He wasn't as drunk as he was pretending to be. I found that out much later. Maybe if I had realized that then, I wouldn't have stepped into the hallway of Maximilian Skinner's elegant home. Although something tells me I probably would have. After all when do I ever make a wise decision at a moment like that?

So there I was, in the lair of the white worm himself, looking around me at the subtle but evident signs of his minimalist good taste, not to mention very healthy bank balance. Like Cinderella at the ball, Beauty in the Beast's castle, or some sacrificial virgin in the citadel of Vlad Dracula himself, the thought occurred to me that I must be stark raving mad. Why was I here? Did I have a death wish? Was this some lemming-like acting out of the spider and the fly?

But madness obviously worked both ways. What possible agenda did Skinner himself have for asking me in? Surely the last thing he needed to introduce into his affluent and privileged existence was his nemesis, the mistress of the poison pen and tongue herself?

Despite the offhand suggestion he had just made about sex, I didn't think Max was likely to try anything on. However, if he did, I was probably dead meat, metaphorically speaking. Max lives in a pretty secluded place, the front door was bolted and he's considerably stronger than I am. But for all that he's a bastard, Max Skinner simply doesn't give out those sort of vibes. He isn't a man who has to force women to have sex with him, well not in the conventional sense. I would imagine, however, that he's quite capable of taking advantage of his position to get laid, but any woman who thinks she can sleep her way to the top with a man like him deserves what she gets, so I can't say I'm blaming him for that game.

Most upwardly mobile City women these days will drop their knickers willingly at the sight of a man like him. It's that thing about powerful, arrogant, confident guys, those who push their way to the top at the expense of others. God knows why, but we all have some sort of lurid attraction for them. It's probably that lingering prehistoric alpha male programming - we want the ape man who will give us tough and healthy babies, as well as keep all the others predators at bay. If that means we get dragged round by our hair from time to time and shagged into the cave floor on a regular basis, so much the better. The female of the species is even more fucked up than the male. Believe me, I know. However, it helps if the particular Neanderthal happens also to be pretty easy on the eye, dresses in Armani - and knows how to give a girl a good time.

I would imagine.

Why was I here then? What had made me drive round the vicinity for hours to find myself at Skinner's door when I should have been on my way to my new life by now? I might feel sorry for how I had behaved in a general sense, but I still didn't like him as a person, and didn't feel I owed him any explanations.

I think. 

Oddly enough at that juncture when trying to remember why I didn't like him, I was having a bit of a problem remembering exactly what it was about him that annoyed me so much. How peculiar, seeing as Skinner and I had been like two mangy dogs vying for the same bone for weeks. But now, it was as if someone had completely wiped my long term memory of the past few months. My short term memory, however, was doing fine. Max Skinner the saviour. Max Skinner, the martyr of the poker game. Max Skinner, the sexy as hell boss who had just sacked me...

"Fresh bottle. Clean glass. Shall I be mother, then?" I heard him say in that self-satisfied manner of his.

I looked up, nodded, and mumbled something about 'Nice place, you've got here...'

He shrugged. "...It'll do for now. I don't spend much time here. Max Skinner doesn't do home. My pad is just a glorified storage container that I sleep in - when I can't find a lady to do the honours for me..." He gave me a patronising smile. I sneered back beginning to recall his obnoxious style.

His general mood, however, seemed morose; I had no intention of indulging his melancholy. Instead I sipped at the brandy, telling myself to go slow. This was not the night -or the man- with whom to get pissed. The cognac, however, was divine.  The real stuff. Smooth as silk. Pretty much like Skinner himself. Smooth, silken bastard.

Max poured himself a large slug into another balloon, obviously deciding that quaffing from the bottle wasn't acceptable now that he had company. He did carry on puffing on his big fat cigar, though. But I found that disturbingly alluring. I like the smell of a good cigar. Especially on a man's kiss. This was a good cigar.

"Cuban?"

He laughed. "What else?"

"How do you get them over here?" I queried, for something to say. I had no doubts people like Max never had any problems with restrictions.

"You can get anything you want anywhere in the world if you can pay for it," he answered obliquely.

I sighed. "Money! It's all you care about, isn't it?"

