Men in Control: Special pack: The Smith Brothers Series

by Brenda Ford

  “I don’t know…” I reply quietly. “I think that I will just sort out all of this in my mind.”

  “Why not do that now? Do it while I am here? Who knows, maybe I can even help you.”

  I dart my eyes up towards her, wishing I hadn’t done whatever it took to bring that tone from her. But I have, and I know that it’s got to be my fault because she isn’t the only one who has spoken to me this way. Everyone has and that’s because they want to get through to me. It’s just a shame that no one has.

  “Where do you want to start? With Mandy?” I wince at the mention of her name. “You aren’t the only person in the world that has fallen for the wrong person. You’re not the first to hurt someone else along the way, and you damn well won’t be the last. But not everyone loses their minds like you have. You have allowed this situation to swallow you up whole and to change you. I will admit that the pressure of the tour probably hasn’t helped you, especially since it’s all been going wrong, but you haven’t handled it well, either.”

  “No, I haven’t.” I hang my head low, ashamed of myself. The way that she is talking to me hurts. “I haven’t done anything right. Even when I want to, I keep getting it wrong.”

  “Right, and that’s because you’re trying to do it alone. You are an emotional wreck and you can’t get ahold of yourself. With a bit of intervention, you can. You don’t need to worry about it when you have others looking after you. Sure, it will still be a battle, I’m sure, but the right people will be around you.”

  I gulp down the thick ball of emotion that lodges in my throat. “What… what are you talking about?”

  “Pack your stuff up,” she commands instead of answering me. “Come on, we’re getting out of here.”

  “But people… I don’t know who is going to be around. I don’t want any trouble.”

  “There isn’t anyone out there. No one knows that you’re here. But they will soon if you stick around for long enough. They will descend on here like there is no tomorrow. Then you will be stuck. This is the time to go. We need to leave, to get you somewhere safe. Somewhere that you can be taken care of and there won’t be anyone around to ask you questions. You’ll have plenty of time to sort your head out.”

  Whatever this place is it sounds like a place that is too good to be true. I know it might be problematic, but what else can I do? I can’t just sit here and wait for everything to come to me and I can’t step out head first in to trouble either. All I can do is nod and allow Freya to do whatever the hell she wants me to.

  “Okay, let’s go.” I nod and agree. “Whatever you want, I will do it.”

  I don’t have much to gather up, so it doesn’t take long until Freya has hold of my hand and she’s leading me outside. The bright light is almost too much for me, it’s hard to digest, but I keep on moving until she pushes me in to the car. I curl around myself as we pull away, fearing that everyone can see me like this. A mess.

  “It’s okay,” Freya tells me quietly. “Don’t worry. Everything will be okay soon.”

  Her voice is soothing and sweet. Really nice to listen to. It helps me to unroll my body and to sit up normally beside her. The world outside whizzes passed me, blurring in to nothingness, which means all I can do is turn to face Freya, to watch her instead so she doesn’t make me dizzy.

  “Thank you for coming,” I say sincerely. “And for coming alone. I appreciate it.”

  “Of course I came. I wasn’t going to leave you, was I? You need me, so I’m here.” She shoots a quick smile my way. “Plus, I care about you. I only want what’s best for you.”

  “So, you’re taking me somewhere that you believe is best for me?” I ask. Half of me is laughing, the other half of me is freaking out with what might happen. “Some place where all my problems will be solved?”

  “I don’t know about that. I don’t know if all of your problems will be over. But this is definitely what you need. This will get you back on the right path once more. Where you need to be.”

  I suck in a deep breath and hold it, trying to calm the swirling panic down. I don’t think I am going to like where this conversation is going. But I still need to ask it, to be sure. “And er, where do I need to be?”

  Freya glances my way a few times before answering, trying to gauge how I will react, which I totally understand when the word finally comes out of her mouth and I learn the truth. “Rehab.”

  Fuck. This blows me away. I didn’t know that it had gotten this bad, but clearly, it has. There isn’t anything that I can do but go along with it to see if it can help me. I’m not doing the best job of helping myself anyway. I’m kind of falling apart increasingly by the moment. It’s a miracle that Freya is even here, that she has come back to me, so I can’t argue with what she wants, even if it means that I miss out on the rest of the tour. Who knows? This might be the best thing that ever happens to me. It might be the cure.

  Chapter 23 - Freya

  A thick silence clings to the room, causing my heart to pound harder. All eyes are upon me, there are prickles of panic coming from everywhere, but all I can do is sit and front this out. I have no choice.

  “So… you saw him?” Gary finally breaks the silence. “You found him? Then you took him away even though we still have the rest of the tour to complete? Huh? You didn’t think about the fans and all of the money that they paid? You didn’t think about the reputation of the band? You didn’t think about how we were going to cope?”

  It’s impossible not to feel guilty about this. I do feel bad now that I’m here looking at everyone that has been affected by the decisions that Alex and I both made. It’s awful to see them falling apart. But there isn’t anything that can make me take a step back from my choice. It was the right thing to do.

