Saving Ever After (Ever After #4)

by Stephanie Hoffman McManus

  Still, even with Kris roaming rampant through the jungle, trying to sneak attack people, and getting his ass killed when that didn’t work, we were still able to push the other team back and get the win after an intense forty minutes of battling.

  Kris jumped up, kicking over his chair and doing some kind of victory touchdown dance, inciting my laughter. “We kicked ass!”

  “Yes we did,” I agreed. “Although I’m not sure what you were doing while we were kicking ass.” I smirked and he glared at me.

  “That’s it, I played your game, and helped you win, and this is the thanks I get. Well now you’re going to do what I want. We’re going to work out.”

  “What? No!” I protested. “I want to play another game.”

  “Well then you shouldn’t have given me shit for dying, besides, your boyfriend already signed off.”

  “He did?” My head snapped back to my computer screen before I realized my mistake. “Wait, I don’t know who you’re talking about.” I tried to backtrack, but Kris just stared at me, unconvinced.

  “Right. Like I don’t know exactly who ‘X,’ or Chris, ‘Cross Ashes’ is. You two spend so much time passing notes back and forth during the game that I’m surprised the both of you don’t die as often as I do.”

  “Well, we don’t suck.”

  “Shut up, and get changed. I’m going to make your ass run four miles on the treadmill instead of two for that comment, and I think it’s a good day to bump up your weights by ten pounds.”

  “You’re a damn sadist,” I groaned, grabbing my shorts and a shirt to work out in and heading for the bathroom to change.

  When we got to the fitness center, Kris did exactly what he promised, and pushed me hard on the machines. I whined and complained the whole time, like I always did, but my body actually felt better than it ever had, even knowing I would be sore after. Really sore if his hard look was any indication of what he had in store for the rest of our workout.

  Collapsing in the grass as soon as we set foot back outside, I groaned. “I can’t move my legs. You’re going to have to carry me back.”

  “I’m not carrying you. Get up, Mia.” He nudged me in the ribs with his foot.

  “I’m serious. You’re going to have to piggy back me or I’m not moving.”

  “Then I’ll leave you here,” he threatened.

  “You can’t get back in my room to get your computer without my room key,” I reminded him. It was currently wrapped around my neck on a lanyard.

  Thinking he was so sneaky, he quickly bent forward, hand shooting out to snatch it from around my neck, but before he could get it, I wrapped my arms around his neck and swung my legs around his waist, latching onto him.

  “What the fuck!” he cried, trying not to lose his balance, but not quite able to stand back up with me hanging off of him. “Get off me you damn spider monkey.” He tried to pry my hands loose behind his neck, but I had a solid grip. “You’re a damned crazy person, Mia!”

  He finally managed to stand upright, but that only allowed me to wind my legs around his waist even tighter, making it impossible for him to shake me. We’d acquired a few onlookers at this point, some seemed mildly amused, while a few wore pinched expressions at seeing the two of us horsing around together.

  “I’m not letting go,” I told him.

  “For fuck’s sake then, just get on my back,” he gave in, not nearly as frustrated as he was pretending to be. His expression and tone might have suggested he was annoyed with me, but I could see the amusement in his eyes, and the almost smile pulling at his lips.

  “Okay, if I hop off to climb on your back, you’re not going to try to leave me are you? Because if you do, I’m just going to lay right back down and we’re going to do this all over again.”

  “Just get on my back before someone calls the campus cops to cart you off for assaulting me.”

  I laughed and jumped down to my feet. He turned, giving me his back and I hopped on so he could piggy back me to my dorm.

  “So when are you heading home for Thanksgiving?” he asked as we approached my building. Up until that moment, I’d completely put the conversation with my father out of my mind. The instant Kris had barged into my room, all the shit had slipped away and I’d had a great afternoon, but now it was back.

  “I’m, uh, not going home for Thanksgiving.”

