Chapter Fifty
THORIN
Can you please take it easy?” Khalil gripes as he helps me back into the hospital bed after my shower. He’s always standing over me these days, clucking like a worried mother hen. I want to deck him, but I kind of love him, so I don’t.
“You beg me for weeks to wake up and now you want me to take it easy?” I bark back.
“What did you think would happen?” I’ve been in a sour mood ever since waking up from a coma, confused as fuck, barely able to speak, and with no memories of how I’ve sunk so low.
It’s no surprise that I’m impatient to get back some normalcy for myself.
And now…
Now I’m in a rehabilitation center trying to learn how to fucking walk again.
Or whatever the hell the doctors said—regaining the strength in my legs.
In three months, I’ve gone from bedridden to wheelchair-bound to short shuffling steps after getting frustrated and purposely snapping the cane they gave me in half.
Once I’m settled in the bed again, Khalil returns to the recliner in the corner while I glare at the red heart-shaped balloon one of the volunteers left in my room for Valentine’s Day.
Fuck love.
Love isn’t real. Love doesn’t lie. Love doesn’t leave you when you’re fucking fighting for your life.
The door to my room opens, and a hooded figure walks in. I don’t have to see his face though to know his mood is as bad as mine. The three of us have been scowling and snapping at each other for weeks with no sign of our moods improving.
“Where the hell have you been?” I grunt.
Zeke doesn’t answer though, as he collapses on the couch pushed against the wall across from me.
He’s got a secondhand Android in his hand that he bought used off eBay.
He stays on that damn thing searching for signs of her.
Khalil’s got a similar one that he rarely touches, except for keeping track of Zeke when he disappears during the day for hours.
Despite the cramped room and lack of bed, the idiots still refuse to get a room at the hotel next door when it means leaving me alone. Instead, they take turns sleeping on the too-small couch at night.
“She’s back in Los Angeles,” Zeke says, his voice hoarse from disuse. He hasn’t spoken a word to us in days. “She’s back with him.”
“Who?” Khalil asks when he forgets to pretend not to care. “Her uncle?”
“The bodyguard.”
Tyler fucking Westbrook. “So what?” I grunt despite the jealousy running through my veins. “We have to move on, Zeke. She left us. She made her choice.”
“She left us, but that doesn’t mean we have to let her go.”
“Shy of kidnapping her, I think it does.” Khalil stretches lazily and then pulls his phone from his pocket, and I narrow my gaze on the device when he starts to fiddle with it, likely looking up whatever news article that riled up Zeke.
“When the fuck did you get so soft?” Zeke snaps at him.
Khalil looks up from his phone to stare at him blankly. “Since Aurelia.”
The two of them start to bicker, and since I can’t run away, I pull my pillow from behind my head and try to smother myself with it. A moment later, the pillow is yanked from my grip, and Zeke scowls down at me from under his hood as he tosses it away.
It’s the first time I notice how much the tables have turned.
I watch Zeke return to the couch and then pocket his phone inside his hoodie to glare out the window at the darkening sky.
“Shit, yes!” Khalil shouts before looking up from his phone with bright eyes. “I just got the email. Our passports have been approved. We can go home.”
“Yippee.”
Khalil’s excitement doesn’t deflate from my lack of it though. He’s the only one who ever had any reason to go back. My home, my real home, burned down months ago.
I have no home.
Khalil stands and walks over to the bed before picking up the paper that I glanced at once and never again from the nightstand.
It’s a list of recommendations for physical therapists in the States to continue my outpatient treatment.
Khalil places it on the swinging table overlapping the bed, and I look away to stare at the ceiling.
“The doctors said you’re recovering well and should be out of here in a couple of weeks. You need to choose which therapist you’re going to see once you’re out.”
“Pass,” I say immediately.
Khalil’s eyes become hard. “It’s nonnegotiable, Thor. You still have a long road ahead of you. You need to take this seriously.”
“I. Am.”
“Are you? We have to go three rounds with you every day just to convince you to get up and do the therapy here.”
“What do you want from me, Khalil?”
