had come along and done it for him.

  Jed.

  That’s what he was doing. Where the hell was he?

  The light of the boat shed was still on. Max crossed the yard with Flo at his side and pushed open the door. “Hey, did you find….”

  His voice fell away. Jed stood by the old shelving unit at the back of the shed, an open box in front of him, an old photograph clutched in each hand, and his face deadened with a cold hard fury that shook Max’s bones.

  “What the fuck is this?”

  Chapter Twenty

  JED STARED at the grainy black-and-white images. They were old, so fucking old, but he remembered the events they depicted like they’d happened yesterday. Without warning, he was nineteen years old again, staring war in the face for the very first time.

  The screams, the smoke, the blood. Fuck. He remembered the blood. Could feel it. Could smell it. Fuck. He remembered the blood.

  “Jed?”

  The boat shed slammed back into focus. He spun around. Max stood in the open doorway, his eyes wide and his face a picture of innocent confusion.

  Innocence.

  Did such a thing really exist? Jed’s heart said yes, but the haunting pictures in his hands told him otherwise. Anger surged in his veins, cold, bitter anger that consumed everything in its path like a wildfire in a drought-hit forest. “What the fuck is this?”

  Max flinched. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  Jed tossed the photos onto a nearby workbench. “Why have you got these?”

  “I don’t even know what they are.” Max ventured closer and frowned. “Nope. Never seen them before.”

  Jed laughed. It was a harsh, humorless sound. A few minutes ago, the only thing on his mind had been the feel of Max’s lithe, beautiful body writhing beneath him. Now he was so mad he couldn’t think straight. “You can’t be that drunk. They’re in your workshop.”

  “Yeah,” Max countered. “And half the stuff in here isn’t mine. And why the hell are you talking to me like that? I’ve never seen these before, I swear.”

  Jed stared hard at Max, watching him take in the images—the sand, the helicopters, the guns. Part of him was surprised such photographs even existed—war had been different back then… combat without a news camera shoved in your face—but the rest of him was fast becoming coolly detached.

  He analyzed Max, searching every facet of his face for telltale signs of dishonesty. For a long moment, there was none, and his anger began to dissipate. There had to be an explanation, a logical bend in the road that had led them here… led them to be bizarrely caught between Jed’s past and his present.

  Then something else flashed unbidden into his mind, something he’d ignored for far too long. “What’s your name?”

  Max looked up sharply. “Excuse me?”

  “Your name,” Jed repeated. “What’s your fucking name?”

  “What? What the hell’s wrong with you?”

  “Tell me your name.”

  Max stared at him like he’d grown two heads. “You know my name, Jed.”

  “Do I?”

  Max froze, like he suddenly understood the gravity of the situation, like he suddenly knew he’d been caught.

  Jed waited… waited for the indignant, defensive anger that would put the final nail in the coffin. It was classic, textbook human behavior, and though Max was unique in many ways, in this he was the same as any other man.

  Max shoved the photos aside and folded his arms across his chest. His eyes flashed with a fire Jed had never seen from him before. “Look, I don’t know what the fuck has got into you, or what the hell these photos are, but you don’t get to talk to me like that. Not here, not in my own bloody home.”

  “You’re lying to me.”

  “No, I’m not! I’ve never lied to you.”

  “Oh yeah?” Jed picked up the box of old junk, the box he’d absently picked up to search behind for the missing cordless phone. It was only by chance that a typical, jarring pain in his leg had caused him to drop it and reveal the photographs hidden inside.

  He jammed the box back on the shelf, scooped up the photos, and stormed past Max to the boat shed door. He didn’t look back to see if Max followed.

  He knew Max would.

  He crossed the yard and slammed open the cabin door. It smacked against the wall, gouging out a hole. He ignored it. The rented cabin was Max’s pride and joy, but in that moment, he didn’t give a shit. All that mattered was getting to the bottom of the sudden black hole between them.