Max eyeballed me for a few seconds before answering. "No, it isn't, to be honest. I care about a lot of things. It just happens that money is all I have at the present time.  But I never take money lightly by the same token. It makes life considerably less onerous, whatever sanctimonious popular myth believes. And money rarely lets you down. How many things in life can you say that about?"

I didn't have a clue how to answer him, so again I said nothing, hiding my unease by sipping further at my drink.

"What are your plans? Where are you going to go?" he suddenly asked.

"Don't have any plans," I answered. "I'll see what happens. Where the wind blows me, I expect."

He nodded. "You talked to Ann?"

"Yeah. Briefly."

"She got the codicil?"

I frowned. "I don't know. I suppose so. Wasn't that the deal she made?"

Max just scoffed that one away. "Like your deal to share the winnings, you mean? Reality check, love. He owns her place now. He owns her. Wait and see..."

"You can't know that!"

Max just laughed and carried on smoking his cigar, leaning back in his chair and blowing the smoke upwards.

"...You're just saying that to make me feel worse..." I protested, somehow needing him to argue back. But he wasn't letting me draw him into some dispute over this. He just gave me that scathing look of his, like he didn't give a damn whether I felt worse or better.

"Why did you ask me here?" I blurted out.

"I didn't. You turned up at my door uninvited. I have good manners. I felt obliged to offer you a drink..."

"Liar! You're feeling low because you haven't got anyone to spend your birthday with. And your manners are not good - they are appalling...That's why you're here on your own and no one gives a damn about you...!"

"...Says the woman with so many things going for her that she hasn't even got a place to stay..."

"That's such a cruel thing to say!" I retorted. "Does it make you feel more of a man to kick me when I'm down?"

He rolled his eyes, seemingly unimpressed at my melodramatic response. "It wasn't meant to be cruel. It's was meant to be the truth. The truth hurts. I should know. I've had to face it - why shouldn't you?"

All at once, I felt a real sense of sadness for him. I'd seen his film. He'd loved Fanny and he'd loved his vineyard in France. It seemed he had finally found himself, become a decent man, growing up, maturing, whatever. How had it all gone so very wrong?

But before I could question him on that score, he had continued with a very personal question. "Why did you stay with Murphy so long? You could have got out years ago. You probably could have been Mrs. Terry Thorne by now if you'd played your cards right..."

"...Shut up! You know nothing about all that!"

"I know I don't. That's why I asked. Why did you stay with a man you didn't love?"

"Because I did love him! Oh, what's the point talking to you about it? You don't understand about love..."

"You think? What makes you the world authority on pain? That's a tad arrogant of you, surely?"

I looked down embarrassed, knowing he was right. Max Skinner knew all about what it was like to love someone who hadn't loved him enough. It was a cheap shot for me to say otherwise.

"Tell, me something, Uma. After all that has happened, do you still believe in love?"

It wasn't what I expected him to say. Imagine discussing love with Max Skinner? Who would ever have foreseen that as the ending to this spectacularly awful day? In fact, his oblique question came so far out of left field that I actually answered it without thinking first, revealing far more of myself than I wanted to.

"Yes, I do believe in love. Even now. Well, the possibility of love anyway. I have to. I've been so close enough times to feel sure that it can happen. With just a bit of luck. I do believe that there might just be a guy out there who will be all the things I need..."

"And if you found this elusive thing called love, do you believe it could last forever?"

At that I smiled sadly. "Ah, that's quite another matter! Not really. I'm not sure anything can last for ever. But the way I see it is, being alone is no picnic either. And as actually being in love is pretty close to heaven, even if it only lasts for a little while, I still prefer to take a chance on love and live in the now. I think you should deal with tomorrow, tomorrow. And never waste good fortune offered today on the off chance that it might just make things worse in the long run..."

He picked up on one thing I'd said. I wondered if he had really been listening to the rest. "...Close to heaven...' he muttered distantly, his eyes far off, seeing something deep in his own memory.

"You know those moments that come from time to time, when the mists clear and you feel like you've touched heaven...? Just for an instant? Like you almost know the answers to everything that counts - until puff! The moment slips a way and the confusion's back again? And I don't mean good sex or a wild orgasm. That's a very different thing. Nothing wrong with either, of course. Both together is definitely preferable.  Pretty damn great, if you get the chance..."

