by Sian Ceinwen
They’d both had relationships before getting together and been sexually active but had never actually gone the whole way and slept with anyone else. The thought of him having sex with Madeline made her feel physically ill, even now. Knowing that he got pleasure from someone else’s body last night when all she’d wanted was to be with him.
Hayden had managed to make it back to his room safely. Why couldn’t Harrison have done the same? Fuck, given their relationship status, Ally might not even have had too much of an issue with that if it had been the other way around. Heather gave way to tears for what felt like the thousandth time today. She was exhausted, and Harrison wouldn’t be back for hours, so she headed to their bedroom to rest. She opened the door, saw the bed, and felt sick. Instead of going inside, she turned and made her way to one of their spare rooms and collapsed on the bed there, before falling asleep.
*****
She woke hours later as Harrison called her name from the open doorway where light was streaming into the room. It was dark outside, and, glancing at the clock, she saw that it was nearly six-thirty in the evening.
Just seeing him was enough to send her into a fresh round of tears immediately. Everything in her ached to go to him and find the place she called home, but she was hurting too much to do it. He was heartbreakingly beautiful, standing there with the light behind him. He was wearing jeans and a T-shirt, his hair was a mess, as though he had spent many hours running his hands through it, which was something he usually did when he was stressed. He came over to the bed, leaving the door open to continue to let the light into the room and sat down next to her, but didn’t touch her.
“I know you don’t want to hear it,” his voice was strained, “but I have to say it. I’m sorry, angel. If I could take it back, I would.”
Heather sat up, wiping the tears from her face and taking shaky breaths of air.
“I know, Harrison. I know.”
She wanted to ask him how he was feeling. She wanted to know that he was okay after being drugged. She loved him more than anything, but her brain wouldn’t stop throwing the image of him in bed with Maddy at her.
“The picture…” she trailed off, unable to say more.
“I wish there wasn’t a picture,” he said, an angry tone to his voice.
“Why? So you could’ve kept it a secret?” She glared at him.
“No, angel,” he sighed, “I would’ve told you. I just wish that you didn’t have that image in your head. I wish that I could have told you, not some piece of shit who ambushed you at the airport the second you got off a plane.”
Heather wondered, for a second, if she would have found what he’d done any less devastating if she’d had the chance to hear it directly from him first, instead of finding out by some sleazy asshole showing her the picture. She didn’t think it would’ve made it any better, though she did agree that not having that image in her head would have been nice.
They sat there in silence for a long time, he seemed to be waiting for her to say something, but she didn’t know where to start. She couldn’t find the words to start the conversation that they needed to have. Instead, she decided to go with facts, beginning with the cause of all of this.
“Gabriel told me that the hospital confirmed that it was definitely MDMA,” Heather couldn’t look him in the eyes, choosing to fiddle with her engagement ring instead, spinning it around her finger repeatedly.
“Yeah, it was. The police came; they’re looking into it. Look at me, angel.”
Even though she knew that her heart couldn’t possibly take any more of a beating today, she couldn’t resist looking at him now. It felt as though there was a massive chasm between them, and that feeling broke her apart.
“Where do we stand, Heather? Is this…does what happened mean the end of us?” He looked as completely and utterly wretched as she felt about this idea, but she knew that she had to answer him honestly.
“I don’t know, Harrison. I can’t answer. I need time.”
“You can take as much time as you need, angel. The fact that it’s not an immediate ‘yes,’ is something.” He gave her a wan smile.
Heather sighed, “I can’t promise that it isn’t a ‘yes,’ though, Harrison. All I can say is that I need time. That I understand that you were drugged, that you’re a victim in this as well. I know that on any given day of the week, you would never cheat on me. Knowing all of that doesn’t change the fact that you did cheat on me, though. It doesn’t change the fact that every time I close my eyes, I see you fucking her. It doesn’t change the fact that I feel physically ill whenever that happens.”
Harrison looked completely miserable as she told him this, she felt the urge to touch him, and this time, she gave in. She moved over to him and put her arms around his waist, and he pulled her into a hug. It felt like it always did, as though she was coming home.
For a second, she thought that she could get past all of this until her brain helpfully supplied an image of Harrison and Maddy in the exact same position in the hotel room from last night, and she couldn’t stop herself from tensing up entirely. Harrison must have noticed, as he dropped his arms from around her, and she followed suit, then moved back away from him again.
“I’m assuming that you didn’t want to sleep in our bedroom, then?” He was the one who wouldn’t look at her now.
“I think that for the time being, I’d prefer being in here.”
Harrison looked defeated as he rose from where he’d been sitting on the bed, “Okay, angel. I still love you.”
“I know. I still love you, too, Harrison. I don’t know if I can get past this, but please know that I intend on trying.”
He caught her gaze, then. She could see the guilt, fear, and longing written across his face. Heather hated that she felt completely and utterly hollow. Something inside of her had broken today, and everything that was important to her had seeped out. There was nothing left.
