Fallen Down Under (Down Under #2) (4 page)

“Oh, I don’t want anything.I just wondered what you were still doing here. I already have everything I need, but you already witnessed that with your own eyes didn’t you?”

I’m thankful for the buzzing of my phone as once again it distracts me from reaching over and slapping that smug fucking look off her plastic face. I know who it is so I let it ring off. Having Stella witnessing my slanging match isn’t going to do me any favours here.

“Well it’s been a pleasure as always.” I say, heavy on the sarcasm. “I’ve got quite a lot of work to do, something I highly doubt you have ever had to worry about and I guess I need to return these missed calls from Max too. Is there anything else I can help you with?” The colour instantly drains from her face. Bloody good. She clearly wasn’t expecting Max to call me, to be honest neither was I, but her reaction is utterly priceless. Gone is the sure-headed bitch that was sat opposite me a few moments before, instead since I have been here I have never once known her to move on her heels so fast. Jess one – queen bitch Nil.

I haven’t got the foggiest idea what Max wants to talk about so badly. In the past half an hour I’ve had thirty two missed calls from him and numerous messages and voicemails demanding me to answer him. He really needs to understand that he is no longer in a position to call the shots. After a while I decide that I have kept him waiting long enough and there is no way that I’ll get everything done that needs to if he keeps disturbing me every two seconds. Plus, if I want to work here and act like nothing has happened between us then I suppose I need to speak to him at some point. Speaking to him over the phone is a bit more than I can handle right now, instead I settle on sending him an email. I’ve got to keep it professional and all that jazz.

Hi,

Sorry I missed your calls; I’ve been busy working on the development. If you have any problems then I’ll be sure to let Mal know as soon as he’s feeling up to it. Everything seems to be on schedule so far. If I need anything then I’ll arrange it directly through Mal.

Jess

I re-read it a dozen times before hitting send. Why is it so goddamn hard to send an email to him? An email that is strictly professional. I thought I was made of stronger stuff than this, obviously not.

By midday, I’m pretty happy with my progress. All the materials have been chosen and ordered and the plans have been finalised. It looks like this little beauty is about to be born and I couldn’t be happier with the results. Now it’s time to get some food into my grumbling stomach. I wait for the lift to come back up and as soon as the lift doors open he’s there. Standing tall in all his beauty, Max Wild stares back at me. His eyes lock onto mine instantly and time stands still. As much as I want to I can’t find the strength to avert my eyes away from him or to take a step back. Instead I stand facing him with my mouth wide open unable to release the words that try to come out.

“Jess.” He whispers. His tone sounds pained yet he looks very calm and collected. Oh how I have missed his face, his body… how I have missed him. “We need to talk. If you’re not prepared to talk to me, fine. But you will listen to what I have to say. Do you understand me?” He now leans over me as I struggle to step backwards. I can feel his body brush against mine and it does all things kind of crazy to me.

“I’m just heading off out to Lunch.” I say in a rush. Being this close to him has me confused. I want to slap him so hard, yet I want to devour him at the same time. My head hurts from it all. I know I should be telling him to fuck off but it’s so much harder than I originally thought. The hold he has over me is unreal. What’s happened to me and where has my willpower gone?

“My Office… NOW!” His voice echo’s across the empty floor and sends shivers up my spine. Oh yes, I’m definitely in trouble when I’m around him, but somehow this time, I manage to stand my ground.

“I’m pretty busy, but I’ll try to catch up with you later.” In seconds his face comes crashing down to meet mine as his lips hungrily seek mine. It takes me a few moments to realise what’s happening and all of my senses fully awaken with his touch and my hands, betraying me on all levels automatically slide up his solid muscular chest. The heat burns from within him and I respond to his touch as easily as the last time. Once my hands have reached their destination, they flex through his hair as I am forced backwards against the wall. The feel of his body against mine is welcome and a moan escapes my lips, my body desperate for more. My phone begins to ring bringing me back to reality with a massive bang.

“Don’t even think about answering it.” He growls as he rests his forehead against mine, his breath coming in short rasps. “We’ve got stuff to discuss and you’re going to listen to me whether you like it or not lady.”

His words instantly get my back up. Who does he think he is barging in here and giving out his orders? “I’ll do what the hell I like. Don’t think you can come in here and start dictating what I will and will not do. That’s my decision and my decision alone.” Hastily grabbing the phone out of my bag I keep my eyes focused on his so he can see how pissed off I really am. I’d say he was pretty pissed off too judging by the way his jaw is tensed.

