Ink Exposed

by Carrie Ann Ryan

  He needed a drink.

  No. No, he didn’t, actually.

  He needed to call Steve, and then he’d call Tabitha.

  Because he wasn’t going to fucking drink.

  Jessica didn’t have that hold over him anymore. Only he did. And he’d be damned if he let her push him over the edge again. Damned.

  Chapter Nine

  Alexander had called, but she’d been on the phone with her mother at the time. And then Tabby had been too scared to call back. She knew that was a cop out, but she’d needed time to think about what she’d seen, what she’d told him before that, and what they were going to do when they saw each other again.

  She was a coward.

  When he’d called the second time, she answered, not knowing what she would say, but she hadn’t been able to stop herself. The thing was, she trusted him not to drink, trusted in his strength. She just didn’t trust in herself enough to be enough for him to not go back to Jessica.

  He’d loved that woman so much; it had actually hurt to see. They’d looked perfect together, and though she knew there had to be problems since they hadn’t stayed married, she didn’t know if those problems could be erased over time. Alexander had never spoken about it, and she hadn’t been able to ask.

  And she hated that her self-doubt reared its ugly head at that.

  They hadn’t spoken long on the call and had only made sure each other was okay. Though she had a feeling they had both lied when they’d said they were fine. Instead of the lazy weekend she’d envisioned with him, they’d said they’d see each other Monday and had only texted a little since.

  She hadn’t been able to cut herself off from him completely, and she hadn’t wanted to. From the way he texted back just as quickly as she did, perhaps he felt the same way.

  Tabby wanted to slam her hand into her planner at the thought.

  Since when was this high school, and why did she care about texts and calls and notes as much as she did. She needed to get her head out of her butt and start acting like an adult. Only, acting like an adult was a whole lot harder when there were actually problems in the world.

  Instead of banging her head against anything, however, she set about working since her list for the day seemed to be twice as long as usual. It had been quiet that morning since Wes was at a project site and Storm had locked himself in one of the back offices to hunker down with some sketches, but she hadn’t minded. The peacefulness had let her think…of course, thinking about Alexander wasn’t the best thing for her to be doing right then. The man in question would be in later that afternoon to talk with the twins about what was needed next for the project he was working on and show them what he had come up with. Tabby had already seen some of it when she’d been at his house, and she wasn’t quite sure what she was going to do about that since she didn’t feign surprise well. She loved the direction he was going, but since no one knew they were together, it was getting awkward.

  They needed to somehow let everyone know soon, and she figured Alexander understood that, as well. Just one more complication in an ever-growing complicated mess. That was who they were together.

  Between his family, hers, Michael and Angel, Jessica, Alexander’s fighting, the attack that had led to Tabby’s training…her head spun.

  The front door opened, and Tabby looked up as Harry and Marie Montgomery strolled in, worried looks on their faces. When she’d first started at the company, Harry and Marie had been in charge. They’d retired soon after she’d been hired, with Wes and Storm taking over, but these two would always be the couple that had taken a chance on her.

  She stood up quickly and made her way to them. “I didn’t know you were coming. Is everything okay?” With Harry’s cancer scare the previous year, Tabby’s mind couldn’t help but race. And her face probably showed her concern.

  Harry gave her a huge hug. “I’m fine, darling, but I think one of our own needs help.”

  Marie kissed her cheek and brought Tabby in for a hug, as well. “Austin called to let us know that Alex told him Jessica is back. We’re worried.”

  Tabby’s eyes widened. She hadn’t known that Alexander had spoken to his family about his ex. That he had, spoke of how rattled he’d been…or maybe how open he was trying to be now. She wasn’t sure, and that bothered her. She and Alexander really needed to sit down and talk.

  Storm came out of the office just as Wes walked in from the outside. Apparently, it was going to be a full house.

  “What’s going on?” Storm asked.

  “Yeah, is everyone okay?” Wes put in as he took off his jacket.

  Marie blew out a breath. “I know we could have called, but I wanted to see Alex for myself. He’s supposed to work today, right?”

  Tabby nodded. “He should be in soon, actually.” She would have known that anyway because of her job, but the fact that he’d texted her that morning to let her know was another matter.

  Storm once again gave her a look she chose to ignore. He truly did see too much, and she wasn’t ready to be so open about it.

  “Jessica is back,” Harry grumbled. “I know we don’t know why the two of them broke up, but we all saw that their relationship was toxic. But now she’s back, and…”

  He trailed off, and Tabby wanted to leave. This was a family discussion even if they were at her place of work. This had always been a family work environment, and though they’d done their best to make sure she felt part of it, she would always be an outsider in some respects.

  “I should let you guys talk,” she said softly. “Maybe you guys want to go back to one of the offices? Or I can.”

  Marie shook her head even as she gripped Tabby’s hand. “You’re one of us, darling. No secrets. We’re worried about Alex, and I know you’ve been with him now for a bit, so maybe you can talk to us and give us some insight into his state of mind.”

  She froze. “Uh…huh?”