  “Yes, I will admit that I wasn’t thinking about anyone else. I was just thinking about Alex and what he needs right now. He has tried, but the pressures of the tour has taken him down. I don’t think that there is anyone to blame for it, that isn’t what I’m saying. Just that he couldn’t handle it.”

  Everyone is silent again for a couple more moments. I gasp in a couple of deep breaths trying to sound much less panicky than I actually feel. I glance my eyes at everyone, desperately searching for some kind of understanding. But I don’t seem to be getting it from anyone. Not even Rachel who can’t meet my eyes.

  “You made this decision alone,” Hank growls, clearly fuming. “He called you while you were here with the rest of us, so you could have told someone. You didn’t need to go by yourself.”

  “He asked me to. I thought that he would run away if I didn’t go along with what he wanted.”

  “That’s stupid. Utterly ridiculous. We all want what is best for Alex and you know that. Even if he didn’t know it at the time, he would have seen it if we would have come along with you to help him.”

  “Maybe.” I shrug. “Maybe not. I don’t know. I couldn’t guarantee it and after days of not seeing him, I didn’t want to do anything to risk him running off again. And when I saw him, I immediately knew that he needed help. Professional help. We all knew that was coming, didn’t we? The way that he has been drinking isn’t normal. The addiction is taking its toll on him and he needs to get sorted. So yes, it might cause issues with the fans and I can admit that it might be a pain for you guys, but Alex came to me because he needed help and that is what I gave him. Help just for him and no one else. Help to get him healed and back to himself. I appreciate what this is going to do to the rest of you, but he wouldn’t have survived anything else. The drinking would have continued and so would the downward spiral. Who knows what way that could have ended up?”

  I expect someone to see my impassioned speech for what it is… but no one does. No one seems to get it at all. Hank even spins on his heels and walks from the room away from me. I seriously hope that he isn’t about to head to Alex’s rehab to pull him out of it when he really needs to be there.

  I stare at Rachel, needing something from her, but still
she won’t meet my eyes. She looks to Gary instead who follows behind Hank, effectively taking her with him. That’s it, Blood Red Masters gone, leaving me behind in a pool of hatred. I don’t think any of them will ever speak to me again which is a shame. I will miss Rachel.

  “You’re okay.” Brad rests his hands reassuringly on my shoulders. “You did do the right thing for Alex, and they will see that soon. Right now, they are torn between helping Alex and wanting to please their fans so that everyone doesn’t turn on them, leaving them with nothing. They have split priorities. But as his brother, I am eternally grateful to you. I know that Alex would have run if we had all turned up. Going alone was the right thing to do. I’m just so happy that he has someone he trusts enough to call. Someone who cares enough to put him first no matter what else is going on. I really appreciate you for that.”

  He pulls me in for a hug and holds me to his chest for a couple of moments, really showing me his appreciation, but as he pulls apart, I already know that he’s going to go now too. Everyone is. There isn’t any reason for any of us to be here without the search for Alex. So, we will all go home. Back to our own lives. Done. I might even be completely done with Alex now too. Maybe I came into his life for a reason, just to get him back on the right path, and now we will go our separate ways. Perhaps he won’ ever want to talk to me again after this.

  Or maybe we will have a friendship, who knows. But I can’t sit around and wait forever. I need to get home too now. Back to Nathan, back to recording, back to my real life. Everything will be the same except for me. I don’t think that I will ever be the same again. I’m not sure that I can be. An ordeal like this will change me in ways that I guess I’m not quite prepared for. But all that I can do is go with the flow, wait and see. As I have seen from Alex, fighting the inevitable doesn’t help anyone. It’s a battle I don’t need.

  “So, yes, as you can see, the whole world wants to work with you now.” Nathan laughs for such a long time that I can tell he wants me to join in. But I don’t. I can’t. “It’s up to you what you do.”

  “I see.” I twiddle the pencil around in my fingers. “It’s up to me. Right, of course.”

  “Why doesn’t this sound like it’s good news, Freya? Because to me, it is.”

  “It is good news.” I nod a couple of times. “My head is just all over the place right now.”

  Nathan leans back in his chair and stares at me. His gaze is piercing, it wants to burst through me but I’m not going to let it. there isn’t a chance in hell that I can deal with that right now. “Still?”

  “Yes, I suppose so. Still. I don’t know, that whole mess just affected me.”

  “I haven’t ever seen things affect you like this before though. I guess that’s what is confusing. I know that it must have been hard for you to deal with all of the Alex stuff, but you seem to have taken it to heart. I think I might know why, but I will let you tell me if you want to. If you need to talk about it.”

  I guess I would like to talk about it, I would like to know what Nathan thinks about it all, but I’m too weary to go through it all now, so instead I shake my head no. I’m sure that the time will come later on.

  “I just want to talk about all of these new jobs, because my career is the most important thing to me, just like it always has been. I want to focus on more music, more press stuff, maybe a tour of my own…”

  “Okay brilliant.” There is a smile on Nathan’s face, but it doesn’t meet his eyes. I get the impression that he would like me to talk about my feelings for Alex, but I want to wait until I’m a bit more over him. I want to talk about it without the thick emotion tainting my words. I want an objective look at it. “So, if you want to get writing now, I can discuss studio time for recording. I can also email you a list of media jobs to see what you want to be a part of. Magazine articles, TV interviews, radio bits… also there are a couple of people who have put the feelers out when it comes to collaborating with you, if that is something you would consider?”

