InHap*pily Ever After (Incidental Happenstance) (66 page)

            “Is that why
you’re here? To avoid dealing with it?”

            “Partly.
Mostly. I just needed to get away from it for a while, to think things through
I guess.”

            “And what
conclusions have you come to?”

            “None.”

            “Look Tia. You
know I love you and that you are welcome to stay with us as long as you need
to…but you can’t hide away from the whole world forever. Take a little bit of
time, but at some point, you are going to have to deal with it. What does Dylan
have to say?”

            “I haven’t
talked to him. I just can’t right now.”

            “He doesn’t
know where you are, does he?”

            “No.”

            Lilly pulled
back and took Tia’s face in her hands, forcing her to meet her gaze. “I don’t
know anything about this situation, but I do know that man loves you and that
it has to be killing him not to be able to explain himself. You need to at
least let him tell his side of the story.”

            “How can he
explain it? What can he possible say that’s going to make this go away?”

            “It isn’t
going to go away, honey, but you know from past experience that there are two
sides to every story, and things aren’t always what they seem.”

            “I know I’m
going to have to deal with it eventually, but I’m not ready to do it right now.
I just need some time to figure things out for myself, to see if there is any
way I can go forward. I’ve given up so much, Lilly—my dignity is one of the few
things I have left; and even that’s taken a big hit. I just don’t know how I
can face him—or anyone—right now. Not until I get my own head straight. It’s
just been so nice being here; feeling normal again.”

            “So be it,
then.  If he did this thing willingly, he deserves to stew in it for a while.
Maybe he even needs to wonder where you are and what you’re doing and feel what
it’s like to lose you. We’ll kick Marcus out of the house tomorrow and have a
girl day. We can bake some cookies and watch some TV and drink wine for lunch
and forget about the rest of the world for a bit.”

            “Thanks,
Lilly. You really are the best.”

*****

            “This is
fucked up sixty ways from Sunday, mate. I really need to know what the hell
happened last night.” After he got off the phone with Jessa, Dylan scoured his
phone for anything that would help him fill in the gaps. He went backward
through all the texts he’d sent to Tia, and found the pictures that had been
sent to her from his phone. Did he do that? He couldn’t think of a possible
scenario in which he’d put himself in that situation, and he sure as hell would
never send pictures like that to the woman he loved more than anything in the
world. She was obviously devastated, and had no intention of talking to him. He
couldn’t blame her, but he needed desperately to find out what really happened.
It was almost a blessing that she wouldn’t talk to him—he had nothing that he
could tell her that would come close to explaining his disgusting and
disrespectful behavior. He waited for the nausea to pass, and called Bo to come
to his room.

            “Shit brother,
I hoped it wouldn’t come to this,” he said, hanging his head sadly.

            “Bo, did you
know about this?” Bo just nodded, never taking his eyes from the ground. “What
the hell, mate?”

            “I had no idea
what was going on dude. I saw this waitress coming out of the back room looking
all guilty, and she said something like she couldn’t be a part of it and that
you didn’t know what you were doing. When I got back there, those chicks were
all over you like flies on shit. They asked me to join in, and I kicked them out.
It was obvious to me that you didn’t know what the hell was going on—you were
so smashed that you could barely open your eyes to acknowledge me. I got rid of
them and deleted the pictures off your phone and brought you back here to sleep
it off—when you didn’t remember it the next day, I hoped that would be the end
of it. All I could do was pray that they didn’t have pictures of their own and
that it would never go any further than that room. I sure as hell wasn’t going
to dump it in your lap the next morning.”

            “Fuck!” Dylan
got up and paced the room, putting his hands to the sides of his head and
fisting them in his hair. “I swear to you that I have no memory whatsoever
about any of this! I would never do that to Tia—I would never do that at all!
What the hell happened?” He took a swing at the wall hard enough to leave a
mark and send a spike of pain radiating up his arm. It was a small fraction of
the pain that Tia must be feeling, and he felt he deserved that and more.

            “They were
pretty smug about the whole thing, I’ll tell you that.”

            Dylan dropped
his head. “How far did it go, Bo? Do you think that I…” he was unable to finish
the thought as his stomach threatened to upheave again.

            “No,” Bo said
immediately. “I really don’t think it went that far. You still had your pants
on, and I don’t think that you’d have been able to get them back on yourself if
they were off. They still had their clothes on too, although they weren’t fully
covered. I’m pretty sure it didn’t cross that line, at least.”