  “She means you’ve been working with him on the project here so you’ve had more one-on-one time with him recently,” Storm explained, knowing in his gaze once again.

  “Oh,” she said lamely. “I don’t know.”

  “Oh, honey, I just don’t know what to do,” Marie explained. “What if he starts drinking again because of her? What if this is all too much? I want to be able to help him, but he doesn’t let me in.”

  Harry put an arm around her shoulders. “We’ll figure this out.”

  “And we have to trust him, right?” Wes put in. “I mean, if we don’t, we could lose him.”

  Storm grumbled something she couldn’t understand, and she clasped her hands together in front of her. She honestly thought Alexander was stronger than what they were thinking, but she didn’t know the full backstory that the others might. He’d been through a lot over the past year after rehab and hadn’t fallen even once. His family had been put through hell, and he’d gone through the good and bad with them and hadn’t once faltered. She had to believe in that. The thing was, she figured he could say no to the bottle because he’d been open about it with her, and she trusted that he was trying. But she didn’t know if he could say no to Jessica.

  And that confused her.

  She was making a mess of this, and it was because she hadn’t laid it all out and figured out what the hell she was thinking. How could she trust him not to drink, but distrust that he wouldn’t leave her for the woman he’d once loved? The only woman he’d loved.

  But maybe that was because she didn’t trust herself.

  What a bitch that made her.

  “Tabby?” Marie asked. “What do you think?”

  “I don’t know,” she repeated. “I don’t really feel comfortable talking about him like this when he’s not here.” She let out a breath. “And I trust him to do what he needs to do and come to us or anyone else if he feels that he can’t handle it.”

  “At least someone respects my privacy,” Alex bit out from behind them.

  They all turned on their heels at his voice, and Tabby want
ed to curl up and hide and run toward him all at the same moment. Alexander Montgomery confused her like no other.

  But she loved him.

  She’d come to the realization after she’d told him about Michael and Angel. She might have been in a small form of love with him when she’d gotten to know him before all of this, but she had truly fallen deep; she was head-over-heels in love with him now.

  And that scared her more than she was willing to admit.

  “We respect your privacy,” Marie said as she walked toward him. Her son stood stiff as a board, his eyes fiery, but Marie didn’t back down. “If we didn’t, I’d have been in your house by now checking to make sure you were safe and healthy. I trust you to make your own decisions, but I’m your mother, and I’m going to worry. And hiding from that and not talking to my children or my husband about the fact that I was worried about you is what got us into this mess to begin with.”

  Tabby’s heart hurt, but she didn’t move. She could barely breathe as it was; looking at the man she loved standing alone and apart from the whole. He couldn’t think like that, though. He was a Montgomery, damn it, and people loved him. She loved him.

  Marie put her hands on her son’s face and forced him to lean down a bit. She wasn’t short by any means, but considering her sons were all above six feet tall, Tabby wasn’t sure how she’d been able to raise all of them as she had. The woman had a backbone and strength of steel.

  “We love you, damn it. And we’re worried.” A mother’s words, a mother’s tone.

  Tabby’s eyes filled, and she forced the tears back. She would not cry now, damn it. Storm put a hand on her shoulder, and while she needed the comfort, she didn’t miss the way Alexander’s eyes narrowed at the touch.

  “I’m not going to drink,” he mumbled. He pulled away from Marie’s hands but gripped them in his own instead of moving all the way back. “Jessica is back in town because she wanted money. I said no, she got loud. End of story. I know this is going to be hard, but every time something shitty happens around here, you guys don’t have to go guns blazing around me as if I’m going to fall off the wagon. I love that you guys are my support system, but I can’t be worried that I’m going to worry you guys. It gets too confusing and hard.”

  “We’re always going to worry,” Harry put in. “But I’m going to fret about all my kids. I can’t help it. Each of you put these gray hairs on my head, and I love every damn one of them and every damn one of you. So know that we’re going to worry, but we’re also going to trust you.” He looked over at Tabby, and she stiffened. “Much like this young lady trusts you.”

  Alexander met her gaze, and she didn’t know what to do, what to say. “Yeah?” he said softly. “You trust me.”

  “Of course,” she said simply, but it wasn’t simple at all. “I trust you to ask for help if you need it. And I trust that your support system goes beyond the people in this room. It’s not blind trust, it’s the fact that you’re learning to trust yourself.”

  She’d said far more than she’d planned to and didn’t miss the curious glances everyone sent her way. They had to know there was something going on between her and Alexander by now, but at least they were gracious enough not to mention it. At least…not yet.

  When Alexander gave her a soft nod, she relaxed, knowing the worry wasn’t over, but they were going to get through this. There was still something going on in the undercurrents around them, but she had to believe in her words.

  She’d said she trusted him, and she was going to do everything in her power to make sure she wasn’t a liar.

  If only she could trust her worth just as much.

  ****

  Later that night, Alex rested his head on the back of his couch as Tabitha made her way back into the living room with two glasses of water in her hands. He hadn’t been thirsty, but she’d needed something to do. She’d come straight over after work since he’d texted her, asking her to do so, and he was grateful she’d come. Only he wasn’t sure how to begin.

