Page 86 of The Young & the Sinner

She was vulnerable to Max in every way possible. He could so easily break her. Did he know that? Did he know she loved him since the very first day they met?

Lizzie met my eyes and shot me a questioning look. I shook my head and looked away.

“He’s been trying to get me to do my homework since the moment I came downstairs.” She turned to Max. “I didn’t think you cared so much about my schoolwork.”

With the way her eyes lit up, she was obviously teasing him, but Max was serious when he answered her. “Of course, I care. I care more than just your schoolwork. I care about you, Lizzie.”

That wiped the smile from her face. She paused for a moment, before saying. “Thank you. But I’m fine, I promise.”

Now it was my turn to shoot her a questioning look, but she was avoiding my eyes. The stairs squeaked behind me, and Mason finally came down. I bit my lip to keep from smiling.

“Hey, I was starting to wonder where you were. I was about to send up a search party,” I joked.

Mason tugged my hair playfully, and I shot him a glare.

“Ha-ha,” he said drily. “As you can see, I made it downstairs just fine.”

“You got everything settled?” Max asked. Mason nodded. “Good. We’re having Chinese, tonight. You and I will go pick it up.”

It might have been my imagination, but I swore Mason looked relieved over the prospect of not being here with me. Unlike before, I knew the reason for his relief. I wasn’t hurt. My smile wanted to widen, and I had to bite my lip to keep my expression from showing too much.

Now it was Lizzie’s turn to frown at me.

I let out a sigh. It appeared we were both keeping something from each other. I walked over to her and grabbed her hand. “Come on, let’s go make Max happy and start on our homework.”

I caught Max’s grin when we passed him.

“But it’s barely the second week of school. I don’t have any homework,” Lizzie complained.

I groaned. “You’re so lucky. How come Dr Martin has already assigned a big project to my class?”

She shook her head. “I told you not to take biochemistry. This is all your fault, you know. We both could have had an easy first year. But no, you had to be an overachiever.”

I stuck my tongue out at her. This was the first year since middle school that we didn’t share a single class together.

When I looked back, both Max and Mason were watching us with amusement on their faces. I waved goodbye and they waved back as we made our way up the stairs and back to my room.

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