“I want you to try! I want you to stop acting like you died. I want you to start living again. And I want you to forget about her.” He snatches the paper from the table and slams it against my chest. “She isn’t. Coming. Back.”
“Fine.” Snatching the paper from him, I scan the list of reputable clinics that’s over a dozen long and all scattered around the West Coast, and I grit my teeth in frustration as I mentally cross them all off.
Seattle. Portland. San Diego. Las Vegas. San Francisco.
Finally, my eyes arrive on the city I want, and I relax against the remaining pillows. “This one,” I say, pointing at the clinic listed third from the bottom. “I want this one.”
Khalil picks the paper up to read it and then looks at me over the top of it when he sees where it’s located. I stare back at him, and he swears but doesn’t argue as he yanks his phone from his pocket to make the arrangements.
Three out of four wishes ain’t bad.
I’m released from rehab a couple of weeks later and with enough medication to start a pharmacy.
I threw them all in the trash on my way out, much to Khalil’s and Zeke’s annoyance since I’m even bitchier when I’m in pain.
Not even being back in the States after a decade away is enough to cheer me up.
I feel like a fish out of water, and I know Khalil and Zeke feel the same way.
It’s…loud in Los Angeles, and the air isn’t as fresh as the wilds. It’s not a detail I ever noticed before we took Zeke and his horde and fled to Canada, but it sticks out in my mind now and tugs at my desire to return to our lonely cliff.
And the people…
There’s too fucking many of them. They’re always talking and rushing to one place or another, and snapping fucking photos as I try to see what the hell they see that’s so picture-worthy.
Now the Cold Peaks…that’s picturesque.
As for our current lodgings, Khalil managed to get in contact with his cousin Gary, who used to be his manager during his boxing days.
Gary’s girlfriend has a few rental properties around the city, and she agreed to put us up in one of her furnished condos for a few weeks while we figured out our next move.
It’s where we are now as Khalil, Zeke, and I lounge around the living room staring at the TV, not talking and barely breathing as we focus on a live talk show.
In between pretending we aren’t here for one thing, I keep my promise and go to the physical therapy sessions, which become less of an exercise in will the stronger I feel myself getting.
Khalil helps a lot with that too when we do some light exercises together.
It’s good for him too since he hasn’t been eating, and he’s lost a lot of muscle tone keeping a constant vigilance over me.
I’m not going to be running any marathons anytime soon, but I can cross the room and stand long enough to shower on my own without getting winded.
The closer I get back to myself though, the more the dark circles under his eyes fade, so I push past the heartbreak and hopelessness because it feels like I’m healing him too.
It’s not easy to see on the surface unless you really know him, but Khalil took Aurelia’s leaving the hardest. Most days, I barely recognize my best friend.
He’s quicker to anger and completely closed off when he’s not focused on piecing me back together.
He thinks about her. Often. Always.
We all do.
But Khalil isn’t ready to face his feelings, so we bide our time and fill our days cyberstalking our girl.
Unfortunately, her sightings are few and become rarer as time passes.
And whenever her public appearances are unavoidable—usually of her dashing from her penthouse apartment to a chauffeured car surrounded by security—she’s always dressed in the most outlandish outfits.
One day it’s baggy denim and oversize sweaters, and the next it’s flowy tunics and voluminous tulle.
Layers upon layers, as if she’s trying to hide.
But there’s no hiding for Aurelia, so it’s an effort in futility.
I knew she was famous, but I didn’t really get the full measure until these last few weeks after I left rehab.
“So, Aurelia,” the host of the talk show says with a gleam in her eye, “Are you ever going to tell us what happened to you? Where you’ve been all this time?”
Aurelia is in another one of her ridiculous getups for the appearance, and she still looks fucking beautiful. I hate that. I cross my arms and pretend I’m not half hard after noticing that her tits have grown. Fuck’s that about?
“Well, I would, Avery, but I’ve been advised by my agent that I should save it all for the book. I’m told it’s going to be a real page-turner, and I wouldn’t want to spoil anything.”
