Back to December (Ward Sisters Book 1)

by Lucy Gage

  “You're not saying you don't love me. I know you love me.” He cried in earnest, now.

  Emily's breath hitched. “I don't love you. I never...loved you. It's over, Rob. Let it go. Let me go. I have to get out of here. I have a flight to catch. Goodbye,” she sobbed.

  She thought he might try to stop her. A part of her wanted him to stop her, to pull her into his arms, to kiss her and make her forget the past several hours. To take her to bed and to make love to her until she changed her mind. But he just stepped aside, head down and sobbed.

  “I love you, Emily! Please, please, I'm begging you, don't leave!” he cried as she walked out the door. She could hear his knees hit the floor as the door shut behind her.

  Liam waited in the car. He started the engine, and Emily had a small hope that when he heard the car start, Rob would run out and try to get her to stay.

  But he didn't.

  “Just go. Please, just go,” she begged.

  Liam said nothing. He shifted the car into gear while Em sat in the passenger's seat, wracked with sobs. She cried harder than she ever had in her whole life.

  It felt like something had been ripped out of her body and she didn't know how she'd ever survive this. She nearly asked Liam to turn around, nearly told him to go back, she had made a mistake. She should have listened to Liam when he said that Rachel was a liar and a manipulator.

  But she didn't. Her mother's, Annie's and Josh's words echoed in her head.

  Emily, what have you done? I thought I raised you better than this! Cheating on poor Josh? With that...that Lothario Deac Roberts? Don't confuse sex with love, Emily. That never ends well.

  You're telling me that he's more than just a pretty face and big bank account?

  Keep telling yourself that. Keep telling yourself that how you've changed has nothing to do with him and his fame. He'll break your heart.

  She couldn't go back, keep shaming her family, playing the game. Because, eventually, he'd break her heart. And she had to walk away before that happened.

  Even if it killed her to do it.

  Emily flew home alone across the country, more miserable than she had ever been in her life. It took an entire day and forced her to make two stops along the way. Her last-minute ticket change meant that she had to take whatever flight she could get, and this one left at 6:10 am, took her through Vegas and Philly and didn't get back to Portland until almost 7 p.m. She cried the entire trip, though she did her best to be as quiet about it as possible. Not that the red eyes or sniffles wouldn't have been a big clue to anyone inclined to look her way.

  LAX had been the absolute worst. Em hid from the photographers and onlookers in the bathroom. She checked all her bags except the absolute essentials she'd need when she got home, just in case they didn't make the long trip with her. The run to the gate at the last second was easier when all she had was her purse.

  She could have had Liam there for companionship, to protect her from the horde, because he had planned to come. But she refused him. Even thought Liam was a good friend, she couldn't be constantly reminded of her failure. It was easier to cut ties at the airport.

  Em had hours to think about what had happened. She felt stupid to believe fairy tale love was remotely possible. Rob had duped her. Emily should have known. She'd watched him on that stage and he was magnificent in person, could just wow an audience. As if she didn't know that even from the first night. She was dazzled by him before she knew who he was. How could it be a shock that he was good enough to convince her that he really loved her?

  And it wasn't just Rachel. Hadn't Lola claimed it, too? That Em would be around until Rob went to his next set?

  They both indicated that he was fickle, inclined to fall quickly in and out of love. Rob had said he was celibate for those three years after Lola, but how could she know one way or another? His family had closed ranks around him then. They'd never have let personal details emerge and Rob had said that there had been rumors. Some of them may have been true. What was it he said to her that first night? That she wouldn't believe he was dating his last co-star?

  Rachel was right, she had been the perfect choice to play the role. Em wasn't into celebrity and wouldn't be enamored by it, would never guess the role she was playing because she wasn't jaded. She was just the kind of girl that the romantics in Hollywood and the public at large would believe could tame a Casanova like Deac Roberts.

  It had been the right thing to do, to end it before she shamed herself or her family any further.

