The Price of Love (A Price Novel Book 1)

by Craft, Maggi

  “So, Blake, where are you doing your internship?” I asked.

  “Boston.”

  “Really, that’s interesting. My little sister Isabelle lives near there. She’s at Harvard Law — maybe you should look her up,” I said.

  “I might do that if she’s single, and even half as pretty and smart as you.”

  I couldn’t believe he was flirting with me. I blushed. “Well, if I’m so pretty, why did you stop calling me?”

  “What?” He looked confused. “Eric said you told him to ask me to stop calling you, that you weren’t interested in me anymore but didn’t want to hurt my feelings.”

  Milly was right. Damn Eric! “I did no such thing!” I said too loudly. The people at the table next to us looked at me. I laughed quietly. “That damn Eric. He’s really something.”

  Blake laughed too. “I guess I should have known better than to just believe Eric. My bad!” He paused and looked around. Then he leaned in closer so no one else could hear. “So, you’re not dating that famous guy anymore?” He kind of flinched when he said it, like he knew he might be touching on a sore subject.

  And he was right. There it was, that sucker punch to my gut. I looked down. “No. I’m not dating anybody.” I made myself smile at him.

  “Well, that’s the best news I’ve heard all day.” He smiled at me. “Why don’t we go out for drinks tomorrow night, after finals are over? We’ll deserve a drink by then.”

  “All right, that sounds great!” I said, and for a minute I was actually a little excited.

  “Except for you have plans already, A!” Now standing at my elbow, Milly threw Slayde’s pet name for me in there because she knew it would sting. She gave me an ugly look. “You told Eddie you would come to his graduation. Remember?” She looked really pissed.

  “Oh yeah, sorry, I did. Well, why don’t we all go out after? We could always go to Pot of Gold.”

  “I doubt Eddie will want to go to work after his graduation,” Milly snapped.

  “Well, damn, Milly, we can go somewhere else.” I snapped back.

  She wasn’t playing with me. “Whatever.” She grabbed her stuff and left. Of course I followed her.

  Milly was almost back to our dorm when I finally caught up to her. I called, “Milly, wait. What the hell was that all about?”

  She stopped and looked at me. “You know, I want to ask you the same damn thing.”

  “Why are you mad?” I whispered, trying not to cry. Fighting with Milly was not what I wanted to do today.

  She calmed down a little. “I’m not mad, Arden. I’m just worried. Why are you flirting with Blake? You know he doesn’t mean anything to you. You know you don’t actually want to go on a date with someone else.”

  “You’re right, Milly. I guess I should stay locked up in a dorm room for the next fifty years, so I can continue to avoid the tabloids, entertainment television, and anything else that reminds me of him! What do you want from me? Why don’t you want me to be happy?” The tears burned my eyes, and I could barely speak because of the huge lump that had formed in my throat.

  “I do! That’s all I want for you, but you’re making a mistake.” She was raising her voice again, obviously unfazed by my tear-filled eyes.

  “How do you know, Milly? It’s not your heart that’s been destroyed. It’s not you who can hardly get out of bed in the morning. It’s me.” I was now yelling and crying.

  “Don’t you think I know that? Have you forgotten I live there? I’m watching my best friend suffer, knowing that all she has to do is pick up the damn phone. This is nuts. What’s wrong with you, Arden?”

  “Why can’t he pick up the phone and call me, huh? If he is so miserable, why hasn’t he called me?”

  She looked at me like I had just slapped her in the face. “Are you serious right now? You have made it abundantly clear that you don’t want to talk to him. This is not a game to him. He doesn’t want to chase you around the rest of his life. He wants you to want him, Arden. He wants you to come back on your own. He didn’t do anything. You did. You freaked out and made a bad judgment call, and you’ve been sitting on your ass, sulking like a five-year-old ever since. Tell me something. If you don’t want to be with him, why do you cry yourself to sleep every night?”

  “I never said I didn’t want to be with him, Milly. I said I can’t be with him. There is a big difference,” I said, trying to stop the tears and snot from running down my face.