Max chuckled, his lips pulled in a pensive pout as he gave my words some thought. I decided it was time for him to open up to me. 

"What about you, then? You always think you know everything about everything. What's your verdict?  Does Max Skinner believe in love?"

He closed his eyes and chewed on his lip for a while. "If you'd asked me that a couple of months ago, I would have laughed in your face. But tonight, I have to say, I believe you're probably right. Love is always out there to be found in the strangest places. And even when it hurts, it's better than feeling nothing at all. I should know that. I've spent most of my life feeling nothing -and it stinks..."

"...Why are you telling me all this, Max?" Suddenly I got the feeling that there was something else quite different going on in his head and I was totally missing the point.

But I already knew. Those mists had cleared all of a sudden and, for a startling moment of clarity, I realized that I understood this man.  He was trying to tell me that he had feelings for me. The even more bizarre self-revelation was that I now knew that I felt something for him, too. I think in some secret hidden part of me, I'd known it all along. We wouldn't have been such great opponents if we'd been indifferent to each other. There's a thin line between love and hate, or so they say.

"I'm in love with you, Uma. Or rather, I am falling in love with you.  And you don't give a shit about me..." His stiff laugh sounded more like a sigh. "But that's not actually your fault. I can't make a woman love me if she doesn't. I know that. It's just that I'm used to getting my own way with women. Or rather, I used to be used to getting my own way. In everything else, I can buy my way to anything I want. Except when it comes to love. Real love..."

"You're wrong. I do give a shit about you, Max. I just always thought you hated me. Self preservation, you know? Hit out first. Attack as the best form of defence?"

"What do you mean?" He clammed up suddenly, flashing me one of his cool, clinical gazes. "Is this just another of your scams? You've tried to beat me and failed, so you think you can seduce your way into my bed to get what you want? This how you think you can play it? I might be pathetic but I'm not stupid..." He was on the defensive already, rather proving my original comment.  But he was running scared now. The cat was out of the bag and he couldn't hide behind his smooth exterior anymore. If I was the bitch I pretended to be, I had him on the proverbial ropes.

"If I thought you actually meant that, I'd slap your face, Skinner. I'm a lot of things, Max, but I'm not a slut and I'm not a user. If I was, do you think I'd have been struggling to patch up a disastrous marriage for five years when I could have had any number of men who would have kept me in the manner to which I would like to have been accustomed? If you want a chance with me, then simply ask me. And if you can't trust my answer, then what are you damn well asking for?"

"I'm not asking..." he retorted tartly.

"Well, fine!  Then go and sit here and drink yourself into a miserable old age all alone then!" I stood up, slammed down the glass and gathered my purse and jacket.

"Where are you going? It's nearly midnight. And where have you been since you left the Phoenix this afternoon anyway, come to think of it?" Max stood up to and walked towards me. I shrugged off the hand he extended.

"Where have I been? Driving around for hours like some demented fool, unable to leave the county for some strange reason because it actually mattered to me what you thought about me! Where am I going now? As far away from you as I can get before you mess up the last few brain cells remaining to me...!"

Don't ask me to explain what happened then. Max must have kissed me. Or grabbed me and I kissed him or something. Because plenty of kissing ensued. My earlier refusal to share spit with him via a bottle of cognac seemed to fly out of the window as we tongue kissed so deeply that we probably shared stomach fluids as well. I don't quite remember the order of events as we rolled about the place, stumbling back onto the couch, then falling off it to the floor and ultimately having rather inelegant first-time sex on his beautiful silk antique Persian rug. I remember the rug distinctly because it was bloody hard on the back; those antique rugs have a very thin shag. Unlike Max, who has a rather thicker one. Ha ha.

Surfacing for air, we found ourselves lying on the floor in an embarrassing state of deshabillés. You know, those times when you have your knickers round one knee, your jeans still caught in your shoe and hanging off one foot, your jumper round your neck and your bra pushed up in a most unflattering arrangement? Max hadn't even taken his pants off. But he did have his shirt tangled behind his back and his vest up round his armpits. He made a few deft adjustments, the way men do,  and was fairly decent without too much having been on show; I, however, was so far past humiliation that it was simpler to shrug everything off and just lie there naked as being the slightly less ridiculous option.

