Ross 03 Leave Me Breathless(40)
She was dying. And he couldn’t fucking take it.
The images he’d been deliberately pushing back flashed their way through his turmoil then, and he shuddered, breathing hard through his nose to keep from losing it. Playing hide-and-seek behind the house, listening to the awesome bedtime stories she always told him to put his hyper ass to sleep, her holding him and rocking him and somehow managing to keep it together while he cried and wailed for his parents. She’d lost them too.
Maybe his mom and dad would know how to deal with everything too. But they weren’t here either. They’d gone away, like most everyone else in his life. They weren’t with him in spirit, they weren’t comforting him, and anyone who said otherwise was full of shit. He was alone.
The emotions tore through and ripped him to pieces. He dropped his head to where his hand clutched his grandmother’s and sobbed.
“I know we promised to let you sleep, but I have a question.”
Macy turned from her blind perusal of the passing landscape and met Sam’s gaze in the rearview mirror. “I probably won’t be able to sleep until I’m in my bed, anyway. What?”
“We debated this all the way up here.”
“Okay…”
“Is he pierced?”
“Sam!”
Her friends’ mingled laughter was like a balm to her soul. What would she do without them? “I’m just joking,” Sam said. “Sorry. It’s just way too serious around here; I can’t help it.”
“I know you can’t.”
“You really are gonna keep it in the vault, aren’t you?”
“Yep. And speaking of vaults, Candace… What has Brian told you about Brooke? Anything?”
“No, nothing really.”
“Wow. Those guys have a blast-proof vault, then.”
“Is he holding out on me? What is it?”
“If Brian hasn’t told you, then I’m sure as hell not going to. I was just curious what you knew.”
“Men and their vaults,” Candace grumbled.
“Hey, we have a vault too,” Sam said. “It’s just that usually, it’s in a centralized location and we all three have keys to it.” She shot Macy a comical glare over her shoulder.
“Not this time. Sorry.”
“Who’s the Brooke chick, though? Clue me in at least a little. I know absolutely nothing.”
“She’s an ex.”
“He still hung up on her?”
“There are some…lingering anger issues. That’s all I’m going to say on the matter.”
“Tear through ’em. She ain’t got nothing on you, babe. Right?”
“At least you’re not blood related to the most prominent ex,” Candace put in. Macy smirked as she pulled her cell phone out of her purse. God, wasn’t that the truth. Brian had dated Candace’s favorite cousin before the two of them hooked up, and it was still a source of contention with Candace’s suffocating family.
She sent a quick text to Seth. They’d been on the road for over an hour; surely by now he’d gotten to the hospital. A feeling that he wasn’t okay churned in her gut, and that more than anything else was keeping her awake.
Of course he wasn’t okay. She wouldn’t be okay in his situation either, but she couldn’t stand not being there. He was practically alone with his ex, a brother he hated and a sister who, while her intentions were good, was probably going to push the whole get-over-it thing until he snapped.
Hope you’re okay, I promise not to stop thinking about you.
She chewed her bottom lip. Too much? Did he give a crap right now if she was thinking about him or not? The words seemed to stand ten feet high on her little display. Before she could talk herself out of it, she hit Send and threw her head back against the seat, rubbing her eyes hard with her thumb and forefinger.
“Okay, Mace?” Sam was watching her in the mirror again.
“I’m…not really, no.”
“Please try to get some sleep,” Candace said. “You’ll feel better.”
“Can you make sure Brian checks on him a lot? I mean, there’s things he won’t talk to me about yet, you know?”
“I won’t have to make sure. He will. He’ll probably be making a trip to see him, but he wasn’t able to today.”
Was there any reason she couldn’t do the same thing? But no, she was being ridiculous. Acting like a lovesick teenager or something. Seth needed to handle his business without her hanging around. In the meantime…
Thanks to him, and last night—and this morning—there were a few things she needed to work on herself.
