Resolution: G-String (Resolution Pact) Page 5

  “Fuck off, you fucking bottom feeder,” I snarled and shoved past him.

  “Your new bed buddy is violent too, looks like you guys have a lot in common,” he laughed and followed me as I tried to walk away. “Come on, where did you meet her? How would you meet a hot piece of ass like that unless she was chasing famous dick?”

  I whirled around on my cast and glared at him. I stared him down and waited for him to back down.

  He didn’t.

  “Come on, hit me! Hit me! I need the settlement money and the views once the video hits the website,” he sneered.

  I clenched my fist and I fought the urge to break his nose.

  “You’re not worth it, you fucking bastard,” I said. “Just leave her alone.”

  “Who is she to you?” somebody else called out to me.

  “Is she your girlfriend?” another voice chimed in.

  Once these types of people smelled blood in the water they always started circling like sharks. It was a horrible way to make a living, parasites living on the backs of the famous.

  I couldn’t even go out and buy a loaf of bread without them stalking me and posting the worst possible photos while they speculated about my life.

  But the fact that they’d dragged Chloe into it, that drove me crazy.

  I stormed past them though, it was all I could do.

  In my cast, hobbling away, I felt frustrated, toothless and angry, but it was my only choice.

  If only Chloe would message me back, then at least I could see her again.

  Or move on if she couldn’t handle being with a guy like me.

  “You always were a big jerk about women,” Peg said and rolled her eyes when I whined for the umpteenth time about Chloe ghosting me. “Maybe this is your karma coming back to bite your ass…hard.”

  “Thanks for the support,” I replied but had to admit I’d been wondering that myself.

  I’d spent my entire life being an asshole to the women I’d been with. Maybe Chloe walking out on me was just a little taste of my own medicine.

  I’d distracted myself for the rest of Saturday by meeting up with Drake and a couple other guys at a private club just outside the city. I needed a break from the thoughts racing through my mind and the prick reporters hanging around outside.

  Sunday morning was my usual brunch meet up with Peg at our favorite neighborhood breakfast café.

  Luckily it was Peg’s neighborhood and nobody knew I ate here. The car had picked me up at the private entrance on the side of my building and the café was known for their discretion.

  “I do support you, little brother,” she grinned and sipped her mimosa. “But come on, I can’t help but laugh a little at the delicious irony of you falling in love with a woman who is literally too smart to fall for your bullshit.”

  “It’s not bullshit though. I really…like her.”

  “You only like her because she doesn’t want you.”

  I shook my head.

  That was another avenue of thought that I’d gone down, and it felt wrong.

  My feelings for Chloe were not dependent on her wanting me or not, they stood on their own even in the face of soul crushing rejection.

  “That’s not it though. I like her because of her, not because she’s avoiding me. I can’t make you understand, Peg. She’s just…fuck, she’s everything to me. The world feels less without her in it, my life feels smaller somehow.”

  She stopped chewing on her bagel, looked at me in surprise and swallowed. “Damn. You are in love, aren’t you? I’ve never seen you like this.”

  “I’m pathetic, I know,” I said. “I promise you once it all works out we’ll be able to look back on this and laugh.”

  “I hope you’re right, otherwise you’re going to be releasing an album of sad as fuck songs next year,” she grinned.

  “And nobody wants that. Nobody wants that at all.”

  We finished eating and I was heading back to my penthouse when I got a demanding text from Gail.

  “LA. Lunch. Zoe’s Café. Tomorrow. Noon.”

  I knew better than to fight it, Gail was Gail and she wouldn’t take no for an answer once she had a meeting scheduled in her appointment book.

  “Fuck,” I mumbled and promptly texted my assistant to arrange a private jet back to my second home. Los Angeles.

  I hated that the meeting would take me farther away from Chloe, and make it impossible for me to show up at her apartment before our lesson on Tuesday.

  But we still had Tuesday.

  I would see her soon enough.

  “While you’re in LA you can get your cast off,” my assistant texted me while I was on the way to my meeting with Gail.

  Thankfully it was early enough that I could see her, visit the doctor, and make it back to Seattle in time for tomorrow’s lesson.

  I was seated before Gail, but she had reservations.

  The waiter brought me a bottled water, opened it and set it on the table.

  “Would the young lady want anything before she arrives?” he asked.

  “Young lady?” I asked. Gail wasn’t ancient, but she wasn’t exactly young. She hadn’t been young since before Reagan was president.

  “Yes, Miss Harris,” he replied.

  And it clicked.

  Gail had set up a lunch date between me and the hottest Instagram model in the world right now, Blythe Orion.

  “I don’t know what she’d like, I’ve never met her,” I replied and moved to get up and leave the table.

  But I was ambushed as Blythe arrived with her entourage.

  Being Instagram famous meant that she never traveled anywhere without a team of stylists, photographers and hanger ons.

  “Gavin, darling, how kind of you to invite me for lunch,” Blythe said and I stood to hold out the other chair for her.

  I wasn’t a total Neanderthal, but I didn’t want to stay.

