Neon Dreams: Loving Dallas Part 19

"Two?"

Jase turns his attention to his phone and when he holds it up I think it's my cue to leave him the h.e.l.l alone to wallow. A gorgeous auburn-haired little girl with startling green eyes and angelic curls smiles into the camera. She can't be more than three or four and she's holding up tiny hands covered in finger paint.

"That's an old picture, but that's my McKenna," he says softly. "I call her Mac. She'll turn thirteen soon." There is reverence in his voice and it hits me hard in my chest.

My hand lifts to my mouth and inexplicable tears fill my eyes. "G.o.d. Sorry. I don't know what's wrong with me. She's beautiful."

He pulls up a more recent picture of a smirking twelve-year-old girl who looks a lot like him. A tear escapes my left eye, then one from my right follows and I feel like a complete jacka.s.s. First of all, it was my job to research Wade and all of his history so that I could make sure this tour was the right opportunity for Midnight Bay. Second, he's Jase freaking Wade. How does no one know he has a wife, well, ex-wife, and a kid? Third, why the h.e.l.l am I crying?

If Jase notices my emotional breakdown, he's gentleman enough to pretend he doesn't.

"I wanted joint custody, or scheduled visitation at least, but Aubrey fought me hard. I had the expensive lawyers but she had all the proof that she is Mac's sole caretaker. There was no denying that the life I lead isn't a great place for a kid. She won't even let me pay for anything and that's the whole reason I work so d.a.m.n hard. So that Mac can have whatever her heart desires. Oh, hey, look at this one. Doesn't she look like a superstar?"

He scrolls to another picture and I am barely in one piece at this point. McKenna is wearing a leotard and tights, standing in what I think is first position.

"She's beautiful, Jase."

"Right?" He shakes his head. "I just wanted . . . d.a.m.n it." Now his eyes are beginning to water.

"We are one h.e.l.l of a pair of party animals."

He puts his phone away and shakes his head. "Sorry."

"Hey, listen. I won't say anything. This is your personal business and no one else's."

"The only people that care about that part of my life are the vultures anyway." Jase looks like a man with the weight of the world on his shoulders.

I wish I knew how to comfort him, but there isn't a go-to response for situations like this one.

Turning around, he faces the party and leans back on the railing in a way that makes me dizzy. If I looked over the banister right now I'd likely puke all over the people below.

"You know, when this all started, moving to Nashville, cutting a demo, signing with a label, it was all for them. For my girls."

"You have another daughter?"

He shakes his head. "I mean Mac and her mom." He swallows hard, his Adam's apple bobbing in his throat. "Aubrey," he says softly. "We were crazy in love. She stood by me through everything . . . and we had some hard f.u.c.king times, you know? Bank repo'd my truck. Nearly lost our house. And then . . ."

I hold my breath in antic.i.p.ation of having my heart further broken on his behalf. I don't know when I became so vulnerable to everyone else's pain but I'm an oversensitive mess lately.

"My career took off. It got bigger than me. Bigger than us. The things I had to do to really make it here-the demands and the schedule and building a brand and a fan base-it didn't leave any room in my life for them. And I just let it happen. I told myself there would be time to fix it later. That once I was on top of my game and killing it on the charts, we'd figure it out."

I'm quiet because I don't know what to say and because I get it now. What he's trying to tell me. I'm sacrificing everything for a "one day" that might never come.

"I'll stop boring you with my bulls.h.i.t. It's a great party, Robyn. I don't say it enough, but I appreciate all of your hard work."

He gazes at the crowd through the gla.s.s doors with a look of detached amus.e.m.e.nt on his face.

"You're not boring me," I a.s.sure him. "I was just thinking."

"About?"

"About whether or not it's worth it," I answer quietly.

When he doesn't speak, I glance over to see him looking at his phone again.

"It isn't," he says evenly.

A waiter steps over and offers us our choice of champagne in flutes or highball gla.s.ses of bourbon and another is close behind with chocolate-covered cherries on the music note sticks I ordered.

I skip the booze and take a few of the cherries. Jase lifts the squat gla.s.s full of amber liquid to his lips while I place the dessert in my mouth. Something about the combination of bittersweet dark chocolate and the sickly sour cherry hits me wrong and I spit it out over the balcony.

"Oh my G.o.d," I say once I realize what I've done. "I cannot believe I just did that."

And I sincerely hope my half-chewed cherry didn't land in anyone's hair.

