Chapter 4

MAX'S POV

The bitter, biting crash of the hotel room door closing behind me was louder than it should have been, I didn't flinch, though. I just kept moving down the corridor, fists clenched tight at my sides and jaw muscles clenched.

I had to do it.

It was the only right thing to do

But why did I feel like I'd made a big mistake that I was going to regret later in the future?

The sad look on Ava's face and the tears that gathered in her eyes when I told her it was never meant to happen. She desperately tried to hide the pain in her eyes but she failed.

Damn it.

I shoved my hair back against my ears, jabbed at the elevator button, and worked on slowing down my breathing. She'd been with me for six years. Being the perfect assistant, fast to act when things got nasty in the work environment, and too damn gorgeous to be good for me.

The way I'd look at her. The way my eye would appear to scan for her when she entered the room. But last night. Last night, I crossed the line.

It was too late to regret it now. I couldn't reverse my actions.

Getting on the elevator, I rested my back on the elevator door, looking at my reflection on the door. My face might not give out anything but I was a nervous wreck inside.

I made it to my own car, I just sat there for a moment, fist on the wheel. Ava's perfume still lingers on me- warm and sweet and lavender. Crinkled eyes, though, that wasn't enough either.

I still heard her.

The way she'd whispered out my name.

The little gasps of breath she'd released when I'd touched her.

"Cut it out," I growled at myself.

It didn't. Any of it. I had a duty. My mother already planned out my future and I would do what my mother wanted and marry the woman she chose for me, despite my feelings.

Feelings did not matter.

Mason had let feelings get in the way of it all, having run off and eloped because he wouldn't marry like our mother instructed us to marry. But I wasn't doing that. I wasn't going to let go of the family responsibility because of some feelings.

Not even if it shattered my own heart into a million pieces along the way.

When I finally arrived home, I attempted to breathe deeply and collapsed onto the couch but my brain would not shut down.

It was filled with thoughts of Ava.

Her smile. Her fingers. The way she'd stared at me like I wasn't Max Anderson, the cold and ruthless CEO.

I'd never felt so exposed. Never been exposed to anyone other than myself before as a person. And I'd had to bring her down because of that.

A ringing phone on the table interrupted me and I answered it when I confirmed that it was my mom calling.

"Where are you?" She asked. "I don't care, just come home immediately."

Perfect what I'd been trying to avoid.

My mother's place was the ultimate dream house, marble floor, ginormous glass doors, all aglitter to an inch of its life. But it's cold. Cold like stones and empty.

As was my future.

I stepped into the living room, and Aaliyah was the first face I saw on the white sofa with her mother.

"Max," my mother simply ordered and cut me off.

"At last," she went on.

"Hello Mom," I greeted my mom, bowing my head and attempting to be as cautious as I could. "Aaliyah. Mrs. Patel."

Aaliyah smiled at me, tiny and nice and stiff, always smiling. There was no spark between us.

Not the way there'd always been with Ava.

My stomach did flip over, but I sat down anyway, my cheek against its cold.

"We were discussing the wedding preparations," I was informed, in a no-nonsense tone. And I did not roll my eyes and she continued, "It's got to be perfect. Guest list, the venue, the-"

I just stood there with my jaw hanging open for a minute. They'd already gone and done it. They didn't require a word from me. I was only the groom- holding down in some fantasy of theirs.

Aaliyah's mom was talking about flowers, and Aaliyah blankly scrolled through her phone, not even pretending to be paying attention.

I looked at the whiskey glass in front of me and Ava's face was all I could think of.

How terrible would she be feeling after what I'd done to her. after the way I'd treated her after everything that we'd been through?

It wasn't fair to her.

I should have stayed a while. Should have said-

"Two weeks."

The words shook me out of my slumber. I opened my eyes, my head jerking upwards into the air. "What?"

My mom glared at me. "The wedding. We've re-scheduled. Two weeks from today."

I glared at her too, my chest aching. "Two weeks?" I growled, my voice constricted more than I'd have liked it to be.

"Yes," Aaliyah's mom smiled.

I did catch sight of Aaliyah, though, and she didn't even glance up from her phone. Was she even paying attention to what was going on

Two weeks. Two weeks, and I'd be married to a woman I didn't love, and the woman that I did love was halfway out the door already.

"No," I'd told myself before I could register what I said.

My mother's scowl grew frigid. "Excuse me?"

I swallowed, my own face contorted the same as theirs by their cold. "That's too soon."

"Nonsense," she cut in. "We cannot wait. All is planned. And the sooner the better, so much the better."

I compressed my lips against each other, then closed them again. I retreated upon the protest struggling to be expressed from my throat. What was I saying? That I didn't want this? That I wanted only Ava?

I felt it, anyway.

"You don't want to marry Aaliyah?" My mother asked, giving me a look as if daring to answer wrongly. "Is something wrong?"

Yes. Everything was wrong.

But I smiled. "No. Of course not. I want this marriage as much as you do."

My mother's sharp eyes never hung half a second longer before she went back to scratching the guest list into being.

I was dying the whole time.