The Last Girl (Sand & Fog #7)

by Susan Ward

  I was halfway up the stairs when I found Cade sitting on the landing between the floors. He was wearing last night’s clothes and gave every appearance he hadn’t been to bed yet. He looked tired, troubled, and pensive, exactly how I felt.

  “Look what the cat finally dragged in,” I announced brightly, dropping to sit beside him. “Or should I say buried, unburied, then dumped on my stairs? By the looks of it, the Paris club scene doesn’t agree with you. What happened to you last night? Beyond the obvious. You didn’t join me here.”

  He cared just enough about me to look uncomfortable. “Things got complicated.”

  I set down my breakfast on the space between us, my appetite gone. “A text after I left the restaurant would have been nice to tell me you weren’t spending the night with me.”

  “You’re right,” he said stiffly. “But to be honest, I didn’t know how to explain what was going on.”

  “Why not just tell me the truth?”

  Grimacing, he raked back his unkempt black waves and fixed his eyes on the carpet before his gaze popped up to mine. “Fuck, Khloe. Zane was acting crazy. Frantic. Out of his mind about us being together last night. There didn’t seem a smooth way out other than to tell him I wouldn’t follow you to the hotel. He’s my boy. Sometimes you’ve gotta do what you don’t want to for your friends.”

  My brows puckered as I mulled that over. I sort of understood their brand of friendship and loyalty. Cade protected Zane. Indulged him. I suspected, though it wasn’t confirmed, that he paid Zane’s way on our travels. Someone sure as hell bankrolled Zane’s lifestyle—his parents didn’t have much of a pot to piss in—and complicated, in the light of my own Zane moments at the café, was probably an understatement.

  “Still, you could have given me a heads-up that crap was coming my way. We’re friends, too.”

  “You’re right. Twice this morning. Don’t gloat.”

  I laughed—Cade could make me laugh in the least likely moments—and we slowly slouched until our shoulders rested on each other’s.

  “You’re dressed for the airport,” he observed, scanning me from my backward black baseball cap, down my worn-soft jean overalls above my stark white tank top, to my Adidas sneakers. “Early in the day even for you to start traveling.”

  “Not today. I’m getting out of Dodge as early as I can.”

  His sharp blue eyes began to probe my face. “You doing all right, Khloe?”

  “Always. Why wouldn’t I be?”

  His answering expression: Don’t put up a front with me.

  I stared wide-eyed back with fake I’m great.

  “I’m not as emotionally handicapped as everyone thinks I am.” Shaking his head, he reached for my coffee. “I saw you and Zane at the café. Then him hauling ass down the street. That’s why I’m waiting for you here.”

  My eyes burned, and my throat convulsed with unshed tears I wouldn’t let flow. “We had some words.”

  “About last night?”

  The way he asked that made me tense. “Not exactly.”

  “Not exactly,” he repeated, nodding several times. It seemed to take a while to decide on his next question. “You broke up with him?”

  It would have been nice to pretend I was the moving party, but I liked Zane too much to lie. “No. He dumped me.”

  “You?” Cade looked flabbergasted, like that was the last thing he thought he’d hear that morning. His gaze grew intense. “Did he say why?”

  I shrugged. “He said he was in love with me. And can’t take my crap anymore.”

  “That’s it?”

  “Isn’t that enough?”

  His lips unfurled in a quiet smile. “Yeah. You don’t have to share more.”

  “Good. I wasn’t planning on it.” I gave him a bump with my shoulder, took my coffee from his hand, and grabbed my plate. “Call me when you get back to New York.”

  I was on my feet when his words stopped me. “About that—me calling you—I don’t think that’s a good idea, Khloe.”

  My stomach dropped. What? No, he wasn’t going to do that, not freshly after Zane. True, without Zane in the mix I’d already figured we were on limited time, but to do it at that moment...no!

  I stared at him, waiting, giving him time to rethink things. When he didn’t relent, I shifted my stare to the wall. “It’s big of you not to say the words. It’s also cowardly.”

  “It’s neither, Khloe. We weren’t anything anyway. I mean less than nothing to you without Zane.”