Her phone chimed with a return message. Im ok. Thx. Cld rlly go 4 some sushi rt now tho. :)
It wasn’t exactly what she’d hoped to hear, but oh well. At least he earned points for the memory he conjured. She wrote back Me too and resolved to take her friends’ advice to try to catch a few minutes’ sleep.
Chapter Eighteen
The ringing of her phone tore her out of the deepest sleep she’d experienced in her entire life. Macy’s head jerked up from the pillow.
She made a clumsy grab for the phone on her nightstand before reality had swept the cobwebs from her brain. It might be Seth; something bad might’ve happened—
The bold letters on her display told her it was only her mom.
She answered and flopped back onto her oh-so-comfy pillow.
“Where are you?” her mom asked before she could get her greeting out.
“I’m home. Asleep.” And that asleep part? I’d like to get there again.
“Well, I figured. But you never called. And it’s two in the afternoon already.”
“Sorry to make you worry.”
“Is everything all right?”
“Yes.”
“Will you tell me now what’s going on?”
Ugh. She’d rushed through her explanation yesterday morning when she’d called her mom because she hadn’t wanted to tell her the situation and deal with her game of one hundred questions.
“Everything’s fine. I told you I was helping a friend.”
“You said you were helping a friend get to Oklahoma. It must be a friend I don’t know, because Candace and Sam don’t have family in Oklahoma.”
“Don’t you think I might have friends you don’t know at this point?”
“You’re being evasive. I can only assume you have a man.”
Oh, Jesus. “It’s a…male friend, yes.”
“I guess we shouldn’t have invited Jared over for dinner tonight, then.”
Macy shot bolt upright. “You did what?” She always had dinner with her parents on Sunday nights; what in the world possessed them to do this?
“He came here this morning, Macy, and he looked pitiful. He’d gone to your apartment looking for you yesterday, but of course you were gone all day. He said he was worried about you, but I told him what you were doing.”
“And he said…?”
“Nothing. Just visited with us for a little while. As he was leaving, your dad told him to come back tonight, and the two of you could talk.”
“Oh, Mom.”
“Don’t yell at me; yell at him. You know he was practically planning your wedding to Jared from the time you were twelve. He loves him, and so do I. We want to see you work things out. Jared seems to want to work things out.”
“I don’t want to work things out.”
“Are you positive about that? You loved him so much. I know you did. And I saw you two outside Friday.”
“Jared’s on the rebound, Mom. His marriage just fell apart. It isn’t love, it’s…nostalgia. Or something.”
“I don’t believe that. I believe he never got over you.”
Damn, what was it with the exes? Try to hook up with someone else, and they buzzed out of the woodwork like angry hornets. Macy had the irrationally hilarious thought that they should introduce Jared and Raina, but she bit her lip on that laughter.
“If he’s going to be there, then I can’t come.”
“Don’t do that. How rude. If nothing else, he was your best friend. He misses you.”
She lay still in her bed and listened to her own heartbeat and the rain she’d just realized was spattering against her window. “Mom…what would you say if I told you I’m thinking of racing again? Not anything serious,” she quickly amended. “Just…getting back into it a little. See where it goes.”
“What would I say?” She could already hear the joy bubbling up in her mom’s voice. “I’d say I think you definitely need to come to dinner tonight.”
So she found herself walking past Jared’s dually parked in her parents’ driveway—he was early—and trudging up to the front door at seven o’clock. She felt like absolute crap, still out of whack. After all this, she probably wouldn’t sleep a wink tonight. Seth had called her an hour ago; he’d sounded tired but okay. He hadn’t talked long, and she hadn’t bothered to tell him where she was going. There had been no change in his grandmother’s condition, and the doctors weren’t optimistic. He’d slept in as long as she had.
It had been so good to hear his voice. She’d heard it in her dreams all night, but they’d had nothing on the reality. Now she needed only to endure her parents’ scheming and get back home. Reflect on the past two days and think. And remember.