  “Why can’t you be with him? Please enlighten me, because I obviously don’t have a clue what is going on.” She threw her hands up in exasperation.

  “Because it won’t work. We will end up right back here,” I cried.

  “You know what, you’re right. If you don’t grow up and get your head out of your ass, then it won’t work. Maybe he needs to move on. He needs to find someone else, and then maybe he will be happy again too. I guess next time I talk to him, that’s what I will tell him. I’ll tell him you said that you’re ready to start dating other people and that he should do the same.” She started to walk away but turned around and pulled some tabloids out of her backpack and tried to hand them to me. “You need to see these.”

  I tucked my hands under my arms just like a five-year-old. She tried to hand them to me again, and I wouldn’t take them. I knew I was acting like she was trying to hand me a bomb, but I felt like they were just as dangerous. “I don’t want those.”

  “You need to look at them. I know your mind is running away with you. I’m nosy, and I’m sorry, but I’ve been checking out all the magazines since you split, just in case there was something that could hurt you. I didn’t want you to find out something via Entertainment Television. Here.” She tucked them under my arm and walked away.

  I knew there were pictures of Slayde in there, and I didn’t want to know anything. I had kept myself safe in this little bubble since we broke up, and I wasn’t ready for this yet. Was he with another girl? Surely Milly would have told me if that were the case, but maybe not. She was pretty mad at me right now. I was shaking, but I turned the magazine over to a page she’d folded down the corner of. It was a picture of Slayde walking into a restaurant. He wasn’t smiling like usual, and he had on sunglasses. The print read, Is America’s Favorite Hollywood Hunk Cracking Under the Pressure?

  With shaky hands, I turned the page. It was just a picture of Slayde and his friend Kevin at a ball game and the one of Slayde and Taylor going into a store in Beverly Hills. There was one of Slayde and his dad at the country club and one of Slayde and two bodyguards leaving a restaurant. In every picture, he looked sad. He was normally smiling, but he looked like he was on the verge of tears in every picture. He was still beautiful, but he looked thin.

  I scanned the article:

  Price’s excessive weight loss has the producers upset … A nutritionist has been brought in to revamp his diet for weight gain … Price recently canceled several interviews … Is the pressure getting to him, or is it something else? … Through all of this, he has yet to be seen anywhere with his fiancée, Arden Simms — are they already hitting a rough spot?

  It broke my heart to see him like this. There was no doubt I wanted to fix the situation, but I didn’t know how. And I didn’t know if a tabloid was anything to base anything on. The press could twist anything in any way they wanted, and I knew that firsthand. Four different magazines featured all of the same pictures. And no one had any real information. Not even anything from “a source close to Price.” If anyone knew anything, it would be Lexi or Kevin, and they weren’t talking. He could have just been tired or had a headache in those pictures, for all I knew. I just couldn’t believe Slayde was lying around, miserable. That wasn’t his personality.

  I shook my head. I couldn’t worry about it right now. I had to ace my exam tomorrow. I had to forget about Slayde and concentrate on studying.

  Milly spent the night at Eddie’s that night, and I lay in bed, thinking about everything she’d said. I knew everything was my fault, but
I really didn’t know what to do about it. For some reason, I couldn’t bring myself to make that call. It wasn’t because I didn’t love Slayde. It wasn’t because I didn’t miss him. It wasn’t because I wanted to be with someone else. It was because I was scared he didn’t feel the same anymore. I was scared he would reject me. What if my freaking out had been the best thing for him? What if it was his ticket out, and he hadn’t realized it until now? And if not, if he did still want to be with me, how would we ever survive in his world? I didn’t belong there, and I couldn’t live my life like that. I knew it, and he had to too.

  The next morning, after our exam, Milly and I went to go eat a huge breakfast like we always did after a huge exam. She had warmed back up toward me, and I was relieved to see our argument from the day before seemed to be water under the bridge. We decided to celebrate the end of finals and Eddie’s graduation all at the same time.

