20. Chapter Twenty
20
Wren
My heart aches with each mile of distance that gets put between me and Ryker. Did he know that I was fired and just didn’t care? I expected him to be waiting and get hysterical about the idea of me leaving, but maybe my feelings were more real than his.
If he ever had feelings.
The conversation with Mack replays in my head like a terrible nightmare that won’t go away. That’s basically what it is.
My phone blares loudly next to my head, making it pound as though there’s a hammer crushing my skull, and I groan before reaching my hand out in search of the annoying device. I bring it to my ear without looking at the name, then sigh sleepily into the line, “Hello?”
“Ms. Grace,” the familiar male voice says on the other end, forcing me to sit upright on the bed with widened eyes. “This is Mack, Ryker’s manager.”
“Yes, I know.”
What could he possibly be calling for?
My heart thuds wildly, sweat building up at the base of my spine as I think about all the reasons for this talk, and I take a deep breath.
“Is there something I can help you with?”
He clears his throat, then asks, “I’m not sure, Ms. Grace, mind telling me why there’s an image of you with my guitarist that got leaked?”
“Sir, I assure you it isn’t what it may have looked like. We were just out shopping,” I say immediately, my mind going right back to the woman I saw taking a picture of us.
“Shopping? That’s funny because it looked like you were at a club.”
My heart drops to the pit of my stomach, and all the blood drains from my face.
Right, the fight. Someone was bound to get a picture, or even a video, of the entire thing.
“Sir,” I say, more than prepared to answer him, but he cuts me off by saying my name angrily.
“This is unacceptable, unprofessional, and not something I need one of my guys to be around. Your services are no longer needed, and I would like you to leave the premises immediately.”
“But, sir,” I choke out.
“You took advantage of his mental state, and I’ll be sure everyone knows exactly the type of wellness coach you really are when everything is said and done.”
The rest of the conversation fades, and I’m trying to hold back a sob when I come to a stop on my parent's front porch, my suitcase thumping loudly behind me, and I knock softly on their front door. Although it’s unlikely, I’m hoping that they’ll miss the noise and I can stand out here to cry on my own.
I can imagine it now – Elias will get one look at me, know something happened, and then proceed to tell me how right he was. It’s not something I’d normally expect from him, but how could I not when he’s voiced his opinion on Ryker this entire time?
The sadness in my heart swells when the front door opens, and my mother gasps loudly in front of me. Before I can say anything, she ushers me inside with my suitcase still standing on the front porch, then shuts the front door without a care in the world about my things waiting outside for me.
“Oh, sweetie, what happened?”
As if sensing my mother’s distress, it doesn’t take more than a few seconds before my father is hurrying around the corner with Elias following closely behind him.
How the hell am I going to bounce back from this?
I suck in a breath of air and look between my family, then bring my attention back to Elias with sadness coated heavily in my gaze. His eyebrows dip, a frown forming on his flawless face, and he sighs heavily before walking forward.
This is when I brace myself for the impact of his words. It’s what I should be hearing, after all, because everything he said was right. I should’ve listened to him when he said Ryker would hurt me, that I needed to be careful, but I’ve got a feeling he assumed he would hurt me in a completely different way.
The last thing I expect when my brother walks up to me is for his strong arms to wrap around my petite frame and envelope me in nothing but warmth. There’s no ounce of commentary being made, just love pouring between the two of us and that’s what has sobs wracking through my entire body.
He pats my back softly, while my mother and father stare at us in confusion. Although my parents have the internet and smartphones, the most they do on their devices is text us or watch random videos on YouTube. I highly doubt they’ve gotten a chance to see whatever it is that Rykers manager managed to see.
My mind rolls back to the way my phone incessantly rang this morning with Mack’s name, the guy who hired me and who I learned was Ryker’s manager, and his voice boomed angrily over the line when I answered. I was half asleep, so it took me a second to understand what he was saying, but once I finally woke up, everything fell into place.
A photo was leaked of me with Ryker, and Mack wanted me out of the house immediately. I would’ve said I’ll go, then stay, but he made sure to let me know that someone would be by within the hour to make sure I’ve disappeared from the premises.
His words exactly were, I want it to look like you were never there to begin with. Erase every trace of you from the house and never contact my guitarist again.
That’s when he hung up, and I scurried around the bedroom without so much as a tear falling down my cheeks – at least until I got outside and into my car. It only hurt more when I walked down the hall, only to find it void of life.
I wondered if Ryker was still asleep, but I knew that it was because he didn’t think what we had was real enough to stick up for. My reputation is going to get painted black. I’ll likely never work in the psychology field again, and I will definitely lose any credibility I had as a wellness coach. My hopes for paying off my parents' house are squashed right along with my heart.
“Wren?” My mother says softly, pulling me back to the present.
I give her a sad smile and sigh heavily. “Have an extra room for me, Mom?”
“Oh, baby, of course we do. Let me fix you a cup of tea, then you can tell me everything.”
She starts to pull me, but I stay rooted in my spot and look up at Elias before turning back to her with a sad smile. “Mom, I’d really love to got out on the horses with Elias.”
