Page 10 of Tempting Max

Taking a breath, I finish placing the beer I’m still holding into the cooler, wipe my hands on my jeans and turn around.

My breath escapes me when my eyes meet his. They’re intensely blue, intensely conflicted and judging by the hard set of his jaw, I get the feeling I’m in trouble. I feel my hands snap to my hips in my automatic defensive position. My tone could almost pass for normal. In fact, I manage to make it sound a bit irritated when I say, “Hey, Max. What’s up?”.

Go me.

“I need to talk to you.”

I stare at him, waiting for him to follow up and when he doesn’t, I press forward.Poke the bear, my brain tells me,he’s the one being weirdly ominous, you haven’t done anything bad that you know of. “Well then, congratulations, you already are.”

Instead of smiling or laughing, his grimace deepens, and—I don’t know how—but his body becomes even more rigid. I have a feeling that if I flung a quarter at him, it would bounce off with a metallicclankand ricochet around the bar. The temptation to try it is stronger than I’d like to admit.

“In private.”

Those two grumbled words make my blood run cold. It feels just like the time I got called into the principal’s office for calling Jason Cody a ‘butthead’ in first grade. Only this time the consequences are a little bigger. I take a fortifying breath. “Am I in trouble? Because if I am, you can just say it here,” I motion to the empty restaurant. “No one else is around. Trace won’t be here for another twenty minutes, and we don’t open for an hour.”

Something very dangerous inside of me dares me to go with him, to find out what might happen if we were finally alone. My saner side says probably nothing, that all these zings and zaps I get when he’s around have got to be one-sided.

I’m sure I’m nothing but a child to him. He could be my father.

No, he could be mydaddy.

The reaction my clit has to calling him daddy glues me to the spot and I’m not sure I’ll be able to speak any time soon.God,nothing makes sense anymore.

His enormous hands twitch as if he’s thinking about hauling me to his office over his shoulder to punish me caveman style and I can’t lie, my libido is here for that. Thank God good sense prevails because I’m just learning to be Gus again and Max seems like the type of man that would consume me.

Clearing his throat, he crosses his arms instead of hauling me away. The muscles of his biceps spread out against his hard chest and the heat pooling between my legs rises, making me flush all the way to the tips of my ears. I fucking hate that my skin outs my feelings at every turn. It must be so much easier to be a brunette. At least the two brain cells he has that are not devoted to being a scary bear-man don’t seem to notice.

“Fine.” He somehow forces this out of his mouth without moving his jaw. “My brothers and I would like to offer you a promotion to manager.”

I blink and my mouth falls open. I was so sure by his grumpy-ass mood that I was going to get fired that I don’t know what to say. This is definitely the first time I’ve had good news delivered to me like I’ve been a bad girl.

A long thread curls through me as I think about how he might handle me as a bad girl. How it might feel to be pulled across his lap and feel his palm strike my bare ass.Jesus, Gus, down girl.I swallow a few times. “You want topromoteme? I…I thought you were going tofireme.”

“Fire you?” His tone is incredulous, his brow furrows, his massive arms drop from across his chest. “Why would you think that? You’ve done nothing wrong.”

“Well,” I motion toward him, “you look like you’re ready to throw me out on the street. There are some very conflicting vibes here between your words and your face.”

He tries to relax his expression, but it doesn’t work. It’s as if his face is so used to scowling that it snaps back without thought. It’s almost comical. “Sorry.” His eyes soften the tiniest bit. “I didn’t mean to come off like I was unhappy with you or your work, I just…”

“Like to terrify unsuspecting employees?” I’m teasing but he clearly takes it seriously.

He rakes one of his hands through his hair and seems truly irritated with himself. “I’m sorry, I knew I would fuck this up. All I wanted to say is that you’re doing an amazing job and we would like to offer you the promotion and the raise that goes with it. If you’d like to accept it, that is.” His eyes slip downward.

Is he actually afraid I’d say no?

I love it here so far, I love the bar, the brew, the whole vibe—it’s been perfect for starting over and having the chance to make more money doing it? Uh, yeah. Duh. Feeling a little guilty for teasing, I throw him a verbal bone. “I know. I was just joking. I would love to take the manager position.”

His eyes snap back to mine, this time with a little less heaviness in them and he almost, very nearly, kind of smiles. One of these day’s I’m going to get a real one, I just know it. “Good, like I said, you deserve it, Gus.”

My God, I don’t know what it is about him saying my name, but it sends a shot of pure electricity along my nerve endings. My mind wanders to what it would sound like in the bedroom, but I clear my throat before I go too far down that road.Era of Gus,I remind myself, not the era of banging your much older boss. “Thank you. And thank you for hiring me, I really love it here.”

Max’s jaw twitches and I wonder what he’s imagining behind those shielded blues. “You’re welcome.”

We both stand there for a moment, staring at each other and I swear on all that’s holy I see his hand twitch as if he wants to reach out for me.Do it, I want to tell him. But I know better. I don’t need sexy, older distractions, no matter how much I want to climb them.

Instead, he spears his hand through his hair again and takes a step back. “I uh, I suppose I should get back to the brewhouse.”

I nod.

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