He presses his palms to his eyes and lets out a giant breath. “Come here, Red.”
I’m hesitant at first, but then he holds my waist on both sides and urges me to him. I climb on the bed, one knee at a time, sliding my body against his as I rest the side of my face on the pillow beside of him. He glides his knuckles across the bruise on my jaw that I’ve hidden with makeup. “I’m so fucking sorry, Si.”
“I know you are.”
“No matter what happens to me, I’m going to make sure that nobody ever touches you again,” he promises, his eyes hard.
I move my head from side to side. “You make it seem like she’s tried to turn you in.” When he doesn’t say anything, I sit up abruptly and glare down at him. “Lucas? Is she?”
He lifts his shoulders. “And at this point, do you think I give a fuck anymore? I looked out for me and only me for years, and then you came along. You made me feel things. And when I laid here after I came back from seeing you beat up and broken because of me, I realized that I stopped caring what happens to me.”
Hearing him say things like this causes my stomach to harden. Because it makes me feel like this is the beginning of the end.
“Well, I care,” I say. “I wouldn’t have come here if I didn’t.”
“I killed someone,” he growls. “And then, I threw money at his family like it would fix things.”
“He was stalking someone you cared about.” I think of Cilla. No matter what kind of conflict is between us, I would never want anyone to have to go through what Lucas said Bryce was about to do to her. “If Sam goes to the cops, your story has to count for something.”
He pushes himself up into a sitting position next to me. “My story is four years too late, Red.”
“Then we’ll figure this shit out together.”
His expression softens. “You’re sticking around?”
“On this tour? No,” I say, and he grins. “But with you? Always. Didn’t Kylie give you my message?”
“Yes, but I was convinced it was the pain pills talking.”
I spend most of the morning locked in Lucas’s arms. There’s very little talking, and no lovemaking, but this almost feels like the most intimate we’ve been since our relationship began two and a half years ago. After he falls asleep, I untangle myself from his body and go out into the bus lounge so that I can call Gram and let her know that I’m okay. By now she’s probably awake, and given the events of the last several days, she must be freaking out.
As I dial her number, another call comes through that I accidentally accept. I’m not in the mood to talk to anyone other than Gram right now, and I look down at the screen, wanting to just hang up and ignore the caller if they try again. But then again, they might not stop trying to get in touch with me. I put the phone up to my ear.
“Hello?”
“Is this Sienna?” The voice is soft, female. “Hello?”
I clear my throat. “Yes?”
“This is Sam. The woman who’s ex-husband you’ve been fucking.”
Like she needed that introduction. I know her well, and I grind my teeth together.
Clawing my phone, I whisper harshly, “Why the hell are you calling me? Haven’t you done enough? And how the fuck did you get my phone number?”
She takes a moment to process all of my questions before she speaks. “You’re easy to find. And you haven’t answered me back. I wanted to hear your voice before—” She stops herself. The little laugh that follows manages to evoke every fear, every amount of desperation, inside of me.
“Before what?”
She answers me after a long pause, and each word is emphasized. “Before I put an end to all of this.”
Sliding down, my butt hits the floor hard, but I don’t even feel it as I hold my elbows close to my chest. “What are you planning to do?”
“What I should have done a long time ago.”
I tuck in my upper lip and shake my head. “You can’t do this to him. Not after he’s given you so much of his money.” My voice sounds strange to my ears, foreign. Nothing like anything I’ve ever heard before. “Not after you’ve put him through so much shit.”
Sam laughs again, this one more forced. Colder. “I can do whatever it is I want, sweetheart. The ball is in my court. All I have to do is go to the cops, and—”
“You can’t do this,” I repeat.
“I’m sorry, but I can’t do this anymore.”
Why is she calling to tell me all of this? And why is she apologizing to me? Leaning my face against my knees, I close my eyes and think of the only time I met her in person. How there had been something so off about her icy gray eyes. This woman is dangerous. Dangerous and crazy, and I am scared to death of her.
“Why?” I ask, my voice hoarse. “Why did you put me through so much shit, just so you could do this? Why bring me into it?”
When she speaks, her words are broken, and I think she’s crying. Samantha, who is calling me to wreak havoc and ruin lives, is crying. “Because you love him. Because I wanted you to know the real Lucas before I tore everything down. And now that you do?”
“That doesn’t change how I feel about him,” I hiss. “It doesn’t change the fact that I love him. What he did happened because he was trying to protect someone.”
“And he’s a coward,” she snaps. “You forgot about that.”
“No.” I hold my hand to my chest because I feel like it’s the only thing that will get me through this. “You wanted me to see Lucas for what he really was, but I saw you too. If you wanted the truth to come out about him so badly, you would have turned him in a long time ago. You’re the coward.”
“Maybe I am. I guess it doesn’t change anything, does it?” She’s still crying, and she sobs loudly into the phone for several seconds before drawing in an unsteady breath. “This ends now.”
“Sam? Samantha?” But she’s gone. And even though I know I shouldn’t, I try to call her back, but she doesn’t answer. I’m sent directly to her voicemail after the first couple of rings. I want to think that there’s no reason why she’s ignoring them, that this call is just another one of her games.
But I can’t. This feels different than before and panic swells through me.
Because I’ve made a vow to myself that I wouldn’t keep things from Lucas any longer, I immediately wake him up. While I sit on the floor of the lounge talking in hushed tones, he strides back and forth down the aisle, his chest moving slightly as he takes it all in. And he takes it better than I ever imagined. His face is a stone mask when I’m done speaking.
“She’ll do what she wants to do.” He stops moving. “But I’m not going to keep chasing after her just to keep myself in the clear. I can’t do it anymore.”
Those were Sam’s exact words from earlier, and they’re even more terrifying when they fall from his lips. I grip my hands in my hair, shaking my head wildly.
“There has to be something.” I gasp for air, and once I find it, I say, “You don’t deserve this.”
Kneeling down in front of me, he tilts my chin up with the tip of his index finger. “Maybe I don’t, but I messed up. I’ve been living with what I did for four years now and these past few days of you and Kylie knowing have been the most liberating fucking time I’ve had since then.” Massaging my cheek with the back of his thumb, he lays his forehead to mine. “Let Sam come after me. She has to already know that I’m going to take her down, too. After all the shit she’s put you through—let her come.”
After this, he refuses to say or hear anything else about Samantha. We spend the rest of the day up until sound check with a stressed silence lingering between us, and when I tell him that I have to go home, he follows me out to my car.
“You’ll come tonight?” he asks, and I just stare at him. I want to scream. Or hit him. Ask him why he’s letting Sam win.