48. Calvin
CALVIN
“Shit. Wait,” I cry as Sienna disappears into the darkness.
Without a second glance at everything we carried out here, I take off after her.
She moves impressively fast, considering she can’t see where she’s going.
“Sienna,” I breathe when I catch up to her. “What are you doing?” I ask when I find her staring at her cell.
“Calling an Uber,” she snaps before turning away from me again.
“Darlin’, we’re hours from home.”
“I don’t care,” she cries. “I just need to get away from here. Away from you.”
All the air rushes from my lungs.
“No, please.”
“I’m not doing this, Calvin. I’m not…I can’t…”
She moves, and the silver light from the moon illuminates her face, reflecting in the tear tracks that run down her cheeks.
Pain slices through my chest.
“Can we just talk about this, please? Let me explain.”
“You’ve had your chance to talk about this. You’ve had months, and you’ve chosen not to. You’ve chosen to lie to me time and time again. Do you have any idea how that makes me feel? I thought…I thought we had…” My firsts curl at my sides as I battle with my need to reach for her. “I trusted you.”
I hang my head as the weight of just how badly I’ve fucked up presses down on me.
Sienna continues to stomp away from me, her rideshare app trying to find her a car.
“Just let me take you home,” I beg. The thought of her travelling home with a stranger for the next two hours doesn’t sit right with me.
“You’ve already done enough,” she hisses, but quickly groans when her app still fails to find her a driver. It’s Friday night. No one is going to want to commit to such a long trip.
“Sienna,” I snap, my patience getting the better of me. “Just get in the car.”
“Don’t tell me what to do,” she cries, spinning around to glare at me.
The look in her eyes fucking guts me.
Pain, confusion, betrayal all dance within them. All of them are my fault. I’m aware of that, and I fucking hate myself for it.
“You don’t want to talk to me right now, I understand that. But if you want to leave, I’ll be the one to take you back.”
“Calvin, I—”
“Please, Sienna. I’d never forgive myself if anything happened.”
Angrily, she wipes at her wet cheeks. “Too late. It already has.”
The victory I feel when she cancels her trip request doesn’t feel anywhere near as good as I’m sure it should.
“Fine,” she huffs, pushing her cell into her pocket. “I’m not talking to you, though. Just take me home.”
Knowing better than to push her, I agree, unlock the car, and watch as she climbs in.
“Fucking moron,” I mutter to myself as I march back toward where we’d set up camp and collect everything.
Less than ten minutes later, we’re back on the road. But any happiness or excitement from the drive up here has vanished. All that’s left is pain and regret.
Sienna keeps herself slightly turned away from me with her head in her cell, ignoring my entire existence. She doesn’t so much as glance over even once.
By the time we get back into the city, my chest is so tight it’s hard to breathe. I just know that she’s going to get out of this car and disappear into her apartment without giving me even a second of her time. It’s fair, I get it. But it fucking hurts.
No sooner do I pull the car to a stop in my parking spot than she has the door open and she’s climbing out.
“Sienna, wait, please,” I beg.
She freezes, and it gives me a little rush of hope that she might be willing to hear me out.
But then she shatters that by hissing, “Good night, Vinny,” and marching away, leaving nothing but the echo of the door slamming behind her.
“Fuck.” I groan, resting my head back and closing my eyes.
I fucked that up.
I really fucked that up.
It takes me the longest time to find the energy to get out of my car and make my way up to my apartment.
I also spend way too long standing in the elevator, my eyes moving between her floor and mine.
It would be so easy to chase after her and demand she talk to me.
But eventually, I manage to convince myself that that won’t help.
She needs time to process everything, and I owe her the time and space to be able to do that.
I just have to hope that once she has, she’s willing to hear me out.
Everything feels wrong as I walk into my apartment. While I tried to stay realistic about how she’d react to finding out who I am, deep down, I truly believed that I’d be walking through my front door with her by my side tonight.
I scan my tidy kitchen, my eyes lingering on a cupboard I spent way too much time inside after my injury. Over the last few weeks, I haven’t opened it once. But tonight…tonight, everything has changed again, and I only have myself to blame for fucking up the one good thing in my life right now.
The bottle of whiskey feels like an old friend as I wrap my fingers around the neck and take it to my bedroom.
After stripping out of my clothes, I fall into bed wearing only my boxers with the bottle for company.
I twist the top, and when the lid falls from my fingers, I ignore it and let it bounce across the floor. Something tells me I won’t be needing it tonight.
The first mouthful burns all the way down, but I welcome the discomfort. It’s the least I deserve.
I think about what Sienna is doing downstairs.
Did she also get straight into bed? Is she still crying?
