A surprise visit from Ry and Alex had done wonders to distract me from my disastrous love life. Gay best friends seemed to have superhuman emotional healing powers. And a heavy hand when making cocktails. It had taken a turn after an argument with Brock at a strip club where I had just gotten into a catfight with Cade’s ex. I had almost melted at the look he had given me after the smackdown I wasn’t aware he witnessed. I then stiffened when he thought he could order me around after ignoring me for the past month. In front of my friends no less. Not okay. So I threw sass. Asserted my independence. It felt good until he had sworn and stormed off with a waitress, his intentions clear. This had been a swift kick in the ovaries.
No matter how much I tried to convince myself I didn’t care, I did. I felt like vomiting at the thought of him with someone else. I then loathed myself for thinking that; I had done the exact same thing with Ian, worse in fact.
Those months sucked majorly. My friend was happier than I’d ever seen her, our business was booming, we had a beautiful home and awesome new friends. I should have been ecstatic. Instead I was miserable. I could hardly sleep, hardly eat with all the shit churning through my mind. I couldn’t keep this up. I had to do something, make a decision about all this.
I did. I came to the conclusion that no matter how much it made sense for Ian and I to be together I couldn’t do it. I wanted Brock. I needed him.
I wanted to make a go of being an “old lady” no matter how much I despised the label and the connotations of ownership that went with it. Gwen seemed to be wearing it as easy as she wore Prada, so I could give it a go. I only faced the prospect of swallowing my pride, or more accurately my fear, and telling Brock this. I was terrified he would reject me. Crush me, humiliate me. Memories of my desperate vulnerable childhood hampered me.
I had attempted to seek him out at the clubhouse days ago, but when I had got there I had seen him with a blonde. Needless to say I had blanched when our eyes met, happy that I had the pretense of picking up Rosie. I was pissed at the fact he was pawing some other woman, but I couldn’t really be since I had slept with Ian. We weren’t together. I had made that abundantly clear. He was free to do as he wished. I had wished he’d be like one of those men in romance novels who waited patiently and chastely for the heroine to get over her shit. But this was real life. He was a biker. It was a miracle he had even wanted to commit. So I couldn’t bring myself to blame him, no matter how much I wanted to scratch the blonde’s eyes out.
Luckily I got the distraction of finding out Gwen was knocked up. I was seriously ecstatic at the prospect of a little kid to spoil and dress up. I was less than ecstatic that I couldn’t enjoy cocktails with my best friend for nine months, but I would manage.
The day after the announcement of Gwen’s little bundle of joy I decided to take a drive to LA to get a jump on baby shopping. I hated that I had to do gender neutral, and on the drive I had decided to buy an equal amount of boys’ and girls’ shit. I’d donate the loser gender to charity once they found out. Plus, shopping was a welcome distraction to what I was planning to do that night. Confront Brock. The prospect of it vaguely brought me out in hives but I had to do it.
What I had to do first was call Ian and tell him he wasn’t coming home to me. That was something else that curdled my meager breakfast. I cared about him. Loved him. The idea of hurting him sucked. The fact that I was telling him this shit over the phone had me wanting to punch myself in the face just a little. It was a seriously crappy thing to do. But stringing him along was worse. I was in the process of finding a way to get in touch with him and was waiting on my info.
I was about halfway to LA when my phone buzzed. I thought it would be my Uncle Garrett with the deets but instead it was Gwen’s mother.
“Hey Lacey, I’m currently on my way to LA to start the shopping,” I greeted, assuming she was calling after hearing Gwen’s news. I knew she’d want to coordinate and was excited to talk to her about it. I thought of her as my mother too, and loved the woman with all my heart.
“Amy, it’s Dave here.” Gwen’s father interrupted me, his voice sounding funny.
“Oh hey, what’s up, Mr. A?” I greeted him fondly. Although he was a man of few words, he was the father I wish I had, instead of the cold and absent one nature had lumped me with.
There was a pause and something about it made my stomach drop. “Sweetheart, I’m assuming you’re not with Gwen so you don’t know,” he said softly, his usually gruff voice sounding wrong somehow, broken.
“Don’t know what?” I asked, dread building in the pit of my stomach.
“We just got news…Ian was killed last night…a roadside bomb,” he told me, his voice breaking. The weight of the anguish and pain in his voice was hard to listen to.
I didn’t hear anything else thanks to a dull roar in my ears. I might have said something else to Dave, I don’t know. Everything was a blur. I must have said my goodbyes because my phone wasn’t in my hand anymore. My hands started shaking on the wheel and my vision got blurry. I pulled over, on autopilot, then stumbled out of the car to be sick on the side of the road.