“You know, I was thinking maybe we could fly home this weekend,” I suggested quietly as we walked in perfect synchronicity.
Declan’s cloudy blues pointed down at me. “Baby, LA is our home now, not San Francisco.”
Pushing that to the back of my mind—because he was so very wrong about that—I continued. “You know what I mean. Anyway, we haven’t seen our families in forever. I thought it would be nice to get away for a few days. What do you say?”
Hope swelled in my chest that, if I could just get Declan out of this poisonous city and away from that snake Chris, I could get my Declan back. Then he went and burst that hope like a spoiled little boy jabbing at a balloon with a stick.
“Fuck, baby. I’m so sorry. I forgot to tell you, our tour starts in a week. I’d love to take you back to see your folks, but we’re gonna be slammed until we leave for New Zealand.”
My heels caught on the plush carpet when I came to a screeching halt. “Wait, another tour? New Zealand?”
“Please, miss. You can’t stop here,” a man with a very official-looking headset commanded. Declan took my hand and pulled me back into motion.
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, but this is huge, Tate. I know it hasn’t been all that long since the last tour, but this one is a huge fucking deal. This is a World. Fucking. Tour!” He exclaimed with excitement. “You name a country, we’re going there. On a private fucking jet, baby.” He squeezed my hand. “I finally get to take my girl to see the world.”
It was neither the time nor the place for the conversation I needed to have with him, but something told me that when we finally did, he wouldn’t be anywhere near as excited as he was right then.
“You fucking promised me, Tatum.”
It was the same freaking song and dance we’d been having the past four years. And I was so sick of it. I was exhausted, it was the middle of the night, and Declan had only just gotten home from some bullshit party. It had been five days since the award ceremony, and I’d only now found the courage to tell him that I wouldn’t be going with him on this latest tour.
“You’re not being fair, Deck. I have a job, and school. You can’t just expect me to pick up and fly around the world.”
“You take classes online!” he shouted, throwing his arms wide as he paced around our bedroom, pulling at his hair. “And I told you to quit that fucking job! I make more than enough money to support us. You shouldn’t be a goddamn waitress, for Christ’s sake.”
“I like my job!” I snapped, standing from my place on the edge of the bed. “At least there I have a purpose.”
“You have a purpose here! Your purpose is to be with me.”
My head snapped back. “Are you kidding me?” I asked on an ominous whisper. “You think my sole purpose is to be at your beck and call, catering to your every need? That’s how you see me, as something you can tuck away in a closet until you have a use for me?”
“Goddamn it, Tatum. No,” he growled. “I didn’t fuckin’ say that.”
“Well that’s sure as hell what it sounded like!”
He rushed me, worry painted on his face as he took my cheeks in his big callused hands and tried to kiss me. But I saw his pinpoint pupils and lost my mind.
“Oh my god!” I yelled, wrenching from his hold and taking a step back. “Are you high again?” That was yet another way Declan had changed recently. The old Declan never would’ve touched drugs.
“Jesus fuckin’ Christ,” he hissed, looking at the ceiling in frustration. “It’s not a big goddamn deal, Tate. Will you stop riding my ass about it already?”
“Not a big deal?” I asked incredulously. “You’re joking, right?”
“It was just a couple lines of coke! Will you get off my back about it?”
I crossed my arms over my chest in an attempt to hold myself together as my insides threatened to shrivel up and fall apart. “I’m not going with you,” I whispered. “Not this time. And maybe you should use this tour to think about what you really want from me.”
Something in him changed. Standing right there in front of me, a mask of bitterness slammed into place.
“Fine,” he gritted. “You don’t want to go? Fuck it, don’t go. See if I fuckin’ care.”
With that, he turned and stormed out of the room. I listened with tears building in my eyes as his footsteps took him down the stairs. A second later, the front door slammed shut, causing my heart to splinter into a million pieces.
Chapter Eight
Tatum
Twenty-two years old
I’d never been more miserable in all my life. After our fight, Declan hadn’t come home for two days. Then he’d flown off for the first leg of Civil Corruption’s World tour.
That had been two weeks ago.
I missed him so much it was like a piece of my soul had died. He’d called and apologized from the airport, begging me to meet him there, but I’d held firm. I wasn’t going. I was going to try and live a life that didn’t center around all things Declan Forrester.
We made up as much as two people could from such a distance. There had been a few phone calls and texts since then, but with the time difference and his insanely busy schedule, keeping in contact had been nearly impossible.
No longer able to take it, I’d bitten the bullet and bought a one-way ticket to Australia where they were currently playing. By the time I landed—well past two in the morning, Australia’s time—their show was long over. Jet lag was going to be a bitch, and the thought of navigating a foreign place all by myself scared the absolute shit out of me, but I’d do it for him.
Because it was Declan and me forever.
When the cab I’d taken from the airport pulled up in front of the hotel, I was finally able to breathe a sigh of relief. I made it.
I paid the driver and climbed from the back seat, hooking my small carry-on over my shoulder before heading inside.
It wasn’t until I reached the front desk in the lobby that I realized my crucial mistake. I’d always been with them when we checked in, so I never really paid attention to the lengths the band’s team went to in order to maintain their privacy.