  I understood why he thought that, wrong though it was, but it didn’t make it better that they both dumped me within an hour. “If you’re less than nothing to me it shouldn’t hurt, only it does, Cade.”

  I swerved around him and ran up the steps to my suite, barely containing my tears before I reached my door.

  I STRUGGLED TO BALANCE my coffee and the quiche I no longer wanted in a single hand as I fished my key card from my pocket.

  “Good morning,” Damon said as the door slammed shut behind me. He was standing across the room by the terrace doors, suit jacket back on, tie flawless, and hair smoothed into place, looking fresh and yummy as a morning pastry. But I’d already had my fill of men for a single morning.

  “Why are you still here?” I plopped down at the table and set my breakfast in front of me.

  He frowned as though that were a stupid question. “Zane hasn’t come back.”

  “I know, and he won’t.”

  “Won’t? Are you saying he’s left Paris? Do you know where he went?” He’d moved across the room and was hovering above me beside the table.

  Shaking my head, I shoved a forkful of quiche in my mouth and forced it down my throat. I had to eat. Eating was important no matter what was going on in my life, I reminded myself, but the eggs stuck like cardboard first in my mouth then my throat. I chased it with a large mouthful of coffee and forced it to my stomach.

  “You know food is easier to swallow if you make the bites smaller,” Damon said in a cautiously teasing manner devoid of criticism that I sensed was intended to be soothing. It had the opposite effect. It made it impossible to look at him.

  My mouth tightened, my lips pushing inward. “Thanks for the tip. It’ll come in useful if I’m ever at Windsor Castle having tea with the King.”

  “It will also keep you from getting a bellyache.”

  Bellyache? Fuck, my head ached, my heart ached, if I gave myself a bellyache I wouldn’t have felt it. I took three more bites, then my cell dinged, and I pushed my dish away. The text was from my driver to let me know he’d arrived at the hotel.

  “Zane mentioned something about flying from Paris with you. You’ll probably find him at the airport. His bags are in our bedroom.” My voice caught at our. “I’ve gotta head out. Stay if you want to. The room’s only paid until noon. After that, it’s on your credit card.”

  Inside my head, I was kicking myself all the way to the door. Room only paid until noon. Such a stupid thing to have said to Damon Saxe. I was off my game, out of my head, internally jumbled and frantic. And over such a paltry thing: two men I didn’t love dumping me on the same day.

  Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.

  As I sprinted down the stairs two at a time, I suspected I’d be privately humiliated for a very long time that my first and probably only interlude with Damon Saxe ended with that.

  Chapter Eight

  THE BANGING IN MY TEMPLES had turned into a vicious hangover by the time we reached the airport. A bout of crying outside my suite coupled with not eating well in the morning can do that. Being flanked by two traveling companions who talked incessantly—and too loudly—in a tiny space like the back of a limo added kick to the thumps in my head.

  As the car zipped through Paris, in between trying to pump me for info on what went down last night with me and my guys, as they called them, Cia and Gretchen chirruped away making copious lists of what we should do to fill our next month once we hit LA. It was all but a mission for them: loading the social calen
dar to avoid looking like they had a single empty moment while in So Cal.

  Neither of them could survive months home without a plan, but I was different. I took comfort in knowing I would soon be in Pacific Palisades with my family, surrounded by people who loved me. I was more than ready for quiet days with Mom and Dad, and my minutes in Paris converting into a nothing burger in my mental scrapbook once I was home.

  It’d be wonderful when it all felt like nothing. Zane ending it with me. Cade picking him in the friends’ competition. And my spirited, if not at times unwantedly impolite first encounter with Damon Saxe.

  Arranging my smile and expression to appear I was keeping up with my girlfriends’ fast chatter back and forth across me, it was present in my mind that I still hadn’t told them I’d met Damon last night. It was quite a big deal, not your average rank and file A-list surprise, even if it’d gone badly.

  As I curled my fingers around my steaming cup of coffee, I tried to figure out why I was keeping that wowza experience private. It was exactly the kind of thing we shared among the three of us. In fact, these were the only kinds of things we ever shared. Who we’d met, info dumps on our romantic relationships, sex experience morning-after marathons, and to break up the monotony of talking exclusively about men we tossed in celebrity gossip, fashion, and shopping.

