He steps away and his hands fall to his belt. He undoes the buckle and yanks the belt off his jeans with a loud crack. He motions me toward him with an abrupt wave of his fingers. “Come here.”

I back away.

“Come here now.” The undercurrent of barely controlled anger in his voice sends me scrambling back into a shelf. I stumble over my yoga pants and fall to the floor. Flower pots and water cans tumble to the ground around me. Max strides across the shed. I hold my hands up and turn away. “Please, Max. I’m sorry. Please don’t hurt me.”

He stops short and looks at me aghast. “Is that what you think?”

I look from him to the belt and back to him. Tears stream down my cheeks. “I don’t know what to think anymore.”

With a roar, he throws his belt across the room, and then sweeps the workbench clean with his hand. Tools clatter over the concrete floor. “What can I do, Makayla?” he shouts. “What can I do to get you to trust me?”

“Not this.”

He pushes open the door. Pausing, he looks back over his shoulder, and breathes slowly, in and out, as if trying to calm himself. “When I got your call, I thought…then I saw you in the cellar…tied up…your face—” His voice breaks and he scrubs his hand over his face. “It was too much. I couldn’t think…talk.” He takes another deep breath and grips the frame of the door so hard, his knuckles whiten. “I needed to see if you were hurt anywhere else. I needed to hold you. But when I saw the bruises on your stomach and your back, I took off the belt so the buckle wouldn’t hurt you.”

He steps out into the night, and the door slams behind him. I collapse, sobbing, in a heap on the cold, stone floor.

***

For the next few hours, the Geek Club bustles with activity. Geeks scatter far and wide. Amanda and I sit on the front porch of the house, and give our statements to the police. Pig and the drug dealers are hauled away. Misery, who turns out to be the CEO of a major tech company, is handcuffed and thrown in the back of a police car. Max and Jake are questioned about the fight.

“Hey, it’s my favorite EMT.” Ray drops to his knees beside me and pulls out his paramedic kit. “You’re looking all banged up.”

“I’ll be fine.”

“She was hit on the head and lost consciousness,” Amanda interjects. “The big guy also kicked her stomach and back when she was down.” I glare at her. I already told her I didn’t want anyone to know. I can take care of myself.

Ray raises his eyebrows and feels along my scalp until I wince.

“How are you feeling? Any symptoms of a concussion? Maybe we should take you to the hospital and get you checked out.”

“I just want to go home.”

Ray takes me to the ambulance and does a thorough check of all my bruises. He cleans up my face and gives me some ice. “I’ll let you go home if you have someone to stay with you for the next twenty-four hours. You know the drill.”

“Sure. I’ll work something out.”

He packs up his kit and hesitates. “Listen, my offer still stands. If you need any help or advice about qualifying as a paramedic, give me a call.”

By the time he leaves, the street is empty. The bad guys are in jail. I haven’t spoken to Max since the incident in the shed, although he has never been far away. I wander back to the porch and huddle in a deck chair.

Jake squats beside me and clasps my hand. “I’m going to take you home, and Max will take Amanda on his motorcycle.”

“Sure.” Numb and emotionally drained, I don’t need to ask why.

“He’s not thinking clearly right now,” Jake offers. “And it’s probably best for you too. I think you need some time to come to terms with the fact he is capable of a level of violence you can’t tolerate.”

I shrug.

Jake sighs. “I’ll tell him to bring the bike to the front to pick up Amanda.”

“Wait.” I grab his arm. “Aren’t you going to talk to her? You are the reason we came here tonight.”

Jake presses his lips together and shakes his head. “Not going to happen.”

“Why?”

“She’s not the only one hurting.”

***

Two hours later, I toss and turn in my bed. I can’t sleep. My head aches. My jaw throbs. My brain is sore. I briefly consider joining Jake in front of the television, but I don’t feel like talking. I wish Amanda hadn’t told him I wasn’t supposed to be left alone.

Where is Max? Did he stay at Amanda’s house? Images of them together appear unbidden in my mind, and I push them away. Amanda would never hurt me. I trust her implicitly. But what about Max? Do I trust him? Would he ever turn his violence on me?

I groan and turn to my side. A deep longing claws at my gut. A longing stronger than fear.

The soft click of the bedroom door startles me. I look over my shoulder and my heart leaps. “Max!”

He puts his finger to his lips. His leathers creak as he eases himself into the armchair in the corner of the room. He sits back and the shadows flicker around him, shades of black and gray.

I toy with the sheet, winding it around my hand. I wait for him to take off his clothes and come to bed, but he doesn’t move.

“Max?”

He draws in a ragged breath and shakes his head. His eyes are bleak and desolate, all traces of their usual warmth gone. My breath leaves me in a rush, and dread creeps its way up my spine. I sit upright in bed and pull the sheet around me. He is wearing his leather pants and a white T-shirt, stained with blood.