"Well, at least you got one birthday present," I murmured, sniggering to myself at my rather tasteless comment. 

He looked across. "I hope you meant that as a singularly unfunny joke, Uma."

"I'm sorry. Bad taste?"

"Very. Are you okay? I didn't hurt you, or anything?"

"My back's sore."

"I've bruised my right knee," he whined pathetically.

We both started laughing. The situation was totally absurd. Had I just shagged Max Skinner? I asked him just to be sure.

"Did I just shag you?" 

"No. To be perfectly accurate, I did the shagging. You were the 'shaggee' as it were..." he retorted, a return to his smug former self. "And if I say so myself, you damn well enjoyed it."

I rolled over and cuddled up to him; his arm slipped round to draw me close. "I'm not complaining. I'm just amazed. And cold. Can we find a bed?"

"Took the words right out of my mouth," he answered. "A bed. My bed. And then we can do it properly..."

"Again? Already? Are you on Viagra? You weren't actually drunk before, were you? You shit, you were just pretending so I would let my guard down!"

"Well, it worked, so stop whinging.  You've just enjoyed a series of rather spectacular orgasms courtesy of yours truly, so have the decency to swoon into my arms and tell me what a man I am..."

Max stood up, pulled me to my feet and swung me up. Nice, one, Max! He was going to carry me to his boudoir. 

"You have spectacularly lovely breasts...Small, firm, pert..." he observed as he ran easily up the stairs. He's ever so strong. "...They're almost as fine as your legs. However, I have to say, it's that cute little peachy bottom of yours that does the trick every time...I intend to be paying some serious homage to those silken cheeks..."

At that, Max kicked open the bedroom door and placed me down gently on the large bed, made up in fabrics of a dark silvery grey. I looked about curiously to be finally in the inner sanctum of this private man. It was a very masculine room with a very masculine colour scheme. Max is a very masculine man. I felt like a tiny delicate little flower budding in his stark monochrome alien world. Yet it didn't feel threatening. It just felt new and exciting - and achingly perfect. The best moments in life are always those that steal up when you least expect them. Tonight had arrived seemingly from nowhere and yet it felt all at once that it had always been meant to be this way. I felt so comfortable with Maximilian Skinner. As if I'd known him for years.

Well, perhaps not quite that comfortable. As he stood up and divested himself of his clothes, obviously eager for round two, I came over all shy and girly. I felt sweaty and sticky and smelly after what had happened downstairs and even if his recent deposit was the cause of it, you know how it is with a new guy? You want to be sweet-smelling and perfect all the time - and not drip on his nice clean sheets.

"Er...Max...may I go and freshen up in your bathroom?"

He smiled and held out a hand. "Be my guest. Help yourself to towels and whatever..."

"You got a spare toothbrush, only mine's in the car...?"

"Use mine."

"Use yours?" I repeated astonished. We were hardly at that stage yet. 

"Are you back on that obsessive hygiene kick of yours again? I've just shared considerably more than saliva with you. My tongue has already been up your...well, we won't go into that. Nor shall I remind you that you were recently happy enough to brush your teeth with my todger...Get over it. Use my toothbrush. And if you must, there's a new head in the top right hand drawer..."

I meekly padded over to his bathroom, feeling very naked all of a sudden as he turned on his supercilious style again. There are times Max makes me feel like a naughty school girl or a disobedient child. Some people have an intimidating presence that makes one feel gauche and unsophisticated. He does it all the time to me, making me feel like the small town girl from Lancashire that I really was.

I closed the door and surveyed the pristine marble cool of his bathroom, all steel, black granite and Perspex. Helping myself to a grey towel (what is this thing he has about grey?) I opened the heavy door of the shower cubicle. It was one of those fancy showers with jets positioned at ever angle. Gingerly, I turned the steel lever and was almost knocked off my feet by the power of the spray driving into me at from all over. It reminded me of Max himself in the swimming pool in Luberon. Fiddling with the controls, I managed to control the flow to less fierce. He obviously can take a lot more force than I can.

I must have been so intent on trying to stand upright against the blast that I didn't hear the shower door open. The next moment Max was there, introducing himself with a rather formal: "Do you mind if I join you?"