I can see the hurt flash in her eyes, so I clear my throat and shrug. “But, I’ll meet you in the kitchen after?”
That brightens her mood slightly, although I’m certain she’s still upset that there’s something wrong in the first place. When she and my dad disappear around the corner, the two of them talking softly to one another, I finally give Elias all my attention.
“Looks like you were right,” I say while holding back another sob.
Elias shakes his head and pulls me against him once more, then pushes away. “No, Wren, I don’t think I was.”
“It feels like you were.”
He nudges me toward the front door and pulls it open, the bright sun splashing across my features in a way I’ve always loved – today, it just makes me want to disappear into the house and never come back out.
What would it feel like to become a hermit after all these years?
“Let’s go to the stables, then we’ll talk about everything.”
I nod and let him lead me gently through the trail while leaning my head against his shoulder for comfort. He reaches his arm out and runs his finger in small circles over my arm, reassuring me with a simple touch that everything will be okay – but how could he possibly know that?
My heart is cracking with each minute that passes like I’ve lost a huge piece of myself that I’ll never be able to get back. I’m desperate to text Ryker’s phone and ask if he really wanted me gone, but Elias standing next to me keeps me from making that mistake.
Elias would never let me attempt to do that, anyway. I’d have to wait until I was alone, filled with sadness from leaving Ryker, to send him a text full of emotion.
We stop outside the stables and instead of steering us toward the horses, Elias saunters over to a bench against one of the walls covered with shade from a large oak tree. I take a seat next to him, silently looking out at the property while my hair blows in the warm breeze that flits by, and I slouch forward depressingly.
“Talk to me, Wren.”
Where do I start?
“I thought I’d had it handled, Eli, but I couldn’t have been more wrong.” I shake my head and sigh. “He stole a piece of me during our time together in a way no one else has before. It feels as though he stomped on it, and it’s crushed deep into the ground.”
It sounds poetic when I say it, but depressing as hell if you think long and hard about the words.
“Did you talk to him before you left?”
“He wasn’t up, I don’t think. Either that or he didn’t care as much as I did about what we seemed to be building and chose not to see me out.” I’m banking on the latter.
I look up and give him a weak smile. “You can say it, you know? I’ve been waiting to hear it since you got a good look at me.”
Elias sighs heavily and wraps an arm over my shoulders to pull me against his side. “I won’t say it either because I don’t believe I was right.” There’s a frown on his face as he shakes his head. “I think he really likes you, Wren.”
Yeah, right.
I don’t answer, or give my own opinion, only sit in silence until Elias breaks it. “What’s going on, though? Why did you come back with your things?”
“Oh,” I say and chuckle, even though nothing about the situation is funny. “That’s the real kicker. His manager called me this morning because a picture of us got leaked and plastered all over the media.”
After he called me, I went online and found the exact one he was talking about. It was anything intimate, just him glaring at the guy who tried talking to me and me staring at the two of them behind Ryker.
If it wasn’t for the fact that we were alone together at a club, there’s a chance things wouldn’t have ended up the way they did.
“You got fired?”
“Oh, yeah. Not just fired, but told in a not-so-nice way to act like I never existed and leave Ryker the hell alone.”
“Damn,” Elias says as he leans back, taking me right along with him. “What are you going to do?”
I scoff. “There’s not much I can do. I doubt I’ll ever be able to be a therapist again, now that my business is out there, and I’m sure Mack ensured I’ll never be able to work as one again.”
“ Fuck .” Elias tightens his arm around me, seeping that warmth right through to my bones, and he kisses the top of my head. “If there’s anyone who can figure this mess out, it’s you.”
At least someone believes in me.
***
After going through the story once again with my mother, since I promised her I would over a cup of tea, I’m mentally and physically exhausted. Crying has never drained me more than it did today, and it feels as though there’s still this large weight pulling me under another fit of tears that I don’t know if I could handle.
I press a quick kiss to her cheek, claim I need a nap, and then quickly make my way upstairs and into what used to be my bedroom when I lived here. It’s not as exciting as it used to be when I was younger, no longer eliciting the giddiness I’d normally get over the bare-chested celebrities taped above my bed.
Why didn’t she ever get rid of things here?
I shiver at the reminder of my younger and naive self but relax into the mattress with a heavy sigh. Even with sleep threatening me, I still find the nerve to pull my phone out and go to my contacts, where I put Ryker’s name.
I quickly scroll down to his name before I chicken out and decide against contacting him – it will only make me feel better if I get answers from him. I need to know if he would’ve watched me walk out or fought to keep me around instead.
I’m not sure why I need to know that since it could only make the heartbreak feel ten times worse, but I do, and I’m not going to try rationalizing it with myself.
Getting a response from him would’ve been the better outcome.
Not an automatic response back saying that my message couldn’t be delivered. To make matters worse, I click the call button, and I’m immediately hit by an automated female voice letting me know that the number is no longer in service.
I’ll never be able to talk to him again… and there goes even more of my fragile heart.