            Dylan let out
a huge sigh that held only a small amount of relief. “Thank God for that, but
it still crossed my line. And it damn sure crossed Tia’s. I don’t even know
what to say to her, and that’s even if she’ll ever speak to me again. Nothing
sounds more like bullshit than ‘I don’t know.’ But I don’t. No matter how hard
I try, I don’t remember anything after Dozer leaving.”

            “Do you think
he would know anything? Maybe he would remember something that you don’t. Can
you call him?”

            “Ya, tanks
mon. ‘E is a beautiful bwoy. Jus a beeny bwoy.”

            It was Sunday
afternoon before he’d finally been able to get him on the phone, and Dylan was
thankful to hear his voice. “Congratulations again, mate. To both of you.
Listen, I’ve got something to ask you. I fucked up, Dozer, and I don’t even
remember it. I’m hoping you can tell me if anything strange happened before you
left. How drunk was I?”

            “No, not much.
You had a clear head.”

            “Do you
remember when the blondes came to our table?”

            “Ya mon. Dey
bring us some drinks an talk about getting naked wi’ us. Dey really like you.”

            “Anything
else? Was there anything strange about the way they were acting? Or the way I
was acting?”

            “You brush dem
off, tell dem dat you not interested. I don’t tink dey like dat answer.”

            “Obviously,”
Dylan said wryly. “Listen Doze, if you think of anything else—anything at all,
no matter how small it might seem, will you call me? It’s really important.”

            “Ya mon, no
problem.”

            There was
nothing else he could do. He dragged himself into the studio on Monday morning,
but he was completely useless as far as recording went. All he could think
about was Tia, hiding out somewhere where he couldn’t get to her; suffering
alone. He’d talked to Lexi again—or more like gotten his ass thoroughly chewed
out by her, and he got no further with Sean. He was afraid to call Will or
Danielle, and equally scared to call Paddy. In their eyes he had betrayed Tia
in the worst way, and how could he expect forgiveness from them when he
couldn’t forgive himself?

            Tia would have
to go back to the apartment eventually, and it might be the only chance he’d
have to talk to her face-to-face. Not that he had anything he could say to make
things better. He could only throw himself at her feet and beg forgiveness, and
hope to hell that she’d give him another chance.

            He’d laid down
enough vocals that the guys could work on things without him for a little
while, and he booked the next flight out to Chicago.

*****

            Bo was really
feeling it. They were doing the best they could with the music, and were making
some headway with a couple of the new songs, but he couldn’t help but worry
about Dylan. He was pretty much a wreck when he left, and the texts he’d sent
over the past couple days were downright depressing. He’d had no word from Tia,
and Lexi refused to speak to him, too. He was holed up in the apartment waiting
for her to come back. Bo hoped she was coming back.

            When his best
friend was hurting, he was hurting, and he just felt completely drained. He
decided to stay behind while the rest of the guys went out to grab some lunch
and he made his way to the kitchen to throw a sandwich together.  As he ate
without tasting, he found himself standing in the little lounge where the now
infamous photos had been taken. They’d been featured on a handful of tabloids,
and were all over the internet; painting Dylan as a louse and Tia as a victim.
Tabloid TV was talking about it like crazy, and so-called experts were
speculating that Dylan probably had commitment issues and didn’t really want to
give up his life as the world’s most eligible bachelor. He’d never really dealt
with bad press before, but he could take it. He was one person who truly didn’t
care what the rest of the world thought of him, but the fact that it was
hurting Tia, and that he couldn’t do anything to protect her, was killing him.
Bo had never known him to be so down.

            He shoved the
last of the sandwich in his mouth and lay down on the couch that had become
almost like a crime scene. The drum sticks he had in his back pocket were
jabbing into his back and he pulled them out and laid them on the back of the
couch so he could stretch out and close his eyes for a few minutes. He wished
to hell that he’d kept those damn bitches in the room and questioned them—there
had to be something that could cast at least a faint glimmer on what the hell
went down.

            Bo went over
it in his mind again and again and there was just something that didn’t add up.
Maybe it was the smug look on their overly made-up faces, maybe it was the way the
one was so sneaky about the way she tried to slide Dylan’s phone onto the…Bo
sat up and hit the back of the couch with his fist, his drumsticks clattering
to the floor. That was it. It had to be. There was no way Dylan would ever be
stupid enough to text those pictures to Tia and even if he was drunk enough to
be that stupid, he didn’t even have enough coordination to button his own damn
pants, much less maneuver his way through his contacts and send a series of
texts with attached photos. And the messages that were sent didn’t sound like
Dylan at all—he was a Brit; he didn’t use the term ‘dude,’ it was always
‘mate.’