  “Blythe, I believe there has been a miscommunication. Gail set this up without my knowledge and while you’re very lovely, I’m not going to be able to stay.”

  Blythe raised one eyebrow and looked me up and down with a derisive look. “Listen, Gavin. You’re old and out of style and hobbling like a senior on that cast of yours. The only reason I’m here is because Gail suggested it’s good for my career.”

  “Your career posting selfies on Instagram?”

  “Uh, no,” she stomped her foot and pouted. “I’m going into music. I’m a singer, that’s the whole reason I started this in the first place. That’s why Gail thought it would be good for us to be seen together.”

  “Tell Gail she can find some other sucker for you to climb like a ladder. I don’t want to have lunch with anyone other than Chloe.”

  “Ah yes, the infamous Chloe. Good luck with that.”

  Blythe’s entourage snickered behind her and I shook my head. I left the restaurant and texted my assistant on the way out.

  The car was waiting for me outside, I managed to clamber in without being noticed.

  I was at the end of my rope with this lifestyle, and I was sick to death of all the poseurs and fakers in LA.

  I texted Gail on the way to the doctor’s office.

  “If you ever pull that kind of bullshit with me again, this relationship is over. End of. Finished. Period.”

  “It was a chance to hit a new generation. Get over yourself Gavin.”

  “I’m twenty-eight, not eighty for fuck’s sake.”

  “You might as well be eighty for the twenty year olds living on insta. Embrace the new. Adapt or die.”

  I turned off my phone and simmered until we got to the doctor’s.

  She had a point, but my point was also simple.

  I wasn’t her trained monkey. I wasn’t going to become something I wasn’t just to appeal to people who wouldn’t appreciate my music anyways.

  The whole reason I became successful in the first place was my authenticity, what the hell was Gail thinking if she wanted me to give that up?

  My
cast was off in no time at all, one of the perks of being rich and famous in LA, and before I could text Gail back to tell her to fuck off, I was on the plane back to Seattle.

  I would see my girl the next day for her lesson, and there was nothing that would stop me from telling her how I felt.

  And that it was authentic.

  Chapter Nine

  Chloe

  I was so freaking depressed.

  It was humiliating how sad I was about the whole thing.

  I still checked my phone relentlessly even though I’d been away from Seattle for a couple nights and hadn’t gotten a single text from Gavin.

  In my fantasies he would have shown up at the rental apartment and swept me off my feet, declared his love for me and told me how much he wanted me.

  In reality I was back in my familiar apartment just a few blocks from Oak Ridge University.

  It was much colder than in Seattle, and there was a little snow on the ground.

  I never thought I’d say it, but I missed the rain.

  Wednesday morning I woke up alone in my bed and didn’t feel like getting up.

  I’d gotten in late the night before, and other than calling Peg’s Music to cancel the rest of my lessons. She insisted on refunding me the rest of my money even though I told her I wasn’t too worried about it.

  It made me feel worse, that strange unspoken tension in her voice confirmed the worst for me. She knew that I was Gavin’s one night stand of the week, and that he wasn’t interested in me at all.

  She almost sounded relieved, in fact. I guess it did make it easier for Gavin to pull the old rock star hump and dump if he didn’t have to face me again.

  So, misery.

  And it wasn’t getting any better.

  I looked at my phone first thing, of course telling myself that I wasn’t seeing if he texted.

  (He hadn’t.)

  I was checking in on the sorority chat. A couple girls were able to get together for lunch this week, the others were too busy living their amazing new year resolutions. I was happy it seemed to be working out for them, but saddened at my own failure.

  And to think I just wanted to learn to play the guitar.

  Stacy had tagged me in the chat.

  “Chloe, whatever you do…do NOT read anything about Gavin today.”

  “Oh come on, of course you know I’m going to google it now.”

  “Seriously, please don’t.”

  “I won’t.”

  But I lied.

  How could I not?

  I immediately googled his name.

  And the first page was filled with articles about him.

  And a spat with his girlfriend.

  Instagram model Blythe Orion.

  “Are you kidding me? Are you freaking kidding me?” I moaned and scanned the first article that popped up.

  It was from yesterday in LA.

  “That was fast. Asshole,” I muttered.

  There were photos from the scene, no video, but the intent of the picture essay was clear.

  He was breaking up with her.

  BLYTHE ORION KICKS GAVIN PIERCE TO THE CURB ON HER TWENTIETH BIRTHDAY the headline screamed at me.

  Had they been dating when we were hanging out?

  I almost started sobbing again, but my anger kept my eyes dry and I practically felt a wall being bricked around my heart as I read.

  The article claimed they’d been seeing each other in private, and that when Blythe found out about the one night stand in Seattle with me she’d decided she’d had enough of his cheating ways and his constant playing around with every, “vapid” fan who threw themselves at him.

  “I’m not vapid,” I grumbled. “I’m probably smarter than her.”

  I hated that I was feeling so jealous about all of this.

  I hated that I was feeling anything at all.

