She shook her head.

“Let’s go. I have no cake at home, or even pie, but I do have ice cream, if that tempts you?”

Max grinned at her.

“You are very good at tempting me, Olivia Monroe.”

They got in his car in the parking lot and were both quiet as they drove back to her house. Then, just as they got off the freeway, Max cleared his throat.

“I meant everything I said back there. In case you were wondering.”

Olivia turned to look at him.

“I thought you did.”

After all of her doubts over the last week, somehow she hadn’t doubted that for a moment.

“Oh. Okay. I just wanted to make sure.”

She couldn’t stop thinking about what he’d said. It had been spontaneous and heartfelt and like nothing she’d ever experienced before. She’d had men fall in love with her before—or at least, tell her they had. And she’d fallen in love, too. But she’d always felt like she had to hide parts of herself with all of those men: her ambition, her enthusiasm, her body. Sometimes all of the above. But for someone to really see her, to want her, to love her, the true Olivia, like Max did . . . it all felt brand-new. She had no idea how to respond.

“I don’t want you to think . . . You took me by surprise, that’s all. I didn’t realize . . . well, any of that.”

Max reached over and took her hand.

“I know I caught you off guard. But I’m glad you know now.” He grinned at her. “How about we go back to your house, eat some ice cream, make out like those teenagers around us were all doing, and finally, at long last, I can let you drag me back to your bedroom. Does that sound good?”

She slid her hand into his. That was exactly what she needed right now.

“That sounds great.”

Chapter Eleven

A few weeks later, Max glanced through his calendar during his regular Tuesday lunchtime meeting with Kara. Everything looked normal, except for the weekend. There must be some mistake.

“Why am I on flights to and from San Francisco on Friday and Sunday? Was that some mistake?”

Kara gave him that look he hated, the one he always tried to avoid getting. The “why am I working for this man when I’m so much smarter than him?” look.

“Because, sir, you have two events this weekend in the Bay Area, remember? Friday afternoon right after you get in you have a meeting with a group of teachers and students in Oakland, then that dinner with the tech people, and Saturday night you’re doing the big party fundraiser in San Francisco.”

Kara was right, she was so much smarter than him. How the hell had he managed to forget this? He and Wes had even had conversations about it—Wes was going to be at the fundraiser, too. But this would mean he’d spend the entire weekend away from L.A. Which would mean he would have two whole weeks away from Olivia.

“Shit. Yeah, now I remember.” What if he flew down to L.A. after the fundraiser on Saturday night, and then back to DC from there on Sunday afternoon? That was, if there was a flight late enough Saturday night from San Francisco to L.A., and if the fundraiser didn’t go too long for him to get on that flight, and if Olivia didn’t mind that he’d get to her house after midnight on a Saturday night and fly out again twelve hours later. But he couldn’t make a plan like that without telling his staff why he needed a twelve-hour detour to L.A.

“Is something wrong, sir?” Kara asked him.

He shook his head.

“Nothing’s wrong. I just completely forgot I wasn’t going to be in L.A. this weekend. I left my good pair of running shoes at my house, and I was looking forward to picking them up.”

He had left his good pair of running shoes at his house, but he almost always left them in L.A.

“Oh, we can get someone in the L.A. office to pick them up and send them to meet you in the Bay Area, that’s easy.”

He brushed that away.

“Don’t worry about it, I’m sure the L.A. staff has better things to do than pick up my shoes. I should just order another pair to leave here in DC anyway. Okay, what else do we need to talk about?”

They ran through the rest of his schedule for the week, but the whole time he could feel the emptiness in the pit of his stomach. He wasn’t going to get to see Olivia this weekend. He pretended he was looking up something else and flipped through his calendar, and realized he’d seen her at least once a week for the past three months. He only wished it had been more.

The past few weeks they’d spent as much time together as possible. He almost always had at least one event to attend while he was in L.A. for the weekend, often more, but other than that, he was with her almost the whole time. They’d been at her place and at his, at the movies and at the beach, and one rainy Saturday night when they were both in bad moods, he’d ditched his previous idea for a date, told her to put on all the rain gear she had, and drove them out to Anaheim for four glorious hours at Disneyland, where the rain cleared up just in time for the fireworks. They got in the car afterward, soaking wet and freezing cold and both smiling from ear to ear.

He’d kept waiting for her to respond in some way to what he’d said that night at the bowling alley, but she hadn’t. Their night at Disneyland had been the perfect time for it—they’d held hands on the roller coasters, they’d walked around with huge smiles on their faces, they’d stood, arms wrapped around each other, during the fireworks, and he’d known the entire time that he was no longer falling in love with her—he’d fallen completely. But she hadn’t said anything, so he didn’t bring it up again.

Did she feel the same way? He had no idea. He tried to be mature about this, to not feel hurt, but he couldn’t help it. Sometimes he just wanted to say “I love you, Olivia! Do you love me?” When he’d shown up at her house wearing a red wig, she laughed so hard she’d cried, and then she looked at him with this tender, loving look in her eyes, and he was sure she was going to say it. She hadn’t, but that look from her gave him hope.

It felt like a physical ache, how much he missed her, how much he would miss her even more in the days to come, how much it would suck to get on that long flight back to California on Friday morning and know he wouldn’t see Olivia at the other side of it.

He tried to shake it off. This wasn’t a big deal. He’d see her the following week; it would be fine.

When Kara left his office, he put his head down to try to read through his stack of briefing papers for the hearings the next day, but he couldn’t concentrate on them. The whole reason he and Lana had broken up, shortly before he announced his run for the Senate, was because he’d been so busy he hadn’t made time for her, and he’d realized he hadn’t cared enough to make time for her. He couldn’t conceive of not making time for Olivia. He pulled his personal phone out of his bag.

Bad news—completely forgot I’m not coming to LA this weekend. I’m in the Bay Area all weekend. A school event, a dinner, and huge fundraiser I can’t believe I forgot about

Wait. He had an idea just as he sent that.

Hey—want to come with me? I could do my events, you could see your family, and in between, we could see each other