I spun round. He was naked, too. Obviously. One does not normally bathe fully clothed (except in swimming pools in Luberon). And smiling a rather cute if knowing smile. He can look awfully like a naughty boy when he wishes. Mr. Supercilious had suddenly disappeared to be replaced by Mr. Charming.

"Only if you promise to scrub my back."

"I'll scrub your front as well, and all the bits in between..." he retorted, his large hands already rubbing gel into foam, ready to set to work.

"I don't usually shower with a man on the first date," I observed. "I thought I'd better mention that in case the matter of me being a tart comes up again..."

"No problem. This isn't a date. We've not had our first date yet. Of course, I might not ask you now. What would be the point? I've had what I came for..."

He grinned, his tongue peeking fetchingly out of the side of his mouth. I slapped his arm. He wrestled me against the cool wall of the shower and forced me to kiss him. Not that it needed much force. Other than to grab hold of my slithery, soapy body. That took some doing. God, he's so big and manly. He makes my knees go all wobbly, a sensation probably intensified by the throbbing erect penis probing between my thighs, all foamy and wet with shower crème. That was definitely making me dance about.

Rivers of soapy water were cascading down his chest, tangling in the thick thatch of hair at his groin. I let him lay me back against the wall, all but swooning at the sight of his powerful body and the intimate attentions he was giving mine. And I am not a girl given to swooning.

He soon gave up trying to get a decent hold; he snapped off the water, threw me a towel and wrapped one round his waist with some difficulty, giving his bouncing erection a fond pat and the usual wiggle of hips that men seem to think passes for sexy come on. They're all the same, aren't they? Wonder if General Maximus does the elephant walk?

Sitting on his bed, I rubbed my hair on one of his grey towels. He settled in next to me and took it from me, patting my hair dry and then taking the brush I had brought in with me, sensuously untangling my long locks, combing them dry. It was a wholly unexpected tenderness, not at all like you would imagine from brisk and business-like Max Skinner. But it recalled the other man inside him we learned about in the film. And it seemed of great significance that he was prepared to reveal his true nature to me so early on in our relationship.

"You've done this before..." I observed softly.

He gave a sigh of agreement. "I had forgotten how it is. The little things one does for someone when you share a life. In the morning, by the window, before we launched ourselves into the day. Talking together while I dried her hair..." He seemed almost to be thinking aloud; even the tone of his voice had changed to soft and wholly un-Maxlike.

"That's what you miss the most in the end," I observed. "Not the sex or the big things. It's the crushing loneliness where there used to be a constant presence. The simple reassurance of being with your best friend every day! Cullen was such great company. He never shut up except when he was asleep. And he even talked then sometimes. He dreams a lot, you see...." I remembered nights when I had had to wake him gently, when he was upset about something, making no sense. It all revolved round his childhood memories, issues about his mother and how she had abandoned him. But I couldn't discuss one man's secrets with another. They would always remain in my heart. So instead I went on in another vein. "He was always so funny. So quick-witted and clever. He would make me laugh from the moment I opened my eyes... I miss the fun we had..."

"...Laughter. I remember that," Max murmured, still fingering my hair. "She laughed so much. She wouldn't let me take myself seriously..."

There was a moment of silence when neither of us said anything. I suppose we were trying to figure out of how you deal with memories that refuse to go away.

"Would you go back to him?" Max suddenly asked. "I couldn't deal with that again. If there's something lingering then tell me now..."

I shook my head. "It's over. I don't want him back. But a little part of me will always love him. I make no apologies for that."

Max nodded. "I would expect nothing less from a woman like you. It caught my eye from the start, that quality you had. You knew how to love. On the other hand it infuriated me that a man I considered worthless had such a beautiful woman in the palm of his hand and was throwing it all away...it just didn't seem fair..." Max observed bitterly.

But even now, I couldn't let anyone speak of Cullen like that. No one ever understands him. I have to defend him whatever he did.  "He's not worthless. For all his faults, he isn't worthless, Max! And nor are you. Although you damn well try to make everyone think you are. What makes you act like that?"

He laughed with a rueful chuckle. "I had to. One tiny chink of weakness - and they have you. And I don't just mean in the financial world. Everyone, everywhere is just waiting for you to make a mistake. I don't trust anyone..."

"That's sad."

"Do you trust people then? You hardly give the impression of a woman who is open to the world..."

