Tonight of all nights.
“Zack,” Andrew said, looking at me like I was crazy, and maybe I was.
I felt crazy in that moment. A part of me really wanted to take Jonathan and shove him through the front window of the hotel. I was so angry, and I couldn’t compartmentalize any of it. Deep down, I knew I was acting irrational, but I couldn’t pull back.
“I’ll be in the bar,” I said, walking away before anyone could say anything else. I needed a drink.
“Zack!” Emily called after me, but I just ignored her.
I couldn’t look at her in that moment. I was too pissed. She knew how I felt about Jonathan, and she knew how he felt about her, yet she continued to be there whenever he needed her, to encourage him and not push him away when he made comments about how we were wrong for each other. It was so obvious that he wanted her, and I was just done. He didn’t need her to fix this issue. It was a bullshit reason to pull her away from me, but she couldn’t even see it.
“I’ve got him,” Derrick said from behind me, and I heard him start to follow me. “Zack, wait up.”
I ignored him.
When I walked into the bar, Derrick and Andrew were right behind me, along with Andrew’s boyfriend. I turned to face them.
“I don’t want to talk about it. Tonight I’m getting drunk, and if you want to be here, you’d better be prepared to drink with me. If not, you can leave.”
“Zack, I don’t think–” Andrew started to say, but I glared at him.
“No. After everything I did for you in the past month, you owe me, so sit down and have a drink or leave. Take your pick.”
I watched him look back at Cole who nodded. “I’ll just be upstairs,” Cole offered.
“No,” I chimed in. “Stay. You like alcohol, right?”
“Uh, yeah?” Cole said, probably thinking I was certifiable.
“Good, go order a bottle of Jamison from the bar.”
“Whiskey?” Derrick asked. “Damn, bro, not that shit again.”
I didn’t even answer him. I just walked over to the bar and ordered the damn bottle myself before I sat down at a corner table to wait for the waitress to bring my drink over. If they weren’t going to join me, I’d just kill the bottle myself.
After a minute, the guys came over and sat down with me. The waitress appeared a few seconds later with the bottle and four shot glasses. I’d been pretty sure they wouldn’t leave, so I’d told her to bring glasses for all of us. Almost immediately, I poured a round and slammed one back before pouring myself another shot.
The guys all tentatively took their first shots, but I didn’t refill their glasses. If they wanted more, they could pour it themselves.
“Zack, what the hell is going on?” Derrick asked after I downed shot number three.
“I want him out,” I told them. “He’s into Emily, and I can’t deal with it. I’m afraid I’m going to lose her.”
There. I’d said it. My biggest fear – that she was going to choose Jonathan over me. I had no idea why I was so irrational about his feelings for her, but in that moment, all I could see was her picking him – even after everything she’d said to me upstairs. The fact that she’d decided to go with him when he needed her nixed every bit of security I’d felt just moments before when we’d been ready to go to a chapel and get married. The only solution I could find was getting rid of him, taking him out of the equation.
“No,” Derrick said firmly, and I looked up at him in surprise.
“What?”
“No, you’re not firing Jonathan,” he said as he poured himself another shot and threw it back. “You probably can’t anyway, but I won’t let you even go to Adam if that’s what you’re thinking.”
I sneered at him. “Are you fucking kidding?”
“No, I’m not. He’s the best thing that’s happened to us. He made our album fantastic. He’ll make this tour better than we ever expected. He’s not going anywhere.”
At that, I threw back another shot, the alcohol finally starting to swim in my bloodstream.
“Zack,” Andrew said, moving the bottle away from me. “Don’t do this. Emily loves you. She’s not into him. You have to trust her. You can’t force her to get married before she’s ready, and I’m sorry to say it, but tonight she wasn’t ready.”
“Yes, she was. She wanted this.”
Andrew shook his head. “No, she wanted to make you happy. She’s so afraid of setting you off that she’ll do anything to keep the peace and not make you upset. You’ve been on edge about Jonathan for so long, and it’s not helping her.”
“How the hell do you know?”
“I just do, okay,” he mumbled.