  There was no denying that how we lived was getting stale, and I was only twenty-two. An even less appealing thought was that in eight years I’d be the worst thing a girl could ever become: an old party girl. My mental image of that made me shudder. The problem was I was trapped on this endless merry-go-round—fate’s choice, not mine—and there was no cure.

  “God, Khloe! Be careful with that coffee,” Cia screeched, pulling me from my thoughts to realize my cup had tipped in my fingers. There was now a noticeable drip over the seat, my jean-clad thigh, and the hem of Cia’s coral sundress.

  “Sorry.” I set my much-needed dose of caffeine into the holder.

  “No more silence. It’s time you tell us what’s going on with you,” Gretchen demanded in her imperative way.

  “You’ve been like a zombie since you got in the car,” Cia pointed out.

  “There’s nothing. I’m just tired.”

  Cia yanked a wad of tissue from the box and shoved half into my hand. “Start dabbing and talking. We know something was going on last night. Cade and Zane got into a vicious argument in front of the café. Cade punched him and then they stormed off in opposite directions.”

  I focused in on them then. Cade hadn’t told me that, and neither had Zane. “You saw them fight? Not just argue. But it got physical?”

  Both girls nodded.

  I turned my face toward Gretchen because if there was info to be had it’d be from her. “Could you hear what they were arguing about?”

  “Not all of it. It was too noisy on the street. Their voices would fade and then they’d shout. Then I heard your name, Cade bellowed that’s whacked, Zane spewed more in his face, and—bam—Cade hit him, called him a fucking piece of shit dirtbag, and left.”

  Cia did a violent upper body shake over the memory. “It was all very intense.” Her lids went wide above her hazel eyes. “We didn’t see either of them again after we took off clubbing with Trent. We figured they both showed up at the hotel last night.”

  “We’ve been worried they had it out with you there.” Gretchen tilted her head with a pretty red lip pout. “We didn’t want to push you to open up if you weren’t ready, but you’ve been behaving so strangely. They didn’t hurt you, did they?”

  Hurt me? Quite the opposite, by the sounds of it. I’d hurt them both more than I suspected, and they had dumped me while remaining friends.

  I somehow mustered a laugh. “Of course not.”

  They nodded with relieved smiles.

  “Good. It’ll blow over, Khloe,” Cia crooned, patting my leg right atop the coffee smudge. “It’s good that we’re going home for fall and winter. We’re too small of a group. Too much testosterone in close quarters. It was bound to blow up eventually. I’m amazed you kept it going this long.”

  “They’re both such dominant men,” Gretchen added in exclamation-point manner, the signal that this discussion was over.

  But it wouldn’t blow over. This tiny piece of almost something being the way I wanted it—Zane and Cade—was now done. There was no doubt when spring rolled around again it’d be just us three girls jetting off to Europe next year. We wouldn’t even have Trent. He’d peel off from us with the guys. That’s how our world worked.

  “It isn’t like any of us are looking for happily ever after,” Cia announced cheerfully. “According to my mom, all marrying young means is you have a lot of ex-husbands by the time you’re her age. She has five and didn’t get married the first time until she was thirty.”

  Gretchen crinkled her nose. “My mom has three.” She turned to studied me as though I were a puzzle and then frowned. “How is it your mom is the one in the music industry and has only two ex-husbands?”

  “No, that’s not right,” Cia corrected. “Khloe’s mom only got divorced once. One ex. One dead. One happy for now. Isn’t that right, KK?”

  I nodded because my abhorrence of this conversation was strangling my throat. My parents weren’t happy for now. They were the real deal. Madly in love and all about each other and family. Twenty-two years and going strong. The ideal most girls secretly wanted but wouldn’t admit it.

  “One ex. That’s got to be a record in Pacific Palisades. Personally, I don’t think happily ever after exists anymore,” Gretchen lamented.

  “Except for Khloe’s parents,” Cia exclaimed quickly, because when it came to my family nothing turned me into a prickly bitch faster than crap talk about them.

