And the Sweet (Addiction Series Book 2) Read Free Page B

good life.” She’s walking faster now, but she’s shorter than me by a few inches and my stride is wider. I catch up to her easily wanting to reach out and take her arm but knowing she’ll probably try to punch me if I do.
    “Please, I’ve been so worried about,” I begin again, coming right out with it. “I heard you were drinking, that people saw you completely hammered and I didn’t want to believe it. I had to find you. Make sure you were okay.”
    She stops and looks up at me. I can’t identify the myriad of emotions that pass over her face. But the scoff she gives is obvious. “Worried about me? That’s funny. Even more funny is not wanting to believe something you heard about me. Too bad that’s too little too late, Chace.”
    “Jesus Christ, Celia, please?” I beg, my voice cracking as my desperation makes itself known. “I’m sorry. Fuck, I’m so sorry.”
    I think I have her, that maybe she’ll stop and listen, but all she does is throw up a hand as a taxi pulls up to the curb. I hadn’t even heard it coming.
    “What do you want from me?” she asks as she pushes Melody into the waiting cab with quiet promise to explain. “You heard things about me? Good for you. Not the first time right? But just so you can stop feeling obligated to look out for me, assuage you of my charge; I’m fine. Perfectly fucking fine.” I can see she’s trying not to cry and I want so badly to wrap her in my arms. “I’ll make sure to keep out of the way of anyone you may know so you won’t have to hear any more stories about me. I’m sorry for being a burden on you once again. Goodbye, Chace.”
    She jumps in the cab and the yellow car peals away with a squeal of the wheels. I can’t chase after her, I wouldn’t even be able to find her now that she’s in a car and the street is empty once more. If it wasn’t for the smell of exhaust, it would almost be like she’d never even been here.
    My hands find my hair, longer than I’ve ever had it in all my life, and I pull. Hard. Tears come to my eyes and I’m pretty sure it has nothing to do with the force gripping the strands of dirty blond. I have no idea what to do now. No idea, once more, where to look or how to act.
    She walked away. Again.
    And those things she’d said…fuck, they lance right through me. I can’t breathe. I feel like I might be having an anxiety attack. My chest is constricting, my vision blurry. I drop to my knees as I try to get my breath back. I’m so lost; so completely void of any idea of what I should do or even how.
    Realizing I can’t stay on the corner like this, knowing someone has probably seen my freak out and is either calling the cops or an ambulance, I stagger to my feet and head toward the train station.
    By the time I get home, I’m frozen, though I don’t know if the temperature dropped or if I’m so dejected my body has turned cold. The only thing I do know is I have to find a way to at least get Cecelia to speak to me, to truly talk to me. Because tonight didn’t prove that she’s okay. It may have shown me she isn’t hooking up with random guys or drinking, at least not tonight, but it didn’t tell me if she’s okay.
    I know she’s not and I need to fix that.
    Given the way I’m treated like a pariah now amongst the guys since it was my associations that led to our clusterfuck, given the way no one but a few of the really stupid groupies gave any kind of damn about Hayley after everything blew up, I know a I’m the reason Celia isn’t okay. It doesn’t matter if she fucked half the world. The way I treated her over just the possibility, because truly, I have no proof, well, it’s beyond deplorable. And I need to make up for that.
    If she really did betray me, yes, it fucking hurts. My heart is shattered at that. The only woman I have ever cared about…the possibility tears apart my soul. But I’ve torn her down too. Degraded her. I think I might have broken her and the last time someone did