It broke my fucking heart, seeing those tears on her cheeks. And it shattered all over again every time she lifted her hand and wiped her eyes on the way home.
But as much as I might want to take her pain away, I’m the stupid motherfucker who put it there. And other than explaining my reasons, which I’m not entirely sure she’ll understand now anyway, there’s nothing I can fucking do.
The thought of her crying in her bed alone makes me drink faster, bringing the freedom that comes with it closer.
Tomorrow is a new day. Maybe everything will be different. Maybe Sienna will wake up and be willing to hear me out.
Maybe…
I turn over and groan when I’m met with brightness.
With another grunt, I tug the sheets up higher, hiding my face from the morning sun.
My heart continues to ache from the events of the night before, but that’s not the only pain this morning, because my head is pounding.
I shift again, begging my body to get comfortable again so I can get a few more hours of sleep.
I just find a good spot when a loud bang has me sitting upright in bed, the sheets pooling at my waist.
“Sienna?” I slur, clearly still a little wasted.
But despite my hope that she might have somehow gotten inside my apartment, no one replies, and when I look down, I find last night’s empty bottle rolling away from my bed.
“Fuck.” I groan before falling back onto my mattress and closing my eyes again in an attempt to block out the sun.
Apparently, I failed to close my blinds last night, and the sun is punishing me this morning.
Rightly so.
Cracking one eye open, I glance at my nightstand in search of my cell to see if Sienna has messaged me. But it’s not there.
“Fucking hell.” I groan, forcing both eyes open before I begin searching the bed.
I eventually find it on the floor, with only two percent battery left.
My heart lurches with hope as I begin scrolling through my notifications.
It soon sinks again when I don’t find anything from her.
Ignoring everything else, I open our message thread and discover that I sent a message last night.
Calvin: I’m sorry. I should have told you. I know that. I was scared. You’re my girl, Sienna. You always have been. I love you.
“Fucking hell.” I groan, chastising my drunken self.
I mean, nothing I said is untrue. But she didn’t deserve to read it in a drunken message.
The worst part?
She’s read it. She’s read it, and she hasn’t responded.
Dropping my cell to my chest, I close my eyes again. I need to get up and take some painkillers, but before I can convince myself to move, my cell begins buzzing against my chest.
That stupid hope surges again, and I lift it to see Darcy’s name staring at me.
Swiping the screen, I lift it to my ear.
“Killer, where the fuck are you? We had a session scheduled for an hour ago.”
My stomach knots, the weight of letting him down pressing heavily on me.
“Shit. I’m sorry. I can be there in thirty minutes.”
When he doesn’t respond, I pull my cell from my ear and discover nothing but a black screen.
My grip on it tightens as I fight the urge to launch it across the room and watch it shatter against the wall.
Throwing the covers off, I swing my legs over the edge of the bed and sit up. My head swims, and I have to take a couple of deep breaths to settle my stomach before putting my cell on charge and getting to my feet.
I pee and brush my teeth before returning to my cell to send Darcy a message apologizing for missing our session and letting him know I’ll be there as fast as I can.
There’s every chance that he’ll be busy with others—I’m not the only player who’s out of action and needing extra work with the trainers right now. I have no doubt that I’m probably the only one selfish enough to waste Darcy’s precious time, though.
I’m still feeling sick when I step into the shower. I stand under the powerful jets of water with one hand resting on the tiles for support.
I don’t know what time I passed out last night, but it wasn’t early enough. If Darcy isn’t free for our session, it’s going to fucking kill me.
When I get out and check my cell, I hate myself even more.
Darcy: I’ll be here when you’re ready. Whatever you need.
“Fuck,” I bellow, instantly regretting it when it makes my head pound harder.
I need him to be an asshole to me. It’s what I deserve.
Twenty minutes later, I’m dressed and in the elevator.
Sienna’s floor taunts me, but she won’t be there. I have no doubt that she managed to get up on time to get to work this morning.
Pain slices through my chest, and I pull up our chat again. I’m not sure what I’m expecting—to find her typing, maybe? But nothing has changed. Instead, I scroll up a little and read through our most recent conversation.
As I hit the ground floor, I’ve loaded up my food delivery service, and I’m ordering her favorite coffee and sending it to the salon.
It won’t go anywhere close to making up for what I’ve done, but at least she’ll have to think about me when it arrives, even if all she does is hate me a little bit more.
I grab my own coffee and breakfast on the way to the arena, but the caffeine does very little to fix me, and when I walk into the trainers’ room ten minutes later, the state of me is confirmed when Darcy looks up and mutters, “Oh, fuck. Did it really go that badly?”