Breaking the Habit: The Breaking Series #4

by Leigh, Ember

  John Stamos crooned his greeting, and then the studio fell silent once more.

  Riley tossed the business card on the work station, stomping out front to her computer. She scanned the studio once to make sure Teddy really was gone, and then tried to re-immerse herself in edits.

  But it was impossible to forget what he’d implied. What he wanted from her. It made her feel yucky even though she’d never agree to it in a million years.

  She was sure that Levi wouldn’t have a problem with some of those images being sold off. He might be excited about it.

  But the photos with Gage? Their private home life? He’d be furious if any of those came to light. Teddy had caught on to the truth—Levi really did protect his private life. Even though he’d do damn near anything to get a chance at the spotlight for himself, he’d never expose Gage to the same glare of fame.

  More than anything, she wished he’d left without sweetening the pot. His last-ditch effort to convince her, hitting her right in her weak spot. Like every struggling artist, she supposed. The clear psychological tactic was to offer any modicum of financial stability. Make thirty thousand dollars selling the photos I’ve slaved over my whole career? It was a dream too delicious to bear.

  Which made Teddy vaguely sociopathic. Another clear reason to stay away.

  Still, images of her someday-gallery exhibit haunted her thoughts the rest of the day. As she edited head shots and replied to emails and worked on a composite image for a different client, she imagined the nerves of an opening night. The curious faces of guests, perusing her work. The look of disbelief on her father’s face as he showed up and saw the hundreds of people there, in love with her work. The work that he himself urged her to abandon. Yes, she could already hear the laughter and champagne corks rocketing open and the clink of glasses as everyone enjoyed themselves.

  Or maybe she was being stupid—rejecting a golden opportunity to make those dreams become reality because she had some misguided loyalty to a celebrity.

  She just had to believe that she’d get there.

  Someday.

  Chapter 28

  Fight week blurred by in a flurry of photography work. The notable highlight was the social media gig—the lifestyle shoot that took place in Hollywood Hills late one Friday night. An up-and-coming Instagram influencer needed Riley to take the perfectly casual shots, and the two of them had fun roaming the streets outside of ritzy clubs and restaurants.

  Riley didn’t often come to the Hills, and for good reason. It wasn’t her scene, made more than evident by running into Teddy Wilcox, skeevy photographer extraordinaire.

  Her stomach had shrunk to a dense nut the second she spotted him. He just grinned like the Cheshire Cat and even snapped a few pictures of her as she scowled and avoided him. Weirdest thing ever, and the mere brush with him left her feeling unnerved. Anxious, almost.

  When just two nights until fight night remained, Riley felt as jittery as Levi probably did. They texted every night before bed, and occasionally, they video chatted, which was both what she needed and the last thing she needed. Because seeing him, hearing him, reminded her of how much she needed him.

  And it was only two more nights until they could tumble back into their sweet, unexpectedly beautiful routine. But it might as well have been years.

  “Anybody home?” Riley called out as she entered the house. It was damn near nine o’clock. She’d be hearing from Levi soon, since he went to bed by ten these days, and then she’d veg out with Nikki.

  But nobody answered. The whole house was dark. Riley’s footsteps clomped down the hallway as she flicked on the lights leading to the kitchen. The hum of the fridge was the only sound that greeted her, followed by a quiet click—the ice maker.

  Her phone vibrated.

  LEVI: Babe we should talk.

  LEVI: About things. About us. About life.

  Riley knit her brows together, a pit forming in her stomach.

  RILEY: Good or bad?

  LEVI: Good. I think.

  She studied the far side of the kitchen. He was two nights out from fight night. If something weird exploded between them, it would affect his performance. At this point, she was one hundred percent Team Levi, which meant one hundred percent Team Winning This Damn League.

  RILEY: Why don’t we wait until after you win the title? You need to focus. Don’t be distracted by anything that isn’t you fighting like a sexy ass champ on Saturday.

  LEVI: Yeah yeah. Good point.