  We only had five days until our own graduation. After that we would all go our separate ways. For the first time in years, I would be alone again. I was graduating in the top 5 percent of my class; I could have done my residency just about anywhere, and I had chosen a hospital in Los Angeles.

  Milly was only going to be in Long Beach, I knew, but I was really going to miss her. It wasn’t that far away, but with our busy schedules, I knew things would never be the same.

  “Get changed, we’re going to Benihana for supper,” Milly said as she blew into our dorm room after Eddie’s graduation. I had come back ahead of her while she visited with Eddie’s parents, and I had made myself comfortable in yoga pants and T-shirt.

  “Why Benihana? Can’t we go somewhere else?” I asked.

  “Because we took a vote. That’s where we’re going. It’s not an option. You have to go. It’s probably our last night to all get together. And you love sushi,” Milly said.

  “OK.” I really hated going anywhere like that. I wanted to stay in my safety zone, and nowhere in public in Los Angeles was in my safety zone anymore. Why couldn’t we just go somewhere quiet?

  Karen had decided to be our DD for the night. I guess you could call it decided; it was really just her turn. When we were getting in the car, I saw Eric walking toward us, all dressed up. I cut Milly a sideways glance, and she didn’t look too thrilled either, which wasn’t like her. Milly was always the peacemaker, but she got into the car without saying anything to him.

  The only vacant seat was by me, and Eric took it. This was going to be a long ride. Everyone else laughed and joked on the way, but Eric and I didn’t speak to each other until we were almost there. He leaned over so no one else could hear and said, “I really am sorry you got hurt.” I definitely didn’t want to talk about it, so I just shrugged and smiled a little and looked away. He didn’t bring it up again.

  Once we had started on the first round of sushi and sake, I actually started to enjoy myself. I really was going to miss these guys, even Eric. I finally talked to him at the restaurant. Not that I had much choice, since he sat by me. I guessed there was no point in being pissed at him. He hadn’t written that article or taken those pictures. Blaming him was pointless. I decided to get over it. We talked and laughed, and it was like old times. I wondered where he was doing his internship. I didn’t ask, and he didn’t tell me.

  After leaving the restaurant, we were all standing outside, waiting for our car and talking, when I heard a bunch of commotion coming from inside. A pack of scum-sucking paparazzi, who always seemed to materialize out of thin air in LA, started walking closer to the entrance of the restaurant. I wondered who was about to walk out, and my stomach got a little nervous. Several bodyguards piled out and began to push people back, including us, so that whoever it was could get out of the restaurant and into the black SUV that had been pulled up in front of the restaurant.

  I definitely wasn’t prepared to see Slayde and several other people walk out of the restaurant while we were standing there — but they did. I thought I was going to faint. I could hear my heart beating in my chest, and I was getting tunnel vision. Is this really happening? I just concentrated on breathing and standing up. I didn’t want to embarrass myself. He didn’t see me at first; I tried to hide behind Eric.

  The bodyguards were trying to get him into the car as quickly as they could, but someone had gotten between him and his vehicle. OMG, it’s Milly! One of the bodyguards went to move her, but Slayde stopped him. He walked over and hugged her, and they started talking. I was too far away to hear what they were saying. They both looked in my direction. When Slayde and I made eye contact, I felt my knees weaken, and my heart was beating so fast I couldn’t breathe.

  Slayde pushed through all of the crazy people and started toward me. Suddenly everything was in slow motion. He reached out and grabbed my hand. Flashes started going off like crazy, which immediately reminded me where I was and what was going on, but Slayde ignored them.

  He smiled. “Hey, Arden. How are you?” he asked. I could see that his eyes were tearing up, and he was blinking back the tears.

  I didn’t answer him. I couldn’t speak. Before I knew what was going on, one of the bodyguards grabbed us and said, “I need you to get in the car.”

  Slayde told him OK and then turned back to me. “Will you come with me? Please ride with me so we can talk, and then I will drive you home.” I still couldn’t say anything. I just stood there, frozen. After what seemed like forever, and after the bodyguard again asked us to get in the car, I went with him. I saw Milly smiling from ear to ear as I passed her. I was sure she was very proud of herself. Once I thought about it, I was pretty sure she had known all along he would be there.

