Chapter 20
Chapter Twenty
Forest had arranged for a driver to meet them at the airport, and they traveled to Skye’s brownstone in a black limousine.
She would have taken a cab, but Forest had refused.
While he’d said he didn’t like spending their hard-earned cash, he certainly had little difficulty with splurging on the finer things in life.
Maybe she should have Forest take care of retrieving her stuff from Bob’s cabin. Ash could take care of his Jeep.
As they rounded the block to her brownstone, a crowd overflowed the sidewalk in front of her home, spilling onto the street. Lights flashed as people lifted cameras over the crowd and snapped photos of the car.
“What the hell?” She leaned forward and peered out the window. Her heart caught in her throat.
“Get down, Skye,” Forest said in a rumbly baritone. He yanked on her shoulder, trying to drag her away from the window. Then, he flinched when he realized what he’d done.
A man with a camera shoved a lens against the blacked-out window as the car rolled to a stop. The flash caught her in the eyes, blinding her. Her name was called out over and over again.
“Fuck,” Forest said.
Flash after flash flickered as the crowd mobbed them.
“Don’t worry; I can get you inside.” Forest huffed a laugh, but his lower lip trembled. “Wrap your arm around me and stick to my side. I’ll get a security team over here to help once we’re inside.”
She stared at her brother, stunned. He wanted her to touch him? From the car to the front door was well over twenty feet. Would he last that long?
“Bean, we don’t have to stay. We can go to a hotel.”
“It’s late, and all your stuff for work is in there, right?”
She nodded.
“I’m a fucking giant. Who better to protect you?”
“But—”
“I’ve been facing a lot of my fears lately. Someday, I’d like to be able to give you a hug without breaking into a cold sweat or…you know. Let’s start now.”
It wasn’t the cold sweats she was worried about. It was the meltdown that was sure to follow. This was a horrible idea.
“Okay, how do you want to do this?”
“I’ll go first.” His voice shook with rising anxiety, but he seemed determined to get her inside. “Hold on to my belt, and don’t let go. They shouldn’t touch you if they obey the law. I’ll shove right on through those bastards. But have your keys ready.”
She fished through her backpack and lifted her keys into the air. “Got them.”
“Okay.” He signaled to the driver. “Go.”
As the driver opened the door, a cacophony of noise descended on them.
Forest used his body to form a blockade while she got out of the car.
She wrapped an arm around his waist, threading her fingers through his belt loop.
As she pressed against him, his entire body stiffened, and his breathing hitched.
Tremors vibrated through the fabric of his shirt as he struggled to control his breathing.
Her physical closeness overwhelmed him, and she tried to pull away, but he clamped a hand over hers, pulling her forward.
A voice called out from behind them, “When’s the baby due?”
Her head whipped up. “What?”
Forest growled, “Ignore them. Don’t respond.” With that, he tucked her under his arm, increasing their physical contact.
Cameras were thrust in her face, and light flashed in her eyes.
Voices called out random questions.
“Is Blaze with you?”
“Is this the end of the band?”
“Is it true that Blaze was high when you were married? Was this a drunken binge?”
“How long have you been seeing each other?”
The questions bombarded her, a wall of chaos she couldn’t process. People pressed in close, screaming above their colleagues. Forest defended, pushing those too aggressive out of the way. He lifted and dragged her up the steps when she became overwhelmed.
Skye’s heart hammered, her chest constricting with fear.
“Is it true you tricked Blaze into marrying you?”
“Is this a publicity stunt for the upcoming album release?”
“Did you marry him for his money?”
“Skye, where’s the fucking key?” Forest shook her, his breathing little more than ragged gasps.
Her head spun from the endless questions.
Forest ripped the keys from her hand and fumbled at the lock. Moments later, the door creaked open, and he thrust her inside, pushing her away from him. She stumbled into the foyer as he slammed the door shut.
“Where’s the fucking light?” His voice was hoarse and desperate.
“What?”
“The light!” he screamed. “Where’s the fucking light?”
She found the light switch and flicked it on.
Forest scanned the narrow hallway. His entire body shook. His complexion was flushed, his pupils dilated. He struggled to take a breath, and then he staggered down the hall, yanking off his shirt and pulling at the catch of his jeans.