            Dylan was
beating himself up over being insensitive enough to send those pictures to Tia
but Bo saw now that he hadn’t sent them at all—the whole thing was orchestrated
to make him look like a complete prick, and once again, both Dyl and Tia were
paying the price for someone else’s bullshit lies.

            He dashed out
the room to grab his phone—he needed to call Dylan and share his suspicions. His
head was swimming with the possibilities, and he thought maybe he should call
Jessa and run it by her first; try to make sense of the whole thing. Was it
possible that the bitches had planned the whole thing ahead of time and had
every intention of putting Dylan in a compromising position and then
documenting it? Absofuckinglutely it was; and the more he thought about it, the
more he knew that he needed to document everything that he saw that night. He
went back into the kitchen and rummaged through the drawers until he came up
with a pen and some paper and sat down at the table to write it all down.

            Bo reached for
his back pocket; he thought better when he had a stick in his hand. When he
came up empty, he pulled the couch from the wall so he could collect them from
where they had fallen. As he reached down, something else caught his eye. The
first thing was a piece of candy; what might have once been an M&M, except
that it was covered with a fuzz of dust that indicated it had been there for
some time. The second thing was a pill—an oblong-shaped, olive green colored
tablet with the number 542 stamped into it that was devoid of dust, so must
have been only been there for a short time…only a few days, perhaps? An image
from the night of the party filled his mind—the purses of the women spilling
onto the floor, scattering a variety of contents including some pills from a
plastic bottle that rolled off in all directions.

            “Gotcha,
bitches,” he smiled, feeling lighter than he had in days. He took a baggie from
a cabinet and dropped the pill inside, pulling the zipper shut. He was headed
out the door when he spotted the phone book on a little table in the corner of
the room. He grabbed it and his phone, and called for a taxi. He texted Ty on
his way and told him that he was taking the afternoon off.

            Dylan sat in
the apartment for the third straight day. He’d showered once, yesterday he
thought, but he was afraid to leave the couch for fear that Tia might come and
go while he was away or otherwise occupied. He had sighed a collective breath
of relief when he saw that she hadn’t packed up all her things before she left,
and he was determined to be here when she returned.
Oh God, please make her
return
, he thought.

            He’d ordered
take-away once, but had been surviving mostly on what was in the fridge and the
cupboards. It certainly wasn’t like he had much of an appetite, anyway.

            He desperately
wanted to turn off his phone, but couldn’t in case Tia called. Bo had rung him
twice a day and Jessa even more often, and he nearly jumped out of his skin
every time it rang only to feel the brief hope that rose with every chirp
collapse when it wasn’t Tia’s new number on the display. He had nothing new to
tell them, and their words of pity and encouragement did little to make him
feel better. His soul appreciated their support, but his nerves were getting
damn tired of it.

            Sleep was
pretty much eluding him altogether. He couldn’t bring himself to even lie in
their bed, afraid that Tia’s scent on the pillow might send him on a downward
spiral from which he couldn’t climb back out.

            How could he
have been so incredibly stupid? He had thought of nothing else for the past
three days, but still couldn’t understand how he could have even allowed
himself to fall into that kind of a situation. Even before he’d met Tia he
wouldn’t have given those women the time of day—they were trashy and
self-indulgent, and that had never been his style.

            All he could
do as he sat and faced the elevator door so he could see her the second it
opened; if it opened; was fight with his failed memory and kick himself in the
arse for being the epitome of everything he despised and swore he would never
become.

            He’d pretty
much given up on finding the right woman; the one who he could love without
worry and give himself to completely. And then, Tia crashed into his life. God
knew he wasn’t looking for anything to happen that night, but he fell for her
quickly and he fell for her hard. She was his everything, and he may have lost
her and didn’t even understand why.

            The hour grew
late and he lay back on the couch, pulling a blanket over himself and hoping
that pure mental exhaustion would bring him some much needed dream-free sleep.

*****

            “Rohypnol,” Bo
said to Jessa’s image on his phone. “Otherwise known as a date-rape drug. The
cops knew what it was the second they saw it.”