The crowd laughs, and Avery Shaw chuckles, but I can see even through the screen that the hostess is searching for a way around Aurelia’s well-rehearsed answers. “Well, how much have you written so far?”
“Oh, about a page. Yeah, I’ve been really giving it my all. The publisher is optimistic. I think my agent is already talking to directors about developing the screenplay.”
Avery feigns surprise. “Just from the one page?”
“Well, it’s a really good page, Avery.”
The crowd laughs again, and the discussion moves on once Avery realizes she won’t get Aurelia to crack. I feel the corner of my lips tugging with pride before I remember to shove it down.
She’s not mine anymore.
When the show goes off and Aurelia is gone, Zeke changes the channel and Khalil turns his head to regard us with impassive eyes. “What do you guys want for dinner?”
I run cold fingers through my shorn hair—the length long gone—as I pretend to give a shit, since me not eating becomes a big fucking deal around here these days.
I’m still getting used to my hair being short since it hasn’t been in the ten years since I was discharged from the Marines, but it’s not so bad.
At least, it’s not a fucking buzz cut. It’s long enough to spike when it’s tousled, brush my nape, and curl around my ears.
I make the mistake of wondering if Aurelia will like it before I banish the thought of her from my mind. Khalil still refuses to cut his hair, but it’s braided now with the ends tucked inside the blue durag he’s wearing.
“Chinese?” Zeke suggests.
Khalil pulls out his phone and begins to look for a spot. It’s a few minutes before he looks up from his phone. “This one looks good, but it’s a bit of a drive.”
“Where is it?” Zeke asks absently as he scrolls on his phone.
“Beverly Hills.”
Zeke’s head pops up while all of my muscles become coiled like a snake. I’m feeling ravenous all of a sudden, but it’s not for food.
Beverly Hills.
Where Aurelia lives.
Where she’ll likely be heading right now.
“Well, I guess there’s no time to waste,” I say as we all stand and dash out the door.
The three of us hop inside the rental with Zeke in the driver’s seat, and the drive to Beverly Hills seems to be over in a flash despite the traffic.
Once we reach our destination, Zeke parks on the street with the neon sign of the Chinese restaurant Khalil found online flickering next to us, but none of us get out of the truck as we wait for the arrival of the black SUV with dark tint.
There are already a few paps and overzealous fans waiting outside as if they had a similar idea.
“Fuck, there’s a lot of them,” Zeke growls while he strangles the steering wheel. His rage at seeing all of those people waiting to ambush Aurelia and the lingering possession that demands we do something about it feel like a twin to my own.
But there’s nothing we can do because the SUV carrying Aurelia, including the lead and tail, are already pulling up.
We watch with gritted teeth as they all clamber to raise their cameras and get closer to the vehicle.
Aurelia’s security steps out first, led by Westbrook, and they work to push the crowd back to make room for Aurelia before she even steps out.
Once there’s a clear path to the door, Westbrook returns to the SUV and opens the back for her. Aurelia takes his hand as she steps out, and then she waves and signs a few items, but doesn’t stop to pose for a photo or revel in the attention.
She’s there and gone in under sixty seconds, and I’m left with a craving that’s ten times worse than before now that I’ve seen her. It’s all I can do not to get out of the truck and force my way inside. To return the favor of when she ambushed our lives like a shiny wrecking ball.
Aurelia George ruined my fucking life, and if I had the chance to choose, I’d let her do it all over again.
“She looks good,” Zeke says, breaking the silence that feels stifling inside the car.
“She’s also a liar,” Khalil reminds him.
Zeke has no rebuttal for that, and it sobers all of us, putting a damper on the desire and obsession that drove us to come running like fucking stalkers. Aurelia’s right. We are creeps, but at least once upon a time, we were her creeps.
We sit for an hour more before we feel the tether leashing us to her slacken enough that we’re able to drive away, but it’s not long before it’s pulling taut again and we find ourselves back on that street night after night.
We return for Chinese food many times. In fact, we can’t seem to get enough of the addicting cuisine.