  He went to the sink, pulled out the locked medicine box, and busted it open on the table. Max flinched again. The unease in his eyes bothered Jed, but he was beyond reason. He rummaged in the box, spilling pill bottles and packets until he found what he was looking for.

  “There.” Jed pulled out the Irish passport he’d found all those months ago and tossed it on the table. “If you’re so fucking honest, who the hell is Lamumba Moore?”

  Silence. Max stared at the passport like he’d seen a ghost. Perhaps he had. “How did you know that was there?”

  “Does it matter?”

  “Of course it bloody matters. It’s not the sort of shit I leave lying around.”

  “Oh yeah? Why’s that? What have you got to hide?”

  “Nothing.”

  Jed closed his eyes, the fight in him gone. This was his fault. He’d known from the start that something about Max didn’t add up. He should’ve walked away, said thanks but no thanks to the room, and left Max standing by the lake.

  But he hadn’t. Instead, he’d succumbed to the warm light that radiated from the spirited young man in front of him and let his attraction to him override everything he’d ever learned about dishonest human beings.

  He knew Max had lied to him the very day they’d met, and he’d let it go. And for what? A quick fuck when he was feeling down? A helping hand when he felt like shit? A year ago, such foolishness would have got him killed. Life had changed beyond recognition since then, but the deception was no easier to take.

  An ache formed at the top of Jed’s gut. He steadied himself on the kitchen counter. His gaze fell on the photographs again, and he shook his head, baffled. Nothing made any sense, but the pictures least of all. Max was seven years younger than him. He would’ve been twelve years old when Jed was shipped out to Somalia. Why the hell would he have pictures of a war he was too young to remember?

  Why the hell would he have those goddam pictures?

  Max turned his back on him and began gathering up the scattered medications. He threw them into the damaged box, his movements sharp and jerky. Even from behind, Jed could tell he was as worked up as he was.

  Fuck that. Jed was angry, really fucking angry, but however mad he was, the last thing he wanted was Max dropping with a seizure.

  “This is bullshit. Just tell me. Whatever it is. If you’re in trouble, I can help you. Or don’t tell me, and I can walk away right now. Nothing is worth this, Max. Trust me. This kind of shit fucks you up.”

  Max placed the last pill bottle in the box with undue care and attention. It was Jed’s tramadol, the bait that had led Jed to the passport in t
he first place. Max attempted to close the broken box. When it didn’t work, he scooped it up and threw it at the cupboard under the sink, taking a chunk out of the door.

  “You know what? Fuck you, Jed. When did you get to decide I had to tell you every little thing about myself? The only thing I know for sure about you is that you’re in love with a ghost.”

  It was a low blow, and it had the desired effect. As Max walked away, every drop of anger drained from Jed, and in its place nothing but a gaping hole where his heart used to be.

  Max was right—a huge part of him still loved Paul, but he wasn’t in love with him. Without even trying, Max had taught him that. Jed had let Max into his heart in a way he’d never let anyone before, and standing alone in the cold, dark light of the kitchen, he had no idea who he’d fallen so deeply in love with.

  JED WRESTLED Tess to the corner of the gym and set her down, catching her tiny hands as she lashed out, furious with him for hauling her away from her game. “Hey, that’s enough. If you want to play ball, you have to be nice to your sister. If you hit her, or me again, I’ll take you home. Got it?”

  Tess scowled, her annoyance clear, but Jed held his ground and counted to ten in his head. She’d been a handful all afternoon, and he knew why. Max hadn’t shown up at softball practice, leaving Jed to handle both girls on his own. Tess wasn’t used to sharing him, and though she hadn’t mentioned him at all, he knew she was unsettled by Max’s absence. Max never missed practice.

  Guilt gnawed in the pit of Jed’s stomach. This was his fault. After Max had left him hanging in the kitchen, he’d done what he did best—gotten in his truck and run away. Max was long gone by the time he’d calmed down enough to come back, Flo too, and they’d been staying at Kim’s now for over a week. The nights were the hardest. By day, he could sleep, or run, or lose himself in his work, but at night, he’d grown used to the warmth of Max stretched out beside him.