            “Oh thank
God,” Jessa breathed. “I mean…that’s not what I mean…it’s just that I knew Dyl
would never…”

            “I know. I
can’t tell you how relieved I was when they told me. I just know it came out of
one of those bitches’ purses—there were pills bouncing all over the damn floor,
but I didn’t make the connection at the time. I just wish I’d grabbed one of
them that night so we could prove it.”

            “Holy crap. Do
you think it might still be in his system? Could he go and have a blood test or
something and maybe get some proof?”

            “The cops
don’t think so, but it might be worth a try anyway. They said it usually only
stays in the system for about 24 hours, and 60 would be the max. It’s already
been almost five days.”

            “Have you told
Dylan yet?”

            “I tried
calling him, but he didn’t pick up. I haven’t heard from him since last night
and frankly, he didn’t sound too good. I’m worried about him. I’m going to try
him again right after I hang up with you, but what if he doesn’t answer? He
needs to know this, like, yesterday.”

            “OK. I’m going
to get on this right away. We may not have solid proof, but I can certainly get
it out there as a strong suspicion at least and maybe sway some minds. I’m
going to do some digging into the porn stars, too. Maybe I can find something
there that will give us a motive.”

            “As if people
need a motive when it comes to Dylan Miller,” Bo said sarcastically.

            “I agree, but
this thing has the stink of Esther Caglio all over it. It wouldn’t surprise me
a bit if she had a connection somewhere.”

            “I thought
exactly the same thing.”

            “Listen, if
you can’t get through to Dylan, you need to get through to someone who can.
Maybe you could explain the whole thing to Lexi and she could go over there.”

            Bo’s heart
skipped a beat at the sound of Lexi’s name. He’d really love to hear her voice,
but wondered if she’d even take his call. Then he wondered if he’d be able to
talk to her at all once he did hear her voice or if he’d trip over his words
and make an ass out of himself yet again. He had so much he wanted to say to
her, but this sure as hell wasn’t the time for it. “Maybe you should call her.
I don’t know if she’d really want to hear from me.”

            “Why wouldn’t
she? Did you two have a fight or something? Why don’t I know anything about
it?”

            “It’s not
that, exactly…”

            “Whatever it
is, get over it. You just need to take care of this, OK? Dylan needs this news
right
this freaking minute,
and if he doesn’t answer, you need to find a way to
get it to him. I have to get on this thing and try to diffuse a bomb that’s
already exploded.”

            “Yeah, OK,
whatever. What’s the number?”

            “You don’t
have it?”

            “No I don’t
have it,” he said, the agitation clear in his voice.

            “OK, I’m
texting it to you now. Text me back and let me know what happens—I’m going to
be on the phone trying to get some answers.”

            Dylan didn’t
pick up. Damn it, he’d thought about calling Lexi at least a hundred times, but
could never figure out how to even start a conversation, much less say what he
wanted to say. Hell, he didn’t even really know what he wanted to say. He tried
Dylan’s line once more, but it just rang and went to voice mail. Bo guessed
that he wouldn’t answer for anyone but Tia, and she probably wasn’t calling.
There was no other choice; he needed to get Lexi to do a wellness check on Dyl
as well as to fill him in on the new revelations. It would be an enormous
relief for him to know that he hadn’t betrayed Tia, and it wasn’t fair to make
Dyl wait for the news because his own palms were sweating over talking to the
woman he was crushing on. He would just make it all business, and deal with his
own shit at another time; if the time was ever right.

            “Damn it,
Miller, I told you that I don’t want to hear any more of your bullshit…”

            His number
would appear on Lexi’s screen just like Dylan’s would—all zeros. Bo couldn’t
help but smile at her matter-of-fact greeting and lack of pleasantries. “It’s
not Dylan. It’s Bo. How’re you doin’,” God help him, he almost said,
‘beautiful,’ “Lexi?”

            “Oh.” There
was a moment of silence as she let that register, and then she was all back to
business. “If you’re calling to tell me that I should take that bastard’s
calls, you can just forget about it. I don’t know where Tia is, and even if I
did, I wouldn’t tell him.”

            Bo couldn’t
help but chuckle. Damn, she was one feisty woman. “I figured it out. I know
what happened, and Dylan isn’t a bastard.”

            “Like hell he
isn’t.”

            “Listen Lexi,
he isn’t picking up his phone, and I’m really worried about him.”

            “And I should
care because…”

            “Because I
found one of the pills that the bitches dropped when they were making their
quick exit. It was a date rape drug.”