“I don’t believe you,” I spat at him, leaning forward.
“You should,” he said, shaking his head. “And you need to calm down, or you’re really going to lose her.”
He said it with such certainty that I could tell he knew more than he was letting on. At that realization, my blood started to run cold.
“How do you know that?” I asked him, venom in my voice.
“Don’t worry about it, man,” he said, only succeeding in freaking me out further. “Just stop pushing her. Let her plan the wedding she wants, get off her back about Jonathan, and don’t push her away, because if you lose her, you’ll regret it for the rest of your life.”
I closed my eyes for a few seconds, as my head started to throb. Fear was slicing through me, so I gripped the tabletop for support.
“Andrew, what are you talking about?”
“He’s talking about Emily telling Rachel that she was thinking about leaving you,” Derrick blurted out, and my vision got cloudy for a few seconds.
“What?” I asked, my fingers gripping the tabletop so hard they were turning white.
“Derrick,” Andrew hissed, looking at him like he wanted to kill him. “You weren’t supposed to say anything.”
“I had to say something. He needs to know,” Derrick said.
It was then that I reached out and grabbed both of them by their collars, yanking them forward. “What the hell are you talking about?!”
“Hey,” Cole said firmly, speaking up for the first time in several minutes as his hand landed on the arm that was holding Andrew’s shirt. “Let go of him.”
“What are you going to do, kick my ass if I don’t?” I snarled at him.
“How would you feel if I did that to Emily?” he asked as calmly as he could.
“I’d kill you,” I told him, since there was no question about it.
He jerked his thumb at Andrew. “He’s my Emily, so unless you want to die, let go.”
Well that sobered me a bit, and I released both Andrew and Derrick, who hadn’t been fighting back at all. I think they knew me well enough to know I wouldn’t actually hurt them. I just needed someone to take my rage out on.
Andrew adjusted his shirt as he said to me, “We weren’t going to say anything, but a few days ago, we heard Emily telling Rachel that she was thinking about leaving. She was in the bedroom, and I don’t think she knew we were on the bus. We didn’t hear much of her conversation, because she lowered her voice when she heard Derrick knock a beer can off of the counter in the kitchen.”
I sat back as the world around me slowly started to cave in. Emily was going to leave me? Fuck. Why?
No. I couldn’t let her. I had to stop her.
I got up from the table without another word and headed to the elevator. When I stepped inside, the doors started to close, but Andrew slid in before they could close all the way.
“Leave me alone,” I growled at him.
“No, you wouldn’t leave me alone when I wanted you to, so now I’m returning the favor.”
I glared at him. “You needed me. I don’t need you.”
“Bullshit. You’re about two seconds away from throwing Jonathan off the roof of the hotel, grabbing Emily, carrying her into a wedding chapel and forcing her to marry you. What the hell has gotten into you?”
“But you will,” he said firmly. “If you barge into that room and start making demands, she’ll bolt.”
“Fuck,” I said, raking my hand back through my hair. “This fucking sucks.”
“Yeah, well, it’s going to suck worse when she breaks up with you,” he said matter-of-factly, and on some level, even though I was out of my mind, I knew he was right.
When the elevator stopped on our floor, I got off, but I didn’t head to Jonathan’s room where I knew they’d be. I headed for my room. Andrew followed me, of course.
When I got inside, I sank down on the bed. Andrew stood in front of me, but he didn’t say anything. Finally I looked up at him. “How bad is it?”
I was freaking out. I’d never been so terrified in my life. I couldn’t live without Emily. She was like air to me, and just the thought of losing her again was making me go out of my mind.
“How bad is what?”
I took a deep breath. “I need to know how badly I screwed up,” I said, looking up at him with what were probably pleading eyes.
Slowly, he walked into the bathroom, and when he came out, he walked over to the dresser. He opened the drawer and closed it. Then he did the same thing with the closet, opening the door and shutting it, the look on his face not telling me what he was doing.
“Andrew. Tell me how to fix this,” I pleaded.
He turned around and faced me, and the look on his face should have said everything I needed to know.