  “What? You just told me last week that you were. Why’d you change your mind?”

  “I didn’t. My dad did. He doesn’t want me to go home to spend Thanksgiving with my family, because apparently I don’t have much of one left,” I told him bitterly. “They’re all so wrapped up in their own thing that they don’t have the time to get together for even one day and act like we all give a shit about each other.” Yeah, I was really bitter.

  “That sucks. So what are you going to do? You’re not just going to sit around your dorm and mope for the whole weekend are you?”

  “I don’t mope, asshole, and no. I’ll probably spend it with Sadie.”

  “You can come to my games then this weekend. We play at home Saturday and Sunday. You could even come to our game in New Hampshire tomorrow if you want.”

  “Thanks for the pity invites, but I don’t know. Sadie is probably going to spend Thanksgiving with Ace’s family in Connecticut, so I might not even be in town if I go with them.”

  “I didn’t invite you out of pity, Mia,” he said, genuinely irritated this time. “I invited you because I want you to come.”

  “Okay. I will if I can.” That seemed to alleviate his irritation with me, but I couldn’t help but wonder about his reaction and how adamant he was about wanting me to come.

  He carried me inside the building, and I remained on his back all the way through the elevator and to my room. I only released him when I dropped down onto my bed. Kris gathered up his computer, preparing to leave.

  “Hey Kris, why don’t you have a girlfriend?” I thought about all the girls who came up to flirt with him any time we were out together, and all the puck bunnies that gathered at his games. He had a lot of opportunities to date, or to not date if he just wanted to hook up, but I never saw him show them even the mildest interest.

  “What kind of question is that?”

  “I don’t know. I just want to know why you have girls throwing themselves at you all the time, but you never date anyone.”

  “Mia, maybe you just don’t see me with girls,” he pointed out, but I shot that down.

  “But when you’re not in class or at practice or away at a game, you’re almost always hanging out with me.”

  “There’s other times I’m not with you, Mia,” he sighed like he wished I’d just let it go.

  “Like when?”

  “Fuck, Mia, why do you want to know so bad?”

  I hesitated for a moment, trying to figure out how best to approach him without upsetting him more. “You’re not . . . you don’t . . .”

  “Don’t what?” he snapped.

  “Like me, do you?” I cringed, waiting for him to answer, afraid that I might have just hurt his feelings. I frowned when he barked out a short laugh.

  “Geez Mia, is that what you’re worried about? And by the way, thanks for acting like that would be the worst possible thing in the world,” he said sarcastically.

  “Well, it kind of would. It would completely mess up our friendship, and I don’t have a lot of good friends, so I can’t really afford to just go losing my best friend.”

  He looked at me oddly for a second and then let out a deep breath. “To answer your question . . . In bed. I’m not with you at night when I’m in bed.”

  “Well duh, of course not. When you’re in bed – oh.” His meaning sunk in.

  “Yeah, oh. So can we drop this now.”

  “You’re a total player, aren’t you?” I giggled, finding it amusing that he had tried so hard to keep that from me. “And you didn’t want me to know.”

  “Well now you do, but we are not going to talk about it a
nymore. I’m serious.”

  “So if you’re such a manwhore, how come you don’t like me?” I asked, simply out of curiosity. I was incredibly relieved that he wasn’t harboring any secret feelings.

  “If I didn’t like you, we wouldn’t be friends.”

  “That’s not what I meant. How come you only want to be friends with me? And how come I’m the only girl friend,” I frowned, that didn’t come out right, “friend girl,” that wasn’t much better “the only girl that you’re friends with outside of bed?”

  He just chuckled. “I don’t know, but I liked you that first night. I think our friendship may have been cemented when you tried to go ninja on Leland’s ass. You were funny and spunky and seemed more real than a lot of those people there, even drunk. You also looked like you could use a friend, a real one. And maybe I needed one too.”

  “You needed more friends? What do you collect them like pet rocks?” He had more friends than the guy who created Facebook.

