Convincing Constance (The Blow Hole Boys) (20 page)

I woke up in Tony’s
bed, cursing myself. The light outside the window slipped through a crack in the curtains, letting me know it was time to get my ass up and leave.

Again, I crept from his bed and into his bathroom. The light above me flickered when I turned it on. The night before had been wonderful. Better than wonderful. He put me in positions I didn’t know were possible and my body ached in all the right places.

I ran my fingers across my stomach and smiled at myself in the mirror. It if wasn’t careful, Tony would be the death of me. Then again, that would be a hell of a way to go.

The man had stamina; that was for damn sure. I’d gotten maybe an hour break before he was ready to go again. He was an all-night kind of man. I couldn’t help the cheesy smile on my face. It was one of those goofy smiles you can’t even force down with your fingers.

I quietly pulled open the bathroom door, and he was standing there waiting for me. His long, hard body was leaning against the doorframe and the man downstairs was giving me another standing ovation.

He reached down and grasped his hardness.

“Don’t even think about leaving me hanging again.” He bit his bottom lip and stalked toward me.

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” I responded as he took me in his arms and lifted me onto the bathroom counter.

I left his room two
hours later with wet hair, wearing the same clothes I’d worn the day before. The hallway was quiet and empty, which I was glad for. The walk of shame in front of families or, even worse, the boys from the band would have been hell.

I didn’t know if Lena was taking a nap or what, so I slipped into my room, careful not to wake her just in case. I pressed the palm of my hand against the door, begging it to close silently.

“Where the fuck have you been?” she yelled when I walked in. “We’ve been blowing your phone up all damn night and most of the day.”

I was met with all the girls sitting around the room, waiting for me. I pulled out my dead cell and held it up for them to see.

“Sorry. It’s dead.” I shrugged. “What’s going on? Why is everyone here like you’ve gathered for a crazy intervention?” I asked.

They looked at each other like they weren’t sure who should be the one to tell me, and then Lena stepped up and grabbed my hands.

“Something happened last night. Just don’t freak out, okay?”

My heart skipped a beat. The only other person I cared about I’d spent the night with. The girls were all fine and looking back at me, so whatever it was, it couldn’t have been that bad.

“What?” I asked.

Lena bent down, grabbed the TV remote from her bed, and pressed the power button. The screen lit up, and it was on one of the music channels. They were talking about recent events and spilling gossip about different celebrities.

Then the news lady said my name and everything around me crumbled.

“A sex video starring the lead guitarist of Red Room Sirens, Constance McClaire, also the daughter of rock legend Clarke McClaire, and the bass player of legendary band Black Daze, Jack Jenson, was leaked on the internet yesterday. Officials are saying they’re not sure who leaked the video, but…”

The video flashed on the screen, blurring out everything but my face. My knees knocked together before my legs gave out and I collapsed onto the bed in front of the TV. A panic attack swept over me, but I was so numb I couldn’t even panic.

My brain stopped retaining information from that point forward. All I could do was stare at my young face and how blank I looked.

Memories of that night crashed over me, and I could practically smell his skin again. The thoughts that ran through my brain when I was unable to move attacked me. I reached up and wiped a stray tear from my cheek.

I looked up into the faces of the rest of the band and all I saw was condemnation. The sounds of my breath and my heartbeat echoed in my ears as the room began to spin around me.

“Constance?” Hope’s voice echoed around me. “Hey. Stay with us. Are you okay?”

I nodded, even though I wasn’t so sure I
was
okay. I wasn’t sure I’d ever be okay again.

“I’m okay,” I said. My voice sounded distant and too soft.

I stood and took in their faces once more before I turned and walked out of the room.

“Where are you going?” Hope called out. “Constance?” 

“Constance? What the hell? Are you okay?” Mia grabbed at my sleeve.

Shaking off her grip, I ignored them and kept going. I couldn’t look them in the face anymore. They all thought I’d slept with that fucker. Everyone thought it, and I’d let them continue to think it before I stood up and told the truth. I just wanted to disappear forever.