“Uh, hi. Yeah. I’m Tatum Valentine, here to see Declan Forrester.”
The woman behind the desk stared me down like I was nothing but a groupie or rocker whore. “I’m sorry, there’s no one by that name checked in.”
God, I was so tired that even my bones were weary. I just wanted to get to Declan, then get to the closest bed. “Look, I know you have to say that. But I’m not a groupie, I swear. I’m his girlfriend. We live together.”
“Funny,” she said in a way that told me she didn’t find anything about our exchange the slightest bit funny. “You’re the third woman today to claim such a thing.”
“Yeah, but I’m actually telling the truth. Look.” I pulled my phone from my purse and scrolled through the photos until I reached a selfie I’d taken of me with Declan. “See?”
“I’m sorry, ma’am, but that proves nothing other than you’ve met him before. And as I already said, there is no one here by that name.”
“Forget this. I’ll just call him myself,” I grumbled as I stomped away from the counter over to the seating area. Flopping down on one of the cushy chairs, I hit his number and held the phone to my ear. It rang and rang before eventually going to voicemail. I tried it again to the same result.
Anxiety started to churn in my belly as I scrolled down to Mason’s contact and hit Call.
I beginning to worry that I’d get voicemail again when his deep voice finally rumbled through the line.
“’Lo?”
“Mace?” I collapsed into the chair in relief.
“Tate? That you?”
“Yeah, it is. Sorry for calling so late, but I’m in the lobby.”
I got silence for a few seconds, then “The lobby where?”
Rolling my eyes to the ceiling, I answered, “The lobby of your building, jackass. I came to surprise Deck, but he’s not answeri
ng his phone, and the bitch at the front desk won’t tell me what room he’s in. Could you come down and get me?”
A distinctive rustling sound came through the phone, like he was putting his clothes on. “Yeah, just hang tight, babe. I’ll be right down.”
“Okay, thanks again. I’m sorry if I woke you up.”
“You didn’t.”
I paused for a second before my nose scrunched up. “Oh, gross, Mace! You answered the phone when you were having sex?”
My squeaked question was followed by his bark of laughter. “You really want me to answer that question, or you want me to finish tucking my dick in my pants and come get you?”
“Gah! Just… stop talking and come get me!”
I hung up on another laugh and waited patiently for my friend to appear. A few minutes later, an elevator dinged and Mason came strutting through the doors, his hair and clothes rumpled from his recent activity. Ignoring the fact that this man, who was like a brother to me, had just been having sex less than five minutes before, I stood and wrapped him in a hug.
When I pulled away, he led me back to the elevator, calling to the lady at the front desk over his shoulder. “Yo. Future reference, she’s with the band. You let her go wherever she wants to go.”
The woman blanched, and I couldn’t help but turn my head and stick my tongue out. What could I say? It had been a bad couple of weeks.
“Is Deck asleep or something? Is that why he didn’t answer?” I asked once we were safely tucked inside the elevator.
Mason lifted his arm and began rubbing along the back of his neck. The air around us shifted at his discomfort, and that sinking feeling I’d been experiencing in the pit of my stomach lately roared back to life.
“Uh, no. Some of the guys from our opening band are having a party in their room. I think you might find him hanging out there.”
I tried my hardest not to let my dread get the best of me as I asked, “Same floor as you guys?”
“Two below.”
At his answer, I reached over and hit the button to let me off two floors before Mason’s. It wasn’t hard to figure out which room the party was in, the music so damn loud the fixtures on the walls were rattling.
“You want me to take your bag back to his room?” Mace asked, holding the doors open with his hand.
Smiling as genuinely as I could muster, considering how bad I was feeling, I told him, “Nah, I got it. I’m just gonna grab Deck and head back up in a few minutes anyway.”
He nodded, leaning forward to place a kiss on my cheek. “All right, sweetheart. See you in a few.” Then he was gone, leaving me to navigate the hallway on shaky legs.
That women’s intuition my mother told me about was currently sounding an alarm inside my brain. I spotted the open hotel room door and began squeezing through the crush of people filling it.
I wasn’t sure who the opening band was for this tour, but whoever they were, they must’ve been good, because they weren’t put up in just any regular room. This was a suite. And while the space was definitely huge, the crowd was so thick it was suffocating.
Standing on my tiptoes, I searched every square inch of the main room for Declan, coming up empty.
“Hey,” I called over the blaring music to a guy I recognized as part of Civil Corruption’s road crew. “You seen Declan?”
I knew he recognized me when the guy’s eyes bulged out of his skull, and he knew exactly who I was. “Uh, n-no… I, um, I haven’t seen him. I think maybe he’s in his room, crashed for the night. You should check there,” he stammered uncontrollably, casting nervous glances toward the hallway.
Lying asshole. With a glare furious enough to peel the paint off the walls, I shoved past the bastard and started down the hall at a fast clip.
“Hey, no! Don’t go down there! I told you he’s not here!”
The first door I threw open housed a group of men and women who looked like they were engaging in a freaking orgy. Declan was nowhere to be seen, so I slammed the door shut and moved to the next one.