  “I said a real friend Mia. I’ve got plenty of fake ones, but you, you’re more than just my only real girl friend.”

  I was shocked for a moment and then smiled. “Are you saying I’m your best friend too?”

  He shook his head, but he was smiling. “I’ll see you tomorrow, you lunatic.” He started toward the door, carrying his computer.

  “Hey, you’re the one with a lunatic for a best friend,” I called after him.

  I heard his soft chuckle before he left the room, the door shutting behind him with a soft click.

  Hmm.

  I had a best friend, like a real one. I’d never really had one of those before. Unfortunately I knew all too well what he meant by fake friends. I’d had plenty of those. Even Lexi and Emma who’d I’d called my best friends, were only party friends.

  Chapter 21

  Chris

  At the beach. Shoot shouldn’t take long.

  I’ll find you when it’s over.

  xox Katrina

  I read the note a second time before crumpling it and tossing it in the wastebasket by the dresser.

  Vacation my ass.

  She was working.

  She’d talked me into bailing on Thanksgiving with my family so the two of us could take off for Cabo. A getaway for just the two of us. A chance to reconnect because we’d been drifting apart even more since returning from Australia. Intimate weekend. No distractions.

  She was fucking working.

  We’d had the argument last night when we arrived and she confessed that she had to do one quick shoot this morning. I told her that was bullshit. As far as I was concerned, work counted as a distraction. She’d argued and promised that it wouldn’t take up much time and then it would be just the two of us. We went to dinner last night with it unresolved, and it seemed that while I was working out this morning, she’d decided to do the shoot, even though I’d asked her not to.

  I’d never, not a single damn time, asked her to put me before her work, but she’d fucking lied about this trip. Then the one time that I ask her to put our relationship first, she couldn’t, or wouldn’t, do it. I felt like that said a hell of a lot, and I didn’t know why I was still trying so hard to make this work, to make our relationship a priority and think of her first.

  Hell, I’d agreed to this trip when I would have much rather spent it with Bas and my Dad. Since Lissa had Abby, I’d hardly gotten to spend any time with my niece.

  Now today was Thanksgiving and I was alone in a damn hotel room. Well I wasn’t going to sit around and wait for her. I showered and changed into a pair of shorts and went to explore, turning off my cell phone.

  I wandered around the resort for quite a while, checking out the pool area that had three large pools, one with a current that moved the water around in a winding lazy river. I got a drink from the outdoor bar and floated around in there on an inner tube with a holder just for my bottle.

  Even though it was relaxing and nobody bothered me, one can only float around in a circle for so long before even that gets old. I powered my phone back on to check the time, wondering if Katrina’s quick shoot was over by now. I decided against going to look for her in the room. I figured she would text me as soon as she was back.

  She did. Almost three hours later. So her quick shoot had been more like a five hour shoot. I’d already had lunch and checked out the shops and area around the resort. The only thing I hadn’t checked out much, was the beach. I’d wanted to avoid running into her on her shoot.

  Hey baby. All done. Where are you?

  That was her first message to which I didn’t respond.

  Babe? I’m back at the room.

  Chris, where the hell did you go?

  Then she called. I didn’t answer that either. The messages and calls continued to come and I continued to ignore them for an hour before I finally returned to the room and found her pissed off and waiting for me.

  “What the hell, where were you? I texted you like six times and called three.”

  “I know,” was all I said as I slipped the shades from my head and set them on the dresser.

  “You know? Well what were you doing that you couldn’t take the time to answer me? We’re supposed to be spending time together.”

  “Like we were this morning while you were at your shoot?”

  “Chris, I already told you –”

  “I know what you told me, and I asked you to cancel it. You’re the one who wanted this vacation with no distractions. Well I’m here on vacation. I was here all damn day while you were working.”

  “Christian, it’s my job!”