  Hadn't it?

  By the time she landed at the Jetport, Em had cried so much and the flight had been so long that her eyes were dry and she could hardly blink. She trudged her way through baggage claim, slogged over to the parking garage, chucked her suitcases in the Civic and plunked down in the driver's seat with her head on the steering wheel. She needed a place to go. She wasn't ready to face her friends at work yet. She had originally intended to fly direct to New York and she needed a buffer. Going to Andrea's house was out. The best solution, the only one that made sense, was Meg.

  Em pushed 3 on her speed dial and Meg answered on the first ring. “Oh, my God, Em, I've been waiting for you to call. Is it true? Did you two break up?”

  “How the hell did you know that?” Emily asked before it registered. Of course. Like it would stay private. “What, did he release an official statement?”

  “No. Nothing from his camp, not a word. But the gossip sites are buzzing. Is it true?”

  Emily started to cry. “Yes.”

  “Where are you?”

  “The Jetport,” she said through tears.

  “Get over here. I'll make the margaritas. And drive carefully, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  She couldn't recall the drive to Meg's house in Gorham, but soon Emily pulled into the driveway. Before she could step out of the car, Meg opened the house door, shoved her feet into boots and ran out to hug her wearing a short-sleeved shirt and yoga pants.

  “Oh, Em. I'm so, so sorry. Let's get your bags a little later. Come inside. You can tell me about it now or later, but you need a drink. I made the margaritas with the good stuff.”

  Meg linked her arm with Em's and they carefully walked down the icy path to the house. Her best friend supported her the way only a best friend can.

  Emily cried the whole first evening. She couldn't function otherwise. Meg supplied booze, but Em pretended to sip it. She wasn't hungry and drank water only because Meg threatened to either drag her to the ER or call her mother if she didn't. When she took a hot shower until the water ran cold, all it did was make her think of the showers she took with Rob and she sobbed some more.

  The next morning when she woke up exhausted, Em smelled bacon and coffee and for a moment, she thought that she might be in Malibu. That maybe, just maybe, it was the day after the Globes and she had been having a nightmare.

  But the sheets were all wrong – a soft flannel instead of high-end Egyptian cotton. The bed was too small – a queen, not a king – and her toes froze when she moved her feet outside the covers. There was no soothing sound of surf pounding the shore, no smell of salt air or Rob's woodsy scent mingled with her perfume on the pillows. She began to cry again in earnest.

  No, it was real.

  Meg dragged her out of bed and made her eat and have a cup of coffee. Then she forced Em to repack her things so she could head to New York. Work, unfortunately, was not going to wait for her broken heart to heal. Her best friend made Emily promise to call every single day and to talk as soon as she was ready to do so, no matter the day or time. And Meg confessed that she was going to tell Charlie, even if Em wasn't ready to discuss it with her family. Em just nodded her assent. Charlie might as well know.

  Worried that she was still too out of sorts, Meg refused to let her drive back to the airport. She promised to pick up Em upon her return and said she'd fly down to New York if Em needed that. Emily felt like the best thing, now, would be to throw herself back into work and to
focus on that instead of everything else. Maybe, just maybe, she could get over it. Whether that meant getting over the sense of betrayal or Rob, she wasn't yet sure.

  As the plane departed for LaGuardia, Em sighed and tried not to think about it all, but her brain wouldn't shut off. When the pilot gave the okay, she turned on her iPod, but that made her more sad when Pink's Don't Let Me Get Me blared into her ears on shuffle. Rob had caught her singing and dancing to that song the day they made dinner for his parents.

  She forwarded to the next song and The Way You Look Tonight played. She didn't dare chance it and end up with Lady In Red on the random playlist – she knew it would crush her faster than anything else. So she shut off the music and sat there, head against the window, and wished the plane would just arrive in New York City, where she could be anonymous as often as possible when she wasn't working.

  The city promised necessary relief.

