by Evie Drae
When the door to the green room finally crept open, Cinder whirled around with a big, dopey grin, ready to catch Ellis in his arms. However, one look at Ellis, whose shoulders were slumped and eyes were cast to the floor, had Cinder’s pulse stuttering to a halt. “What’s wrong? What happened? Are you okay?”
The door clicked closed before Ellis pressed his back against it, eyes averted. “We need to talk.”
What was it about those four little words that could shoot a man straight through the heart? Even when he’d never heard them outside the movies or traumatizing stories told by friends, they still had the power to cut him off at the knees. Cinder sank to the couch like a lead weight had been glued to his ass. “Okay. About what?”
Rubbing the back of his neck, Ellis sighed. “I’m sure you heard about Ray.”
Cinder pressed his lips together to halt the colorful curses dancing over the tip of his tongue from making a verbal appearance. “Yes, I did.”
If that motherfucker had done something to hurt Ellis… Cinder narrowed his eyes, angling his head as he tried to get a better look at Ellis’s face. Assessing for signs of violence.
Clearing his throat, Ellis ducked his head even farther, as if he could sense Cinder’s scrutinizing gaze. “Lizbeth offered me the chance to help her since she had to take over Ray’s position. I… I said yes, and I…” Ellis tugged at the hem of his T-shirt, rubbing it between his thumb and forefinger. “I need to focus on this right now. I have a chance at making my dreams come true, and I can’t… I can’t mess that up.”
Cinder frowned. “Okay.” He drew out the word. What was Ellis getting at? What did that have to do with him? With them? “I fully support that. I was beyond thrilled when I heard the news.”
Ellis’s eyes drifted closed, the muscles in his jaw jumping as he clenched his teeth. But why? What had him so on edge? Wasn’t this a good thing?
“I need to… I need to focus.” Ellis repeated the empty phrase, still providing Cinder with no hint as to what this conversation was about. Balling his hands into fists, Ellis blurted out, “I can’t keep doing this. All of this. Us. It’s… it’s too much. I-I need to focus.”
It hit Cinder like a two-ton sack of cement, cutting off his air as it crushed his chest under the painful weight. He placed a hand over his heart, as if he could somehow ward off the emotional blow with a physical defense. “You can’t… You don’t mean that.”
The click of the door opening drew Cinder’s watery gaze. He blinked back the burn of tears as Ellis turned away, his hand on the doorknob and one foot already out the door. “I do. I… I do mean it. I’m sorry, Henry. I’m so, so sorry.” Voice breaking, Ellis fled. The door slammed closed in his wake, leaving Cinder surrounded by the broken shards of his heart.
By the time he managed to gather the fractured pieces of his world and make his way home—barely aware that Emmitt had to take his keys and stuff him into the passenger side of his own car to get him there—Cinder was in no mood for surprises. All he wanted was to bury himself in the blackness of his room, under the weight of his covers, and not surface until he’d found the will to breathe again. Or not. Whatever.
But the freedom to mope and lose himself to his personal demons was taken away when he trudged into his living room to find Lizbeth and Kumiko lounging on his couch.
Kumiko jumped up at the sound of Cinder’s shoes squeaking on the freshly waxed hardwood floor. Her face was pinched as she rounded the couch with her arms open in invitation. “Come here, boo.”
Frozen in place, stuck somewhere between spiraling depression and grateful relief that he didn’t have to walk into an empty house, Cinder could only stare helplessly at the floor.
When Kumiko’s arms wrapped around his middle, followed by Lizbeth’s belly bumping into his back as she molded around his waist from behind, the tears Cinder had managed to suppress spilled in earnest. He buried his face in the soft cotton of Kumiko’s T-shirt and allowed every sharp arrow of pain and heartbreak to pierce at once, leaving him gutted and ruined, yet buffered from the harshest edges, thanks to his closest friends’ warm and soothing presence.
They held him through the worst of his wracking sobs, and then Lizbeth headed off to pour them a nightcap—something alcoholic for Cinder and Kumiko, and something virgin for herself—while Kumiko steered him into the bathroom. She had him splash cool water on his face and rubbed his back in soothing circles. “I’d say I’m sorry for breaking and entering, but I’m not. Plus, you gave us a key. When AJ called and said you were hella upset about something, we came right over. Talk to me, boo. What happened?”
