Page 60 of Are You Going to Love Me

“You’ve spent days talking life into me and never once showed that your crown was slipping. What kind of superpower is that?”

Eden shrugged, her head resting on his chest. She tried to remember the last time she didn’t have to be strong or have it all figured out. Staysha just started taking the load off of her recently, but before then, Eden walked around with the weight of the world on her shoulders and kept shining.

“Being Poppi’s girl, I guess,” she murmured. “I’ve had to be strong since my momma left me and Staysha on Poppi’s porch. When Poppi got sick, I had to be strong. There wasn’t space or time for crying. When Mama snatched the business from Poppi and we lost damn near everything, I had to be strong. BecauseI smile or I dress it up, people don’t think this shit gets fucking heavy. I had to have a full breakdown for my sister to step in and help me.”

Maximus lifted her face so he could take her in fully. He swiped another river of tears. “You gon’ let me help you?”

“Max, stop. You got-”

He placed a soft peck to her lips to silence her. “I got what?”

“Your own-”

He did it again. “What was that?”

“You got your own shi-”

Maximus hooked her chin, turning his soft pecks against her lips, into his tongue swiping over hers. “My shit ain’t never going to be too big not to stand in front of you.”

He kissed whatever response she could follow up with. Eden’s hands found his shoulders as she kissed him back. A simple gesture turned into a heated exchange. Now straddling his lap, his hands in her hair, and massaging her waist. The growing attractions and sexual tension between them rushed heat to her center and hardness to his dick.

“Tell me what you need, Eden,” he directed huskily between the fusion of their mouths as he came alive underneath her.

Feeling him grow to size alerted Eden’s brain. She pulled back, fueled with temptation that battled against her sense. “I can’t give you sad girl pussy and I'm not taking sympathy dick.”

Pulling her body from his felt sinful. The coolness from the absence of his body was a shock to her system.

“Shit,” she lowly blew. “I should go home.”

She reached for her bag to order her JoyRide home.

Maximus calmed himself. He didn’t want her any other way than free and regretless. As brutal as the excitement was, he respected her retreat. But he couldn’t let her leave him. If she left, he’d go back to his initial course of action and beat Rico to a pulp for hurting the woman he’d silently deemed as his.

“Don’t go,” he rumbled, halting her midtap.

Eden’s eyes lifted from her screen to him. “I can’t promise I'd stay without wanting something more.”

“You hungry?”

“Do you want me fat? I can’t get brand deals or otherwise looking like a brick house,” Eden whined.

Maximus flashed a devilish grin. “I’d want you in whatever way you serving it up. I’ll do you one better...” Maximus stood up and moved to the other end of the couch. “That’s your side. If you need to move closer, move closer. So again, you hungry?”

Eden laid her phone down and tucked her legs under her butt. “Why do you want me to stay so bad? You think I’m going to retract on my self-control?”

“Not at all. That shit is actually sexy which is why I’m over here. You gon’ let me feed you, watch a movie, pick your brain?”

“What are you trying to feed me?”

“Not sympathy dick,” he spoke with a chuckle, lightening the heaviness of the mood.

“You know what I haven’t had in a minute?”

Maximus leaned forward. “Tell me, I'll make it happen.”

Eden bit a grin. “I want you to stop talking to me like that.”

“I’m not.”

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