by Selena Kitt
“No more throwing up.” He kissed my nose. “We’ll take care of you.”
I smiled, letting him kiss me again. Every time he said something like that, a part of me balked. I’d been raised by parents who were very practical, rational people. They’d instilled in me not just the desire, but the need, to take care of myself.
But I had to admit, I kind of liked how protective he was, how he just stepped in and took charge. He didn’t do it in a bullying sort of way—I never felt pressured or unheard—but rather he acted like a man who made a lot of confident decisions and was used to doing it, not just for himself, but for other people too.
“I hear a phone.” I cocked my head, frowning. It was definitely a cell phone ring, but I couldn’t tell if it was his or mine. We’d discovered, with a shared look of disbelief and a mutual grin, that we had set our phones to the exact same ringtone—the chorus to my favorite Trouble song, Can’t Break a Broken Heart.
“I hope it’s Katie!” I pushed open the shower door, the ring slightly louder.
“I’m going to finish washing up,” he called as I grabbed a big, fluffy white towel off the bar, wrapping it around me as I hurried toward the bedroom. “Tell her I said hi!”
When I got into the bedroom, the phone stopped ringing. Of course. I picked up my phone but there was nothing on the screen. No calls.
Damnit, Katie, where are you?
I’d left her tons of messages, but she hadn’t called me back. I decided to try her again while Rob was in the shower. I really missed her. Although I was currently living in paradise, I missed my little house and my little car and my best friend most of all. We hadn’t even had a chance to catch up. She’d seen Rob far more than I had in the past two months, given that she’d gone on tour with the band. She had kept her promise to watch him for me and every time we talked, she’d sworn she never saw him with any women.
The phone just rang and rang. It didn’t even go to message, which was strange. I was about to hang up when the ringing stopped.
“Hello?” She croaked, after a good fifteen seconds of silence, sounding far away.
“Katie!” I exclaimed, my heart soaring. Just hearing her voice made me happy. When she was on tour, we talked at least once a week on the phone. I had been so jealous of her being on tour, being near Rob, although she was far more interested in Tyler, the sexy, blonde lead guitarist who had asked her to go along on the tour in the first place.
“Bree?” She sounded more awake now. I checked the clock on the night stand, remembering I was on Pacific Time, three hours behind Detroit, but it was five p.m. here, which meant it was evening back home.
“I’ve been trying you all week.”
“Yeah...”
I sank down onto the bed, still wrapped in a towel, just knowing something was wrong. I’d been friends with Katie since I could remember—and we’d been Trouble fans for years, going to all their concerts together. It had been the central pivot of our friendship at first, which had grown and deepened over the years.
“Is everything okay?” The last time we’d talked, I had told her about the pregnancy. I’d finally broken down. I had to tell someone! She’d been her usual Katie self, if a bit distant. But she’d been that way the entire time she was on tour with the band. I just chalked it up to the experience. “Are you missing Tyler?”
“Don’t.” Her voice hardened at the mention of his name. “We’re not talking.”
“Oh.” I blinked in surprise. The last I’d heard, the two of them had made a party out of their last tour stop in Tampa. Rob had mentioned they got a little wild.
“Are you with Rob?” she asked.
“Yeah.” I could hear him in the shower. He was singing. It made me smile. “What happened? Did you and Tyler get into a fight?”
“You better tell him to get his boy in check before the tour starts up again in Europe.” She sounded angry, but more than that. Her voice had a hard, sharp edge to it.
“His boy... Tyler?” The line went quiet and I thought, for a minute, that the signal had dropped. “Katie? Are you there?”
Finally, she answered, that edge gone from her voice. Now she just sounded sad. And scared. “He’s out of control, Bree.”
“What do you mean?” My blood turned to ice. Had he hit her? What was going on? There was a commotion in the background, someone talking, a gruff exchange.
“Yeah, all right, all right, I’m going.” Katie was talking to someone else but then she turned her attention back to me. “Listen, I gotta go. Tell Rob.”
