Avoiding Commitment (45 page)

After cleaning up, Lexi fell back into Jack’s
arms letting him hold her tight. He fanned out her hair letting it
run loose between his fingers. “Better than the museum?” she asked
playfully.

“Much better,” he said leaning down and
kissing her on her temple. “Everything is better when I’m with
you.”

She sighed heavily unable to believe that
after everything they had been through and all the heartache and
tears she had endured, she was finally getting the chance she
deserved with Jack. So maybe they weren’t officially a couple, but
at least they were something. She could deal with whatever came
next as long as he was around. That would be good enough for
her…for now. Then they could go past this, and work towards a real
future together.

But right now, she was ready for round
two.

CHAPTER 19

PRESENT

Lexi bounded into Jack’s room and quickly
stripped off the band t-shirt he had loaned her. She looked
longingly at the cracked bathroom door where steam was currently
streaming from. She took one step forward, her heart racing with
desire knowing that Jack was naked on the other side. She
cautiously approached the bathroom door and peered into the room.
Lexi could just make out Jack’s figure through the glass.

She had been so determined to barge in there
even though she had just kept them from making the same mistake.
She leaned her head against the doorframe and shut her eyes
attempting to reason with herself.

Yes, Jack was naked in the next room.

Yes, he probably looked freaking amazing as
the water ran down his body.

Yes, she wanted him.

All of these things were obvious to her, but
she needed to keep a lid on her emotions. Just because she wanted
Jack didn’t mean that she should have him. He was taken. Though she
had never respected that in the past, she liked to think that she
was a different person now.

As she was about to walk away, she heard soft
humming over the drum of the water hitting the glass. The humming
turned into a melody and eventually, Lexi could put the pieces
together and make out the lyrics to Mae’s song
The Ocean
.
She left her eyes shut tight allowing the lyrics to flow over her.
She could have stood there indefinitely just listening to him sing
so clearly over the water. His voice was mesmerizingly smooth and
took her back to times when things had been easier. Or at least,
she had thought they had been easier. In fact, they had been the
calm before the storm.

She knew that if she rushed into that
bathroom right now, it would be exactly the same. Jack would have
all the control. It was hard enough turning him down twice in a
twelve hour period. She wasn’t sure she was capable of doing it a
third time.

The final note of the song sounded in her
ears and the shower cut off. Lexi jumped from where she was
standing, not expecting them to be timed together. She grabbed her
clothes from his dresser and rushed into the guest bedroom.
Scrambling into last night’s clothes, Lexi dashed for the exit. She
didn’t want to be here when he got out. She didn’t trust herself
enough not to succumb to his wiles.

Lexi hailed the first cab that she saw and
had them whisk her to the airport. Flight time from JFK to
Hartfield-Jackson was only two hours, and since Chyna was flying
private jet it might even be less time. Lexi didn’t care how long
she would have to wait. She couldn’t be around Jack right now. She
needed her best friend. She needed Chyna to tell her that she was
doing the right thing, because Lexi had never been good at that.
And all she wanted to do was turn around and be back in Jack’s
arms.

The cab stopped in front of the airport
terminal. She threw some cash over the front of the seat and
quickly exited the vehicle. The cabbie rolled the window down and
called out to her. “Change?” She turned around and shook her head
at him.

The wait was shorter than she had expected.
She had passed the time sitting with her feet propped up across
three chairs, listening to whatever was blaring through her
earbuds, and people watching. New York was bad enough. She couldn’t
believe what she had seen coming to and from an international
airport. She shook her head at the remembered images and deposited
the iPod back into her purse. Chyna had employed some poor sap to
wheel her luggage through the airport for her. Lexi shouldn’t have
expected anything less from her gorgeous friend. When Chyna caught
sight of Lexi, her feet moved double time as she nearly ran in her
rather impractical four inch heels to greet her best friend.

“Alexa, I’m so glad I’m here,” she squealed
wrapping her arms around her neck.

“I’m glad you’re here too, Chyna,” Lexi told
her.