  “Sure. I don’t see why not.” I try to ignore the icy sensation in my chest that it will never be with Blood Red Masters. I can work with other people. It doesn’t matter. Just because it won’t be the same… “It could be fun.”

  “Great, great, so I will get that sorted too.” He taps his chin. “Basically, right now, it’s sorting out a viable schedule for you to fit the people that you want in. You are a hot property, miss!”

  It remains unmentioned that my time with the band and the media storm that came with it has added to that, created it really. I don’t like the idea of getting bigger because of Alex’s failures, but what else can I do? I have already decided that I can’t sit around and wait for him to come to me when he might not want that. So, I need to keep going forward. Moving in the right decision. Thinking about me. It used to be so simple to put my career first. I didn’t even need to think about it, but now it’s impossible. I can’t stop worrying about Alex and where he might be, what he might be doing. How he must be coping in the rehab facility I put him in.

  I want to go and see him to check on how he’s doing. But I really don’t think that I will be welcome. I’m sure that he doesn’t need any visit right now, particularly from me. I don’t know how he feels about me right now, and I don’t want to do anything to put his recovery in danger.

  “And me?” I ask Nathan, trying my hardest to focus. “I just need to check off on your list.”

  “Yes, let me know what you want to do. And write as well. You always need to write.”

  Huh, well at least I have a lot of emotional material to work with now. I can turn everything that happened with Alex in to a positive for me as well. I suppose it doesn’t have to be only him that’s helped by this. I can write some good songs from deep in my heart to make a good third album. It might even be healing to process things in this way. Either that or it will tear me apart even further. But that will be good for the creative process as well. It can only be a good thing, I suppose. If I’m going to see the positives in it…

  “Right.” I rise up from my seat and nod at him. “Okay. I can do that. I will check the email and reply, while writing at the same time. I will be working the entire time.”

  “Oh, I know it! And I will also sort out the tour for you. I think it will be good for you to headline your own one. Not as big as you’re used to, I’m sure with what you’ve had, but one without all the drama.”

  I nod and agree with him, unable to form any words when it comes to the memories of the drama. I just hope that it isn’t like this forever. That one day I will be able to think back on that time without it destroying me.

  Chapter 24 - Alex

  The green grass is almost sparkling in the sun light. The redness of the flowers glow brightly, almost bringing a smile to my face. I might only be able to see this through a small window but it’s a nice clear sight that I like. I would prefer to look at it for a lot longer in silence, rather than talk to the counselor sitting in front of me.

  “Talking isn’t easy for you, is it?” she asks kindly. “I can see that about you.”

  “Hmm, I suppose not.” I can’t even meet her eyes. I don’t want her judgement. “I don’t like it much.”

  “But you can talk to some people, can’t you? The woman who brought you in here, you talked to.”

  A groan of agony flies out of my mouth as I think about Freya. The beautiful woman who dragged me here, almost kicking and screaming, when she knew that I needed it most. The only person who cared enough to force me here. I didn’t really want to, I knew that it was going to be hard, but I did talk to her and I listened as well. She got through to me when no one else would, and now I miss her like crazy.

  “I wasn’t good enough for her.” I shake my head hard. “It’s a good job that she’ll walk away from me now.”

  “You were together?” the counselor asks. “Or you still are together?”

  “Never properly.” I lean my chin on my hand and try not to lose myself in what I could
have had, given half the chance. Freya was willing to give me a chance, to be with me, and I threw it down the toilet. Or down the bottle of a whiskey bottle, I should say. “I didn’t ever really let her in because of what happened before.”

  The counselor remains in silence, not pushing me at all. She knows a little bit about me and Mandy. I have talked to her a little while being here, but I guess it isn’t enough. She will always want more. I don’t want to give it to her, but I am here for that reason alone. To talk and to get better.

  “I can’t let anyone in when I know that I’m rotten to the core,” I admit. “Only someone who is awful like I am and would do the things that I do, could be classed as rotten to the core.” I shrug and fight back the emotion that wants to sweep me up whole. “And that really pertains to romance, so I can’t allow anyone in that way, can I? It’s dreadful but true. I can’t let anyone into my life romantically because I’m not good enough.”

  “That has always been a feeling of yours, deep down, isn’t it? That you aren’t good enough.”

  “Well, I slept with my twin brother’s girlfriend. I wrecked his relationship because we had an affair…”

  “No.” She shakes her head as she interrupts me. “No, I didn’t mean that. I mean before that. Even earlier on in your life. Perhaps when you were a child. Emotions as deep seated as this one is for you usually come from being a child when something goes wrong. Did you have an emotional upheaval when you were young?”

  I sigh loudly and nod, knowing that I’m about to face a subject that I really hate talking about. “My parents died when I was four years old. They had a really bad car crash and it killed them.”

  “And you had a good relationship with them? Before they died, I mean?”

  “Yes.” I nod. “Yes, it was very good. From what I remember anyway. I was very young…”