“Where are you?” Had she spent the night with another guy? My mind raced with the scant bit of information she’d shared, trying to put the puzzle together.
“At... a friend’s. Have you seen Tyler at all?”
“No.” I flushed, hearing the sound of the shower turning off. “We’ve been... preoccupied.”
“Right. Well. Like I said, he’s gonna wreck himself if someone doesn’t do something. And I... I can’t...”
That gruff voice was back. This time I heard snatches of phrases. Lafayette. Curfew. Fucking cops.
“Can’t... what?” I felt panic rising in my throat. Cops? What in the hell? “Katie? Talk to me!”
“I gotta go.” She hung up.
I stared at the phone for a moment, watching it tremble in my hand. Then I tried calling her back, but it went instantly to message. She’d turned it off.
I had to go home. I had to go now. Something was wrong. Not just a little, but a lot. This wasn’t just Katie and Tyler having a fight. He’s gonna wreck himself. He’s out of control. What had happened to make her say that?
“Was it Katie?” Rob came out of the bathroom, a towel wrapped around his waist.
“Something’s wrong.” My voice trembled almost as much as my hands.
“Is it the baby?” His eyes went wide as he sank beside me onto the bed.
“No, not me.” I stared at the phone in my hand, willing it to ring Call me back! “It’s Katie. And Tyler. Have you talked to him?”
Rob didn’t say anything, and I looked over at him, expectant. He dropped his gaze to the rug and shook his head.
“You haven’t talked to him at all?” I prompted.
“I can’t.”
“What?” I made a face, trying to puzzle this out. “Why?”
“He’s in rehab.”
I stared at him, unable to say anything. Rehab. Did Katie know?
“Alcohol?” I asked. “Drugs?”
“Yeah.” Rob gave a short, little laugh. “You name it, he does it. You can’t be in this business and not get high. It pushes you in a million different directions at once. If we didn’t do something, we’d go insane.”
“So...” I let that sink in, all the way to my toes. It weighed a ton. “So, you do it too?”
“Not anymore.” He shook his head. “I don’t like the person I am when I’m high. I’ve been clean and sober for two years. Eight months. Couple days. One day at a time.”
“Drug of choice?”
“Mine or Tyler’s?”
“Both.”
“Mine was coke. His is heroin.”
“Oh God.” I was a cop’s daughter. The dangers of drugs, even the so-called “safe” ones like marijuana or ecstasy, had been drilled into me from the time I was small, but heroin was the worst. Don’t ever touch it, not even once. That’s what my father had said. No one quits heroin. Of course, I knew that wasn’t completely true, but statistically? Heroin was bad. Very, very bad.
“Katie said it was bad.” I shivered, wrapping my towel tighter around me, although I wasn’t sure I was cold. I wasn’t sure I was anything at all. Everything seemed to have gone numb, inside and out.
“Tours are rough.” Rob stood, going over to my carry on and pulling out a t-shirt, a bra, a pair of panties. “The roadies can keep him supplied with whatever he wants, and I can’t always stop it. Here, get dressed before you freeze to death.”
But I wasn’t cold, even with the breeze blo
wing in off the patio. I couldn’t feel anything at all. That was the problem. Still, I methodically dried off, getting dressed. Rob went to his closet—a huge, walk-in affair—to get a clean pair of jeans.
“She seemed to think it was particularly bad this time?” I called, hooking my bra and pulling on my t-shirt.
“Yeah.” He agreed, voice muffled from the closet. “It’s the first time I’ve ever known him to go into rehab without a fight.”
“Aren’t you worried?” I called, pulling on my jeans and sitting on the edge of the bed to towel dry my hair. “He’s your best friend!”
“Of course, I am.” Rob came out, pulling a black t-shirt over his head. “That’s why I told him he either had to do rehab or he was off the tour.”
“You’re kidding.” I gaped at him, dropping the towel to my lap. “Trouble can’t go on tour without Tyler Cook!”