  She paused, her fingers damn near ready to type I love you. But she needed to wait. Once they could enter the honeymoon phase, when he’d won the title and they were falling back into bed and life together.

  RILEY: Did Gage decide if he wants to go to the match?

  LEVI: He’s in. As long as Amara, Lila, and Gen can personally escort him, he said he’ll make the effort.

  RILEY: He’s gonna be so baller.

  LEVI: He’ll probably talk about it for a year after.

  RILEY: I hope so. I’ll get the rest of those details squared away for him. I just want him to love it.

  LEVI: Hey Riley?

  RILEY: What

  LEVI: You’re the fucking best.

  Riley smiled as she prepared a quick snack for herself, hummus on pita with arugula and feta, like a pizza, but rolled up like a burrito, with no filling to speak of. It was her favorite snack. She didn’t care that it broke all the rules.

  The front door opened as Riley settled on the couch to turn on the TV. Nikki came in a moment later, backpack slung over her shoulder.

  “Hey, girl.” Riley twisted, brows knitting when she noticed how grim Nikki looked. “Is everything okay?”

  Nikki nibbled on her bottom lip, just staring. And then she sighed and climbed onto the couch next to Riley, boots and all.

  “I don’t want to have to be the one to tell you this,” she said in a low, serious voice. “Like, seriously? This is the last thing I wanted to have to do.” She unzipped her backpack and brought out her laptop.

  “Nikki, I don’t like this.”

  “Yeah, me neither.” She scowled, pulling up a web browser. “I found out today while I was at a casting call. Somehow the conversation turned to Levi—” Riley’s heart sank to her toes. “And everyone had something to say. Like seeing him out, getting drunk, and…” Nikki shook her head, scrolling through a page. “And of course, I wanted to wait until I saw you to tell you in person. This isn’t the sort of thing you text someone about.”

  Riley opened her mouth to ask what on earth it was when Nikki turned around her laptop, shoving it toward her. A photo of Levi filled the screen. Shot at night, his brown hair wavy and messy, someone’s hand clasped in his as he stepped down off a sidewalk.

  Riley stared at the picture for a long time, blinking and trying to understand and blinking some more.

  “It’s Levi,” Nikki said after a while.

  “Yeah, I see that,” Riley said. “But—”

  “Scroll down,” Nikki said, frowning. She reached around to tap the scroll button on the keyboard. “Hun…this is you.”

  A three-picture panel popped up—a tightly cropped photo of Levi looking worriedly somewhere, a smug shot of Titi, and then…her. Riley. Scowling at something in the distance.

  The panel told a clear story. This was a love triangle, and Riley was the one on the outside.

  She just wasn’t sure how she’d gotten involved. Or why the whole world knew about it except her. Again.

  “Wh—” she tried again.

  “It’s from two nights ago. He’s with this girl. This…model.” Nikki scoffed, turning the laptop back around so she could see the article. “Titi LaCrap or whatever.”

  It was the name Titi that made all the disjointed information finally click together. The model that she herself had taken photos of, weeks earlier. The model who seemed to skulk around every practice Levi had at the gym these days. The model who had her own trail of photogs, her own fame, her own celebrity pull. />
  Thoughts collided painfully in Riley’s head, leading her to a truth that she didn’t want to accept.

  A truth that didn’t make sense, no matter how much evidence there was.

  “Hang on.” Riley grabbed for the laptop, slowly beginning to scroll. “Let me look at this.”

  “I wanted it to be fake,” Nikki whispered, “after what you went through with Braden. But there are pictures, Riley. They’re everywhere. It’s trending on Twitter right now. These two are like…dating.”

  She rolled her lips in, hearing Nikki but also actively rejecting her words. It couldn’t be true. Not when she and Levi were a thing.

  “I don’t understand,” Riley mumbled, flipping through one article after the other. And it was just the tip of the iceberg. There were so many things she didn’t understand.

  Like how she hadn’t caught any red flags. Not even a yellow flag.