Jack. The bastard told me if I didn’t pay him fifty grand he would ruin my life, but I hadn’t paid attention. Honestly, I hadn’t thought about his threat again. I blocked him out of my mind completely, the way I always had, and yet again, he’d broken me. Split me in two and left me numb to everything around me.

I pressed the button on the elevator over and over again, hoping it would open faster. I wanted to get on and disappear before the girls followed me. Plus, I needed to get out of the building and into some fresh air. I was suffocating and the hallways were getting skinnier as the walls moved in on me. When the door opened, I rushed into the elevator and straight into Tony.

“Constance?” He looked down at me, confused. “Baby, what’s wrong?”

I just stood there and gaped at him. I hadn’t even noticed the rest of the guys with him.

“She looks like she’s in shock, dude,” Zeke said as he snapped his fingers in my face.

Everything felt as if it weren’t happening to me. It was like I was watching a really fucked-up movie starring some girl who could
never
be me. I wasn’t her. I wasn’t weak. I could never be as small and helpless as she was.

“Come on,” Tony said.

I didn’t fight when he scooped me into his arms and carried me out of the elevator.

“I’m taking her to my room. Find out what the fuck is going on,” Tony said to the boys as they stood around and gawked at me.

And then they were gone and I was lying on Tony’s bed, staring up at him. He leaned over me and brushed the hair from my face.

“I don’t know what happened, but I’m going to make it better. Whatever it is, I’ll fix it.”

There was knock at the door and then Tony was gone. I lay there for what felt like hours before I sat up. The room around me was blurry. My eyes burned as I held back the tears that threatened to fall.

The beige walls and contemporary furniture in the room around me felt too clean for a girl who was so dirty. My gaze bounced around the room until it landed on the thing I hated the most. Directly in front of me was the TV, and beside that was Tony’s precious stash of pills. The baggy was flipped open, revealing different tablets of all different colors.

I stood up and picked up the bag, pouring a few into my hand. It was strange to touch them. I didn’t understand how something so tiny could alter a person so much. They made you numb—took away all feeling. All the aches. All the pains. All emotion.

Picking out a handful that stood out to me, I threw the rest in the bag and tossed the others in my mouth the way I’d seen Tony do. Except I couldn’t just swallow them without something to drink. Going to the bathroom, I scooped up a handful of water and sucked it down, pushing the pills down with it. I wasn’t one to take drugs, but I needed to not feel. I needed to block it all out.

Instead of waiting for Tony, I left and went back to my room. The girls were still there waiting for me, and they stood when I walked in.

“Are you okay?” Hope asked.

Twiggy came up to me and wrapped her slim arms around me. Her hug knocked me back into myself, and for a second I could breathe.

I shook my head. “No, but after you take me out and get me shitfaced, I will be.”

“That sounds like a damn good idea,” Hope said. “Let’s go get fucked up.”

The girls were quick to jump on that since I never really partied with them. Throwing ourselves together, we left and went straight to a random bar that Google suggested.

It was Florida, so there were lots of beach-themed places, yet somehow we’d ended up in a fishing tavern. The few people who littered the room gawked at us like we were aliens. As we moved across the room to the bar, my eyes settled on the items throughout the room.

It was a small place. The wooden walls held stuffed fish and pictures of fishermen. Fishing lures and poles hung from the ceiling, and the music playing was a mix of country and jazz. It was a hole in the wall, but they served liquor, and at that point, that was all I gave a shit about.

As soon as I sat down, the old bartender slid a shot in front of me. He smiled at me, showing a missing tooth right in front.

“You look like you could use this,” he said with a deep cackle.

“Don’t sip it. Just down it,” Mia said as she smiled at me over the rim of her glass.

I watched as she downed her shot and slammed the tiny glass onto the bar. I lifted mine to my lips and slammed it.

It had been years since I’d taken a shot of anything, and I’d forgotten about the burn. Fire streaked down my throat and settled deep in my stomach, eating me from the inside out. It took my breath away, causing me to cough.

“Again,” I said as I set my glass down on the bar with a loud clink.

“Okay! That’s what I’m talking about.” Mia laughed. “Bartender, keep the shots coming.”

I slammed three more before I quit feeling the fire. Each shot we toasted to something different.