I shrugged. "Not sure. Yeah, I think I trust people. Mostly. Until they let me down..."

"Bad choice. They always will. A wise person expects the worse and is never disappointed...."

"No. You're wrong. That doesn't sound like something you learned off your Uncle Henry..."

Max smiled, threw the towel on the floor and pushed me back gently onto the bed beneath him. "It isn't. It's something I learned all for myself in the years after. Henry opted out. I opted in. There was a hell of a lot of difference in that. So, you're the optimist, are you? Then it's a good job we're together. The two of us might just make one whole sane person..."

The mood had changed radically from our earlier clumsy frenzied coupling. I suppose the tension lying between us for weeks had required crazy wild fucking simply to get us past the many obstacles in the way. But now it was as if we had finally faced up to the reasons we were both here tonight. We'd been honest with each other at last. And as a result, all I could see were the good things in Max Skinner. Maybe he could even see some of the good in me now, too.

So we made a different kind of love. A needy, passionate love, full of longing and joy in our unbelievable discovery of each other. Max was so tender, so loving - so utterly darling - that I think I fell for him completely, right then and there. We loved like lovers do, slow and deep and lazy. Then we lay wrapped together, too happy and animated to sleep, too sleepy to do anything but lie there.

Instead we talked, about a lot of other things, actually. We had the 'getting to know' each other kind of talk, the conversation that most normal people would probably have before they had sex, the kind of process that had been denied to us because if we had tried to go down that road, we would still have been at each other's throats. So now we talked about those unimportant things that are really very important in a relationship, if you know what I mean, those pieces of information that reveal who you are, the inconsequential details that you only tell someone who cares enough to listen. And Max did. Listen to me. Intently. Asking questions, interested, taking me seriously.

He opened up about himself, his childhood, his parents, his struggle to get on in the City, how he had worked his way through university because he really didn't have much money, whatever his upbringing seemed to suggest. His parents had lived beyond their means; their premature deaths had left little in the kitty for their only son. Without Henry Skinner, Max would have had to leave his first-rate boarding school and possibly even had to be placed in an orphanage. No one had wanted him, other than the eccentric Henry Skinner, an unlikely surrogate father.

Yet, there had been a price to pay for schooling in a bastion of privilege like Rugby School when you were suddenly reduced to penury; his friends began to regard young Max Skinner as a charity case, a rather pathetic creature who was hanging round the well born rich hoping for crumbs off their table. The daily humiliations he had suffered at their snotty-nosed hubris had made a deep mark on the young boy. It had driven his ambition and fired his determination to walk over all the snobby little round shouldered pricks and climb to the top of the heap, whatever it took. Many of his old school friends now hung around him waiting for market tips or introductions to the people who counted who now all moved in Skinner's set. Somehow it became easier to understand Max and why he had become what he had become. I felt for the awkward and a lonely little misfit boy - and was proud of the man he had turned out to be. It made me love him a little bit more. No one would ever get one over on my man these days.

Max mentioned his first marriage briefly but without seeming to want to go into too much detail; it had been unhappy and short-lived, a thoroughly ill-judged interlude on both sides. It was a simple matter when it came down to it. He had married Charlie's sister. He always preferred Charlie. And even Charlie was a dickhead. Enough said on that topic.

I would leave that one for another occasion.

It seemed we would just drift off to sleep eventually, for neither of us spoke for a long while then. Until, all at once, Max stopped stroking my arm tenderly and rolled onto his side, tilting up my face to his.

"Uma...we have tread very carefully from now on. Tonight's been amazing. Completely and utterly wonderful for me; a new start for both of us - but it isn't as easy as that. The problems don't disappear just because we've made the earth move a couple of times..."

"Problems? What problems?" I asked, sleepy and sex-soaked enough not to be quite on his wavelength this time.

"Wade." 

Just the mention of the name shook me out of my languid torpor. I sat up sharply, leaning back on the headrest; Max settled in next to me as we sat side by side, our arms folded.

"You think he hasn't finished with us?" I asked.

"Not finished? He's barely started. A man like that gets his foot in the door and then starts moving in for good. My bet is he's hassling Ann over the codicil already. But we have a real chance against him now. It's essential we use this... Make our head start count..."

"Chance? What do you mean, chance?"

