His button-up dress shirt is so dark blue it looks black and seeing him in perfectly tailored charcoal-colored dress pants is confusing. Dallas is flannel and denim for the most part. Hoodies and backward ball caps. Maybe I’m still confusing him with someone that I used to know instead of who he is now. Maybe I don’t know him at all anymore.
He takes a long pull from his beer bottle, the light glinting off his shiny black and silver watch, before stepping into my path. “Can we talk, please?”
I shake my head. “Pass. You need to get back to your groupies and I have to find my boss.”
“Hey.” His fingers are warm beneath my chin. “What’s going on? You look like hell.”
“Thanks. So much for chivalry, huh?” I jerk my chin out of his hand and turn away from his searching gaze. “Feel free to return to your non-hellish-looking fans now.”
“Wait a second. That’s not what I meant. Robyn?”
I can hear him and I can feel him close behind me in the crowd but I keep going, walking toward the coat-check room without acknowledging anyone as I weave through a sea of overly perfumed bodies. My stomach threatens to turn on me again and I decide to text Katie instead of trying to find her or Mr. Martin to let them know I’m not feeling well.
No one is manning the coatroom so I walk in and begin searching for my black leather jacket and matching bag.
The door clicks shut from across the room, where Dallas stands glaring at me.
“You want to tell me what that was about?”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” I return to shuffling through coats on the rack.
“Well, you were busy having a moment with Wade out on the balcony so I mingled like you told me to do. After which you run by shooting me a death glare that should’ve killed me on the spot. Then you come out of the ladies’ room looking like you’re recovering from a three-day drinking binge. Now you’re behaving as if speaking to me rationally is beyond your limits of capability. So I’ll ask you again.” Dallas comes closer, plucking my jacket from a rack and holding it open for me. “What the hell was that about?”
“I’m just stressed. And tired. This party was a lot of work. But I’m fine now.”
“Well, I’m glad. Because we need to talk.”
“Can we talk later? I’m beat and I’m just going to—”
“Just going to what, Robyn? Lie to me? Keep something huge from me, like, oh, I don’t know, your mom having fucking cancer? Because let me tell you, finding out something like that just before a show wasn’t distracting at all.”
I close my eyes to shield myself from his wrath.
Shoving my own ire down deep, I turn and let him help me with my jacket. Dallas can’t let it go at that, though. He lifts my hair gently from beneath my collar and lays it over my right shoulder, giving him full access to the left side of my neck. He places a soft kiss on it and my traitorous body shivers.
“I’m not going to pretend I’m not angry, but seeing you all sick and fragile is softening my resolve to yell at you. Come back to my hotel room tonight. Stay with me. I missed you and we need to talk about this. About that summer.”
It’s tempting. I feel like death walking, and seeing that girl on his lap opened old wounds I’d been holding closed with all my might. But the thought of slipping so easily into the warmth of him, letting him hold me and make it all better, is enticing.
This must be similar to how drug addicts feel. I know it’s wrong. I know it will only cause more problems. I know exactly how much it will hurt the next time I have to see women groping him at a publicity event. But so help me, I am still tempted to crawl through the valley of the shadow of heartbreak. Naked.
I toss up a silent prayer for strength and step away from him. “There’s nothing to talk about. She was sick so I stayed home to take care of her. I didn’t want you to cancel any of your shows so I kept it to myself. Besides, I think I’ve got the stomach flu. I’m sure you can find plenty of willing bed-buddy candidates for the evening.”
“Maybe I would’ve wanted to be there for you, Robyn. You didn’t even give me a fucking chance.” Dallas snorts out a noise of frustration. “Don’t blow this off, like you actually give a shit about a bunch of girls hanging around the next big thing for all of five minutes until the next shiny new guy comes along? Come on. I thought you knew better by now. You’re the one that told me to play the part and keep what was going on with you and me under wraps. Remember?”
“The one on your lap looked dedicated. She seemed willing to hang around a lot longer than five minutes.”
“Cut the crap, Robyn. You know I’m not interested in any of them.”
“Don’t,” I say, pointing a finger at him. “Don’t make me seem crazy. I’m not overreacting or making a scene. You’re the one chasing me down here. They were all over you and you were lapping it up like a stud in the pasture.”
“That’s a lie and you know it.”
I gawk at him in disbelief. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
“Are you?”
We’re yelling now but I can’t figure out how to defuse the situation.
“No. I’m not. I’m supposed to be here to do my job and that’s pretty hard to do watching the person I’m sleeping with getting molested in front of me. I’m having a hard enough time trying not to gag all over the place as it is. You were right. We shouldn’t have crossed that line because now we can’t go back.”
“I’m here doing my job, too, damn it. And what the hell is that supposed to mean? Go back? You want to unfuck me?”
“I want to unknow you. I want to go back in time and never freaking speak to you. It always ends like this, no matter how hard we try or how many things we try to do differently.”
“What do you want me to do, babe? Tell the next woman that touches me to keep her goddamn hands to herself? Do you have any idea what that would do to my career? Who do you think buys my music? Have you paid attention to who’s filling those seats at every show? This is part of it. This is the gig, sweetheart. You’re the one who planned this fucking party for this very reason. I thought you got that.”
“No.” I shake my head and wipe the tears threatening to spill from my eyes before they can fall. “The party is to celebrate the music, the sales, and—”
“It’s the same damn thing!” Dallas throws his hands up, looking at me like I’m brain dead and he’s tired of dumbing everything down for me. “It’s me. That’s what I’m selling here. Me. I need them to buy into me as an artist. I can’t do that by being an asshole to them.”
He’s about to reiterate his whole “Performer Dallas” versus “Person Dallas” spiel but I just can’t hear it right now.
“Go on and get back to your party, Dallas.”
“You want me to leave?”
I nod. “I do.”
“You sure? I just want to be clear so if I go you don’t hold it over my head for the next five years.”
I have no words.
None.
The bile burns too hot, sending an acidic searing sensation through my chest and into my throat.
When I finally find my voice, it’s eerily even. “Do not throw our past into my face. I have never held anything over your head. If anything, I let you off the hook too easily.”
Dallas smirks and shakes his head. “What fucking hook, Robyn? You dumped me, remember? Instead of letting me be there for you, you lied to me—kept something huge from me. And you’re the one who gets to be pissed? I’m throwing the bullshit flag on that one.”
I blow past him and out of the room like a wayward hurricane of hellfire. I am not doing this at a work-related event. Moreover, I can’t. Because I’m about to be sick again.
I make it outside to where valets in red vests are retrieving cars before I vomit in the bushes beside the building.
The entire world spins, kind of how my life is spiraling out of control while I’m powerless to stop it. All I can do is kick my purse out of the way, brace my hands on my knees, and let it come.