She slept fitfully that night; her dreams were nothing but a constant movie of Harrison fucking Maddy in a hotel room. In them, he wasn’t drugged, though. He was enjoying it; he was telling Madeline that she was better in bed than Heather was, and the other woman was relishing in it.
Heather woke feeling horrendous, the nauseated feeling was back, and she had no idea how she was supposed to carry on with her life. It was Monday, and she was supposed to go to work today; the ladies had probably organized some kind of celebration for her performance on Saturday Night Live. Louise was an excellent baker and rarely needed much of an excuse to bring some of her delicious treats in.
She couldn’t face leaving the apartment today, though. Heather got her phone and sent a message to the group chat she had with the ladies, telling them that she wasn’t feeling well and wouldn’t be in today. She didn’t know if they would go into work. She didn’t care if they did. She couldn’t bring herself to care about anything right now. The hollow feeling was still there.
Heather made her way into the kitchen and put some bread in the toaster, deciding that toast was the safest breakfast for her uneasy stomach and knowing that she’d eaten and subsequently kept down so little yesterday that she needed to get some kind of food into her system today. While she waited for the bread to toast, she set about getting herself a glass of orange juice to go with it.
As she moved around the kitchen, Harrison appeared from the direction of their bedroom. He was only wearing a pair of old sweatpants that were riding low on his hips. His muscular chest was bare, and he looked incredibly masculine and sexy. Despite herself, Heather felt an ache between her thighs, she wanted desperately to take him back into their bedroom and ride him, but she was also feeling too raw. The knowledge that barely twenty-four hours ago, Madeline was riding him like that, was too cutting for her to follow through with her desire.
“Morning, angel.” He gave her a tight smile.
“Good morning, Harrison.” She was grateful for the distraction of her toast popping up, so s
he could turn away from him to deal with it.
“Are you doing that on purpose to hurt me?” he asked her softly.
“What? Eating toast?” She glanced over her shoulder at him, and he looked incredulous at her response.
“No, angel. Calling me ‘Harrison’ all the time.”
She hadn’t even realized that she’d been doing it, “It’s not intentional. I’m sorry.”
“I think that might make it worse,” he sighed deeply and sat down at the kitchen bench as she turned with her plate of toast, took it, and her glass of juice with her to sit next to him.
“I don’t know what to say, Harrison”—he flinched—“I guess it doesn’t feel right calling you ‘honey’ at the moment. My ‘honey’ is someone who would never do what you did, drugged or not. I’m coming to terms with what happened and as shitty as it all is, my faith in you, which was previously completely and utterly unshakeable, has been shaken.”
He dropped his head to his hands as she took a bite of her toast. Harrison looked so broken; she wished she could go back to two days ago. Heather wished she’d never gone to New York; if she’d been with him, this wouldn’t have happened. They would’ve been together instead of him fucking someone else because she wasn’t there.
“Did you wear a condom, Harrison?” Heather sighed, as she asked the question she needed to ask.
“I’m not sure,” he said, then looked away from her. “I don’t really remember anything.”
There was a heavy silence between them. Heather felt as though he must remember more than he was telling her, but didn’t want to push him on this, right now. What happened was awful, and she knew it wasn’t his fault, but for the first time in their relationship, she felt as though he wasn’t being completely honest with her.
“How are you feeling?” she asked him, then clarified, “I mean, physically. What did the doctors say?”
“I feel like shit. The doctors wanted me to stay in the hospital like everyone else,” he confessed, “because they didn’t know what dosage we’d been given or how pure the drug was. They wanted us all to stay for monitoring for at least a day. I need to call the others and find out how they’re doing, actually.”
Heather was confused by what he was telling her, “Wait, if they wanted you to stay, how are you here?”
The look that he gave her was full of pity and love, “You can’t guess, angel?”
She shook her head at him; if they’d wanted him to stay so that he could be monitored, she didn’t understand how he had convinced them to let him fly back to Chicago.
“I discharged myself against medical advice. Had to sign the world’s longest waiver, they tried very hard to convince me to stay, I’m pretty sure they didn’t want the death of a member of Cruise Control on their hands,” he smiled ruefully at her, “but I needed to come home to you. Callum was worried about you, which worried me.”
“Harrison Fletcher!” She glared at him, “How fucking dare you do that? Sleeping with someone else while drugged is bad enough, but how the fuck do you think I would’ve survived if you’d died from some kind of fucking complication mid-flight?”
Despite the fact that she was cursing at him, he looked pleased with her response and smiled at her, “Ah, angel. You do care.”
Heather felt a surge of fury flow through her; she wanted to smash something. She inhaled deeply and blew out the breath of air slowly, trying to get a hold of her anger as she narrowed her eyes at him.
“Don’t you fucking dare do anything like that again, Harrison. Put your health at risk again, even if it’s to come and see me, and we’re definitely through.”
“Noted. I promise not to put my health at risk, again, angel. S—” he managed to cut off the word before it slipped out, “—o, what are you doing today?”
Even Heather managed a smile at his pivot away from the word ‘sorry,’ to the word ‘so,’ instead.
“Nice catch. I’m not going to work today,” she found as she said it, that she didn’t want to stay here in the apartment all day with Harrison either, “I thought I might go see my mom.”