“Hello.”

“Jess. Where are you? I’ve got the cocktails in. You better hurry your arse up because they’re evaporating in this heat.”

“I’ll be with you in five. Did you think to order any food or is this strictly a liquid lunch?” I ask, but this is Melissa we are talking about here.

“Don’t ask silly questions girly. Just get your backside here ASAP.”

Before I have a chance to reply the call disconnects. “Can you and your sister get any more demanding?” I shout at him in utter frustration. I press the button behind me and to my relief it opens straight away. I waste no time in jumping in to get away from his overwhelming presence and the effect he has on me. Max doesn’t follow me, which I am more than happy about. Instead he says “I’ll be waiting.”

“You’ll be waiting a pretty long time pal.” I say to myself. I don’t know if it’s nerves or just me being pure childish but I flip him the bird just before the doors close and I feel pretty damn good about it. What a twatbag. I can’t believe I let myself to submit to him once again. The guy is unreal, even now I know that he’s with Stella, he’s still playing his silly little games. I’m such a glutton for punishment when I’m around him. Maybe working from Liss or Mal’s isn’t such a bad thing after all.

Less than five minutes have gone by and a Cadillac slows down beside me. I know it’s Max without even turning my head to see.

“Get in the goddamn car.” His voice is raised and I lose my battle and turn my head to the side to look at him. Oh boy, he’s pissed alright. Even his hands are white at the knuckles from clenching the steering wheel too hard.

“Why are you doing this to me Max?” I plead. “What is it exactly that you are trying to achieve with this?”

“Jess, for fuck sake, get in the goddamn car. All I want to do is explain. If you don’t get in, trust me when I say I will drag you in here kicking and screaming if I have too and I don’t give a shit what the passers-by will think either.”

Honestly, I’m not ready to talk to him. I don’t want to hear about him and Stella and how they have decided to work things out. If that’s what he’s come here for then he’s more of a bell end than I originally thought. I’m also petrified of how I will react to him. He clearly knows he has this strong pull over me. Will he continually try to hound me if I don’t get in the car? I make a mental note to grab some wine for tonight when I will be drowning my sorrows for the pain that I am going to put myself in. I stop and turn towards the car. Oh well, I guess it’s best to get this over and done with. Plus it’s a free ride to the beach hut so I’ll get to Liss much quicker. Here goes nothing.

Once I’m safely clipped in I wait for the slow hum of the engine to start back up but it doesn’t. Instead the car is filled with an awkward silence and I can feel Max’s stare burning straight into me as if demanding me to look at him.

“I think you need to head that way.” I point straight ahead, giving him the hint to move. Instead he just continues to watch me, leaning back slightly into his seat so that one arm rests on the wheel while the other snakes around the back rest of his seat. I steal a quick glance and  he looks so fucking perfect, my body is screaming out to be touched by him but my head knows that it’s so, so wrong. If things hadn’t have worked out the way they have, right about now I would be sitting in those arms and potentially doing some naughty, naughty things. But unfortunately, shit happens. Why did I bloody get in the car
? “Because you’re a bloody silly cow that’s why.”
I think to myself.

“Max, I’m not interested in your little games. Either say what you want to say otherwise I’ll get out of this car and keep walking. To be honest, I haven’t got the time to be dealing with your bollocks.”

Max

It takes every ounce of strength that I have to keep my hands to myself. All I want is to reach out and touch her. Let her know how I much I really need her in my life, how much she has affected me in the short period that I have known her, but I can’t.

That smart mouth of hers never fucking stops, she’s not been in the car for more than five fucking minutes and already she’s rhyming of her demands. My senses are filled with everything Jess, vanilla and strawberry. Shit, just sitting next to her in the car has me hard.

This morning when I woke up I decided that enough was enough. I needed to talk to Jess one way or another before she boarded that plane and made her way back home. As much as I want to protect her, I’d hate for us to be on bad terms. Normally I wouldn’t give a toss but this is Jess that we’re talking about and she deserves some kind of explanation – even if it’s not the one she wants.

She’s been running around in my head constantly since she saw me in that mother fucking situation with Stella. Why did things have to get so complicated? I already knew that she would be at the office today after speaking to Melissa earlier. I didn’t have a clue what I was going to say to her, I just knew that I need to say something.