  I killed time by finishing up the last of the research I’d done for Professor Steinbach so I could at least get partial publication credit, googling old photos of Gavin looking really ugly, and complaining to my mom about what a jerk he was.

  She was sympathetic but didn’t completely understand what I was going through.

  It’s not like many people would. How could anyone understand what it was like to have their name dragged through the mud by basically everybody online?

  The articles had been bad enough, but the comments.

  I know they say to never read the comments, but I’d read the comments.

  And people were horrible.

  Beyond horrible.

  I couldn’t imagine what potential employers would think if they googled my name. I doubted I could even get a job at this point, even though I needed one.

  Thursday was just as painful as Wednesday, worse even in a way because my heart still ached for him.

  I didn’t understand how he had threaded himself so deeply into my heart in such a short time, and I didn’t understand why I couldn’t get over him as easily as I’d gotten over other exes.

  In the evening after I got back from a long walk in the crisp, winter air, I decided I was going to fool around a little on the guitar.

  That had been the whole point of my resolution after all. And I had learned a song or two.

  I was strumming along and singing a few words when I realized that it was a Gavin Pierce song.

  One of his biggest hits, Silver Moon, about a break up.

  Of course it would have to be one of his, and of course it would have to be about breaking up.

  I decided to keep playing it, and I have to admit I was actually getting pretty good at it when I heard a sharp knock at my door.

  I listened but didn’t stop, if it was one of my neighbors complaining about the noise I would probably lose my cool with them.

  I was singing along and heard the knock again, louder and more persistent this time.

  I planned on ignoring it, but it just didn’t stop.

  The knocking got louder and more demanding.

  I put my guitar down and prepared myself to take my pent up anger and frustration out on some unsuspecting neighbor.

  “Seriously!” I yelled as I stomped over to the door. “I’m allowed to make noise in here, you know! I pay condo fees too!”

  I slid the lock back and opened the door, opened my mouth to keep yelling but no sound came out.

  I was speechless.

  And then I was being kissed.

  Gavin Pierce was kissing me.

  Chapter Ten

  Gavin

  “She’s not coming in,” Peg told me Tuesday when I showed up at the music store.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean she’s not coming. She called to cancel the rest of her lessons. Whatever happened, it was obviously too much for her.”

  “Did she say anything else?”

  “No, it was a very uncomfortable conversation. That’s all I know. You could have cut the tension with a knife. I think you fucked up, she’s not going to text you back.”

  “It wasn’t me though. It was the fucking parasites who wrote all those stories…”

  I knew it was useless to keep going though. Peg had zero sympathy for me when it came to the spotlight, she’d been put through the ringer herself over the past decade.

  It had only been the last few years that people had finally started to leave her alone. They’d finally gotten the hint that Gavin Pierce’s big sister wasn’t going to talk, that she was notoriously tight lipped and surly when it came to interviews.

  “I know, bro. And I’m sorry. I really am. But maybe this is a sign that it’s just not meant to be.”

  “I won’t accept that as an option, Peg. I just won’t,” I replied and strode from her store. “And I won’t be doing any lessons today, I’m sorry.”

  It felt good to finally be able to make a dignified exit now that the cast was gone.

  I told the driver Chloe’s address and was on edge the entire way to her apartment.

  Once there, I ran up the t
hree stories to her floor and banged on the door.

  It opened slowly and I almost swept the girl who answered off her feet.

  But it wasn’t Chloe.

  “You’re…” she murmured sleepily and rubbed her eyes.

  “And you’re not Chloe,” I replied, my disappointment palpable.

  “The Chloe? She was here?” the girls asked, perking up. “This is just an apartment the university provides. The former resident is gone, I moved in yesterday. I can’t believe it’s the Chloe apartment from the stories. I’ve seen pictures…oh my god, they were taken right in front.”

  I didn’t bother replying, this girl had nothing for me and I didn’t have time to make small talk.

  Not when I had to find Chloe.

  I went right back to Peg’s shop, walked past surprised customers and stood in front of her counter. She looked me up and down and said, “Now what?”

  “I need her new address.”

  “I don’t have that.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “Come on, Gavin. I can’t share information with you.”

  “I’m not asking you to share anything she wouldn’t have given me herself if the press hadn’t involved,” I pleaded.

  “Let me see your texts. Let me make sure you’re not being a creepy stalker,” she said, her mouth pressed into a thin line.

  I handed her my phone and opened it to the messages I’d sent to Chloe.

  Peg read a couple, looked at me and said, “Dammit, you do love this girl.”

  “I do.”

  “Wait, this doesn’t look right,” she said and reached under the counter. She pulled out an appointment book and flipped it open. “You idiot, you have the wrong number.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “This isn’t her number. You have seven eight six five as the last four digits. It’s actually seven eight five six.”

  Chloe had entered her number into my phone, she wasn’t an idiot but she had probably been overwhelmed by going out with me.

  Or maybe it had just been a slip of her finger.

  Either way, those texts had been going to the wrong number.