Drying his face with the fluffy towel Kumiko handed him, Cinder sighed and sank to the lip of the large Jacuzzi tub. “Ellis and I… We broke up.”
Kumiko joined Cinder on the tub and threaded their fingers together. “Love is never easy, boo. It’s even harder when you add fame and money into the mix. Always manages to muddy the waters when both parties aren’t on even footing there.”
Cinder shook his head. “But it isn’t like that with Ellis. It never was. You know I didn’t tell him who I was when we first started talking, and once he found out, his biggest concern was keeping a low profile because he didn’t want everyone to know about us. It’s not like he was trying to use me. He loves me for me.”
Kumiko brushed Cinder’s damp bangs from his forehead. “I know he does, boo. But being the partner of someone with the kind of life you live can be challenging on the best days.” A smile, both wistful and a bit sad, played over her lips. “I met my first love when she was a rising star, and I was still a nobody running around backstage with a clipboard and a dream. Jillian’s level of fame hadn’t reached anywhere close to where you’re at, and yet, despite my ultimate goal being a career on the road surrounded by illustrious celebrities, I was still overwhelmed by it all. Can you imagine how Ellis must feel, especially knowing he never wanted this kind of life?”
“I know, but…” The whiny retort died on Cinder’s lips when Kumiko’s words sank into his soggy brain. It made sense. Too much sense. Ellis had never wanted a famous boyfriend. He’d tried to keep their relationship secret at first and had wanted nothing more than to live a normal life from the start.
When Cinder hid his identity at the beginning of their relationship, he wasn’t just lying to Ellis. He was also preventing him from making an informed decision. Cinder had always—clearly, quite incorrectly—assumed things only went one way. That everyone wanted to be well-known and celebrated. To live a life of opulence and extravagance. Had Ellis ever indicated he wanted any of those things?
No. He hadn’t. If anything, Ellis had made it as clear as possible that he preferred anonymity to celebrity. He wanted to earn the things he had, not be given them. To live in peace, not luxury.
And here Cinder was, ignoring what Ellis wanted. What he’d tried to tell Cinder he needed, time and time again. Instead, far too used to getting everything he yearned for in life without care for what it might mean to those around him to hand it over, Cinder had focused on his wishes and desires. He’d begrudgingly given Ellis moments of normalcy, but for all the wrong reasons and paired far too frequently with moments that stretched well beyond Ellis’s comfort zone.
For fuck’s sake, he’d told Ellis he loved him for the first time via song. And not just any song. He’d chosen to perform a very personal love ballad to an audience of over four thousand screaming fans.
Had he been paying attention at all?
Kumiko’s palm patted Cinder’s cheek, drawing him out of his tumultuous reveries. “Don’t beat yourself up, boo. All relationships have rough patches, and they’re built on compromise not martyrdom. If you really want to make things work, you have to find that happy medium. Give a little, take a little. Both of you.”
Cinder nodded. Still, he wasn’t convinced things were as straightforward as Kumiko made them out to be. Maybe if he’d started things out with that in mind, but was a simple compromise enough to fix the damage
he’d caused?
Not likely.
If he wanted to win Ellis back, he’d have to do a lot more than show up with some half-assed negotiation tactic and a prayer. He’d have to come up with something that would prove he understood and wouldn’t make the same mistakes again.
He had no clue what that might be, but he would figure it out. Eventually. In the meantime, he would give Ellis the space he’d asked for.
Sighing, Cinder stood and offered Kumiko a hand. “Come on. Let’s join Liz for a drink, then you two can wow me with your latest list of baby names.”
Kumiko tittered as Cinder guided her back to the living room, where they took Lizbeth’s proffered glasses and snuggled on the couch together.
Cinder’s heart was still raw and painful, but being surrounded by the love of his found family—one of his truest blessings—helped to ease the ache. He settled between them and allowed their comforting hugs and gentle chatter to soothe his nerves and bolster him for the lonely night ahead.
