Total pages in book: 148
Estimated words: 135517 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 678(@200wpm)___ 542(@250wpm)___ 452(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 135517 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 678(@200wpm)___ 542(@250wpm)___ 452(@300wpm)
If Sydney hadn’t been guiding me, I doubt I would’ve made it back in one piece because I don’t remember my feet touching the ground, and I never lifted my head up to see where I was going. Tears were the only thing I saw as they filled my eyes before running down my cheeks. I thought I was done with this; I really did.
She hustled me onto the boat and below deck as soon as we reached, which was a good thing because I was close to breaking point. On the walk here, when I wasn’t freaking out, I’d been thinking in that short space of time of all the things I should’ve done differently instead of freezing at the sight of him.
I took it easy on myself and admitted that there were too many emotions running through me at the time for anything but the result I gave, and besides, I hadn’t been prepared. Maybe I’d finally conjured him somehow with all the hidden thoughts I still can’t get rid of. No one ever tells you that it can take close to forever to forget someone, even long after you’ve convinced yourself that you are over them.
I hadn’t seen him face to face since the award show, where I sang on the stage in front of him. The press had had a field day with his response back then, something that I’d done my best to ignore, even though it was obvious that he’d been affected. As far as I was concerned, he was already married to someone else, so what did it matter if he wore a look of guilt and unease and looked at me with soulful eyes?
All that did was cause another uproar that I’d wanted no part of. There were a million different angles of his face that night as if all the cameras in the building were on him, and his reaction to seeing me and hearing my song had been captured for posterity and all the world to see.
There was new speculation about his marriage and our relationship, and the questions had started all over again. Something new and shiny came along not long after, and the paparazzi moved onto that, leaving me alone again, but the fans were like a dog with a bone, even mine.
My fans, who had torn him and his wife to shreds until I begged them to stop, had once again started building castles in the sky with the two of us playing the main roles in whatever fucked up play they had running in their heads. At least they weren’t calling for him and his wife’s blood any longer, so a win is a win, I guess.
I’d heard bits and pieces about him being missing in the last few weeks and have tried my best not to care; easier said than done. But still, it was no longer my problem. The fact that my heart still hasn’t let go is neither here nor there.
The heart will always want what it wants, but there’s a flip side to that coin. The heart is deceitful above all else, and that bitch is the first to give out when shit hits the fan. She’s like a mischievous little sister who starts shit with someone else, then run away or hides behind you when things get real. So, my heart can want whatever the hell she wants, but I’m not playing that game.
Life had already kicked my ass but good the last time. That bitch had used both her legs and arms to take me out. I am not going back for more of that shit. So, my heart and other parts of me that were going pitter-patter could calm the f*ck down.
Things have finally been looking up for me. I have a better handle on things now, especially where my mental health is concerned, and I’d only be doing a disservice to myself, not to mention to all the people who’d worked so hard these last five years to get me back on my feet if I allowed myself to be sucked back into anything to do with Ryder Sumner again.
But damn, if it doesn’t hurt like the first time all over again, and I was right back where I started. Why have I become so weak? And why is it always him? Nothing else in life, no disappointment in my career, no other friendship or relationship has the power to bring me down the way ours did.
But why the fuck now? Why now, when I had finally been able to put the past behind me? When I was ready to move on and live again. I’d had so many plans. How could just seeing him like that for all of a few seconds cause me to go all the way back to the back of the line?