She’d said it as an excuse, but as she did so, she realized how much she needed to see her mother. Her mom had tried calling her yesterday, one of many calls that Heather hadn’t answered, but it would be good to see her.
“Oh, lovely; tell her I said hello.” Heather raised an eyebrow at him, and he grimaced, “Actually, probably not a good idea, I guess. I’ll call Cal and tell him your plans; I wasn’t sure what you were doing today, so I told him to wait until he heard from us.”
“Thanks, I appreciate that.”
Heather finished the last of her toast, stood up, and rinsed her plate and glass before putting them in the dishwasher; she hesitated next to Harrison on her way out of the room, then kissed him on the cheek.
“I do still love you, Harrison, and I’m glad you didn’t die on the flight back here. Please see a doctor today and get checked up.”
“Also noted,” he smiled at her, “and I will.”
Heather left him sitting there and realized that she would need to go into their bedroom to get fresh clothes. She was stung by a pang of hurt as she made her way into their room, the last time she’d been in here was right before she’d left for New York. She’d been on the phone to Harrison, and they’d had phone sex after he’d insisted that an orgasm was the perfect way for her to calm her nerves about performing on live TV.
She grabbed some clothes, and took them with her to the spare room, not wanting to use their bathroom to get ready. Heather showered in the guest room’s bathroom instead. Once she was dressed, she called her mom.
“Heather, are you okay?” Her mom seemed worried.
“Yeah, I am. Can I come and see you today?”
“Of course, sweetheart. What time were you thinking?”
“As soon as possible,” Heather breathed a sigh of relief; she didn’t know where she would’ve gone if her mom hadn’t been free.
“Okay, I’ll see you then.”
Heather pulled out her phone while she waited for Callum to arrive. Her screen was full of social media notifications; every platform was blowing up, of course. She didn’t want to wallow anymore, though. The internet could keep its god damn opinions to itself, as far as she was concerned.
She opened up a text to Sebastian.
Hey, lover. MDMA all out of your system? Docs letting you come home to me anytime soon?
It felt forced, even to her. The ignorance of the strained and weird situation they were in right now. She just wanted some tiny semblance of normality.
Yeah, they’re letting us go sometime today. I’ll be home soon.
I’m glad you’re okay. I miss you.
She really was; a wave of anger rushed over her toward whatever asshole had done this to her family.
Me, too. Are you okay, lover? I’ve been worried about you.
Heather wondered how much Harrison had told him about how tense it was between them right now. It was nice that Sebastian was concerned for her, though.
You know me. I’ll survive. Always have, always will.
Never anything like this, though. I hope you know I’m here if you need to talk. I do love you.
Heather smiled and sent back a text, thanking him. Despite his flaws, which were many and varied, Sebastian Fox really was one of her favorite people in the world, and she counted herself as blessed to be one of the few people who were granted his love.
She sighed as she heard Callum’s voice coming from the living area. It was time to go, and she had a hell of an apology to give him for her behavior yesterday.
~DECEMBER~
HARRISON AND HEATHER ARE OVER!
Rumors abound that Harrison Fletcher and Heather York have officially called off their May wedding. Harrison was caught in bed with a woman named Madeline Turner last month, and he hasn’t been seen in public with Heather since.
A close friend of the ban
d tells us that they have broken up and canceled the wedding, but they have yet to make an official announcement. Heather was rumored to be having an affair with Cruise Control’s lead guitarist and international playboy, Sebastian Fox, which many people think was what caused Harrison to cheat.
We’ve caught wind that the band has already recorded a new album that is due for release in March, but if Sebastian and Heather are together now, how will this affect the release of the new album? Can Harrison work with Sebastian now that he’s stolen his girl?
Chapter 15
A THOUSAND WORDS
HEATHER SAT ON THE sofa at their therapist’s office, with Harrison beside her. It was Saturday; they’d both agreed to do relationship counseling and spent the start of their weekends in Brendan’s office. The last month had been rough; they were essentially living separate lives now, having strained conversations when they crossed paths in the common areas of their apartment.
She did want to mend their relationship, which was why she’d agreed to do counseling with him, but she didn’t know how they could ever come back from this. Heather sat in silence and played with the engagement ring on her finger, as Harrison was discussing with Brendan, once again, what had happened when he cheated.
“So, you were drugged when it happened. Do you feel like it would have happened if you weren’t drugged?” Brendan asked him.
“No.”
“You mean, of course, that he was drugged when he fucked someone that wasn’t me, maybe without a condom. Who would know? Because, apparently, he doesn’t fucking remember anything even though everyone else does.” Heather raised an eyebrow, and Harrison looked upset.
“That’s quite an aggressive way of phrasing it,” Brendan looked at her over the top of his glasses, “why do you choose to say it that way?”
Ugh. Fucking psychobabble. She was actually a big proponent of therapy, but she was still feeling so incredibly raw, and she found these sessions very frustrating. It was practically the only time she talked to Harrison these days, and they just ran through him cheating over and over again.