“That’s what he said.” Rob gave me a little smile, coming over to sit next to me again. “How’s Katie?”
“She didn’t sound good.” I shook my head. That was an understatement. She didn’t even sound like Katie. “She didn’t sound good at all.”
“She got pretty into it.”
“Into what?” I looked up sharply. “Tyler?”
“Him—and everything Tyler was into.”
He let that sink in and when it did, that numbness in my limbs turned to ice.
“Katie was doing drugs? Oh my God, Katie was doing heroin...” I whispered the words, knowing it was true. It made perfect sense, in the upside-down world of rock and roll tours. “Rob, you said you’d look out for her!”
“I tried.” He held his hands up as if I might attack him and for a minute, I considered it.
“I can’t believe this,” I whispered, picking up my phone off the bed and dialing her number. I went straight to voice mail again. “I have to go back. She needs me.”
“I need you.” Rob grabbed my hand when I went to get up, my mind already racing ahead of itself, thinking about calling the airline and changing my flight.
“Rob, she’s my best friend.” I felt tears stinging my eyes, thinking of Katie in trouble. “I have to do something.”
“She’s going to be okay.”
“How do you know that?” I snapped
“I’m taking care of it.”
“How?” I crossed my arms, glaring at hm.
“Look, I can’t force her into rehab. I’m doing what I can.”
“What can you do from here?” I waved my arms at the canopy over our heads, the door that opened out onto a view of the ocean and an infinity pool. “You can’t wave a magic wand.”
“No.” He sighed. “But I did have someone fly back with her, to make sure she made the transition from life on the road.”
“Is that the euphemism for detox?” I could barely see straight. The ice water in my veins was turning into hot blooded anger. “This isn’t pot or crack or even meth. This is heroin we’re talking about. Who did you send with her?”
I remembered that gruff voice in the background while I was talking to Katie on the phone. Was that her supposed “protector?” Her “transition management specialist?”
“A friend.” Rob’s jaw worked, tightened, released. He did that when he was angry, but he wasn’t anywhere near approaching how furious I was. “She’s done this before. She can usually get them into treatment.”
“How many times?” I asked, my voice barely audible. I could hardly get the words out. My hands were shaking, and I clenched them into fists. “How many girls has Tyler done this to?”
“I don’t know.” Rob didn’t meet my eyes.
“Too many to count?”
“Yeah,” he said finally, lifting his gaze to meet mine. His expression was pained. I didn’t know if I wanted to hit him or hug him.
“So, call your friend,” I insisted. “It was your phone that rang. Was that her? Is she with Katie now?”
“I don’t know.” Rob grabbed his phone off the night stand, scrolling through. “It wasn’t her. Sarah texted me early this morning to tell me...”
“Tell you what?” I prompted, arms crossed.
“She lost Katie last night.” Rob put his phone back on the night stand.
“Lost her?”
“Katie left in the middle of the night,” he said. “Sarah hasn’t been able to find her since.”
“Why didn’t you tell me this?” I whispered. That was the thing my mind kept circling back to.
“I was hoping she’d be found and I wouldn’t have to,” he admitted. “Sarah said Katie was getting close to breaking down and going into rehab before she took off.”
“You knew. This whole time. For months.” My mind, circling back and back. Rob had lied to me. “You let her do it.”
“Sabrina, she’s an adult,” he reminded me. “She made her own choices.”
“But you knew about Tyler!” I cried. “You knew what was going to happen.”
“No, I didn’t.” Rob reached for my hand, but I yanked it away from him. “Tyler got clean before this tour. He was clean when we were in Detroit. I don’t know when he started using again. But you have to understand, it’s not a monkey he’s got on his back, it’s a fucking five-hundred-pound gorilla and it just keeps coming back...”
“But you didn’t tell me!” That was the thing. I couldn’t get past that. “You kept it from me.”
“Sabrina.” He slid closer, putting his arms around me. I tried to move away but he held fast. “I didn’t know until the tour was almost over. I swear it.”