  Unfortunately, Emily had copious amounts of free time. She had two events to cover – the opening of a new exhibit on Abstract Expressionism and a visit to a Fluxus exhibit as a companion piece to the event at the Walker. At the time she had accepted the assignment, it seemed like a great idea. Now, it was a painful reminder of her time in Minnesota and of the days in San Francisco. Em had to wait until later in the week to attend the opening and it left too much time on her hands to think.

  What kind of fool had she been to believe that a man like Rob would really want her? Wasn't that what Rachel had said? Hadn't Emily told him the same thing on Christmas? He played her like a fiddle.

  Right?

  Except, when she thought about that conversation, it had been too organic to be planned. Sure, he could have been improvising, but from what she could tell, Rob's acting strength lay in his ability to quickly memorize lines and then infuse them with the personality of the character. She couldn't say if he was good at improv, since she had never seen him do it.

  But he was very charismatic. Although, she had always believed that was influenced by his honesty and self-deprecation. What did Liam say? He thought he was the geek at the cool kids' table. Kelly had said he didn't believe what he saw in the mirror. Em could believe that Rob's family might have protected him, might have done as he asked.

  But not Liam.

  It was almost harder to walk away from her friend than it was to end things with Rob. She was angry with Rob, had felt duped by him. But Liam, she believed he was a true friend. He had always been honest with her. He had been, in every way that mattered, like a brother. No, him she didn't envision fooling her. So, either he had been kept in the dark, or else she was wrong about what had happened with Rob. And Em couldn't imagine Liam unaware even if they hadn't told him.

  By his own account, Liam had been friends with Rob since college. He was, in fact, probably Rob's closest friend aside from Rick, perhaps even one of his only real friends. Yet, Emily couldn't imagine Liam being so loyal to Rob that he would destroy her, that he would not only let her think Rob was in love with her, but would encourage her to believe in it. In the beginning, Liam had constantly reassured her that Rob's feelings were genuine. And after how he stepped in front of Rob and told his friend that he might be the boss, but Liam's job was to protect Emily, she couldn't conceive of her friend knowingly letting her be snowed at any time.

  The only logical conclusion was that she had been wrong. That she had let her pain and confusion over the kiss with Rachel override all she knew in her heart to be true.

  And Emily had no clue what to do with that.

  During her time with Rob, Em learned to think outside the box and go with the flow. Marcus was impressed with the questions she had asked Ronin Edgars, particularly the ones she had formulated after seeing the film. And that had given her confidence to do the same during the MoMA show. Before meeting Rob, Old Emily would have been too inflexible, would have stuck too closely to the script she'd written for herself beforehand, to have been that inventive.

  How could her time with Rob have been a mistake, then? She could only conclude that it hadn't. Which meant that her real mistake was when she walked away and listened to those voices that told her to run. She allowed admonitions from her mother, Annie and Josh convince her she had been a fool.

  She wasn't a fool until she'd listened to that witch Rachel, ignored the truth, and nurtured her fears.

  After a few weeks distance, she knew that Rob hadn't used her. She watched the Oscars. He'd been thrilled to see David win. They even showed him jump up, give David a standing ovation and hug him as he walked to the stage. She recalled how Rob had reacted at the Globes, how shocked he'd been that morning to get the nomination.

  Rachel's manipulations and the words of her family had made her doubt Rob.

  Without those things, would she ever have thought him anything less than genuine? Would she have ever believed him to be anything but madly in love with her? He'd confessed to liking her within hours of their meeting. That second night at dinner, his feelings overwhelmed him to the point of tears because they were so unexpected in such a short time.

  And that was all before they discovered how deep their sexual and emotional connection could really go.

  Why had she listened to the voices of her mother, Annie and Josh instead of people like Liam, Kelly, Amy, and Reggie?

  Has Rob always been insecure?

  Yeah. I think he still feels like the geek at the cool kids' table.

  Even though he's been a movie star for almost 10 years?