After Kumiko and Lizbeth eventually returned to their own home later that evening, Cinder wandered around the house, sipping at Kumiko’s unfinished vodka cranberry. He replayed memories of the carefree days and nights he’d spent here with Ellis, further solidifying his drive to win back the love of his life.
But when he made his way into the bedroom and crawled into bed alone for the first time in months, the aching weight of despair returned. What little reprieve he’d found from the solace of his best friends’ company dissolved, leaving him emotionally bruised and forlorn.
As he curled into himself, pulling Ellis’s pillow against his chest as a futile substitute for the warm body he craved, Cinder’s hand brushed over something soft and cotton. Considering his sheets were silk, the contrasting texture drew his eyes open as he twisted the fabric around his fingers.
Yanking it free from where it had lodged between the headboard and mattress, Cinder realized it was a T-shirt. One of Ellis’s T-shirts. Fresh despair washed over him as Cinder clutched it to his chest, burying his face in the cloth that still smelled so much like Ellis.
As unbidden as the wave of anguish, a strained laugh rolled up Cinder’s throat as an absurd realization settled over his shoulders. If Ellis was Cinder’s runaway prince—fleeing at the stroke of midnight because he’d only been pretending to fit into Cinder’s chaotic world—then maybe this T-shirt was his glass slipper.
Something left behind to give the abandoned prince, moping atop his throne, a bit of inadvertent hope.
Chapter Twenty-Five
“You’re gettin’ paint all over the damn doorframe.” Ray smacked the back of Ellis’s head and pointed to a tiny white dot that had escaped Ellis’s careful tape job. “I told you to be fuckin’ careful.”
Mumbling an apology, Ellis pulled a rag out of his back pocket and wiped the spot clean before returning to painting his stepfather’s living room. Despite being unemployed, and therefore ramping up the frequency and amount of his drinking, Ray still found plenty of time to dream up things to keep Ellis busy.
Which, in the long run, was probably a blessing.
If he hadn’t spent every waking moment outside of his paying job doing whatever random chores Ray had thought up for him to do that day, Ellis wasn’t sure he would’ve survived the past few weeks.
After following through with Ray’s demand that he end things with Henry, Ellis had been a mess. And without the physical outlet his rigging work provided, he doubted he could’ve maintained his sanity doing the odd tasks necessary to maintain his room and board at the theater.
It wasn’t that he didn’t love working with Lizbeth and being trusted enough to be taught and guided by an expert in his dream field—someone he’d come to realize was far better at her job than the man he’d spent a lifetime idolizing. But if his body wasn’t beaten into submission when he went to bed each night, sleep eluded him. And without proper rest, concentrating on the intricacies of his audio engineering duties proved far more challenging than surviving a day of mindless physical tasks had ever been.
But that all ended today. Henry’s final show was this evening, and after that, Ellis had no clue what to expect. He hadn’t heard anything about what would happen once Cinder’s crew left and the Colosseum was taken over by the next act. Would he be demoted back to stagehand duties once Lizbeth was gone, or had he been permanently promoted to audio assistant?
Even more prominent was the question of what he’d do once Henry was gone. It was hard seeing him up on that stage every day, singing and dancing and appearing for all the world as if his heart wasn’t shattered into a million irreparable pieces like Ellis’s. Especially when he belted out the soul-crushing “Until I Found You,” with as much heart as he ever had.
Wasn’t that what Ellis wanted? He wanted Henry to move on. He wanted him to find peace and happiness in a life without Ellis, even though it hurt to watch it happening while he remained heartbroken and inconsolable. Especially knowing he wouldn’t have the comfort of Henry’s physical presence to dampen the pain after tonight.
“When you’re done in here, the foyer needs a coat. Gotta make the place presentable.” Ray took a sip of whatever amber-colored poison filled his glass, and leaned against the opposite side of the double doorframe from where Ellis worked. “Our first open house is this weekend.”
Ellis froze with the paint roller halfway between the tray and the wall. “Open house?”
