Chapter 55

* Ryder *

“You straight? It’s time to get out of here. Be sure to take everything you need because you won’t be coming back here for a while.” Tyler came into the room to find me standing there, lost in thought. Every once in a while, I’ll get hit with a flash of memory that I wasn’t sure was real, and I’ll have to stop and think it through to make sure that I wasn’t having some type of withdrawal effect.

Right now, though, I was thinking of the best way to play this. I have to think about Elena with my every move now, and since she didn’t know what I was involved with, the way things may look to her, and the way the press was going to play this, it could very well set us back.

I kept my head down as we left because there was nothing more fun than reading everyone’s thoughts on what I was feeling or doing. No doubt the headlines will read that I was bereft and heartbroken or some other such crap because they’d been conditioned for the last five years to believe that I was deeply in love with that snake. It was for this reason that I wore her blanket.

I wanted her to remember when she read those inevitable words that it was her I was thinking of and no one else. I see the necessity for me to keep things as they are for the sake of the young girls we were trying to save, but I find myself caught in the middle again because I can’t explain to her why I’ll be doing certain things and it’s starting to be a problem for me.

There’s no guarantee that everything will be tied up neatly and wrapped up in a bow in a month’s time, and the longer this goes on, the longer the public still believes that I’m married, the more problems I foresee. It’s what I deserve, though, I guess, my penance for the hurt I’d caused. It shouldn’t be easy because she deserves so much better than easy.

She’ll never know just how much I appreciate her giving me another chance or how much I fear making a wrong move again. I’ve only been clean for a little while, but I have the last five years as a reminder of why I should never let myself get that bad again. The thought of touching anything stronger than Benadryl makes me numb, and I can’t help but wonder how things had happened as fast as they did.

I’m plagued with long-buried memories almost every second of the day now. Things that seem so out of sync with who I am, who I’ve always wanted to be. I was only at my best when I was with Elena; I know that, and I’m sure the whole world knows it too. When I see pictures of myself going back to the day of the wedding until I got my act together, I can barely recognize myself.

I looked like I aged ten years or more, and though they were spreading some bullshit about me being clean, anyone with eyes could see that I was anything but. There were write-ups about me being ill, but I don’t remember any of it. I do recall a time about two years in when I wanted to make a break for it.

The memories are a bit muddy, but I’m almost certain that I had that conversation with Matt, and it was not long after if the publications are to be believed, that I came down with this mysterious illness. As we drove through the streets in some kind of covert manner that you only see in the movies to escape the paparazzi who could never get enough, it struck me that I had a lot to be grateful to these guys for. And to think it was all because three little girls were fans of ours.

The irony is that we ended up here because of another fan, one who had obviously gone off the rails or had always been that way. I tried to remember anything about Janie that I’d liked, one thing that stood out for me, and could find nothing, so how did I end up with her? I know about the threats against Elena and all of what came with that, but how did I end up in the same vicinity as Janie, and why can’t I remember?

“You need to learn how to hide your thoughts better, kid.”

“Hmm? What?” I looked to my left, where Lyon had his head back, and his eyes closed.

“You’re worrying again. Nothing good ever comes from worrying, and neither does looking back. You fucked up; you had help doing it, sure, but at the end of the day, it was your choices that made it easy for them to get the drop on you.”

“There’s no way to go back and change it, but you can do better going forward. Once you make up your mind to do that shit, you stick to it no matter what. If you don’t think you can make it, walk away now. Don’t tell yourself you love her and yet be willing to hurt her; love doesn’t hurt like that. It can hurt like a son of a bitch, but not like that.”

“It’s only supposed to hurt when the one you love is in pain or in some kind of danger, shit like that. But this hurting the one you love shit is for assholes. You’re not an asshole, are you? And before you answer that, my kid probably has this shit bugged down to the rims, so be very careful what you say. If you get on her bad side, I’m moving out of the way because I do not fuck with Hitler’s youth.”

“You call your daughter that?”