  How glibly and delightedly she’d fallen head over heels for Levi, believing everything he told her. How he’d managed to fool her, when they texted so often. How he could act like things were okay when really he probably had Titi with him at that exact moment. In his arms, while she traced that constellation of freckles with her fingertips like Riley had so many times. In his bed, that slate gray haven that she’d claimed for herself.

  Her stomach tightened, almost to the point of nausea. Rationalizations began clicking into place. He didn’t want to see you for the past week because he’s been with her. When he texted you wanting to talk tonight, it was because he was about to tell you himself.

  “I don’t understand either,” Nikki said. “I’m so sorry, Riley.”

  “But maybe this is—”

  “Fake?” Nikki gave a disbelieving laugh. “I don’t know. Photoshop is definitely a thing these days, but I don’t know why anyone would Photoshop stuff like this.”

  Riley’s mouth went dry. Nikki had a point. These photos looked too real, too. And if the most common-sense explanation was Levi had cheated on her, then maybe that really was the simplest truth.

  She didn’t need to invent some Photoshop workaround. Her heart had already broken. There was no salvaging it.

  “Did you see them out whatever night this was?” Nikki asked.

  Riley jerked her head no. “I was in the Hills that night, and I saw a super shady photographer I met recently. He took my picture. He knows I have connections with Levi. He must have been scouting him that night.”

  Nikki tutted and squeezed her shoulder. “I’m so sorry, honey.”

  Riley pushed the computer aside, unable to find a readily accessible reaction. She wanted to rage at the same time she wanted to cry and shout and stuff her face full of pita bread. Not only was she being cheated on—again—she’d also been dragged into the spotlight. Once was enough. Two times was grounds for something drastic. Cutting all her hair off or moving to Prague drastic.

  “Are you okay?” Nikki asked, her face creased with concern. Riley nodded, pushing to standing.

  “Yeah. I’m gonna go…think.”

  “Are you sure you don’t want me around? I’ll go with you if you want to go to his house. Or confront him in the street. Or send a flaming pile of poop to his doorstep.”

  Riley laughed on the inside but couldn’t force a reaction on her face. “I appreciate that. But I just want to go lie down and fall asleep.”

  And she did. Her limbs were heavy as she plodded up the stairs, her heart still suspended between disbelief and sickening, liquid knowing.

  Because she did know. She should have known. She’d told herself all along this would be the case. That Levi would end up the same, because she knew how these stories ended. She knew how men like him behaved.

  She plopped onto the bed, buried her face in her pillow, and didn’t move for what felt like an hour. Thoughts hung in her mind, bulky and sluggish. She could make no headway. She could only stew in it. Feel it wash over her in terrible, gummy waves.

  As careful as she’d been with Levi, she hadn’t seen getting dragged into the spotlight coming. She’d been careful to keep her distance, even while his own celebrity ballooned. Still the spotlight had come searching for her. It didn’t matter what she did. There was no winning against the attention-hungry eye of the storm.

  But what had the alternative been? Strap on a chastity belt and wear a paper bag over her head in public?

  At one point, she looked at her phone, wondering if she should text him.

  But what would she say?

  The truth was, she was also a contracted employee of his. And with his match two nights away, she had a responsibility to not fuck over his career by tearing his attention away from that. And once she brought this up, it wouldn’t just tear at his attention, it would completely slaughter it.

  After the league was over, she could blow it up however she wanted. And she would. Oh, she intended to make this one explode all over him.

  So that he couldn’t help but get burnt by the shards.

  But for now? She needed to sleep.

  So that tomorrow she could wake up and find out that this had been a horrible nightmare.

  Chapter 29

  The day of the fight.

  Levi was spaced out from the second he woke up, which was the first bad sign.

  He couldn’t get his fucking head straight, no matter how much he tried to joke around with Gage or go for brisk walks around the block. Everything was on track. He’d made weigh in the night before, he’d had the perfect big breakfast and light lunch, and now he was waiting.