  He doesn't think of himself that way, Em. It's probably a good thing he doesn't. He could be a total douche like half the guys in Hollywood with a quarter his fame and a tenth of his paycheck. And unlike those guys, he'd probably be worthy of it.

  Lucky for Rob, he deserves someone as great as you. If he didn't, I'd kick his ass and tell you to dump him. I don't care if he is my boss.

  I don't know if you've noticed, but he still acts and thinks like the gawky boy he used to be. I don't think he believes the guy he sees in the mirror is real. Never mind the one on the screen.

  He deserves to be happy. To be loved and to have a good life. He's a great person. He's not perfect, but he's pretty damn close. And I'm his sister. I'm inclined to think he's a brat. Just be careful with him, okay? He's been unlucky in love.

  Most people in his position are narcissistic and obnoxious by now. He's down to earth and never, ever full of himself.

  Emily had intentionally hurt the man she loved and she wasn't sure she could ever forgive herself for it. She could only hope she hadn't caused either of them irreparable harm.

  Central Maine, four months after New Year's...

  “What you need,” Meg declared as she dipped her fries in ketchup, “is a palate cleanser. You know, like you have at a wine tasting.”

  Em sipped her iced tea. They ate a late dinner at a hole-in-the-wall diner on the way home from Bucksport to Portland. They'd visited their parents for Easter and to deal with Charlie's wedding details.

  Emily sighed and nibbled at her Cobb salad.

  “I know what a palate cleanser is, Meg. I don't want a palate cleanser. I don't want to forget him. I don't want to forget one single thing about him. I regretted leaving as soon as I walked out the door of the beach house. I didn't want to believe he'd use me or that he'd hurt me, but I was so humiliated by what Rachel said that I couldn't stay. Old Emily took over and pushed me out that door. It was the hardest thing I've ever done.”

  “Then go back to him. Tell him you still love him. That you were just hurt and that you made a mistake.”

  “I was horrible to him! Why would he ever want to speak to me again?”

  “Maybe he won't. But if you don't try, then you won't know. You can't sit around for the rest of your life in love with him and turning into a spinster because of it. You have to try to move forward. Either you attempt to get him back or you cleanse your palate and get on with life. Take your pick.” She stabbed a fried shrimp and dipped it in cocktail sauce.

&nbs
p; Em pushed around the contents of her salad. “I'm not ready. It hasn't been that long. Don't you get twice as long to get over a relationship as it lasted? We were together for six weeks. I've got eight more left.”

  Meg sighed. “Okay. Fine. I'll give you that. At the end of those eight weeks, you're going out with me. And I want you to at least consider taking some hot guy home with you.”

  “Fine. I'll consider it. But I won't say I'll do it.”

  “I'm not expecting you to do it. I know Old Emily wouldn't have, anyway, but even New Emily has her standards. You're not one-night-stand material.”

  Em gave her a sad smile as the tears sprang to her eyes. “Rob said that to me once.”

  “Oh, honey, I didn't mean to make you cry. Why did he say that to you?”

  She laughed as she sniffed. “He told me that Liam thought I was hot but that he'd never hit on me because I wasn't one-night-stand material. Too bad I couldn't introduce you to Liam. He's cute. And he's like you, likes no strings.”

  “I'd go for strings with the right person. I haven't met him yet.”

  Emily laughed. “I don't think you ever will, Meggie. You're picky.”

  In a haughty voice she replied, “I'm particular. There is a difference.”

  “Keep telling yourself that.”

  Just then, Em's phone chimed an incoming email alert. It was from Charlie. She sent a link to an article about a publicity scandal. Em was about to click out of the page when she saw the name Amy Ramirez. She read further and was stunned.

  “Earth to Em? What's that all about?”

  Emily shook her head. “Hold on.” She finished the article and said, “Holy shit.”

  “Okay, Em, you're scaring me. You never say shit. What's going on?”