by Tracey Ward
By the time I make it to the elevator, I know I won’t get home alive. I’ll crash and burn on the highway before I get halfway to Tarzana. My skull is cracking under the pressure, my eyes nearly shut against the fluorescents overhead, and I seriously consider laying down on the elevator floor when it opens to pick me up.
I need to call someone. I have to admit I need help.
I call Colt but he doesn’t answer. Matthews doesn’t either. Darren answers but he says he’s in Kentucky. I hang up on him before he can ask me what’s wrong.
I’m running out of options and Tia’s words are ringing in my ears – You’re like Eli. You’re sweet, but you’re prickly. You don’t have any more friends than he does. Is she right? Am I an asshole with no friends?
The truth is, I have friends but there’s a small number of them I’m okay with seeing me like this. There’ll be questions, ones I don’t want to answer. I need someone good at keeping secrets. Someone who knows not to run their mouth. I could call Mila but she’s with her dad. It’d look suspicious if she ditched him at the stadium and there’s a good chance she’d be seen leaving with me. Can’t happen.
Suddenly, the fog in my mind clears and I realize who I should have called from the beginning.
“Can’t get enough of me today, can you?” Sloane answers happily on the second ring.
“Are you still here?”
“Where’s here? The stadium?”
“Yeah.”
“Yeah, I’m here. Why?”
“I need a favor.”
“What kind of favor?”
I grimace as my stomach rolls roughly. “I need a ride.”
“Are you okay?” Sloane asks, her voice going tight with concern.
“No. I’m sick.”
“What? I just saw you. You were fine.”
“It’s a headache. It came out of nowhere and it’s…fuck, it’s bad.”
“Get to medical,” she tells me hurriedly. “I’ll meet you there.”
“I’m not going down there.”
“Why not?”
“Just… can you meet me by the dumpsters?”
“I bet you say that to all the girls.”
I shake my head weakly. “Not a good time for jokes, Sloane. I feel like I’m gonna die.”
“Then you have to go to medical,” she insists seriously.
“I’m either meeting you at the dumpsters or I’m driving myself home like this.”
“Jesus,” she growls, but I know she’s coming. Even before she tells me, “I’ll see you by the damn dumpsters.”
I try to hang up but it takes three tries. My phone won’t recognize my finger for some reason. I almost give up and huck it at the wall, but it finally does what I need and I’m able to ride the rest of the way down to the ground floor with my eyes closed and the steel wall cold against my cheek. I’ve never had a headache like this before. It’s some of the worst pain I’ve felt in my life, and I broke two ribs falling out of a tree when I was thirteen. That was nasty. This shit is nastier.
It’s the first time since it all started that I’m truly, legitimately afraid of what’s happening to me.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
MILA
I decide not to text Tyus before I head to his house. I want to surprise him with the jersey I’m wearing. It’s powerfully yellow with his name and number on the back. I wore it all day and Daddy definitely noticed. He frowned when he saw me at the stadium in it but he didn’t say anything. I think he’s taking it as an act of defiance, nothing else. He told me not to talk to Anthony and now here I am wearing his jersey with pride. My extensive track record says this is a button I’m pushing with him, but in reality it’s a button I’m trying to push on Tyus. Part of me wants him to be turned on by it but a bigger part wants him to be proud. I’m excited to see his smile and hear that low rumble of laughter in his chest when I do something stupid that amuses him. I like that I do that to him – make him laugh. It feels like a super power, one I never knew I had until now. I never want to stop using it.
When I pull up to his place to ring the buzzer I’m surprised that I don’t see his car through the big, black gate. It was in the driveway last night but today there’s a silver Mercedes in its place, one that looks vaguely familiar. It doesn’t dawn on me whose it is until I hear her voice ring through the intercom.
“Come on in, Mila,” Sloane says casually. “I’ll meet you in the kitchen. Door’s unlocked.”
The motor in the gate starts to whir about the same time my blood begins to hum in my ears. They sound the same but the wider the gate gets, the louder the hum. It’s building and building, bursting in my ears like a thousand crickets on a summer night.
I should leave. I should go before this gets bigger than it is, but then again how will that look? Guilty, that’s for sure. I know enough about getting caught to know that you never admit what you did was wrong, and running will make this look very, very wrong. Probably worse than it actually is, so the best bet I have for both Tyus and my sake is to keep moving forward like I don’t get what the big deal is. And, really, I don’t. We haven’t had sex. We’ve made out a couple times, but that’s it. I’m solid. I’m straight. I’ve got this.
I slide out of my car like I don’t have a care in the world. Like I’ve been here a million times and it’s nothing, don’t worry about it. The door is open like Sloane promised. I saunter into the big, marble foyer with a spiraling central staircase, and I don’t miss a beat. On instinct, I go to the left to find the kitchen. I get lucky that it’s there. So is Sloane. She’s standing tall, blond, and striking in the almost all white space, a long sweater hiding her slender body in its comfy, blue bulk.
She smiles when she sees me. “Hey.”
“Hey.” I put my purse down on a stool at the island. “What are you doing here?”
