Lost Avalon: A Finding Nolan Novel (7 page)

             
I have no idea how long I stood there, silent tears streaming down my face and a heart aching so badly I wanted to scream from the pain. But I didn’t. I never did. Because Blaise was already making enough noise with the nonstop, self-destructive episodes he made me watch night after night.

             
“Avalon.” His voice was thin and hoarse, like he hadn’t had anything to drink in days. I poured him a glass of water from one of the bottles on the bar and carefully tilted the rim of it against his lips. He lifted his head and took several sips before falling back into the pillow.

             
“I’m sorry,” he croaked with his eyes closed.

             
“Just go back to sleep, Blaise. We can talk in the morning.”

             
“You’ll stay?” His hand came out into the room, searching for me blindly.

             
I reached out and held it in mine. “Yes, I’ll stay.”

             
It was all he needed to hear to fall back asleep until morning.

***

I had no idea how I had wound up there or when she had come back to me, but there I was, lying in bed with Ava beside me. It was as close to home as I would ever get. Without her, I was homeless. Lost. And she knew that better than anyone. It was the only reason she took pity on my pathetic ass time after time even though it was clear as fucking glass that I didn’t deserve it.

And I would tell her so. Or rather, I would plan to tell her. And then, I would sober up, decide that I could handle my own shit and I didn’t need her. And, instead of thanking her, instead of telling her how she was the only thing that made any fucking sense to me, I would be an asshole. I don’t know why… Maybe I do…Maybe I wanted her to prove that her love was, and would always be, unconditional. Maybe I wanted to prove that it wasn’t.

Chapter 6

I woke up
the next morning, and for the first time ever, I didn’t rush to sneak out of the room before anyone else was up to catch me. There was no one to hide from. Royce already knew.

For a moment I just laid there next to Blaise, enjoying the sun warming the leg I had slipped out from under the covers. Then, he began to move and I realized his waking up would lead to talking, and I wasn’t really in the mood for that yet.

In keeping with my newfound mission to move about like I goddamned pleased, I threw back the blankets and jumped out of bed, making sure I properly bounced the mattress as I did so. Then I pulled one of the hotel robes from its hanger with a jerk, making the metal clink loudly as it fell back into its fellow closet mates.

“Shit, Ava. Could you keep it down?” Blaise was burying his head under his pillow trying to dull the noise and with it, the pounding headache he was likely experiencing.

“Nope,” I called back as I swung the door open, walked out and then slammed it shut behind me.

It felt good. And, I strutted my way happily into the kitchen.

When I turned the corner to make a beeline for the coffee maker, Royce was already there, smirking at me.

“Making sure Blaise is suffering through his hangover?”

“Uh-huh.” I opened the cupboard and reached for a mug. Now that Blaise’s undoing had been averted, I had more thoughts available to linger on what had made me run out in the first place. The betrayal. Royce had been a part of that.

“You going to make arrangements for us to fly out and meet up with the others?”

I shook my head and casually poured myself a coffee.

“Then what’s the plan? Are you cancelling the rest of the tour?” Royce’s voice jumped up a few octaves. He wasn’t angry exactly, but definitely getting heated.

“I’m not doing anything, Royce. I quit last night. I’m not your manager anymore.” I walked back out of the kitchen cradling my warm mug in my hands.

“What the fuck are you talking about? You can’t quit.” He looked confused…and surprisingly, hurt.

“Fuck yeah, I can. Same as you assholes can take a meeting with Mitch Braxton.”

Royce’s face fell. “Who told you?”

I glared at him. “Lee.” Then I turned my back on him and walked out onto the terrace. I couldn’t stand to see the look in his eyes anymore. Guilt. Embarrassment. Self-loathing. I had felt plenty of those myself lately. I wasn’t going to let myself sympathize with anyone else when no one ever bothered to show me the same courtesy.

It wasn’t long before I heard Royce’s slippers move across the ground behind me.

“It’s not what you think,” he said quietly.

“Yeah, I bet,” I snorted. “Blaise tried that bullshit, too.”

“No really, Ava. We had no idea what we were walking into. The label set up the whole thing. It was their idea, not ours. I swear. The moment we found out what we were there for, we all stood up and walked out.”

My head spun back at him in shock. “What?”

“It’s the truth. And that’s not all. Blaise was fucking pissed. He raised hell with the label. Threatened to walk on the record if they ever interfered like that again. Then he made us swear never to tell you.” Royce exhaled loudly, staring out at the city’s skyline. “It wasn’t the right way to do it, but he was trying to protect you. We all were.”

“Fuck me.” I could barely get the words out, my throat was clenching up on me so tightly. Then, before I could stop them, the tears were back. “I screwed up. I should have listened to Blaise when he tried to explain…but I was so pissed…and hurt. And, so I just ran out –“

“And Blaise lost it.” Royce nodded slowly as he reached over and pulled me in for a long hug. “That wasn’t your fault though, Ava.”

“Yes it was. I knew it would happen. I knew he would do something like that. And I knew no one would be around to stop him,” I sobbed into his chest, wetting his shirt in the process.

“You are not responsible for Blaise’s actions. No matter what you think you knew, you have to start holding him accountable for the things that he does. If not for yourself, than for him.”

“I know.” I sniffed.

Royce tilted his head to the side to get a better look at my face. “So, just to be clear. Are you our manager again, or what?”

I laughed in spite of myself. “Yes.”

“Good. Then let’s order some breakfast. I don’t know about you, but I’m fucking starving. Lugging Blaise’s ass around last night burned off any excess calories I had in my system.”

I winked. “Now you know the real secret behind my flat abs.”

“That’s fucked up.” He still laughed though.

Together we walked back inside just as Blaise was coming out of his bedroom.