I arrived at the hotel pretty early and decided to hit the gym to burn off some stress before facing the angel that will somehow be the death of me. Half an hour on the treadmill usually works a treat every time, but today nothing seemed to be cutting it. After an hour I gave up and hit the shower. Max Wild giving up. There’s another fucking new one. The hotel is busier than ever right now, something that should make me ecstatic. Yet all I feel is a huge fucking void. Only one thing is going to fill that. Only one thing that I will never be able to keep. Fucking Jess Townsend.

By midday Jess was still up in her office so I busied myself looking over the plans. Jess doesn’t fuck about when she says she’s going to do something. Everything has been ordered, booked in for delivery and the work force set in place. What she fell behind on in the past few weeks, she has more than made up for now.

“Mr Wild.” A small delicate voice greets me as I step into the foyer, my thoughts wandering into a place of their own. I watch as the heat flushes her face when I look at her. I normally would have taken that as my cue to have my way with her but not anymore. I nod politely at her, step around her and head to the lifts. I don’t even know what I’m going to say to her. Somehow I don’t think “Jess, you drive me absolutely fucking crazy.” Isn’t going to cut it. Yes, I know I have been an absolute twat and for that I want to genuinely apologise for how I cut her off and treated her when Mal fell ill but right now the one thing I need to apologise to her for is Stella and me and what she walked into. I guess it didn’t help matters when she saw Stella with me at the hospital. Talk about putting two and two together, but shit. What was I supposed to do? Explain in the goddamn car park that Stella had some Gynae appointment. Guys don’t talk about shit like that to anyone, ever. Or at least I don’t.

Building up enough courage to cup my balls and swallow my pride, I made my way up to the fifteenth floor to get this shit over with. I’d probably feel better if she fucking slapped me or something. It’s driving me insane the way she acts like she’s so over it, over us. Jess fucking killed me the minute those lift doors opened. All I wanted to do was pull her into my arms and feel her body against mine. When I couldn’t hold back anymore I took what I wanted, just like I always do. Fucking Melissa had to choose that moment to call didn’t she? She fucking knew I was coming to talk to her today as well.

Now here I sit, my perfect angel sat by my side, shouting out useless threats if I don’t start the engine. I drive or she walks. Over my fucking dead body will she be leaving this car until I have said what I came to say. For once in her life she’s going to do as she is fucking told. I rub my hand over my face as I try to think how I am going to word what I want to say to her. Where the fuck do I start?

“Jess, the way I acted when Mal...” Fuck, that’s not where I wanted to start. She watches me intently so I continue “Shit Jess, I acted like such an arse.”

“Actually you acted like a complete twat face. I knew straight away when you came rushing into my office that something was wrong and instantly knew it had affected you a great deal. That’s why I left you to it and didn’t try to push you. I get it completely Max.”

“You do?” This fucking woman sat before me is too fucking perfect and here I am messing up on all crazy as shit levels. No wonder she’s heading back home.

“It’s done with Max. Mal’s better and that’s all that matters. Forget about it, I have.” Her words hit me hard in the chest but I try not to show it. I don’t want her to know my weaknesses, Shit. I don’t want anyone to know my weaknesses.

“So you and Melissa are becoming quite the pair hey?” I ask. I need to change the subject. I’m not used to apologising and I’m not sure I like it all that much. I don’t know if I should be happy or worried at how close they are becoming, but at least Melissa finally has a female around to do all that pampering shit with that girls seem to love so much.

“Well I guess she didn’t have much of a choice when I suddenly had nowhere to go.” There it is, that gigantic boot to the balls that I knew would come eventually. Sure, I fucking deserve it, but it still fucking hurts.

“Fuck.” I slam my hand down on the wheel, hard and she flinches at the sound. “Jess, you have no idea how shitty I feel about everything that has happened. As soon as Mal arrived, everything went tits up. I know I shouldn’t have shut you out the way I did. I guess it was just my way of protecting you. Now that you’re going home, it’s only right that I’m honest with you.” We both remain quite for some time, neither one of us taking up the place to speak and I can feel those Bambi eyes of hers burning into me.

"Before I came back to London I was happy in my every day, day to day life. I could do what I wanted when the fuck I wanted, without a care in the world. I didn't answer to anyone and I fucking liked it that way. Shit. I've looked after myself for as long as I can remember, aside from Mal and Daisy anyway." I stop and watch her, mouth slightly agape as she says nothing, just waits and hangs on to my every mother fucking word. I laugh a little as I continue. "Well that's how it was. Right until you came crashing into my life with that smart arse mouth of yours and turned everything I knew upside fucking down. After a while I found a small piece of me needing you more and more each god damn day and it's been driving me insane. You allowed me to forget. Shit, you allowed me to fucking feel again."

