My Life Of Evasion

16. Can We At Least Have One Normal Date?

Chapter 16

Can We At Least Have One Normal Date?

 

 

At the hotel later that day, I thought Max would have gotten around to telling me just what that call was about, but it turned out that he was just going to act like it hadn't even happened.  At least, that's what he was giving off what he was going to try and do. 

Since I knew him as well as I did - I mean, we did live together after all - I knew that he was just acting like his normal self, unsuccessfully, of course.  When he was worried about something, his eyebrows would push together...and that's just what they were doing as we rode up the elevator of our hotel in the city of Bangalore.  Dad was telling Ben, Drew, and Sophie more about how we could find out more about the scytale and Max was trying to look like he was listening, but with his eyebrows pushed together and that far off look in his eyes, I knew that he wasn't hearing a word.

So when the elevator doors opened, I put my hand in his just as he stepped out into the hallway.  I guess I kind of caught him by surprise because he looked down at me like he'd forgotten that I was there for a moment. 

"You okay?" I asked, raising an eyebrow as everyone headed down the hallway in front of us. 

He nodded, pulling me into his side and kissing my temple.  "Yeah, just thinking about something," he said, smiling like he was trying to brush whatever it was off. 

"Are you going to tell me?" I asked, looking up at him again when I pulled away from him.

The smile that was in place didn't reach his eyes like they normally did.  "Not a chance."

I smiled back at him, trying to act like I believed that he was telling me the truth.  Maybe he knew that I wasn't buying it.  Maybe that would goad him into telling me what happened. 

But that probably wasn't going to happen, so I was just going to let it go...for now, that is. 

"So I was thinking that we could go out tonight, just the two of us," Max said a few minutes later when we were in our room in the suite.  We could hear Ben and Drew fighting over who got the bigger bed in their shared room and Sophie telling them to stop acting like children.  She wasn't sharing a room with them, just probably got tired of them fighting since her room was right across the hall.

"Really?" I asked as I flopped down on the bed beside where he was standing.  "Why?"

He shrugged one shoulder as he looked down...and I could see his eyebrows pulling together once again.  "Because I want to spend some alone time with you," he said, looking up at me a moment later after he put his normal expression back onto his face.  "We haven't since we were in Chile and I thought it might be fun.  It would get our minds off of everything else and just on each other."

I could hear a double meaning in his suggestion, like he was thinking something else.

"Okay," I said, nodding.  "Sure."

His smiled again - it still didn't reach his eyes - and leaned down to kiss my forehead.  "Good."

"I can't help but notice that Max is acting...a little odd since we got here to the hotel," Sophie said.  "Actually, ever since we left Ravana Phadi."

She and I were sitting in the living room area of our suite.  I had Addy on my lap, feeding her her bottle as she started to fall asleep.  She'd had a busy day just like the rest of us.  No wonder she was falling asleep while she was eating.