“Let’s hope my town car is waiting,” Chyna
stated grabbing Lexi’s hand and whisking her out of the
airport.

A black town car was indeed waiting for
Chyna’s arrival outside of the airport. After the baggage was
secured in the trunk and the girls were in the backseat, the car
whisked them away to the hotel in which Chyna already had a
penthouse reserved in her name. Once the two were safely in the
hotel accommodations, Chyna immediately went on a rampage. Lexi was
only half listening to what she was saying as she stared in awe at
the hotel room. She had seen impressive residences. Chyna obviously
had a remarkable suite, but Lexi had been there so often she had
become desensitized to its beauty. This place was completely
different. Everything about the room was classy and elegant, drawn
out in soft golden hues. An exquisite den area was set in dark oak
and brown and cream suede. Through colossal double doors revealed a
four-poster bed draped with an intricately detailed quilt comforter
and at least a dozen throw pillows of varying shape and size. The
sheer, gold-trimmed curtains opened to a sprawling balcony
overlooking the city. From several dozen stories up, Lexi could
really see the splendor of the place she had grown up.

Chyna cleared her throat. “Are you listening
to me?” she asked grabbing Lexi’s wrist.

“Huh?” she asked turning away from the
decorations to look at her friend.

“I was talking about what’s been going on
with you,” Chyna told her unceremoniously.

“Yeah,” Lexi mumbled falling backwards in a
large chair that she sank into on impact. “Things aren’t exactly
going as planned.”

“You think?” Chyna asked sarcastically. “You
were supposed to tell the girlfriend what happened between you two,
and let that be the end of it. What about that was
complicated?”

Lexi buried her face in her hands.
“Everything,” she grumbled.

“No, it’s not. That’s what I was saying
earlier. You get
way
too attached. Clean break is what you
need. Just forget about him. Forget about whatever happened between
you two. That’s what you were supposed to be doing here, Alexa.
Tell me what happened to change that. I cannot fathom why you’d
want to have anything to do with this scumbag again after what he
did to you. I kind of want to go find him myself and cut off his
you-know-what,” she exclaimed angrily. “He doesn’t actually deserve
to have balls after everything that went down. I can’t believe I
actually convinced you to come see him. I should have seen this
coming. What was I thinking? He’s obviously the same pig-headed
asshole he always was. He thinks he can waltz right in, take over
your life, and leave you in pieces all over again. Well, I’m not
having it alright? Do you hear me?”

“C, chill out. That’s not how it’s going to
be.”

“You’re damn right that’s not how it’s going
to be. Wanna know why? Because I’m not letting you near him again.
I don’t care what you say, Alexa Mae.”

“You’ve got it all wrong,” Lexi said through
her teeth.

“And you’re brainwashed by him,” she
cried.

“I’m not brainwashed, alright?” Lexi yelled
back. She stood forcefully and stared at her friend. “I know what
happened with Jack, and I swore I would never let that happen to me
again. I know what he is capable of, but it’s not going to happen
this time.”

“I hope it’s not going to happen, because
you’re not involved with him,” Chyna retorted staring back at her
friend.

“I could have slept with him. I could have
given myself up to him all over again. I could have torn down all
the walls that I had placed around myself against him, but I
didn’t. Do you know how hard it is to say no to him? No! How could
you?” she cried, anger that she had bottled up threatening to
overflow. She was even beginning to make wild accusations against
her best friend…the one person in New York she told everything.
Well…almost everything.

“Watch it,” Chyna warned.

“You are just given everything you want. You
take everything that you want. You have no concept of what it means
to say no to someone that you truly love, because you don’t love
anyone,” Lexi uttered viciously.

Chyna’s mouth dropped open in shock. “Excuse
me?”

“You heard me,” Lexi growled. “You have a
silver spoon shoved up your pretty little ass, and the world jumps
at your beck and call. You’ve never loved anyone, because you’ve
never put yourself out there to be loved. You just sleep with guy
after guy after guy.”