Sloane laughs. “Isn’t that my line?”
“I don’t know. Is it?”
“This is fun.”
“Is it?”
She laughs again as she fills a glass with water and ice from the fridge. The thunk of the ice making its way through the machinery is almost painfully loud in the large, echoing room. I glance around, looking for signs of Tyus, but he’s nowhere to be seen. I spot the open door to a bathroom in the hall. The center of a living room through an archway. There’s no one. Not a sound. The TV isn’t even on.
Sloane sees me searching. “He’s upstairs. In bed.”
I feel my temper rising violently. I can’t control it. It comes out of nowhere and flashes like lightning across my eyes. I’m practically seeing red, and it must show on my face, because Sloane gives me an impatient look.
“Chill,” she groans, sliding the glass of water in front of me. “I’ve got Trey massaging my feet every night. I’m not messing with your man or anyone else’s.”
“He’s not my man.”
“Whatever. It doesn’t matter. You can put the claws away because that’s not what I meant by ‘he’s in bed’. He’s sick, that’s why he’s up there. That’s why I drove him home all the way out here in Tanzania or wherever the fuck we are. He couldn’t do it himself.”
My anger immediately turns to worry. The change makes me feel almost faint, it’s so sudden. “What’s wrong with him?”
“That’s the million dollar question, isn’t it?” She shrugs into her coat, grabbing her purse off a barstool. “Everyone wants to know the answer to that one, but all I know is that he has a headache. What about you? Do you know more than that?”
“How would I? I just got here.”
She looks at me hard. “Not what I meant and you know it.”
Sloane is intimidating in a lot of ways. She’s assertive to start, acting like she owns a room the second she walks into it. She’s also gorgeous in an effortless, irritating kind of way. The picture of a professional woman in her expensive dress and yellow Burberry bag. Her dark gray pea coat is Vera Wang, somber and severe. Menacing in the sharpness of its lines. She’s fierce, st
rong. Probably pretty scary if you’re on the wrong side of her.
Lucky for me, I don’t scare easy.
I shrug, oozing nonchalance. “I don’t know what to tell you.”
“What about why you’re here? You want to tell me that?”
“Nope.”
She smiles. “Fine. It doesn’t matter. I’ll find out about it when it all blows up in your faces, but for now, he’s in a bad way. You good to take of him?”
“Is it a migraine?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never had one.”
“My mom gets them.”
“Then you’ll make a better nurse for him than I will.” She steps past me to head for the door. I’m surprised by how soft her hand is on my shoulder. It’s sort of reassuring. Motherly, almost. “I’ll leave you to it. Up the stairs. Third door on the left.”
“You’re leaving?”
“Yep. I have shit to do. Parents to impress. Trey’s, not mine. I burned that bridge already so now it’s more important than ever that his love me, so if you’ll excuse me…”
I step in front of her to block her exit. “Wait. If Tyus is hurting so bad he couldn’t drive, he should see a doctor.”
“Tell him that. I dare you.” She nods to the glass on the counter. “That water is for him. I gave him a Percocet and it’s helping, but it makes his mouth dry. Keep him hydrated. If I leave two more pills with you, will you be careful giving them to him?”
“Where’d you get Percocet?”
Sloane looks at me hard. “Where would you get it if you needed it?”
“Mama’s medicine cabinet.”
“Aw, it’s nice to have another rich girl around,” she sighs theatrically. “You get it. You really get it. But can you also be responsible with it?”
I shake my head soundly. “I’m off that shit. I haven’t touched a drug in a year.”
“Good to hear. I’m going to ignore the fact that what you just said implies that you used to touch this shit on the regular and I effectively hired a recovering drug addict to man the front desk at my agency.”
“I wasn’t an addict and I was never into pain meds. I like uppers, not downers.”
“Liked. Liked. Get it down that it’s past-tense, please, or I’ll be worried.” She digs inside her purse to find a plastic sandwich baggy. The kind mom’s put their kids sandwiches in, but instead of a PB&J this one has two long, white pills clustered in the corner. “Be good. Keep an eye on him. If he gets any worse, call an ambulance. I don’t care how pissed he’ll be. You’ll never get him in the car but the paramedics can deal with him.”
“I will. I’ll text you if anything changes.”
“Good. Thanks. And if you need to leave, call Colt. He’ll be over in a flash if he knows what’s going on.”
“Should we call him now to give him a heads up?”
Sloane frowns pensively. “No. I don’t think so. We’ve got it for now. If Tyus wants him to know, he’ll tell him. We’re keeping Tyus from killing himself from the pain. We’re not micromanaging the man’s life. You start making decisions for him, and he’ll never forgive you.”
“Got it.”
“Call me if you need me. But, you know,” she smiles, winking at me, “don’t need me.”
When Sloane is gone, I take the glass of water and small bag of pills up the stairs with me. Tyus’ house is a surprise. It’s very white and stark. Super modern. There’s not much to the décor, especially upstairs. There are no family pictures on the walls. He doesn’t have his Sports Illustrated covers framed. All of his art is the kind of thing you’d see in a high-end hotel. Not a man’s home. More like a parking spot.
