Avoiding Intimacy (Avoiding #2.5)(58)

“You walked out on him after all of that? Sweetheart, I’d do way worse!” he told her honestly. “If he’s going through the effort to f**k you over so thoroughly, he had it for you, and he had it bad. I’d go through hell and high water to make sure you were miserable without me.”

“Fuck!” she cried angrily. “Can’t you just f**king sympathize with me? Why do you have to be so logical?”

“Look, bitch, if you can’t take the heat, get out of the f**king kitchen!”

“Fine! I will!” she yelled through the phone.

“Whatever. You’ll come crawling back for more. I’m the only man you ever keep coming back to.”

She felt that like a slap to the face. She needed to remind herself never to fight with Frederick again. He fought dirty, and she was too sensitive right now. What he was saying hurt! And all she wanted to do was stop feeling.

“Just wait until you see what I do to my apartment,” she growled into the phone.

“Find another designer to clean up your mess!” he snapped, the double meaning clear in his words. He hung up before she could get the last word in.

Of all the things she had been expecting from Frederick, anger and judgment were not among them.

Without him, whom else could she talk to about this? How could she make them understand that she had lost something special to her…something that had really mattered to her? People didn’t think anything mattered to her besides drinking and random hook-ups. How could she prove them wrong now? The industry wouldn’t let her stick with modeling, and it would all look like just another thing that Chyna quickly got tired of.

She sat back on the bench, her anger seeping out of her like sand through a sieve. There was one person. One person who would understand what she had given up to get to where she was in modeling.

One person who would understand what she was losing by giving it up.

Her hands were trembling as suspense stole her stomach. This shouldn’t be so difficult. She used to talk to him every day.

She waited for the line to click over to voicemail. He wasn’t going to answer.

Just another disappointment . She heard him clearing his voice before anything else. It was so familiar that she nearly smiled.

“Hey,” he muttered into the phone.

“Now really isn’t a good time. Can I call you back?”

She sighed. “Can we talk?”

“I…uh, do you…think that’s a good idea? We kind of…” he trailed off.

“Please,” she begged. “I’m not asking for much, just some of your time.”

He paused, releasing a sigh that said he was going to give in. “When you didn’t call after you got back, I thought it was over,” he said softly.

“Isn’t that what you want?” she asked, her desperation palpable.

“How could you think I wanted that?”

“You ended it.”

“You were leaving.”

She sighed, thinking about everything that had happened since she left New York. A lot of it was pretty f**ked-up, but a lot of it wasn’t. She loved modeling.

Wasn’t it better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all ? Even if it hurt like hell?

“I’m glad I did,” she finally responded softly, “but not that I lost you in the process.”

There . She had admitted it.

CHAPTER 12

PRESENT

Chyna watched Alexa walk away from her town car toward the airport. After her conversation with Adam earlier, she had felt a lot better about what had happened to her. She had wanted to tell Alexa about what had happened with Marco, Cassandra, Frederick—with all of them— but she had so much else to deal with right now.

Going to this wedding was a terrible idea, and as much as Chyna had tried to talk her out of it, she couldn’t reason with Alexa. If Chyna had unloaded all of her problems on Alexa today, that would have been really bad for her friend. Chyna wanted to tell her, but timing was key. It could wait until she got back. It was just one week.

Plus, Alexa was hiding things from her anyway. She wouldn’t tell her whom she had been secretly seeing. She thought she was so clever, but Chyna saw it all over her that she was into someone new.

Eventually, she would get it out of her, but perhaps, that was a conversation for later as well. After that godforsaken wedding.

Adam would be off work soon, and he had promised to come over to talk. She was picking up Chinese food, his favorite take-out. It felt really normal, and she kind of liked it. She needed some normal in her life after the whirlwind that had taken over.

Carl drove her back to her place, and a weight seemed to settle on her shoulders as she took the elevator to the top floor.

She’d had to keep it together for Alexa, but she couldn’t keep the act up. What had happened was eating away at her slowly but surely.

She had officially hit rock bottom.

Before this, she had never really known what it felt like. She had lost Adam of her own volition. Hope still sprung up between them, but she didn’t know what would happen once they started talking.

Would the old feelings blossom again?

Or, would he realize what she had known all along—that she wasn’t good enough for him? It seemed fitting, considering everything else.

She had lost Marco. She had lost the Corsa contract. She had lost modeling all together. Frederick was mad at her, not that she thought that would last.