“But when you did know, you still didn’t tell me, Rob.” I lifted my face to meet his eyes, feeling tears threatening, and not just about Katie anymore. “How can I trust anything you say?”
“Fuck, I hate this.” Rob closed his eyes for a moment, taking a deep breath. “I’m sorry, I know I should have told you and I would have told you if Katie hadn’t called. I just... I wanted to tell you she was safe and okay and being taken care of.”
“But she isn’t, Rob.” Now the tears weren’t just threatening. I was far too emotional to deal with this. I felt nauseous and it didn’t have anything to do with being pregnant. “She isn’t safe or okay and she’s definitely not being taken care of.”
“I’m doing the best I can,” he pleaded, trying to hold me as I struggled out of his arms.
“Letting Katie get wasted with your drug addicted friend? That’s your best?” I whirled away from him, standing and shaking him off as he followed.
“It wasn’t like that...”
“Sounds like that was exactly the way it was.” I snapped, stalking over to my carry-on bag. “I need to pack.”
“Sabrina, no.” Rob watched, standing by helplessly as I started throwing clothes back into my suitcase. “Don’t do this. Stay until Monday. Then we’ll both go back.”
“What?” I stopped, a pair of jeans in my hand.
“If you’re not staying here, I’m coming with you.” His eyes were dark, determined, and I knew he meant it. He was coming, whether I wanted him to or not.
“Because you’ve been such a help so far,” I whispered under my breath, shoving my jeans into the bag.
“Sabrina.” There was a catch in his voice and it broke me. Whatever was going on, he was hurting too. Tyler was his friend, his band mate. And if what he was telling me was true, he really hadn’t known what was going on. And when he knew, he tried to do something. He just hadn’t told me about it. And I knew he was just trying to protect me, but I wasn’t a child. I was carrying a child, for Pete’s sake!
“You want to come with me?” I reached out and took his hand, seeing relief flood his face.
“I want to be with you.” He gently pulled me closer, into the circle of his arms.
“I want to be with you too.” I closed my eyes, pressing my cheek to his chest, hearing the steady thrum of his heart. “But I don’t know if I want all... this.”
“Yeah, I know.” He squeezed me gently, kissing the top of my head. �
��It’ll be okay. I promise, I’ll make it okay.”
He was still trying to protect me, and I nodded, pretending he could, even while I knew there were no guarantees. We both had no idea if he could keep that promise.
Chapter Six
“Oh my God, Rob. That’s me.”
I didn’t even know what rag it was—some Inquirer type paper—but there we were on the front page, Rob swinging me around in my bikini, my suit riding up my ass, my cleavage embarrassingly exposed. The headline read, “Trouble in Paradise?” and beside the picture of us was another of Catherine dressed up to walk down the red carpet, looking very tall and thin and so beautiful it hurt my eyes.
“Damn it.” Rob shocked the newsstand guy selling papers and magazines by the baggage carousel. He grabbed all the papers out of the rack, slapped a bunch of money down on the counter and threw them all into the trash on our way out the door.
“I think there’s more where that came from,” I said wryly.
“Jesus Christ, is it snowing?” Rob peered up at the gray Detroit sky. “It’s April!”
“Welcome to Michigan.” I laughed as he stalked across the crosswalk, like he knew where we were going. I was parked in airport parking and dug through my purse, looking for my ticket.
“I’m gonna hear about this,” Rob muttered as I unlocked my Kia and slid into the driver’s seat.
“Do you mean Catherine?” I asked as he got in beside me and I started the car.
He just pursed his lips and nodded. Of course, she would see the paper. Of course, she would say something. I was just grateful that California was a no-fault divorce state and she couldn’t use it against him, at least not in court. The unwelcome news about a no-fault divorce, as Rob pointed out, was that she was entitled to half of everything. I couldn’t even conceptualize exactly how much money that was, but Rob kept saying he didn’t care how much it was, as long as it meant he could be with me.
“Hey, no talking and driving.” Rob held his hand out for my phone as I dialed Katie’s number.