Jase laughs at me. "And here I thought you were some cla.s.sy broad. You could enter a chewing tobacco spitting contest and give some boys I know a serious run for their money."

"I'll add that to my resume." I wrap the remaining cherries in my c.o.c.ktail napkin. "I usually love those. But lately chocolate has been making my stomach turn. And I need to go see someone about those cherries. I think they might be rotten."

Jase gives me some intense side-eye. "I had some earlier. Tasted fine to me."

"Well, that batch had to be bad. They even smelled weird."

"You think so?" He's still scrutinizing me as if I am an alien life-form to be studied beneath a microscope. "You know, when Aubrey was pregnant with Mac, she couldn't stand the smell of oranges. It was the d.a.m.nedest thing. She used to love them. Then she got pregnant and said they smelled like kitchen cleaner and I had to keep her out of the produce section for fear she'd get a whiff and puke all over aisle five. We couldn't even keep OJ in the house anymore."

My mouth gapes open. What the h.e.l.l does my spitting out a rancid rotten cherry have to do with his wife's pregnancy and aversion to- I feel as if my head is detaching from my body and floating up into the sky like a wayward balloon.

I don't want it to be true but it's entirely possible. I know it is. I knew the day I stood in my bathroom realizing I had two more birth control pills than I should have had after getting home from weeks of traveling for work. After having unprotected s.e.x with Dallas. More than once.

I doubled up my next two doses but then I googled that and saw that it wasn't necessarily effective or even a good idea.

Likely noting my distress, Jase takes my arm much more gently than he did when he almost knocked me over. "I think you've had enough fun for one evening, darlin'. I'm going to call us both a cab so we can get-"

"No. I'm fine. It's just this stomach bug. I need to get back inside. Excuse me."

Without another word, I stride quickly away from him and toward the throng of people flowing in and out of the ballroom.

Halfway across the room, I run smack into a couch where Dallas is sitting surrounded by executives and half-dressed women snapping pictures with him. A bottle blonde in a sparkly blue dress is in his lap. She looks comfortable. Like she's been there awhile.

The small amount of lunch I've managed to keep down rises in my throat and I have to get to the ladies' room or risk covering the entire couch and its occupants in puke.

On second thought . . . no. I'm better than that. I clench my jaw and try to swallow the excess saliva filling my mouth.

"Robyn, hey. There you are. You did an amazing job with the-"

I hold a hand up and shake my head. I can't talk to whoever is trying to get my attention. Dallas looks up when they call my name but I avert my gaze.

I can't do this right now.

All I can hear is Jase Wade in my head telling me about his pregnant wife as I run through the crowd, elbowing people out of my way in hopes that I make it to the bathroom in time.

I didn't even eat that much today. Apparently my stomach decided to hang on to a week's worth of meals to toss into the toilet.

Leaning against the side wall of the bathroom stall, I place a trembling hand to my forehead.

My head pounds and my throat is raw, but that's not what's concerning me the most. Jase's words play over and over.

Then Dallas's question at my apartment.

"Are you late?"

I kept telling myself it's the stress. The traveling.

It isn't the first time I'd skipped a period or two. But I've never felt like this before. Weak. Drained. Constantly nauseated and repulsed by smells that I barely even noticed before.

For a fleeting second, I wonder if maybe it's something else. Cancer runs in my family on my mom's side. Jesus Christ. If my brain is trying to reconcile this by rea.s.suring me that it could be a fatal disease instead, I am even more screwed up than I thought.

Stepping out of the stall, I see one of the girls from Dallas's estrogen-filled entourage heading into the stall beside me. I ignore her and turn on the sink in front of me. Rinsing my mouth and checking my hair for puke, I catch a glimpse of my ashen skin in the mirror.

My face looks gaunt, the skin beneath my eyes sallow and puffy.

If I get fired for blowing off my responsibilities at this party I have a promising career as a corpse on any crime show that will have me.

My purse is checked in the coatroom so I can't really do anything about my horrifying appearance except splash some cold water on my face and dab at my smudged eye makeup with a paper towel.

"It reeks in here. Don't you work here? Can't you do something about that?"

Dallas's groupie has joined me at the sink. Oh goody.

"Yeah I'll get right on that."

"Oh, and there are no more of the little blue shots. They're so good. You might want to get on the waiters to send more of those around."

"Thanks for the tip."

She begins adding more black eyeliner to already overly lined eyes. I silently hope her hand slips and she stabs herself right in the retina.