Max ran a hand down his face wearily. Obviously this was going to be a long night. "What was he after, Uma? It sure as hell wasn't all about extending gentlemanly assistance to some put upon ladies. Was it my business he was after? I doubt it. He knew I wouldn't put that on the table. So did he want the codicil? Sure. He wanted that - once you two told him about it. It puts him exactly where he wants to be with Ann. But why? Why is he so keen on moving in on this place? There had to be something else in his mind even before that..."

I shrugged. "He just loves to cause trouble..."

"...No." Max cut in. "There's more to him than that. He always has an agenda. I don't know what it is, but it can't be hard for us to work out. Let's give it some thought. He used to run a successful gang. He's used to being the boss, with everyone dependent on him for everything. Wade controlled his men with an iron fist back then. He held the power of life and death over them. Now he finds himself stuck here in this place where he's just another Crowe boy, not to mention out of his depth in a future time he doesn't really understand - yet."

I nodded. "He'll hate that, won't he? Especially as these guys aren't like his mangy little sidekicks back in his film. The men here could take him down easily; they aren't in the least in awe of him. They are his equal in every way - and then some: Maximus, Jack, Bud, Terry, Cort...Maximilian Skinner, of course..." I added hastily.

Max chuckled. "Don't ask me to go head-to-head with that psycho. I know what I can and can't do. But thank you for your vote of confidence in me anyway, sweetheart. Wade will only be satisfied when he's running this place. You know he wants that. Not the library or the Phoenix - but this whole little world. He wants to control us all."

"He can't do that! No one's going to let him take over..."

"It doesn't work like that, Uma. One by one, he's taking us out in a series of different ways. You and Ann are the main targets at the moment.  He knows you two are the keys even if none of us quite know why. First he ruins you. Then he gets Ann where he wants her...who next? Think about it. If I was O'Gallagher, I'd be worried. Wonder if Mitchell's got the brains to work that one out? Probably not," Max answered his own question dismissively.

He was right though. Even if we couldn't quite plot his whole game, Max was astutely reading the writing on the wall about Benjamin Wade. Why had no one else caught on so far? Simple.  Because everyone else had their own problems. People were looking the wrong way - me included. And all the while it enabled Wade to insert himself deeper and deeper into the fabric of our little world. By the time the ones who could act found out, it might easily be too late. Whatever you thought of him, Wade was a genius.

But so was my fella. As I was already beginning to regard my adorable Max Skinner.  "God, Max! You're brilliant! What a master strategist! But what are we going to do about him?"

Max smiled, obviously pleased that I was so impressed with him. He snuggled down happily to nuzzle at my pert little nipple. "We are going to take the chance we have been given and make it work for us. Wade thinks he's won. He's beaten you and me, driven a permanent wedge between us (so it seems) and now he's got Ann in his sights. Or so he thinks. And so we must allow him to think, which means to all intents and purposes you and I are still mortal enemies; you are down and out - and no one must suspect a thing."

I pushed him away; it was hard to concentrate while he was making love to me. "So we say nothing about us? How can we do that? If I stay around here, someone will find out..."

He rolled on his back for a moment, giving it some thought. Then with a flash of inspiration, he sat up, rubbing his hands together. "Get a job with Maximus. He's bound to need a bit of help around his place. Tell them all you're renting a room in the area. If you turn up at the Phoenix from time to time, start a fight with me. I may even have you thrown out on your cute little bum on the odd occasion. No one has the slightest idea that we are actually madly in love with each other..."

"Are we?"

"Well, we will be by then. Trust me..." he grinned and then slithered down the bed again, suddenly ready to play. I caught his hand.

"But what about Ann? I have to tell Ann!"

"No. If she thinks we are shagging, she'll lose all sympathy for you. Wade wins again. He would really break up the friendship then. Ann hates me more than Wade..."

"...Well, you can hardly blame her with that damn codicil business. What were you playing with over that, you bastard! I must say, you've taken losing it all remarkably easily all things considered. I know you didn't like it- but you've hardly turned a hair about what you had to hand over to Wade..."

Max sniggered; it was not a pleasant sound. "I lost bugger all, darling. It might be a lot of money to him, but it was small change to me, love. And the codicil? It was a bloody fake. A mate of mine, a corporate lawyer in New York drew it up. It wouldn't stand up in court but it might have fooled Ann into panicking, or maybe some hick local legal office would have been impressed..."