  The closer we got to the car, the more the press got in our faces. It was awful. This is why I wanted to run. This is what I hated. This is why I was so miserable. But I realized I wasn’t half as miserable as I had been for the last six weeks, so I went with it.

  The bodyguard pushed us both into the car and slammed the door, and we drove off. It took me a second to remember we weren’t alone in the car. Shelley and two guys I didn’t know were also in there. They were clearly intoxicated, but strangely enough, Slayde seemed stone sober. He leaned forward and said something to the driver.

  After we were on our way, he grabbed my hand. I noticed that his hand was cold and clammy. He was obviously nervous. He didn’t say anything, but he kissed the top of my head. I had no idea where we were going or what was going on, but after we had gotten a few blocks away from the restaurant, the driver turned down an alley. Slayde helped me out of the car; a black Escalade was waiting for us there. Just Slayde and I got in. The driver looked in the rearview mirror, Slayde said, “To the house,” and we drove away.

  “Where are we going?” I asked.

  “To my house.”

  “Your house? Or your parents’ house?”

  “My house.”

  “When did you buy another house?”

  “About a month ago.” He looked down at the floor. “I just couldn’t go back to the other house after you left, and eventually I got tired of staying with my parents. So, I bought a little house. It’s not my dream home or anything, but it’s mine and it’s not far from work.” He looked up at me. “What have you been doing? I know you’re almost finished with school. Where are you doing your internship?” He was chewing the inside of his cheek, which he only did when he was really nervous.

  “LA,” I said.

  “Really?” He looked shocked but then relieved. “I just figured you would go somewhere else. Why did you decide to stay here?”

  “I don’t know. Who knows why I do anything these days?” I crossed my arms and looked out the window, extremely uncomfortable.

  He turned my face, smiled, leaned over, and kissed my lips softly; he put his forehead on my temple. “I have missed you so much, baby. Are you gonna stay mad at me forever?”

  I didn’t know what to say. We had driven up to a gate; the driver punched in a code, and we drove into the garage. Slayde and I got out.


  “I thought you were driving me home,” I said.

  I saw the disappointment in his eyes. “If you’re ready to go, you know I’ll drive you, but don’t you want to come in for a minute?” I just stood there in the garage, not saying anything in response to his question. I knew if I went in there, it was going to change everything. I wasn’t sure how, so I was afraid and just stood there staring at him like a deer in headlights. Finally he gave up. “Just let me go get my keys.” He sighed and went inside.

  I had no idea what I wanted. I really wanted it to be three months ago and to be curled up in our bed at our house, but I guessed that was out of the question.

  Slayde was taking a while. Tired of standing in the garage, I finally decided I was here, and he obviously wanted me here, and so I walked inside.

  His house was a typical bachelor pad. There was a flat screen in every room. It was all clean-cut lines and big open areas, without a bunch of distractions on the walls. I walked into his bedroom, and to my shock, the first thing I saw was a picture of Slayde and me on his nightstand. It would be hard for him to bring another girl in there with that staring at them.

  Walking out of his bathroom, Slayde found me looking at the picture. He smiled but looked embarrassed. “That’s still my favorite picture,” he said quietly, looking down at his feet. He looked very nervous.

  It shocked me how unsure he was of himself. He looked so vulnerable. Maybe he always had been, but it was hard to see it through his intimidating, gorgeous exterior. I reminded myself he couldn’t help being gorgeous. He was just being himself.

  He hurts just like everyone else. He gets scared just like everyone else. He’s just human. I felt really bad. I was guilty of doing what I got so pissed at the rest of the world for: making him this larger-than-life object. Forgetting that he was just a regular guy, like everyone else, I’d expected him to live by a larger-than-life standard. That wasn’t fair. He had never expected anything of me that I wasn’t easily capable of, but I hadn’t given him the same respect in return.