Drive(102)

And then reality came crashing down around us.

He ripped his hands away from me, accusation clear in his features, all the warmth leaving him. Incredulous, he stared at me before he shook his head. “I should have known.” His voice cut me a thousand times over when he spoke again. “The funny thing is, I never felt you leave me,” he said with a voice full of irony. “I never felt you leave me, Stella.”

I was gasping at the loss of him, grasping again for the man I missed as he slipped through my fingers. “Reid—”

“Reid,” Ben repeated behind me. “Hey, Stella.” I looked to see Ben eye me wearily. Apparently, I was a sore subject when it came to the Sergeants. “They’re rioting man,” he said, looking between us and reading the tension before he shook his head and walked away.

I couldn’t say anything. I was too far gone. Doused in gasoline with no match in sight, the aching, the longing, and the burning all there. I looked to Reid, who took a retreating step back from me. “Maybe you were never there.”

“Oh, I was there,” I assured him, taking a step forward as he put up his hand, a wall between us. “I was there, Reid. And I felt every goddamned thing.”

“You sure?” he said, eyeing me spitefully as he glanced at my hand like it disgusted him. “Because I’m pretty sure the girl I fell in love with is lost.”

“Reid—”

“Better get on home now, Stella,” he said, his eyes glowing green and piercing me. “Your future husband awaits.”

Nate. I hung my head as I thought of the man waiting out in the bar for me with my promise of forever. I wiped my face of the debris and looked up at Reid, who was as inconsolable in his anger as I was in my aching.

One song. One fucking song.

Dread coursed through me as I realized within the seconds of that song I had lost them both.

As I stared at the man in front of me, all I could do was wait for the inevitable.

“I wish we would have never happened.”

I gasped at his cruelty.

“I swear to God I do. Because at least broke and alone I wouldn’t know what it felt like to lose this,” he muttered before he began to brush past me and stopped when we were a shoulder-width apart. I managed to look him in the eyes. There I saw his decision before he spoke it. “I’m done waiting.”





Poison & Wine

The Civil Wars



I walked through our condo door, both relieved and terrified to see Nate’s Tahoe in the drive. He left me at the club, and I had no idea what he saw, but I knew I was headed into a second living hell. I noted the eerie quiet of the house. And then I heard his voice. Reid’s voice.

Pulse racing, I walked into the living room to see the interview I’d done with the Sergeants months ago playing on Nate’s laptop on the coffee table. He was hunched over in front of it and turned the volume up when I directed some questions to Reid.

“For the most part, you’ve stayed tight-lipped about your personal life. Is there anything you want your fans to know?”

Reid looked directly at me. “I like to keep my private life, private.”

I could see my fake smile on the screen from the edge of the living room.

“You do realize that makes you more of a mystery, and some women find that appealing.”

“I don’t think about it, or the attention,” he said, blowing out smoke, his eyes intent on mine. He was so obvious.

“Any addictions, skeletons, Reid Crowne?”

“I kicked all my bad habits a few years ago. I still dance with my skeletons and tuck them in bed at night. They don’t talk much,” he said with a straight face.

I remembered sitting in that room, tension swirling in the air between us. As an afterthought, Reid pulled on his cigarette. “Addictions are dangerous,” he said pointedly, his eyes covering me in want. “I know what’s good for me.”

Nate paused the interview and sat back, his head in his hands, rubbing furiously.

“I always wondered why you didn’t air that podcast. I’m such a fucking idiot. I pushed you right into him, didn’t I?

“No,” I choked out.

“I was so intent on the story, I didn’t read between the lines. You were scared that day. You didn’t want to do it, and I pushed you. I fed you to him.”

“Nate.”

His eyes met mine. They were bloodshot. He’d been drinking. “You let go of my hand. The minute he started to sing, you let go of my hand.” I felt the rip in his heart. The betrayal.

“I’m sorry. Nate, please believe I didn’t realize I would react like that. I love you.”

“Give it up, Stella! He knows you love him. Fuck, I feel sick,” he said as he paled. “He’s a goddamn rock star and you didn’t think to tell me anything?”

“He wasn’t when I met him.”

“God, it just dawned on me. He’s the waiter. Isn’t he? The one with the broken arm. You were with Reid fucking Crowne before me. It was him.” His voice was filled with dread.

I nodded slowly.

He stood and walked over to me. “So, did you go with him tonight? Is it my turn now?” His eyes glittered with anger and disgust. “No thanks.” He pushed past me to our bedroom.