“To men with big cocks,” Lena said before we all downed our shots.

The older men around the bar smiled behind their beer bottles.

“To being a kickass Siren,” Twiggy slurred.

“To the best vibrator in the world.” Mia giggled.

“Fuck that! To never running out of batteries.” Hope laughed.

An hour later, I felt nothing. I understood immediately what it was about pills and alcohol that made Tony tick. I could live through anything feeling the way I felt. Nothing bothered me, and while I knew there was chaos all around me, I didn’t care. All I cared about was my next shot and the next song that was going to be played.

I turned to go back to the bar, but the room spun with me. I giggled and leaned against the closest table.

“Stick a fork in that bitch! She is done!” Hope slurred loudly.

The rest of the girls laughed and I laughed with them. Once I started laughing, it became hard to keep my eyes open. Briefly, the world went black, and when there was light again, Lena was bent over me.

“Constance!” she screamed in my face.

I smiled up at her, and then everything went black one final time.

When the elevator door opened
, all I saw was Constance standing there. Her skin was pale and her eyes were wide and unblinking. She looked like she was sleepwalking.

She wasn’t looking at me, yet she walked right into me. Grabbing her by the tops of her arms, I looked her in the eyes. Something was definitely wrong.

She felt lighter when I lifted her into my arms. And she melted into my shoulder without any kind of fight. That alone triggered warning bells. Constance was fine with being manhandled in bed, but outside the bedroom, not so much.

Once I laid her on my bed, it was like staring at a dead woman. Her stomach moved up and down as she breathed, but that was it.

I pushed the hair away from her damp cheek and ran my fingers over her face. She looked so delicate—so breakable—and I wasn’t sure what it was that shattered her, but I would find out.

When the boys came to the door, I left her there and stepped out into the hallway.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

“Some really fucked-up shit, that’s what,” Chet said.

“Man, you’re going to want to see this,” Finn said.

I followed behind him to his room and sat on the edge of his bed. He flipped the TV onto a music channel and at that exact moment, all I could see was Constance’s face. Everything around her was blurry, but it was obvious what was happening. She stared out of the screen with dead eyes, and my heart broke.

“It’s everywhere, man. It’s spreading like a wildfire that she’s sleeping with Jack Jenson and they made this sex tape together.” Finn ran his hands through his hair in aggravation. “I don’t know about you, but it looks to me like she’s drugged.”

“Yeah. No doubt. The girl in this tape isn’t Constance. She’s doused out of her mind.” Zeke followed.

I couldn’t take my eyes away from the TV screen. Anger built inside me until it reached behind my eyes and burned my cheeks. It didn’t matter where I found him, but when I did, Jack Jenson was a dead man.

I jumped from the bed and left the room. I needed to be near Constance. I wanted to make sure she was safe in my arms, but when I got back to my room, she was gone.

I went to the bathroom and threw open the door, but she wasn’t in there either. I went back into the room and grabbed my wallet from the counter and went for my baggy of pills. I stopped when I saw the bag had been opened. Pills were spilled onto the countertop and a few were littered across the floor.

“Shit!” I said as I ran to the door.

I rushed out into the hallway and right into the boys.

“What’s going on now? Where are you going?” Chet called after me when I took off down the hallway toward Constance’s room.

I knocked on the door and tried the knob.

“She’s not in there. The girls just got on the elevator. They’re taking her out and getting her shitfaced to relieve some stress. Sounded like a damn good idea to me,” Zeke said.

I didn’t even stop to explain as I took off toward the elevator and started pressing the button over and over again. It took forever for the elevator to get back up to our floor, but when it did, I got on and pressed the button for the lobby.

The elevator moved too slow, stopping at every fucking floor in the hotel. Couples got on with kids, and I stood behind me, coming apart at the seams.

When I got off the elevator, I rushed around the lobby, looking for the girls, and when I didn’t see them, I ran outside and looked. They were nowhere to be seen. And then I saw Shane.

“Hey, Shane. Have you see the girls from Siren out here?” I asked.

“Yeah. They just left. Man, that’s some shit about that chick fucking Jack from Black Daze. No wonder their album’s doing so fucking good.” He chuckled.