“Hey. You two the only ones up?” he asked when he spotted us.

“Doubt it.” Royce barely made eye contact with him as he walked past into the kitchen for a refill on his coffee.

“Everyone else is already in Arizona, Blaise,” I explained.

“What?”

“We were all supposed to leave last night, remember? After the VIP party?” Royce’s tone was less than friendly.

“Yes, I remember,” Blaise snapped. “It’s not my fault shit got mixed up and they left without us. Talk to Ava.”

“You motherfucker.” Royce was prone to mumbling when he got pissed. He had decided long ago that swearing
and
yelling were too much. So, he had opted for swearing and dropped the loud shouting. In a way, that made it even scarier.

“What’d you call me?” Blaise was amping up for a fight. Under normal circumstances Royce wasn’t built to take down a guy Blaise’s size, but these weren’t normal circumstances. At that particular moment, Royce could have slammed two pot lids together and Blaise would have been out for the count, lying on the floor like a baby and holding his head between his knees.

“He knows, Blaise. Royce knows.”

He turned on me, eyes squinting. “Royce knows what?”

“I know you’re a fucking drunk who likes to fuck girls who fuck you up. Oh, and I also know that you’ve been using Ava as your fucking scapegoat this entire time.” It was less of a mumble that time around. Just an eerily calm tone spewing some seriously not so calm words.

“What the hell, Ava?”

“You didn’t leave me any choice. You were passed out. Unconscious. You’re lucky I even found you at all.” Images of the night before came flooding back. Now, with nothing requiring me to keep it together, the nausea hit me full on. “It was either Royce or an ambulance. I chose Royce. Live with it.” I ran from the room.

Just before I closed the door behind me I heard Royce say, “You know she was at the airport last night? That’s how close you came to losing her. Really want to go there again?”

Since I hadn’t eaten in nearly twenty-four hours, there wasn’t much for my stomach to churn up. Still, my stomach repeatedly contracted, making me go through the motions even if nothing was coming out.

I was crying from anger and the physical pain my own body was inflicting on me, when Blaise showed up behind me, reached down and gently peeled my hair back.

“You’re going to hold my hair?” I hiccupped.

“You always rub my back when I’m puking my guts out. It’s the least I can do.”

I felt my entire body tighten up and then release violently with no results other than the twisting pain in my abdomen. I whimpered. “This sucks.”

Carefully, Blaise’s arm reached around my stomach, slowly bringing me back until I was standing upright and leaning with my back against him.

“Come on. This is getting you nowhere.” Holding me steady, he whispered in my ear, “Just breathe, Ava. In and out. Everything is okay now.”

I did my best to follow his instructions. But I couldn’t. It was bullshit. What was okay? Not a damn thing, that’s what.

“You’re a fucking liar,” I hissed in between short breaths. “Sure, everything is fine right now, but how long before you go out and get shitfaced again and I have to track you down and sober you up? Huh? What is okay about that?”

“Would you stop? You’re going to start heaving up you internal organs if you don’t relax.” He tightened his grip around me, both arms wrapped across my chest. How could the safest person for me be the most dangerous to him?

“I’ll stop if you stop. I mean it, Blaise.” I turned my head to look at him. “It has to stop. I can’t do what I did last night ever again. You need to get help.”

Instantly his arms dropped to his sides, leaving me standing there alone again.

“I don’t need help, Ava. So I like to have a little fun from time to time. That doesn’t make me a drunk.”

I shook my head repeatedly before I got out the words. “That was not fun, Blaise. Not for me, not for Royce, and definitely not for you. But you would know that if you were able to remember any of it.”

“I’m not doing this with you, Avalon.” He was already walking out of the bathroom. Nothing like Blaise’s problems to distract me from my own. I took off after him.

“Yes, you are. Because I’m not doing
that
with you anymore, Blaise. If you want me to stay and keep being your manager, keep being your best friend,” I paused, hesitating to make the ultimatum, “then you need to go to rehab.”

“She’s right.” Royce had suddenly appeared in the doorway. “You need help, man.”

“Oh, now you’re in on this, too? You two need to back the fuck off.” Blaise was getting more and more pissed by the second. If Royce hadn’t been blocking the way, he’d have stormed from the room. Instead, he resorted to pacing.

“I am not backing off. You need to hear this.” My voice was breaking and I knew it was just a matter of time before I started crying all over again. “What if it were me, huh? What if I was calling you in the middle of the night too drunk to find my way home? What if when you found me, you also found cuts and bruises all over my body? Left behind from whatever random asshole I’d decided to hook up with that night?”

“I’d hunt him down and beat the fucking shit out of him.” His fists were balled and his nostrils flared.

             
“Exactly. But what if that wasn’t the worst of it? What if one night, I didn’t call? Hm? What if instead, I just stayed missing and you had to track me down in some sleazy apartment? And, what if when you found me, I wouldn’t wake up? What if you saw me there, naked and tied to a bed and looking comatose? Or dead? Huh?” I was screaming at him now, tears streaming down in floods, and he just stood there, taking it. “Because that’s what you did to me, Blaise! I thought you were fucking dead!” I took a deep breath and blew it out, bringing down the volume of my anger. “And you know what the first thing was that popped into my head? How am I going to spin this so the world never finds out what really happened?” I laughed harshly. “That’s what you’ve turned me into. My fucking heart was screaming in my chest, but my brain was already going into overdrive figuring out a way I could make death look good for you.”

             
When Blaise finally looked up at me, his eyes were red. He’d never let himself actually cry, but the signs of his emotions were clearly visible. “I’m sorry.”

             
“I don’t need you to be sorry. I need you to be better. Aren’t you ready to give this up?”