“You can’t. She’s gone.”
I didn’t react how I thought I would had I been thinking ahead to this situation. Although I wanted to tear the room apart, throw things, break things, run down the hall and break Jonathan’s jaw, I didn’t. I just sat there and stared at the wall, not even fully conscious that I was processing what had truly happened.
Emily was gone. She’d left me.
Without you I’m nothing.
Nothing.
Without You I’m Nothing. Those were the words tattooed on Emily’s rib cage, because they reminded her of me and our song and that we were supposed to be together. How could she have left?
And the worst part was, there was nothing I could do. I’d acted like a fucking crazy person, and I’d lost her because of it.
Without you I’m nothing. No truer words had ever been written, because in that moment, faced with the prospect of going through life without her, that was exactly how I felt.
And so I just sat there and stared straight ahead while Andrew leaned against the dresser and watched me. He was probably waiting to see if I would go into the bathroom and get my razor so I could slit my wrists, but I wasn’t going to do that. My mind was only thinking of ways to get Emily back, to get her trust that I wasn’t going to push her into something if she wasn’t ready. Hell, I’d wait twenty years to marry her if that’s what she needed. I just wanted her back.
I couldn’t believe she’d left, that she’d packed up her stuff and actually left me. The pain in my chest was immeasurable. If I didn’t know better, I might have thought I was having a heart attack.
“What do you want to do?” Andrew asked after ten minutes of silently watching me freak out.
I looked up at him. “What do you think I want to do?” I snapped.
He sighed. “I guess we’re going to go looking for her?”
“Damn, right,” I said, standing up, new resolve flowing through me – along with four shots of whiskey – but I couldn’t even feel them. I was completely, stone-cold sober.
My phone chose that moment to ring, but I wasn’t answering it. There was only one person I wanted to speak to, and I knew she wasn’t calling me. I ignored it instead.
It rang again.
“Are you going to answer that?” Andrew asked.
“No.”
After a few minutes, the phone in the room rang. Andrew watched it while I watched him, daring him to answer it. After the third time we played this song and dance, he stalked over to the phone and picked it up.
“Hello? . . .Yeah, he’s here. . . Uh-huh. . . Uh-huh. Seriously?! . . . Holy shit. . . Okay. . . Okay. . .Yeah, definitely. Here, talk to Zack.”
“I don’t want to talk to anyone,” I growled.
“You want to take this,” he said and held the phone out to me.
I grabbed it and held it to my ear. “What?”
“Zack, you need to get up to the roof. Now!”
It was Leo. I had no idea where he’d been all night, but I didn’t care.
“Fuck off, Leo.”
“Fuck you, asshole. Get up here now. I need your help. Derrick’s gone all nuts and is threatening Jonathan with a gun.”
What?
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
“Just get up here,” Leo growled, and in the background I heard some genuine scuffling that made me concerned that Derrick was going to do something drastic.
Fucking Zack Easton to the rescue, of course, and at the worst possible time too. I had to find Emily.
“Come on,” I growled at Andrew who was probably sick of me at that point. “We have to save Derrick’s ass. I am so not in the mood for this shit.”
I was not bailing him out of jail again. If he shot Jonathan, he was on his own.
Andrew somehow knew how to get to the roof. I wasn’t even sure how Derrick and Jonathan had gotten there or where Derrick had gotten a gun. Had he had it with him this whole time?
“Come on,” Andrew urged as we ran up the stairs. Then he stepped back. “You go first.”
“So he can shoot me?” I questioned.
“Just go,” Andrew urged, pushing me forward.
Nothing, absolutely nothing prepared me for what I saw when I stepped out onto that roof. Standing near the edge were Leo, Derrick, Cole, Jonathan, our two roadies, our sound technician, Molly, Jen, Leo’s fiancée Kristin, my aunts and my other cousins, Jared and Reagan and Cat, her husband Simon, and my dad and Sierra, who was holding Lily. Her eyes lit up when she saw me.
“Daddy!” she said, and wiggled until Sierra put her down. Then she ran across the roof, and I scooped her up in my arms.