  “Happy for now,” sounded in my left ear, and I tried to block out Gretchen’s voice but couldn’t. “It’s like it’s become the limit of what any relationship can be for our generation. Like the beginning and the ending are absolute from the start no matter how good things are between two people. I’m surprised people don’t get the lawyers and negotiate their divorce in advance at the time they say I do.”

  “Duh. They do. It’s called a prenup.”

  They both busted up with laughter, but gloom fell over me like a London fog, and the beauty of Paris beyond the windows was suddenly gray. We were all in the same boat, pretending to be cool with how things were and oh-so happy about our no-strings party lives.

  We were very good at maintaining a pretense that we didn’t want the fantasy of one guy, one girl forever. Our reasons were different, but it didn’t matter. The truth was that we did, even me, and having a lifetime of only happy for now was an inescapably sad thing.

  THE LIMO DROVE US STRAIGHT out onto the tarmac, where we waited while our luggage was being loaded onto the jet. I was antsy to get out of the car. Feeling jumbled and restless while being confined wasn’t good for me. Gretchen and Cia had lapsed into silence focused on their phones, and in the quiet I could hear my own thoughts and didn’t want to. I’d texted my bodyguard who’d accompany me home to rescue me, which meant come and get me, but for some reason Cody hadn’t responded.

  Fuck it—not waiting, I opened the door and crawled over Cia to get out. I felt a hard slap against my right hip. “Damn it, Khloe. A bit impatient today? It’s not like the plane is going to take off without you. You could have asked me to get out and I would have.”

  “I need Cody. Now.” It wasn’t true, but it switched their grousing into concern for me.

  “Wait. We’ll get him,” Cia called out as I hurried toward the stairs as if I hadn’t heard her.

  “Where’s her bodyguard?” Gretchen shouted in a voice that nearly drowned out the sound of the flights overhead. “I just saw him waiting with the plane. Cody, where are you? Khloe needs you. She’s having an episode!”

  I’d created a commotion on the pavement behind me, but once inside the cabin I let out a slow emotion-laden breath. It was dimly lit inside, and as
the plane belonged to my father, it held the feel of home that I desperately needed.

  After returning the flight attendant’s greeting, I went to the private sleeping compartment in back. My gaze roved, finding each thing I expected to be there. A vase of beautiful violet roses from my dad. A luscious goody basket from my mother, stuffed with comfort tidbits for the long flight to California. My favorite blankets, my pillows, my bear on the bed with a stack of envelopes.

  I began to rummage through the handwritten notes from my family. Even though we texted each other every day I loved that they did this. Words on paper always felt more real. Something that could last forever if taken care of.

  My erratic pulse slowed and steadied. I closed the door, curled up on my bed with my bear, and began to read.

  Chapter Nine

  CODY WARRICK, MY BODYGUARD and invisible shadow while I traveled, collapsed backward onto the pillow beside me and made a loud huff. “Girl, there is too much drama in your life.”

  “Sorry.” I peeked over the top of the letter from my grandpa Jack and pouted exaggeratedly. “I texted you to rescue me and you didn’t. I wanted to be alone. It’s the fastest way to shake off Gretchen and Cia. Having an episode. Now they won’t knock on the door once before we’ve landed.”

  His brows shot up. “Don’t try to defend it as something good you did for us to have calm on the flight. I left the tarmac for two minutes. You didn’t have to hit the panic button.”

  Oh, but I did.

  “Episode,” he grumbled, disgusted, his head shaking as he stared at the ceiling of the jet. “It’s insensitive to you that they call it that. Serious things should be treated seriously. Which, I point out, is why you shouldn’t hit the panic button unless you need protecting or my stellar army medic training.”

  I crinkled my nose. “I promise I’ll never do it again.”

  “I’m confident that you will.” He turned onto his side to face me and raked back his sandy blond hair. “I don’t know why you travel with those girls. Everything’s a joke to them. Everything’s a party. They have no substance. None whatsoever. You’d have thought there was a terrorist bombing on the runway by how Gretchen was screaming my name and running around. Then, two seconds later they’ve completely forgotten the incident and are back to being them.”