  “I know, and maybe if you had been up front with me I wouldn’t be so pissed right now, but you were the one who made such a big deal about this trip being time for us and not letting anything else get in the way.”

  “I know. I’m sorry, I just really wanted you to come away with me. I’m done now. No more work the rest of the trip. We can just focus on you and me.”

  “I don’t know if it’s going to work Katrina,” I sighed and scrubbed a hand through my hair, bringing it to rest on the back of my neck, squeezing to relieve some of the tension. “I don’t know if we’re going to work.”

  Her eyes went wide with panic and her mouth fell open, but she didn’t say anything for a moment. “What do you mean?” she asked, her voice nearing hysteria.

  “Things were really good when we started out, but lately, they’re not anymore. Obviously you’ve noticed it or you wouldn’t have made such a big deal about us needing time to work on our relationship. I know relationships aren’t supposed to be easy, that it takes work, but I don’t even know what it is we’re fighting to hang on to anymore. It’s obvious we’re both more committed to our careers than each other and I think that if this was real, we’d both have done more to make each other a priority.”

  “I don’t know what I’m supposed to say here, but I know you’re wrong. You mean everything to me Chris.” She grabbed my hand, her eyes pleading with me. “We can make this work. I know we can.”

  “I’m sorry Katrina, but I don’t think we can.” I tried to pull my hand out of hers, but she clung to it desperately.

  “Please, just give us this chance. We can talk. About anything you want. We can get back to where we were.”

  “That’s the problem Katrina, we shouldn’t be trying to go back. We should be moving forward. Our relationship should be growing, but it’s not.”

  “But we can work on it,” she cried. “You can’t just give up on me, on us.”

  “Look, I’m not trying to hurt you, but I think if you were being honest with yourself, you would see that I’m right. I know this isn’t easy to hear, but I think you’re more upset about losing the idea of our relationship and what you want it to be, than the reality of what we actually have.” She dropped my hand as if I’d burned her, pulling it back and then shoving at my chest.

  “Don’t!” she cried. “Don’t you dare try to tell me what I feel or what I want.”

  I stepp
ed back, raising my hands up in the air. “Okay, I’m sorry.”

  “So that’s just it? You’re just sorry and it’s over?”

  “I don’t know Katrina, but I think so.” It might not have seemed like it to her, but this was hard on me as well. Eight months together wasn’t nothing to me. I didn’t want to throw that time away, and she did matter to me, but that just wasn’t enough. There had to be more than that.

  “What I know is that I’m going to book a flight home, and I think you should stay here. You should take the time to yourself to relax and try to enjoy the rest of the trip. We can both use the time apart to really think about what we truly want, and then when you come back we can talk and see where we’re at.”

  “I don’t need to think about it,” she choked out hoarsely, “I already know that I don’t want to lose you.”

  “I’m sorry, Katrina. I really am.”

  “This is about her, isn’t it? I saw the way you looked at her in Australia, and I know you’ve been playing that stupid game with her almost every night.”

  I sighed, “This isn’t about Mia. This is about you and me.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  I didn’t know what else to say to her, except, “I’m sorry.” This wasn’t about Mia. Yes, I felt something for Mia, and maybe that’s what opened my eyes to things between Katrina and me, but I’d chosen Katrina. We weren’t working because we weren’t right for each other, no matter how much we both didn’t want that to be true. I just couldn’t deny it anymore and I was tired of not even knowing what I was trying to hang onto.

  She sat on the bed and watched me pack. It really was one of the hardest things I’d had to do. I could feel her hurt, it was almost suffocating. To be honest, it was the most emotion I’d seen or felt from her in almost the entire time we’d been together.

  I placed a soft kiss on her forehead before walking out. Even though I’d told her that we would use the time apart to think, as soon as the door clicked shut behind me, I knew that I had just closed the door on our relationship. As hard as it was to accept, mostly because I hated that it caused her pain, I knew it was the right choice, and that eventually she would see that.