His bedroom door is open a crack. Inside is so dark it’s hard to see and I have to pause in the doorway to get my bearings. Slowly, my eyes start to adjust and I make out the outline of a big, gray bed in the center of the far wall. It’s cold as winter in the Rockies inside, sending goosebumps up and down my arms. Faint hints of daylight squeeze in through the curtains pulled tight around a wall of windows. Tyus’ body is on the edge of the bed farthest from the light, his back turned to it. His shape shifts to look at me standing in the door. His handsome face contorts in disgust.
“Close the door,” he groans painfully.
“Sorry.” I hurry into the room, shutting the door firmly behind me.
“Is that you?”
It doesn’t escape me that he’s careful not to use my name because what if I’m not me? What if I’m Sloane or someone else? Some sidepiece who has the code to his gate and fucks him on Fridays?
“It’s Mila,” I tell him softly.
“Fuck. I’m sorry.”
“Why?”
He shifts in the bed like he can’t get comfortable. His voice is tight when he tells me, “I should have called you and told you I was laid out. You drove all the way out here for nothing.”
“It’s not for nothing. I came to see you.” I put the pills down on the dark gray nightstand. It’s cluttered with books I can’t see the covers of. “Is it okay if I stay?”
“Is Sloane still here?”
“No. She left when I got here.”
“But she saw you?”
“Yeah. We talked.”
“I’m sorry,” he repeats.
“Stop apologizing and drink this.” I offer him the water, cautioning, “Slowly. Do you need a bucket?”
“No. I’m past puking.”
He sits up on his elbows to take a small sip of water. The big, downy comforter covering him slips off his chest. He’s bare underneath. His skin is darker than the shadows in the room, and I have to resist the urge to touch him. I’ve felt his chest under my hands before but I haven’t seen it. I haven’t enjoyed it with all of my senses the way I want to. But now is definitely not the time. As soon as he’s had his fill of the water, he hands it back to me and collapses back on the bed in a heap of misery.
“Did she ask why you were here?” he sighs.
“Yeah, but she didn’t expect an answer and I didn’t give her one.”
“Best thing you could do, considering.”
“Will she tell anyone I was here?”
“She might tell Trey but they tell each other everything. He’s a vault. He’ll keep it quiet.”
“Our secret is safe.”
“For now.”
I frown, not sure what to make of that. “Do you need me to get you anything?”
Tyus slides away from me toward the middle of the bed. He lifts the edge of the comforter to expose the empty space he’s made. “Get in here with me.”
I feel my heart start to race. To pound in a rhythm out of sync with the room. “I don’t think I should.”
“I’m not gonna try anything, Mila.”
“No, but I might. I’m not good at…” I lick my lips quickly. “I don’t control myself very well.”
“You have my permission to take advantage of me. Just don’t expect anything in return.”
“This is starting to sound like every date I’ve ever been on.”
“Doesn’t sound like you’ve ever been on a date.”
“They might have been hookups.”
He shakes the comforter impatiently. “I’m getting cold, girl. Get in here.”
I give in because I’m weak and easy. I kick off my shoes by the bed and slide in next to him, facing him. He immediately cocoons me under the blanket. His arm slips under the pillow under my head so he can pull me closer, holding me loosely.
“Hey,” he says softly.
I smile, feeling small in every way. In this bed. In his arms. In my heart. “Hey.”
“You look pretty.”
“So do you.”
“I look like shit.”
“You look like you.” I reach out to run my fingers along the line of his jaw the way I was dying to do last night. “You look perfect.”
“How long can you stay?”
“How long do you want me to stay?”
He takes my hand from his face to kiss
the sensitive skin on the inside of my wrist. “As long as you can.”
“I can stay all night.”
“Good.”
“I’ll have to call and check in with my parents at some point, though. They’ll want to know I got home safe.”
“You’re going to have to lie to them?”
“It’s fine. I’ve done it before, believe me.”
“But not this year.”
I grimace unwillingly. “No. Not this year.”
I can see his eyes in the dark. They’re wide and worried. “I don’t want to fuck up what you’ve got going on with them. You’re trying to make things better, right?”
“I’m trying to be a better person, yeah, but I have limits. Sometimes the old me is going to happen.” I twist my hand in his so I’m holding it. I pull it in close to my heart. “And she wants to happen here with you.”
“We have to be careful,” he warns, but there’s no weight to it. It’s only words that need to be said but no one wants to hear them. Not right now.
It’s hard to feel worried about much of anything in this cave with him. I feel separated from the world. Untouchable, except by him. I want him to touch me everywhere, my libido bulldozing my better sense, but I strive to keep it in check. I struggle to think of him instead of me; to put his needs ahead of my own.
“You should sleep,” I whisper to him.
He plays with my hair behind my head, tugging on random strands in that mesmerizing way they do at the salon that makes me feel so sleepy I worry I’ll pass out in the chair. “Tell me a story,” he demands softly.
I laugh. “You need a bedtime story?”
“I need a Mila story. A good one.”