Page 47 of Homecoming

I was done.

She wouldn’t leave?

Then I would.

I turned to the door, fully intent on walking away, when she called, “No. Stay. You can’t go out there, they’ll eat you alive.”

I turned and looked at her. She was rushing around, collecting some of her things.

“I’ll go. If you want me to, I’ll go.”

I wanted to stay cold. I couldn’t. I was watching the woman I loved leaving my life.

She had betrayed me, and I still wanted her to stay with me. To love me.

How fucked up was that?

As she walked past me, I almost reached out and stopped her. I didn’t, though.

There was nothing to be done. I couldn’t get over that.

I felt an emotion I hadn’t felt since I was a kid. Self-pity.

And as she slammed the door behind her, I flinched, the feeling intensifying.

Self pity resulted in failure. That was not an option for me. I’d never let myself go down that road before in my whole adult life. But, watching her walk away, I didn’t have the strength to fight it anymore. And I wallowed in it. Without her, nothing mattered. She had become my whole world, but this time, she was the one walking away and leaving me behind.

“Fuck,” I whispered in a quiet room.

With nothing else to do, I got on my phone to try and get the situation with the press under control.

Chapter Twelve

Ian

“Hey man. You drinking by yourself?” Colton asked as he sat next to me on the bar stool.

I nodded, confirming the obvious.

It was late, I should have been in bed but I knew the sleep would evade me

The past week was full of running around, trying to contain the damage made. It was out of my hands, now. All I could do was wait and hope that I wouldn’t lose my seat. And wallow in the fact that Lola was gone, because I’d thrown her out.

The more I thought about it, the more I regretted it.

There was a niggling feeling deep in my gut, I got it all wrong.

Remembering the look in her eyes as I hurled my accusations at her gutted me.

For the hundredth time, I wondered if I was wrong, if Lola didn’t sell me out after all.

But, there was no one else who could have done it.

Colton signaled the bartender for a drink.

“Just needed some time to think,” I muttered, raising the beer up and taking a swig.

“What’s on your mind?” he asked.