With a snort, Ray downed another swallow. “What’d you think was gonna happen? I lost my job, and you don’t make enough to support us both and make the house payments. I need money, and there’s a decent amount of equity in this old girl.”
Pain lanced through Ellis’s already damaged heart, and he let the paint roller fall into the tray, heedless of the splatter. “You can’t do that. You promised, as long as I kept making the payments, you wouldn’t sell the house. You promised.”
Ray swirled his glass, the ice clinking against the expensive crystal. His eyes narrowed, but a distant look stole over his face before his frown turned almost sad. “I loved your mother too, and this place has fond memories for us both. But a man’s gotta live, and finding work in my field ain’t a cakewalk. I’ll probably have to leave Vegas to get a new gig, and selling means the freedom to do that. Plus, it gives me and Suze somethin’ to live off in the meantime.”
Ellis’s head swam with Ray’s words. They floated in and out of focus until they lost all meaning. He rubbed at his temples in a vain effort at bringing some semblance of coherence to his thoughts. “But… but I broke up with Henry.”
Scoffing, Ray narrowed his gaze. “What’s that gotta do with me sellin’ the house and gettin’ outta Dodge?”
It didn’t make sense. Ray had made Ellis end things with Henry because… because why, again? Everything felt muddled. The only memory that stood out in stark contrast to the hazy mess swirling around his brain was the very real threat Ray had made. The threat to ruin Henry. To label him a sex offender. To claim he laid his hands—among other things, no doubt—on a minor. Against her will.
But he’d threatened to do that if Ellis didn’t take care of him, right? He hadn’t wanted Ellis to leave. He hadn’t wanted Ellis to stop giving him money or quit doing his bidding.
So if Ray was skipping town—if Ray was selling the house for cash and fleeing to parts unknown—what did that mean for Ellis? More importantly, what did that mean for Henry? Did the threat still stand, or was Ray wiping his hands of Ellis on all counts, including giving two shits about who he dated?
A cool rush of anxiety blew through Ellis’s system before a blast of heated anger took its place. His fingers curled into fists as he rounded on his stepfather. “I’ve worked myself to the bone so I had enough money to make those payments every month. This was my mother’s house, not yours. You blew through her life insurance rather than paying off the house like she’d asked, then you gambled yourself into such a deep hole your only options were to take out a second mortgage or
lose the house. So I did. Well, you did, but I’ve paid every red cent of it. This is my house far more than it’s yours.”
Tilting his head, Ray worked his jaw back and forth as he studied Ellis. “What about all those years I paid on the damn thing while I took care of a child who wasn’t even mine? Did you factor that into your outlandish claim?”
The hurt tried to surface, followed by the fear, but Ellis wouldn’t let them take root. Not this time. “You could’ve paid off the house and paid for my upbringing with my mom’s life insurance policy. She made sure of that. It isn’t my fault you chose to make poor financial decisions. You were the adult in that situation, not me.”
Those final words echoed in Ellis’s mind, turning his stomach sour. In all reality, he’d been the adult in his relationship with Ray since far before his eighteenth birthday, yet still, he’d allowed Ray to intimidate and control him.
No more. He was done. Not only was he bigger than Ray, he was also smarter. After peeling off his work gloves, Ellis shoved them into his back pocket and stalked toward Ray. Using his larger size and the seething river of rage running rampant through his system to steel his strength, he pointed a finger into Ray’s chest as Ray had done to him countless times in the past.
“I’m done cowing to you.” Ellis reveled in the shocked pop of Ray’s brows. “You’re nothing but a fuckup, and I’m not going to let you continue to bring me down with you.”
“You can’t—”
“Oh yes, I can.” Ellis glanced around the familiar room, but for the first time in longer than he could remember, he really looked. Memories of his mother still filled the space. Her favorite rocking chair, where she used to knit while he watched cartoons, was still there, only it had been shoved into the corner and now served as a catchall for discarded clothing items and piles of unopened mail. The bowl she used to fill with rose-scented potpourri sat on the spindly antique end table she’d bought on a whim when she’d taken Ellis on one of their many garage sale adventures, but both the smell of roses and the carefree fun of those Saturday outings had disappeared not long after Ray entered their lives.