            There was a
beat of silence and Bo could hear the intake of Lexi’s surprised breath. “Say
that again?”

            “I’m positive
that they not only drugged him, but that they planned to take the pictures and
make it look like Dylan was steppin’ out on Tia.”

            “Oh my God.”
He could clearly hear the sadness in her voice.

            “I walked in
on them in the middle of it all and kicked their asses out; and when I tossed
their purses off the chair, some pills went flying across the room. Dylan was
so out of it he couldn’t even stand up. I thought that he was just drunk at the
time, and I carried him back to the hotel so he could sleep it off. I had no
idea about the texts until later the next day, and even then, he couldn’t
believe he sent them. Now I know he didn’t.  I didn’t believe him at first
either, because all he kept saying was that he didn’t remember anything. I
found one of the pills today under the couch and took it to the cops; and they
confirmed that it was a date rape drug. I can’t prove it, but I know in my gut
that it went down that way.”

            “I believe
you,” she breathed. “God, I had such a hard time believing that Dylan would do
something like that, but the evidence was kind of overwhelming. I feel like
such a bitch. I was so mean to him.”

            “I didn’t cut
him a whole lot of slack either, but none of it sat right with me. The
important thing is that they both need to know this information, and I can’t
get through to either one of them. Dylan isn’t answering his phone, and I’m
really worried about him. He’s really fucked up over the whole situation, and
he still thinks that somehow he’s the one to blame. He’s gone back to Chicago
to wait for Tia to show up at the apartment, and I just know he’s sitting there
stewing in this whole mess and blaming himself for hurting her.”

            “Oh God. Poor
Dyl. Poor Tia!”

            “You need to
help me fix this, Lexi. Can you go to the apartment and fill him in on this
information so he can stop kicking the shit out of himself? And if you do
really know where Tia is, she needs to know that he never did anything to hurt
her. I don’t know a whole lot of people who deserve each other like they do,
and I can’t stand that they’re both doubting that right now.”

            Lexi was
already shrugging into her coat and heading for the door. “I’m on my way to him
right now,” she said breathlessly. “I’ll make them let me in. I’ll call the
cops if I have to.” The images of the cops busting in on her own pity-fest were
still fresh in her mind, but she wouldn’t hesitate to do the same for Dylan if
it would help resolve the situation.

            “Thatta girl,”
Bo said, cheering her on.

            “I honestly
don’t know where Tia is, but she calls me at least every other day and tonight
should be a call night. Oh shit, I hope it’s a call night. I really can’t
believe this, Bo. No matter how many crazy things happen to them, I can’t help
but wonder how people can be so shitty to each other. I feel horrible for the
way I treated Dylan, and once again, he didn’t do anything wrong.”

            “Tell him
that. It’ll mean a lot to him, I promise you.”

            “I’m leaving
now.” She paused, and Bo held his breath. “Thanks, Bo. Once again, you’re the
hero.”

            His heart
melted just a bit at her words. “Thank you, Lex, but I think you’ll get the
hero status out of this one.”

            He heard the
click as she cut the connection and he sat there with the phone in his hands for
a long while, praying for miracles.

*****

            “Welcome to
Chit
Chat
!” The familiar voice of Dottie Miles filled the living room, and Tia
sat back with a cup of tea. She’d been avoiding watching the television,
preferring instead to hide in books and prepare meals for Lilly and Marcus.
Curiosity had finally gotten the better of her;  but more than that, she really
needed to get a grip on her life and make some hard decisions. She needed to
see if people were still talking about the pictures and find out what they were
saying. Did the whole world think she was a complete loser who couldn’t hold
onto her man, or that Dylan had decided that Penelope had been right all along
and that a relationship between a rock star and a teacher could never last?
Were they right?

            She couldn’t
keep hiding out at Lilly’s. She and Marcus had been wonderful to her and hadn’t
mentioned a word about her leaving; even when the snow was under control and
Lilly had to go back to work on Tuesday. Tia had done some hard thinking that
day and every day since, but her brain was still clouded and the pain was still
too fresh to come to any definitive answers. The time had come, however, and
even though the apartment in the city still didn’t really feel like home, it
was hers and she missed it.

            It was nearly
halfway through the show before Dottie brought it up. “OK, can we go back to
the Dylan Miller story for just a bit?” she asked her co-hosts. “Now you know
I’ve been a fan from the start—and I still am—so I just have to say that I think
people are making entirely too much of the whole thing.”