Chyna’s jaw set at the accusation. “And
you’re much better?” she asked shaking her head. “You do the same
thing, but at least I know where I stand with them. You…you’re just
using them, because you can’t
have
the one thing that you
want. The one person that you want doesn’t want you, and you’re
right, I don’t know what that’s like. Everyone wants me.”

“Yeah, they want to fuck you and be gone by
the morning,” Lexi said maliciously.

“That’s better than wasting a life on someone
who will
always
choose the
other
girl over you. I’d
rather be in control, using them rather than have them use me,
because that’s all he’s doing. He’s using you, and when he’s done,
he’ll throw you out with the trash like he always has,” Chyna
snarled letting her words cut straight through to Lexi’s core.

Lexi couldn’t believe what she had just said.
Was this what Chyna had been holding back all those years? Was this
what it was like to get the full blow of Chyna’s anger? Suddenly,
Lexi felt like all the air had been sucked out of her body. Her
chest was seizing up with the lack of oxygen, and her head was
spinning in the oxygen deprived environment. She could feel her
face lose its color as the blood flow weakened. She gasped out
hoping to breathe in some precious oxygen, but nothing happened.
Then she was in darkness.

*****

When Lexi finally began to stir, the first
thing she noticed was that she was no longer in the same place. Her
fingers spread apart as she felt the silky material caress her
hand. Her eyes fluttered open as the reality that she was lying in
the hotel bed came to her. She turned her head to look around and
found that there was a crowd of people whispering inside the double
doors. A searing pain shot through her head at the movement. She
reached her hand up to her aching head. Her hand pushed into her
tangled hair and found a large knot on the backside of her scalp.
She groaned at the slight feel of her fingers brushing the
spot.

The noise must have alerted the room as Chyna
immediately scrambled to her side. Her face was tear-stained and
the most imperfect Lexi had ever seen her. It was a relief to see
her this way. And though she knew this had something to do with
her, she couldn’t remember what had happened.

“Oh my God, you’re okay,” Chyna gushed, a
fresh wave of tears threatening to break loose. “I was so worried.
Oh my God. Oh my God.” She was fanning herself with her hand as she
perched on the side of the bed. Her face was stricken with
worry.

“C, what happened?” Lexi asked weakly
attempting to sit up in bed.

“Whoa there,” a man said rushing forward and
pressing her shoulder gently back into the bedding. “You’ll want to
stay lying down for a little while longer. Looks like you had quite
a spill.”

The wave of nausea that hit her when she
tried to get up was the only reason she hadn’t fought this man.
“Yeah, I guess so,” she said turning her face to look at Chyna
again. She wanted answers.

“Oh, this is
all
my fault,” Chyna
muttered covering her face with her hands. Lexi glanced back to
where the crowd had been, and saw that everyone else was beginning
to exit the room. She figured it must be hotel staff of some
sort.

“Ma’am, I’m sure this was not your fault,”
the man said putting his hand reassuringly on Chyna’s shoulder.
“People faint for all sorts of reasons,” he stated calmly. His hand
rubbed down her arm gently in an effort to halt any further bouts
of despair.

“I fainted?” Lexi asked trying to put the
pieces together.

The man reluctantly stepped away from Chyna.
He was a bit older with graying across his temples, but with a look
that showed he must have been very attractive in his younger years.
Lexi didn’t miss the glance he sent Chyna’s way before focusing his
attention back on Lexi. “Yes, as far as I can tell, you just
fainted. I’m Dr. Mike Cutler. You can call me Mike if you like,” he
said flashing Chyna another brief smile.

“Will I be alright, Mike?” Lexi asked using
his name to snap his attention back to the person who was bed
ridden.

“You took a pretty nasty fall and managed to
smack your head into the side of the coffee table. There is a large
knot on the back of your head, but that should be gone in a matter
of hours. You’ll have some tenderness over the next couple days,
but nothing to trouble yourself over. No concussion or any serious
damage. You’ll need to take some ibuprofen for the pain. Seems to
have frightened your friend here quite a bit though,” he said
readjusting his focus again. Lexi rolled her eyes. “If either of
you need anything further, give me a call,” he told Chyna as he
handed her a business card.