“I call her a lot of things; that’s beside the point. All kidding aside, not that I’m kidding, mind you, my kid would fuck you up worse than these people ever could, so if you’re not in for the long haul, get out now.”

“We’re here to save lives, to bring those girls back home, but you’ve got more than that going on. It’s rough, I know, and I won’t say it’s the price you pay for fame because that’s bullshit. My kid filled me in on your background; you had it all, you were going places, and that young lady was with you every step of the way. She saw something in you when no one else did, something beyond the fame, I mean.”

“What you failed to realize and still haven’t, as far as I can tell, is that someone didn’t want you whole. That’s the beginning and the end of it. If your brain wasn’t so fried from the drugs, you might be able to remember, you’d be able to see things more clearly, but it’s probably going to be a while before you get your shit back all the way.”

“What do you mean someone didn’t want me to be whole?”

“It’s hard to control someone who has their shit together. It’s even harder to control someone who has their shit together and is surrounded by people who genuinely love them. This town is full of parasites who prey on the innocent.”

“You were an innocent when you came here, just like the ones we’re trying to save now. You had a gift, a talent, and you just wanted to cash in on it, nothing wrong with that. Where you went wrong was you believed that every smile was genuine and every friend was real.”

“You didn’t know how to play the game because no one taught you. It’s for that reason I wouldn’t let my dog move here to get tied up in his shit. A bunch a blood-sucking succubus around every corner.”

He went off on one of his rants, and as always, it was a sight to behold. If I had any doubts about how he felt about Hollywood and its citizens, there would be none left after this latest tirade. He read everyone for filth, going back to the first silent movie producer to the latest. I could remind him that the son and heir to the most prominent studio in this town was one of his men, but I was afraid of what he might do to me.

He snapped back into the conversation as if nothing had happened, and I hid my smile of amusement well. “Your girl saw it happening and tried to stop it; that’s why they had to get rid of her and why they did it in such a vicious way. Your only break is that you were a kid when they started in on you.”

“What do you mean? How do you know that?” His answer was just a look that said he wasn’t going to answer that, and I had enough sense to drop it. “Never mind. Go on.”

“As I was saying, your one saving grace is that you were still a kid when they started working on you, so you never saw it and can’t necessarily be held responsible for what was done to you, not by you. Others might have tried to warn you along the way, but they have their own skeletons they want to keep hidden, so they could only do so much. Your girl was the only one willing to stick it out for you, and with you, so they had to destroy her in any way they could.”

“Once they got you hooked, you were no longer in control of anything; you lost the game right then and there. They knew it, and she knew it. She hung in there, tried to hold on no matter how much you fucked up, until they drove the nail in her and finished her off, or at least they tried to.”

“They never bargained on my little angel getting her knickers in a bunch and going the fuck off. And since she’s in it, now I’m in it, and I don’t fucking lose. Especially not against some pampered assholes who like playing with voodoo dolls and shit.”

Aaaand he was off again. If my life wasn’t in the toilet, this guy would be someone I could spend the whole day just shooting the breeze with. It’s a shame I had to meet him at a time like this and under these less-than-stellar circumstances. For someone as strong as him, I can only imagine how he sees me.

“I say all this to say; you were not to blame for all of this; you were led astray, you were used. I’m sure they’ve done things to you that you never want to mention or even remember again; they’ll use that against you too. The thing you have to do is get out in front of it.”

“Come clean to who matters. But remember, you can’t try to please everyone; you’re going to lose some people, some of your fans. If they’re too dumb to realize that you were a victim as well, you don’t need them.”

I was too transfixed to speak. Where was this guy when I was wandering around L.A. like a lost lamb? His every word resounded with me, and I was left wondering how he knew the things he did. Every word rang true, and he said it so plainly it was hard not to see the big picture he painted.

He wasn’t absolving me of all guilt, but he was laying out the facts as they were, and it felt as if a weight had been lifted off my shoulders. If I wasn’t so amazed and hanging onto his every word, I would be brought to tears.