"Max." She whispers, her lips trembling slightly. Looking into her eyes I see that tears begin to swim to the lids, desperate to break free. I want to take her in my arms right here but I need to finish what I have started. If I don't, I'm worried that what I want to say will never be repeated again and I need her to know...

I hold my hand up and stop her as she tries to talk. "That night I left, I couldn't bring myself to admit how much you changed me. I was too scared to admit it. As I watched you sleeping peacefully in my arms, I was too much of a fucking pussy to admit that I had feelings for you. So I did what I do best. I upped and left without a backward glance in the hope that if I ignored you then these sudden foreign feelings would disappear once and for all."

"Why are you telling me this now? None of it matters anymore Max." Her voice waivers as her emotions break through that beautiful mouth of hers and it kills me inside knowing that I have done this to her. I'm the one who has crushed her and I'll never be able to truly forgive myself for that.

"I went two days Jess. Two fucking days without seeing you, two days without touching you and I felt like I was about to fucking explode. Deciding that I needed to grow a pair I checked with Mal to see what time you finished but by that time you'd already left. Then I saw you in that bar with Jen and I knew I wasn't going to leave you there. Not with those fucking vultures undressing what was mine with their eyes anyway. No fucking way was I going to leave you on your own in that state." I can feel my body getting worked up just remembering the look on their faces. How I didn't punch anyone is a fucking miracle.

"So I can tick fun drunk off my list of amazing qualities then?" My chest lightens a little as a smile dances across her lips. It's only small, but it's there.

"You're pretty fucking hot when you're drunk, you're pretty fucking hot all the time but I love how feisty you become when you have alcohol in your system. I guess what I'm trying to say Jess is that care about you. I care about you like I've never cared about anything or anyone before and it's scaring the fucking crap out of me. I want to look after you. I want to be the one you moan to when you've had a shit day. I want to be the one you fight with and then make up with. As much as I'm trying my fucking hardest to fight this," I wave my hand between us to exaggerate my point. "It's too fucking painful trying to stay away from you, for both of us." There it is. It's fucking out there and I suddenly begin to panic. Her small smile is gone, her face is slack. Her body is rigid and stiff as she just looks at me as if I'm about to disappear in to thin air. "Say something, goddamit."

"What about Stella?" She says it with such venom that I want to laugh. No matter what life throws at my perfect fucking angel, she always stays true to herself.

"Fuck Stella. What you saw wasn't what it looked like and yes I know that sounds like a cliché but it's true."

"Really, you sure about that Max? From what I saw she was practically dry-fucking you. Is that something you guys do for fun over here?"

Jeez, she doesn't stop or listen to anything anyone says. I run my hands through my hair in exasperation before continuing. "When Mal ended up in hospital it brought back some pretty dark memories. The only way I knew how to deal with it was to close myself away from those close to me. After the way I'd treated you by pushing you away I thought it was for the best, to keep you safe. I went to the office so I could make sure that you were okay but from a healthy distance. I didn't want to hurt you anymore than I already had. I guess when Stella turned up, she picked up on the fact that I was down and read into things completely wrong. As soon as she leaned into kiss me, I was pretty shocked at first and the moment my brain registered what was happening I pulled back instantly and that's when I saw you."

"Why now? You've never bothered to tell me any of this before today. It's pretty fucking easy to pick up the phone or stop by your sister’s house seeing as you knew I was there?"

"I didn't want to hurt you anymore than I already have Jess. Do you not understand what I’m saying to you?"

"How is telling me going to hurt me more than you already have Max? That's insane. Instead you've lead me to believe that you and Stella having been laughing at me behind my back. Now that, that hurts more than anything."

"So I did fucking wrong. I told you I'm no good at this shit. The bottom line is; everyone who comes close to me always ends up getting hurt. First there was my mum, then Mal. No fucking way was I prepared to let anything happen to you. I thought it would be best for everyone if you hated me. It's proved fucking good so far hasn't it?" I can't help the sarcasm that rolls off my tongue. I finally allow my twitching hand to reach out and cup her angelic face. "I don't want you to leave Jess, but this is the only way I can be sure that I can't hurt you again."