I frown at my own reflection. First I cry all over Wade's tragic turmoil, then I fantasize about gouging some random chick in the eye. I am so not this person.

Am I?

I have to get out of here.

After drying my hands briefly, I shove the door open.

"Hey." Dallas stands there as if he's waiting for someone.

"Hi." I narrow my eyes because I don't know if it's me he's out here for or the girl coming out behind me.

When she winks at him on her way by and he doesn't so much as glance in her direction, I have my answer. But I can't do this with him. Not here.

His b.u.t.ton-up dress shirt is so dark blue it looks black and seeing him in perfectly tailored charcoal-colored dress pants is confusing. Dallas is flannel and denim for the most part. Hoodies and backward ball caps. Maybe I'm still confusing him with someone that I used to know instead of who he is now. Maybe I don't know him at all anymore.

He takes a long pull from his beer bottle, the light glinting off his shiny black and silver watch, before stepping into my path. "Can we talk, please?"

I shake my head. "Pa.s.s. You need to get back to your groupies and I have to find my boss."

"Hey." His fingers are warm beneath my chin. "What's going on? You look like h.e.l.l."

"Thanks. So much for chivalry, huh?" I jerk my chin out of his hand and turn away from his searching gaze. "Feel free to return to your non-h.e.l.lish-looking fans now."

"Wait a second. That's not what I meant. Robyn?"

I can hear him and I can feel him close behind me in the crowd but I keep going, walking toward the coat-check room without acknowledging anyone as I weave through a sea of overly perfumed bodies. My stomach threatens to turn on me again and I decide to text Katie instead of trying to find her or Mr. Martin to let them know I'm not feeling well.

No one is manning the coatroom so I walk in and begin searching for my black leather jacket and matching bag.

The door clicks shut from across the room, where Dallas stands glaring at me.

"You want to tell me what that was about?"

"I have no idea what you're talking about." I return to shuffling through coats on the rack.

"Well, you were busy having a moment with Wade out on the balcony so I mingled like you told me to do. After which you run by shooting me a death glare that should've killed me on the spot. Then you come out of the ladies' room looking like you're recovering from a three-day drinking binge. Now you're behaving as if speaking to me rationally is beyond your limits of capability. So I'll ask you again." Dallas comes closer, plucking my jacket from a rack and holding it open for me. "What the h.e.l.l was that about?"

"I'm just stressed. And tired. This party was a lot of work. But I'm fine now."

"Well, I'm glad. Because we need to talk."

"Can we talk later? I'm beat and I'm just going to-"

"Just going to what, Robyn? Lie to me? Keep something huge from me, like, oh, I don't know, your mom having f.u.c.king cancer? Because let me tell you, finding out something like that just before a show wasn't distracting at all."

I close my eyes to shield myself from his wrath.

Shoving my own ire down deep, I turn and let him help me with my jacket. Dallas can't let it go at that, though. He lifts my hair gently from beneath my collar and lays it over my right shoulder, giving him full access to the left side of my neck. He places a soft kiss on it and my traitorous body shivers.

"I'm not going to pretend I'm not angry, but seeing you all sick and fragile is softening my resolve to yell at you. Come back to my hotel room tonight. Stay with me. I missed you and we need to talk about this. About that summer."

It's tempting. I feel like death walking, and seeing that girl on his lap opened old wounds I'd been holding closed with all my might. But the thought of slipping so easily into the warmth of him, letting him hold me and make it all better, is enticing.

This must be similar to how drug addicts feel. I know it's wrong. I know it will only cause more problems. I know exactly how much it will hurt the next time I have to see women groping him at a publicity event. But so help me, I am still tempted to crawl through the valley of the shadow of heartbreak. Naked.

I toss up a silent prayer for strength and step away from him. "There's nothing to talk about. She was sick so I stayed home to take care of her. I didn't want you to cancel any of your shows so I kept it to myself. Besides, I think I've got the stomach flu. I'm sure you can find plenty of willing bed-buddy candidates for the evening."

"Maybe I would've wanted to be there for you, Robyn. You didn't even give me a f.u.c.king chance." Dallas snorts out a noise of frustration. "Don't blow this off, like you actually give a s.h.i.t about a bunch of girls hanging around the next big thing for all of five minutes until the next shiny new guy comes along? Come on. I thought you knew better by now. You're the one that told me to play the part and keep what was going on with you and me under wraps. Remember?"

"The one on your lap looked dedicated. She seemed willing to hang around a lot longer than five minutes."