“Thanks for saying that. I think I needed to hear it from someone who wasn’t part of my circle or my life in any way. I think I owe your daughter a great deal, huh.”

“Shh, don’t say shit like that, kid. Don’t ever tell my kid you owe her; that’s a debt you would never stop paying.” I laughed at the look on his face, but he was dead serious. “Oh, you’re not kidding.”

“No, I’m not. Just watch and learn. She’s having fun with this shit; she’d probably thank you for feeding them to her. Her uncles dropped the ball and gave her carte blanche. Now my hands are tied, and I can’t rein her in, so it’s your lucky day.”

“You say that as if you know what she’s going to do next.”

“She’s my kid; of course, I know what she’s going to do.”

“And what’s that?”

“Like I said, watch and learn. You have to beat these people at their own game, and since you’ve got your hands full, I’ll let my kid take care of it for you.”

“But she’s just a little girl. If they’re as horrible as you say, how can you let her get mixed up in this?”

“Pfft, you hear that, boys? He’s worried about Mengele.”

I’d almost forgotten that Tyler, Zak, and the other newcomer Mancini were in the SUV with us. No one had interrupted the whole time we were talking with each other.

“No need to worry about our little princess Ryder; these clowns are child’s play for her. She’s just cutting her teeth, and your ex-wife really pissed her off, so there’s no turning back. Not to mention what the others are up to; it’s going to take some doing to pull her off of them so we can get some.”

Tyler laughed and turned back around. I was a little confused, though. They don’t involve their wives, but the ten-year-old was all in the mix. I didn’t voice my opinion, though, because I was sure they had their reasons which they weren’t about to share with me.

“So, we good? You gonna stop thinking so hard over there so I can get some shut-eye? I’m on no sleep, and your stressing is stressing me out.” How is that even possible? Was I going to ask? Hell no. He went back to leaning his head back against the headrest with his eyes closed while I sat in silence and pondered his words.

He’d hit the nail on the head in more ways than one. It’s true I couldn’t get out from under the cloud I’d painted myself under. No matter how I looked at things, I was the one in the wrong, the one responsible. Having someone else spell it out for me without bias has helped me to see things in a new light.

I’d given up on my innocence, accepting that the things that were happening and had happened to me in the past were my just desserts for the life I’d led. I lost sight of the fact that I wasn’t always this way, that I was once a pretty decent guy. But it’s hard not to blame myself when I was the one who had caused so much harm.

Even the fact that my concerts were being used for such a despicable act, why hadn’t I known? How had I become so selfish that the fans who’d adored and supported me since the beginning had become nothing more to me than dollar signs? How had I deluded myself for so long that I was on the right path? That Matt was helping me find myself?

How had I gone so far off the mark that I lost myself completely and didn’t know it? Was it only the drugs that were responsible for that? Would I have been a better person had I never become addicted? It’s hard to know now since it’s so hard to remember a time when I wasn’t like this.

The sad part is I don’t think I deserve Elena. That’s the hardest pill to swallow but one that I’ve had to take. So how do I reconcile knowing that, feeling that way, with wanting to be with her? How do I get over knowing that she deserves better and still being selfish enough to want her for myself? And how do I get through all this without getting her involved?

Will I always bring darkness and pain into her life? I’d tainted her so much already, had brought this ugliness into her life. A life that was on track for greatness long before I came along. Fine, if I have to accept that they had done this to me, then I have to accept that they were the ones to hurt her as well, not just me. That makes them my enemies. Not only because of what they’d done to me but because they’d dared to go after her.

Lyon is right; I have to get my head out of my ass and quit feeling sorry for myself. It’s time to take them down, all the way down, not for me, but for Elena, the only one who ever really gave me her all without any hint of altruism.

The only one who saw the real me, the young innocent me, without blemish, without blame. I’ll do whatever it takes to give that back to her. To be that boy of promise that she’d fallen in love with. The boy who would die before he hurt her or let any harm come to her.