“Bean?”
He held a hand out. “Don’t come near me. Don’t you fucking come close.”
He kicked off his shoes, but she saw the damage those few moments of physical contact had done.
Forest disappeared, desperate, responding to a stimulus conditioned into him by the demon of their combined past. A door slammed shut down the guest hallway, and an agonized moan followed.
She took in a shuddering breath. How far back had those few minutes sent her brother on his road to recovery?
There was a reason they didn’t touch. She made a beeline for her liquor supply where she uncorked every bottle of wine and poured it down the drain. Once Forest achieved the physical release he needed, he would come looking for a chemical outlet for his pain.
There were no drugs in her home, and she would be damned if he started drinking again because of her.
Not when he was so close to earning his sixty-day sobriety coin.
Not when he’d come to help with her problems. His body couldn’t avoid the conditioned response, and she knew his mind would struggle against the chains that bound him.
The next few days would test her brother’s sobriety, and if he failed, it would be all her fault.
The cops came by twice to move people off the front steps of Skye’s brownstone.
The officers introduced themselves, expressed their sympathy for the disturbance, and gave Skye their assurances that they had the crowd controlled.
After offering congratulations on her nuptials, they sheepishly asked for autographs from her husband.
She had saved one bottle of wine. Shielding Forest from the demon of his addiction had come at a hefty price—ten bottles down the drain. She poured a glass of chardonnay and stared at the shuttered windows.
Flashes of light flickered through the wood. Eager reporters would not give up on that one-in-a-million shot.
Already down one doctor due to maternity leave, Bob Manley couldn’t afford to lose her as well.
She had to work, but she couldn’t leave her beanpole alone.
Not in his fragile state. His compulsions and addictions were primed to explode with the emergence of a conditioned response that crippled him on many levels.
It was another horrific reminder of the torture inflicted upon a poor frightened boy and a helpless girl.
In the meantime, Forest needed to be constantly watched.
Ten p.m. already, and one glass down.
She would have arranged for the protective detail herself, but the contact info was locked in Forest’s phone.
There was one other person she knew in town who traveled with a team of security experts, people trained in how to deal with the mob outside.
The only question was whether Ash would accept her call.
Texting Ash instead of calling showed her weakness, but she didn’t trust herself to speak.
Her voice would crack and crumble as her heart fell to pieces.
As succinctly as possible, she laid out her problem.
There were paparazzi outside her house, and she asked if she could please borrow his bodyguard and one or two of his friends.
She hated asking for such a huge favor, but she needed someone large and strong enough to intimidate Forest—someone to babysit him and keep him from tumbling into a chemically induced fugue.
Sam would lose in a fight against her brother, but all he had to do was keep Forest inside and away from any mind-altering substances during her day shift.
Her phone vibrated within seconds of sending the text.
Help is on the way.
His message told her nothing about Ash’s state of mind. What was he feeling? Did he miss her? Had she hurt him? Did he understand the reasons behind why she’d left?
With a groan, she gave up on deciphering nonexistent clues in the simple text.
Her attention shifted to the hallway and the closed door of the guest room. Going to Forest would not ease his pain. Quite the opposite would happen, and she appreciated the sacrifice he’d made to keep her safe.
Her presence would exacerbate an already shitty situation. She’d give almost anything to sink into a simple brotherly hug and feel Forest’s love surround her within the strength of his arms, but that was not how their relationship worked.
She had a few minutes before Ash’s security team would arrive, so she went to her room and turned on the shower until the air thickened with billowy steam.
She washed quickly, removing two days of grime, and then sat on the tiles where she hugged her knees tight to her chest, watching the steam swirl.
While she loved medicine with a passion born from a need to help others, Forest couldn’t run their empire alone. She had obligations she could no longer ignore. But was she ready to step into such a daunting role?
The Elsbeth Beneficence Foundation funded several charitable organizations.
The Brenerkie Foster Care Initiative was their first. A fourteen-year-old girl named Ivy was a victim who had been placed into their charter foster care system.
The poised Rice University student Skye had met on the flight from LAX bore little resemblance to the young girl broken by abuse.