SWNOVELS Flawed Heart: Chapter 16
25 years old
Three months later…
I want to kill someone.
Not just anyone. Beckett Wilson and Riggs Mitchell, or Spyder, as he’s known in the entertainment world by his friends. It’s been three months since everything I thought I had known shattered in my hands. Amelia found the loophole, saving us from the contract. And I can still see Riggs and Beckett, each of them wrapped protectively around her. Shielding her from us, from me. I remember the way they looked at her, and worse, the way she smiled at them as if they were her world. The smile from my childhood when things were simple and happy. The one that saved me on many occasions. The smile I now dream of before waking up and then realizing she isn’t actually here. She isn’t mine.
Rationally, I know she has every right to move on, especially after all the hell I put her through so that she would end our marriage contract. I asked for it. I bullied her to do it. I’m not thinking rationally, though. Because now, all I can think about is her innocent hazel eyes, her strawberry lips and that long, pink hair that I want wrapped around my hand while I punish her for thinking she could move on. It doesn’t make sense. It’s not the script I’ve been giving since high school. The thoughts drive me crazy until I wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat and then I spend hours googling Beckett and Riggs.
I can’t talk to York about it. He’s been in his own seclusion of misery after the meeting. The whole situation hit him hard and the fact that Amelia wanted to pull away from him and their family name has greatly impacted the already-strained relationship between their grandfather and York. I think my best friend is second-guessing his family-run business approach, when his own sister is cutting him off.
Back then, we both knew that what we were doing to her was shitty. But we justified it. York was protecting his friend. And I was an asshole because I wanted to ruin my grandfather. In the end, we both destroyed the one person who had always been there for us.
Fuck, even at my most evil times, she still reached out on birthdays and holidays. I used to get mad at her for caring, when I was trying so hard to be her worst enemy. Then one day, it stopped. I can’t remember exactly when it changed, but I feel the emptiness she’s left in my life, especially now that I’ve stepped back from all the bullshit. I can see the life I have been living was empty. All I did was work and go home. Even when I had been with Carrigan I let her cling to me because I thought we were the same. Once I stepped back I could see the way we were hurting each other and the absolute misery we were living in. We fought all the time and if we weren’t we co-existed at most.
Carrigan and I both needed an escape and that became the basis for our whole relationship. A relationship I gave energy to for far longer than it deserved. I used it and rubbed it in Amelia’s face on purpose. I intentionally would kiss and grab Carrigan anytime Amelia was in our vicinity. Shitty move. Jackass of the year, I know, but it was part of the game plan. I thought my grandfather was out of his mind for creating a marriage contract, now I second-guess if it was the only nice thing he ever did for me. The rest of the time, he was an evil dictator, who turned his family against him, and almost ran his precious business into the ground. If he had lived to see the progress I’ve made, I have no doubt, he would have still found me lacking. I bet he’s rolling in his grave, laughing at me for letting Amelia walk away from me.
Seeing Amelia in that meeting, in her element, confident and taking charge, makes my chest tighten. She’s beautiful, and if I’m finally being honest, she always has been. I used to be so angry by the pure way she was able to live her life that I let it cloud my judgment of who she really is. I took her angry words and actions to heart and warped them in my own mind to prove a point. Only now can I see that she was young and fighting to have her place beside us. Even when we almost destroyed her, Amelia was still there, fighting. I pushed her away, and now I don’t know how to live without her in my life.
York is freaking out. And even now, he is standing in my office, threatening me again, and I just don’t give a fuck. He’s already cussed me out and we’ve come to blows a couple times in the past few months especially. He took my side back then and now he’s regretting that too. I regret everything. It’s to the point that I’ve literally looked for her everywhere on any type of social media account I can get access to. She’s a fucking ghost, so then I end up stalking her friend and roommate from college and then find roommates of hers from living abroad. It’s out of hand. Today, York caught me looking up information on her new company, Rosen Records, through his database.
“Zan, you’re my best friend, but you need to back the fuck away from my sister.” He stands with his hands on his hips, his jaw clenched.
“I can’t. I need to know everything,” I tell him, while flipping back to the screen on my computer that has flights to New Zealand.
“Don’t do this man,” York shakes his head, “you asked her to stop, and she did. I get you feel guilty right now, but everything she said to us in that meeting wasn’t meant to be hurtful. It’s meant to heal. We need to move on like she is.”
“Fuck that,” I laugh at him, “I can’t just move on. You knew how I was feeling before that meeting. I finally got my shit straight, and all I could think about was her. I tried calling and texting, but she isn’t answering.” She wants me to chase her, she wants my attention, and she’s about to get all of it.
“She changed her number.” York blows out a breath, his eyes looking to the ceiling.
“Excuse me?” I grit out, ready to kill my best friend right now.
“I didn’t know either, at first. I made a comment to my grandpa, and he confirmed it.” York shrugs, like it’s not a big deal. Like I haven’t threatened her that if she didn’t answer me, I was going to fly there. Hence, the flights pulled up on my desktop.
“York, you’re my family, but if you don’t give me some real answers right now, I’ll kill you right here in my office. Katie won’t like it very much because it will be messy, but it might be worth it.” I growl at him.
He shakes his head. “Jumping the security clearance to look at employee records of my company is one thing. You actually plan to jet halfway around the world, to do what?”
“Tell her I made a mistake. Or at the very least apologize.” I shrug.
“Give it some time, man.” York’s face drops. I can see the pain he’s wearing underneath. “Besides, we have some other matters to discuss right now.”
“I don’t really care about work right now, York—”
“My grandpa is sick. He doesn’t know that I know, but I happened to run into Dr. Mohammed last week. He asked about my grandfather’s condition.” York stuns me with the news.
“How sick?”
“I don’t know. He didn’t say. But obviously, enough for the doctor to be concerned. And I haven’t been able to tell Mia because she changed phone numbers.” He sighs heavily.
“I’m sure he’s fine,” I try to say, but York is already pacing. “Look, Arlo is a tough bastard, okay? If the doc wasn’t flagging you down for something dire, it’s probably not a huge thing.”
“Yeah, maybe. Still, I want to stop-in and check on him.” York points to my computer. “So you need to drop the obsession tonight and come with me. We should get some things finalized with the old man, so he can relax for a few days. You can stalk my sister later.”
I grunt. “If only it was that easy. Seriously, I know you don’t understand–”
“You’re right, I don’t. You said you didn’t love her. We hurt her.”
My head hangs down, my hand coming to the back of my neck. “I don’t know how to explain it. I just woke up and felt that something was missing. I don’t feel complete, and when I figured out why…it was those damn cookies, man. Then I thought about her for the first time in years, and I haven’t stopped since. Seeing her again didn’t help.”
York nods. “You’re right. I still don’t get it. But can we worry about it later? Give her some time. We’ll get her number and see if she even wants to talk, okay? Let it be her choice this time. There is a really good chance she may not forgive you. Or me for that matter.”
I know this. And it eats me up every day to the point my chest aches so badly I can barely breathe. I don’t know what I’ll say to her yet or how I’ll get her to trust me again. I just know if I miss this chance, I’ll regret it for the rest of my life.
I need her back.
I want Amelia Allister to be mine.