No Declan behind door number two.
With the third door, I hit pay dirt. And I’d have given absolutely everything I owned to have never witnessed what was taking place in that room.
“Oh yeah. Fuck yeah, baby. Your pussy’s so goddamn tight.”
My heart fell right out of my chest at the sight of Declan fucking a blonde woman. A jagged gasp scraped its way down my throat as I stood, frozen in place. A second woman, a brunette as naked as the day she was born, sauntered up behind him as he took the blonde from behind.
She lifted a handheld mirror with two lines of coke up to Declan’s face, and he snorted them both, never once breaking rhythm. Once he’d finished shoving the powder up his nose, he turned his head, grabbed the brunette by the hair, and yanked her down viciously, sealing his mouth with hers as another moan ripped from his chest.
I knew that moan.
I’d heard that moan countless times.
Then, sure enough, he jerked his face away and came, long and loud into the blonde on her knees in front of him.
That last little piece inside of me, the one that had been hanging on for dear life these past two years, died in that moment. There was nothing left. He’d taken it all and destroyed it. Destroyed us.
Destroyed me.
I wasn’t sure how I managed to function, let alone move, after that, but I somehow managed to make it out of that goddamn room and out of the hotel in one piece. It wasn’t until I was in the back of a cab heading for the airport I’d left only an hour earlier that I finally broke down.
Declan
I fucked up.
Jesus Christ, I fucked up so goddamn bad.
I hadn’t even realized what I’d done until the guys came barreling into that room three mornings ago, ripping my naked ass out of a bed that wasn’t mine and from between two chicks I’d never seen before in my life.
I’d been so fucked up the night before, having snorted enough goddamn coke to choke a horse, and drunk my weight in Jack, that I didn’t have the first goddamn clue what was happening. Then Garrett and Killian clued me in. Of course, that was after Mason had almost broken my nose.
Tatum’s phone went to voicemail for the hundredth time, and as I paced our suite in Amsterdam, I left another frantic message. “Baby, look. I know what I did was the worst. But I can fix this, I swear to God. I can fix us. Tatum, please, just call me back, okay? We have a break coming up in a few days, and I’m coming home. I’m coming to you. I’ll make this right.”
A loud beep sounded, cutting my message off, and I hurled the cell across the room with a vicious yell.
“You really surprised she’s ghosting you, shithead?” Killian growled from the couch. “She doesn’t want a fucking thing to do with your sorry ass. And I can’t blame her.”
Mason glared at me like he’d been doing nonstop for the past three days. “You’re fucking lucky they kept me from knocking your teeth down your goddamn throat for what you did to her.”
Needless to say, the guys were pissed. Tatum was almost as important to them as she was to me. When they found out I’d gotten high as a kite, then proceeded to cheat on her, I could’ve sworn they were going to kill me.
“You think I don’t know I fucked up?” I shouted, collapsing onto one of the chairs scattered around the main area of the suite. “I know.” Dropping my head, I rested my elbows on my thighs and yanked at my hair as I started rocking back and forth. “I know, okay? Jesus. I need to fix this.”
I couldn’t wait another day. I was going out of my mind. “Fuck this,” I muttered as I shot to my feet and headed for the door.
“Where the hell are you going?” Killian called as I jerked the door open.
“I’m not waiting. I’m gonna get her back.”
“Dude, we have a show in two days!” Garrett shouted. “You can’t just bail. Chris’ll have your ass. The label will have all our asses!”
“Fuck Chris, and fuck the label. I need t
o see Tatum. I’ll be back in time. You have my word.”
It took a little over fifteen hours to get back to our home in LA. And as soon as I ran through the front door, I knew something was wrong.
The house was empty, and not a sound other than my ragged breathing could be heard. Racing to our bedroom, I whipped open the closet door, all the air rushing from my lungs at the empty hangers scattered across the floor.
Her drawers were empty. All the girly shit she kept stashed in the bathroom was gone.
I bolted down the stairs, taking them two at a time, and skidded to a halt in front of the fireplace. All the knickknacks she bought those first six months after leaving San Francisco were still lining the mantle. The snow globe from Santa Monica, the little figurine of a hula girl she picked up at a shop in Venice Beach, every piece of junk she collected so we could, as she put it, “remember where it all started”, were still front and center.
But the framed pictures of her with her loved ones that she’d put around the room were all missing. The only photos that remained were the ones I was in.
I struggled for breath as I turned toward the kitchen. On the counter that separated it from the living room was a notepad with her handwriting scrawled across the top page.
We’re done.
Stay the hell out of my life.
I never want to see you again.
She didn’t even bother signing her name.
The first thought that ran through my head was No. No, this can’t be happening.
It wasn’t until I collapsed onto the floor, clutching my chest where my heart used to be, that I realized the ugly, horrible truth.
She was gone.
Really gone.
She’d broken her promise to me.
As the years passed, that bone-deep sorrow grew into fury.
What I’d done was the worst thing a man could ever do to the woman he loved. But she hadn’t even given me a chance to make it right. She wouldn’t let me fix it. If it hadn’t been for the drugs and the booze that night, I never would’ve touched those women.
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