  He’d been thrown when he heard her words in the office that morning. Just as thrown as he’d been seeing his family talk about him as if he were a fragile bird. He might have been once, but he was learning to fly again.

  Or some shit like that. Griffin was the writer; he just took pictures.

  “So…it’s been an interesting few days,” she began, and he nodded.

  “Interesting is a good word for it,” he put in.

  “Do you…do you want to tell me what happened?”

  He took her water glass from her hands and set it on the table next to his. Then he turned so they were facing each other on the couch.

  “I think that if I’m going to do that, I need to start at the beginning.”

  She slid her hands into his. “You can tell me,” she whispered. “You can tell me anything.”

  He let out a breath. “I’ve never told anyone,” he said casually, though he was anything but casual. “Somehow, I’ve made it through countless sessions and talks with people who are trying to help me, and I haven’t said the words I probably should have long ago.”

  “If you’re not ready, you don’t have to.”

  Alex met her gaze. “But maybe I have to be ready, or at least pretend to, because I don’t think I’m ever going to be ready. Today, my family freaked out because they didn’t know what I’d do, and for less than a second this weekend, I wasn’t sure what I’d do. But I was stronger than the voices in my head this time, and fuck if I’m going to let the voices win the next time either.”

  She squeezed his hands.

  “I’m an alcoholic,” he began. “I will always be an alcoholic, but I’m a recovering one now. At least that’s the label they gave me. I haven’t had a drink since Decker and Miranda’s wedding.” The wedding he’d nearly ruined because he’d been so drunk and so far up his own ass that he hadn’t thought about the callous words coming out of his mouth or the consequences of his actions.

  “I wasn’t always like that, though,” he continued. “I don’t really remember not wanting to drink, but I know I used to be normal.”

  She shook her head. “No one is ever really normal, you know.” She winced. “I mean, it’s not like you’re evil or abnormal for the disease you have.”

  He ran his free hand over his face. “A disease. People call it that, and I guess that’s true. It’s something I started myself, but now I can’t stop it. Or at least I couldn’t stop. Now, I’ve trained myself to focus on other things and say no to the voices that tell me it’s just one drink, just one drop.” He shook off the words. “I’m going in circles. Like I said, I need to go to the beginning.”

  “And I need to not interrupt,” she said with a wince.

  He leaned forward and gave her a quick kiss, surprising them both. “You’re trying, and you’re listening, that’s all I can ask for.” He blew out a hard breath. “Okay, so here it goes.” His body felt as if it were falling down into a deep cavern with no end it sight, but his mind wasn’t going at the same speed. He couldn’t catch up, couldn’t breathe. Everything hurt but, at the same time, he felt weightless.

  But he had to tell her.

  Had to explain.

  He needed to tell someone, and he knew it could only be her.

  He would deal with what that meant later.

  “I met Jessica in high school. We weren’t friends when we started dating because it happened so fast. She was nicer then, I think. And hell, I was probably nicer, too. We fell hard for each other, and despite everyone saying it was too fast, we got married young. I was still a teenager when I got married for fuck’s sake.” He shook his head, annoyed with himself for even thinking about that.

  “I knew you’d gotten married young,” she said softly. “You and Meghan were the first Montgomerys, right?”

  He nodded. “And both of us ended up divorced I think before the next set got married.” He took a sip of water, his throat parched. “Anyway, though Jess and I fought sometimes like all couples seem
to do, we did okay for the first couple of years. We mostly fought about money and how we didn’t have a lot of it. And then we fought about the house and school and jobs and all of that crap. But I loved her, so I did everything I could to make sure she was happy. I thought she was doing the same for me…but she wasn’t.”

  And this was where it got hard, where he felt like he was dying every second of every day.

  A soft hand slid into his once more, and he centered himself. He could do this with her. Only her.

  “A couple of years into our marriage, we both decided we wanted kids. We might have been young, but we were at a place where we were ready. Or, at least I thought we were.”

  Tabitha’s eyes filled, but she blinked the tears back.

  And he hadn’t even gotten to the hard part yet.

  “We got pregnant right away,” he croaked. He took another sip of water. He needed to just blurt out the rest of it, or he’d never be able to function. “She miscarried during the second month.”

  He let out a breath. “At least, that’s what she told me,” he whispered.

  “Oh God,” Tabitha breathed.

  He couldn’t look at her when he spoke next, or he’d break. Instead, he pulled her into his lap so he had something to hold on to, someone who he knew wouldn’t let him down. He didn’t know why he knew that, but he did. She tucked into him and burrowed in. And that was how he could say what he needed to next.

  “Jess was so broken up about it, and I did everything I could to make sure she was as comfortable as possible without showing too much of what I felt. I mean, I was dying inside, because damn it, that was our baby. One minute we were planning a nursery, the next, everything had changed. But I didn’t say the platitudes that others would have, like how we could keep trying, or that there would always be more babies. That had seemed so callous to me. I started drinking a little here, a little there, to numb some of the pain, but it wasn’t that bad yet. Not yet.”