“What are you doing here?” I asked her, completely confused as I snuggled her close, needing her sweetness in that moment when just minute before I was sure my world was about to come crashing down around me. Hell, it had crashed the minute Emily had left.
“Missed you!” she said, and I looked up in confusion at Jen who was just smiling.
“I missed you too, baby girl,” I said, kissing her cheek as I noticed Rachel and Emily’s brother Chase, her sister Keely and their parents. As if on cue, they moved a few feet to the left, and there was Emily, wearing a long white gown, looking more beautiful than I’d ever seen her.
In front of me was a trail of white rose petals leading to where she stood, and in her hand was a bouquet of roses. She was smiling at me, and behind her was an arch covered in flowers and twinkle lights. Chairs were set up on the roof, and when I looked around more I saw lights strung all around, giving the roof a fairytale glow. There were tables set up around the edges of the roof and a tower of white frosted cupcakes in the corner.
“Surprise,” Emily said, as I stood there staring like an idiot, my mouth half-open, trying to wrap my head around everything that was happening.
It had only been thirty minutes since Jonathan had swooped in on us and took Emily with him. How the hell had all of this happened?
“What? How? I don’t . . .”
Derrick was suddenly by my side taking Lily from my arms. “Come on, Lily Girl. Let’s give your daddy and Emily some time to talk. I’ll get you a cupcake.”
I turned to him. “Derrick, it’s way past her bedtime. No cupcakes,” I said, shaking my head as I unconsciously shifted into dad mode, but even as I heard the words, it was as if I was hearing them from afar. My voice didn’t sound like my own. It sounded confused and disjointed, just like I felt.
Derrick rolled his eyes. “That’s what you’re thinking about right now? Please.” Then he looked past me. “You might want to turn around.”
I turned to see Emily crossing the roof to me, her blond hair blowing in the breeze behind her. She stepped up to me and smiled. When she was right in front of me, everything that had happened in the past hour crashed over me like a tidal wave.
“I thought you left,” I choked out, unable to wrap my head around anything that was happening.
She shook her head. “No, I’d never leave you, Zack. I told you that. I love you more than anyone in this world, and I’m so excited to marry you.”
I just stared at her. It was literally all I could do.
“But I thought you were upset. Andrew said you were talking about leaving. You moved your stuff out of our room. I’m sorry if I was–”
“Shh,” she said, putting her hand over my mouth. Then she smiled. “I couldn’t wait to marry you, Zack. I wanted to be yours in every way possible, and I thought what better time to do it than now.”
“But we were going to one of those walk-in chapels,” I said, still so confused. “You left with Jonathan to deal with the song stuff. How did you get up here, in that dress, with the flowers? And the lights and the cupcakes? Where did everyone come from? How did they get here?”
I looked up again at my family, our friends. They were smiling at us, waiting for me to figure it all out.
I looked back at Emily. She was still smiling. “You almost ruined my plan tonight, so I called Jonathan to help me out. He made up the issue with the song getting leaked, so you couldn’t drag me off to some twenty-four hour wedding chapel and marry me in street clothes. I wasn’t having that,” she said, shaking her head, as if amused by what I’d thought was a pretty good idea.
“The song wasn’t really leaked?”
Why was I focusing on that? What did it matter?
She shook her head again. “Nope. That was a lie to get you out of the way, so I could get ready. You see, I decided a few weeks ago that we should get married while we were on tour. I knew you didn’t want to wait, and neither did I. But I wanted to surprise you. Then you went all caveman on me when Jonathan was doing what he could to get you worked up, which I now know was probably a bad idea to ask him to do that, so I had to tweak the plan. Never in a million years did I think you’d suggest that we get married on the fly. I just wanted to throw you off so you didn’t figure out what I had planned. I figured if you were under the impression that he was trying to steal me away, you’d be obsessing about that and wouldn’t notice that I was on the phone working out last minute wedding details.”
Broken Fairytales Series Box Set (Broken Fairytales, Buried Castles, Shattered Crowns) Page 90