“Looks like you had quite the night,” Greer commented.
Reid opened his eyes to slits and swept his gaze around the room again. A half-empty liquor bottle lay on its side. Next to it was an ashtray full of cigarette butts. Bile rose to the back of his throat, the burn causing his eyes to water. It wasn’t the sight of the liquor or cigarettes that caused his reaction, though, it was the small mirror covered in white residue with a rolled bill lying across it.
“Shit.” Reid swallowed thickly, but his attempt at taking a deep breath was thwarted by his stopped-up nose. “Where is everyone?”
“Gone.” Greer smirked and laced his hands behind his head. “Well, everyone but Tom. He’s currently making sure no pictures of you walking around Devon coked up out of your mind have surfaced. You’ll be the luckiest son of a bitch on earth if they don’t.”
Reid paced the length of the room. “I only left once,” he muttered, pressing the heels of his hands into his eyes as he tried to bring the memories of the night before to the surface.
“Why the fuck did you leave at all?” Greer asked, his cool demeanor slipping. “Any of us would have done a run for you, man. Hell, we have people who have people who would have gone out to get you fucking alcohol and cigarettes. Why would you take the chance of someone seeing you? You’ve managed to find someone to do it for you this entire tour; why slip now? Shit had finally started to cool down.”
Reid froze, his hands falling to his sides as he stared at Greer. “What the hell are you talking about? You’ve been with me every damn day. You know I haven’t been fucking around with this shit.”
Greer narrowed his eyes, his gaze distrustful as he stared at Reid. After a beat of silence, he spoke. “No way, dude. I don’t buy it. You might not have messed with it in the beginning, but your mood swings have been all over the damn place. I wasn’t sure at first, but since we got to Devon, you’ve been in a bar fight, bailed on the band the last day of the tour, and well, I think the evidence speaks for itself about what you did last night.”
Reid pressed his lips into a thin line, his anger surging past his regret. “What I did yesterday is none of your fucking business, and if you would’ve taken care of Chloe in the first place, I wouldn’t have ended up in a bar fight. Also, for the record, until last night, I hadn’t touched a line of coke.” Reid was too angry to worry about his half-truth. For months, he’d struggled almost every day with his desire to chase that high. To forget about everything wrong in his life and instead focus on the vastness of nothing. With his posture tall and his eyes locked with Greer’s, Reid dared Greer to refute him again.
Greer sighed and leaned back in the chair. “Then what the hell happened? Why do something like that the last night of the tour? You were fine before the show, but the minute it was over, you were dragging Chloe down the hall like some kind of psycho” Greer’s lips parted and his eyes widened as a look of understanding crossed his face. “Son of a bitch. This is about Chloe.”
Reid balked. “You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t I?” Greer asked, his voice taking on a hard edge. “You think everyone can’t see what’s going on with you two? Did she get pissed about you going to spend the next few weeks with your girlfriend? Or did she tell you to fuck off when you tried to convince her you were going to end things with Jess?”
Reid lunged toward Greer, grabbing the front of his shirt and yanking him to his feet. “I am not fucking Chloe. She is not pissed that I’m going to spend the next few weeks with Jess, and I haven’t tried to run any kind of game on her. That’s your style, remember?” He pulled Greer closer before shoving him back into his chair once more. The sound of Greer’s breathless chuckle caused Reid’s back to stiffen. He turned around, his hands balled into fists.
“I’m sorry, man,” Greer sighed, his hands held out in front of him. “I just needed to hear you say it. I like Chloe. I don’t want to see her dragged into some kind of fucking love triangle. And it’s obvious there’s something between you two, whatever it is.”
The anger drained from Reid as he realized Greer was being sincere. “She’s my friend. I care about her.”