He didn’t know it was coming, but I knocked him out cold in the middle of the lobby.

I sat the in lobby
in the most uncomfortable chair known to man, refusing to move no matter what the guys said.

“Dude, sitting here like you’re guarding the receptionist isn’t helping anyone. Come back to the room and let’s figure this shit out,” Finn said.

“What if they come back and I miss them?” I asked.

I called every bar I could Google and asked if the girls were there, but I was getting nothing. It wasn’t until I made it to the last bar on the list that the bartender told me the girls were there. He described them as a spunky group.

Apparently, they’d been there disturbing the older patrons and getting drunk out of their minds.

I hailed a cab outside the hotel and had him take me to the bar. Traffic was a bitch, and I didn’t think we’d ever get there, but when we did, there was an ambulance pulled out front.

I threw a hundred dollar bill at the cab driver and jumped out of the car. Pushing my way through the crowd of onlookers, I made it to the center of their circle to find Constance lying on the ground with the EMS workers working on her.

Her eyes were closed and her body was convulsing. Her skin looked blue like she was freezing and her hair was soaked and stuck to the sides of her face. Foam formed at the corners of her mouth and dribbled down her cheek.

Everything moved slowly and it didn’t seem real. I stepped into the circle and went to her side, but I was stopped by a police officer.

“I’m sorry, sir. You need to stay back.”

I didn’t even fight. I just stood there and stared down at her. They lifted her onto a gurney and carried her to the back of the ambulance. And then the doors shut, blocking me out.

“Tiny. We’re following them. Are you coming?”

It was Lena tugging on my arm.

“This is my fault,” I said absently.

No one heard me in the all the commotion.

I hated hospitals in the worst way, but I had to go. I had to be there for Constance. I followed behind the girls and we stuffed ourselves into two different cabs.

When we got there, we had to wait in the waiting room. Again, the walls were painted a happy yellow, and again, all I could think about was how unhappy hospitals made me feel. I sat in the chair and tried not to panic or get sick. The walls were closing in on me as usual and I couldn’t breathe, but I sat there and suffocated for her.

I reached into my pocket to get my pills. Pulling out the bag, I held it in my face and stared and the multiple-color pills settled on the bottom. I could take them. I could take them all and feel nothing. I wouldn’t know this pain. I wouldn’t know the guilt that was coming with knowing it was my fault that Constance was in the hospital.

But I didn’t do that. Instead, I stood and walked across the waiting room with the baggy in my hand.

If they hadn’t been there staring her in the face, she wouldn’t have taken any. It was definitely my fault. I was the reason she was rushed to the hospital, and if she died, I’d never forgive myself.

I stepped up to the trashcan in the waiting room and stood above it. I stared at my baggy once more before I opened my fingers and let it drop into the can.

It felt good to get rid of them, even though I knew I’d suffer hell later. I was already in hell just sitting in the hospital. But I was done with drugs. I wanted nothing more to do with them. Everyone was right. I needed help, and if it was the last thing I did, I would get some. I’d do it for me.

Most of all, I’d do it for Constance.

After sitting in the waiting room for hours, we were allowed to go back. I used the doorframe as support when I saw her lying in bed, looking helpless. She was such strong girl. She wasn’t supposed to be in the hospital. She was supposed to be okay.

Holding her hand, I sat next to her bed and waited for her to wake up. It was hard, but I did it. She slept the entire time, and once the panic got the best of me, I left.

The cab ride back to the hotel was a hard one. I was already feeling the effects of not having any pills and I wasn’t looking forward to the talk I had to have with the boys.

Finn’s door opened before I knocked, and I was face to face with Zeke.

“I need to talk to y’all,” I said.

Chet turned off the TV when I walked into the room, and they all sat and waited for me to speak.

“I need help,” I said. “I have a drug problem. I threw my pills out at the hospital, but I’m already going through withdrawals. I know we have this tour to finish, but…” I couldn’t finish.

“Don’t say another word. Let’s go,” Finn said as he grabbed my shoulder reassuringly.

An hour later, I walked into a rehabilitation center with shaking hands and a strong will.