  It had to be nerves. This was the final, and he was about to be crowned king. Of course his stomach would feel like a steel nut.

  Of course he’d have sweaty palms while he wished Gage a good trip with the girls to the arena and drove to Holt.

  Of course his legs would feel like they’d give out at any second when he got to the dressing room and minutes turned into a half hour and Riley still wasn’t there.

  Everything around him moved in slow motion as the clock ticked inexorably toward the match. All he could think about was that it never felt like this before. Normally, he had a clear head. Normally, he was alive and laser focused and here.

  But not today. The air itself was stuffed with cotton. Travis massaged the tops of his shoulders, feeding him lots of inspirational prefight words. Levi nodded. Something was wrong. He just didn’t know what it was yet.

  The dressing room door opened, and Riley appeared in the doorway with five minutes until fight time. He should have been upset, but he was only relieved. He gobbled her up—the last time they’d seen each other was at his practice earlier that week. And that was too much damn time apart.

  Her hair hung in dark waves around her face. A tight black skirt hugged her hips, topped with a black lace tank. Her big camera bags hung off one shoulder, and she already had a camera in hand.

  “Sorry I’m late,” she mumbled, fiddling with the camera. Levi stared at her, waiting for that electric jolt. Waiting for the warmth in her eyes. The silent communication they’d perfected over the past month and a half.

  But she didn’t look at him. Made a point of avoiding his gaze.

  An icy wave passed through him.

  “All right, dude, it’s almost time,” Lex said after he’d poked his head out of the dressing room.

  “Riley, you look amazing,” Levi said, his gaze snagging on the lace of her top. She cleared her throat, hoisting her bags. Her chocolate-brown eyes flicked his ways for the briefest of seconds, but the minimal contact there seared through him. And suddenly, his body was filled with understanding.

  Riley wasn’t good. There was something wrong.

  Anxiety streaked through him as Travis urged him to stand.

  “This is it. The final fucking match. God, it’s gonna feel so good when you win the title. Do you hear me, Levi? You are minutes away from wearing that belt.”

  Levi jerked his attention back to Travis, trying to force the questions and doubts from his mind. This was
it. The pinnacle of the league, and he needed to clear his head now.

  “I wonder how much it weighs,” Levi said, cracking a smile. Riley waited in the hallway for them to file out, her lips a thin line. And suddenly he realized that whatever was wrong with her had to do with them.

  “Let’s fucking do it,” Travis boomed, herding Levi out into the hallway. Lex sauntered along behind them.

  “No pre-fight joke?” Lex asked.

  Travis twisted around to look at Levi, a brow arched. “Yeah. Where’s the joke?”

  Levi shook his head, cottony confusion and doubts invading him. Nothing made sense. “I’m ready. It’s time.” He took one last look at Riley before he made the effort to file away the confusion for later.

  He had no room for doubts and wondering.

  The only thing allowed in his head space was unfaltering certainty.

  Levi went through the motions. He hopped from foot to foot as the boom and hiss of the arena grew nearer. When he stepped across the threshold, guided down the narrow aisle by Travis winding toward the octagon, the chants of his name almost knocked him over.

  The energy had never been this high. This loud. And Gage was out there somewhere. He pumped his fists into the air and hopped, adrenaline beginning the familiar twisty path through his body in time to the sick hip-hop beats of the music accompanying his walk. Yes. He needed more of this. More of the hype. More of the energy.

  Some of his focus returned when he reached the octagon. But he made the mistake of searching for Riley. Couldn’t find her down there and spent too long looking. Pulled himself out of his hype state.

  “Here we go,” Travis boomed over the roar of the crowd, bringing him back to center. Across the octagon, his opponent stared him down, a middleweight pro they called Benny the Bulldozer. Levi flexed his hands against the tape as the announcer began his familiar routine. Calling out the stats of each fighter, touting the tension of the final, and then each fighter began his walk around the octagon.