"Fake?" I jumped up and leaped on him. "You unprincipled bastard! You were trying to get her to sell out based on a forgery? That's obscene! How could you do something like that?"

But if I thought I was going to make Max feel guilty, I was sadly mistaken. "May I remind you, Wade has the damn codicil now? Just let him try and act on it. I hope he does. Then he will be in big, big trouble. You think a small time outlaw like him would be able to negotiate his way around the corporate world these days? He'll end up in Yuma gaol alright, or the modern equivalent of it this time. And just like Al Capone, they'll get him in the end for a technicality. It couldn't have worked out more perfectly. I got the girl, lost absolutely bugger all that matters - and set that bible-spouting cowboy up for a major fall. And all the while he thinks he's the cat's pyjamas. That's the key to success. Always let your enemy feel he's safe. Then get him, right between the ribs..." Max chuckled to himself obviously high on his sexual conquest on the top of the real victory that he knew he now had over Wade. Frankly speaking, there's not really that much to choose between Skinner and Wade.

Okay I doubt that Max would shoot a fellow trader through the throat if he made a mistake or throw a rival over a cliff if he insulted his mother. But that really isn't the point. Maximilian Skinner is as ruthless in the ways that count in his world as is Ben Wade in his. He didn't need to throw his enemies off cliffs. Skinner drives them to destruction and they willingly jumped themselves. That realisation gave me a sudden thrill. I know that is pitiful but what can I say? The man turns me on. Everything about him turns me on, most especially the fact that he is utterly unapologetic for his aggressive masculinity. In another age, I guess he would have been a war hero, or a sea captain or a pirate or some kind of adventurer, the leader of a gang of bank robbers like Wade - maybe even a general of a Roman legion. But transferring those characteristics to the modern world you have a bullish captain of industry or a deviously ruthless city trader...

My suspicions were confirmed the next morning as we got ready together in his bathroom. I was applying makeup as Max was shaving. Suddenly we had passed the embarrassing stage. Intimacy included sharing a bathroom, getting ready together.

"Max? I have to call Ann and explain. I know you said tell no one but..."

"Not Ann. Most especially, not Ann," he muttered as he neatly took the remaining stubble from under his chin.

"But...!"

"But, nothing. I know she's your mate. That's the bloody point. For a start she needs to keep up the act that you're the poor abused girlfriend. If she knows you're okay, she'll reveal it to Wade, even if she doesn't mean to. It's essential this cover is maintained. Furthermore..." he added as he rinsed his face and dried, patting on an expensive après-rasage.

I waited. Somehow I knew this was going to be good.

"...Ann hates me as much as you dislike Wade. She'll never accept me with you. She will try to break us up - or she will regard your affair with me as you betraying her. I'm the man who took your business and tried to destroy hers. Even if it is a load of old cobblers, that is her perception..."

"Actually it isn't a load of old cobblers. You were trying to take the Library from her..."

Max just gave me a withering gaze.

"It's business. Nothing personal. It's a different way of seeing things. But I'm not going to argue the toss with you now. Go put on a pretty frock, lay it on in spades for Maximus - who is just as susceptible to a woman as any other man with a healthy dose of testosterone, whatever you and your schoolgirl crush-mates think , and put the plan into action. Not a word to anyone. Least of all Ann. You got that?"

I had it. Max was not going to move an inch on this one. But I wasn't fooled that his desire to save the world as we know it was the driving impulse. He was singling Ann out for punishment because she had dared to think she could cross him. Well, so had I, but all was forgiven now that we had become lovers. But someone had to pay for his discomfort. Max was driving a wedge of his own between me and my friend, as surely as was Ben Wade. I wasn't fooled. I know men and how they operate.

For now, I would let him have his way - but there was no way he was going to drive away the best friend I had ever had. Men really don't quite get the depths of female friendships, do they? I smiled sweetly over and demurred but if Skinner thinks he has entirely tamed the shrew, then he has another think coming.

However, for now, it is really cool to let him stride around like a Colossus. I swear, he really is that big...oh damn, no girlfriend to talk to...! This is going to be bloody hard...