Chapter 31

Nicole

I opened my eyes, my brain slightly groggy from drinking more last night than I normally would, but not enough for a hangover—for which I was thankful.

The space where Mason had been before I’d fallen asleep last night was now empty. I reached out to touch the sheets, and frowned. They were cold.

I strained to hear if he was in the bathroom, but there was only silence. I turned to check the time on the bedside clock. Maybe I had slept in, and Mason had woken up and decided not to disturb me.

Six-thirty a.m.—five hours after we’d returned to the hotel. And it wasn’t like we had gone straight to sleep once we entered the room. We’d had sex first.

Mason hadn’t eaten much in the past day or two. He could have woken up hungry and gone to get breakfast. I checked my cellphone. He hadn’t texted or phoned me.

I sent him a text to find out where he had disappeared to. While I waited for his reply, I showered and got ready. Even though it was early and I hadn’t gotten much sleep, I was suddenly not tired. A bad feeling skittered through me. And it only got worse when I checked my phone and there was still no message from Mason.

Needing to escape the room, which was now feeling way too small, I grabbed my jacket and wandered downstairs. The lobby was busy, with the Thanksgiving weekend crowd checking in.

A twinge of homesickness poked at me, reminding me I wouldn’t be celebrating Thanksgiving today with my best friend, the way I’d been doing ever since my mother died. It also reminded me how much I missed the time Mason and I had spent together back in Desert Springs, when he had fixed things around the house as if he lived there. When we’d removed the wallpaper together and spent most of the time laughing and joking around. When we’d walked Bernie and shared stories about ourselves and about Zack. When we’d eaten ice cream and watched Die Hard movies. When he’d shared with me the music for the song he had written—the song the guys in the band didn’t even know about.

That was the Mason I loved most. The Mason I had fallen in love with long before I realized what was happening.

I headed for the front entrance, along the path that cut through the casino. A chorus of groans rose from one of the blackjack tables as I passed not far from them. Without meaning to, I glanced at where the sound had come from…and came to an abrupt halt.

Mason was sitting at a table, a stack of chips in front of him. A crowd of onlookers stood around him like vultures observing their next meal slowly die, unwilling to miss when it finally happened.

The dealer dealt the cards for himself and Mason. I watched in horror as Mason lost, then indicated he wanted to play another hand by pushing a large stack of chips forward.

He lost that as well.

I stood there for a few more minutes, ice filling my veins, as the same thing happened again. It was like witnessing a deadly car wreck as it happened, leaving you unable to turn away. You could only pray the sequence of events would suddenly change, and everyone would be okay.

Once more he gestured to the dealer for another round. And, like the other times, he lost.

“What are you down by? Fifty grand?” the man sitting at the end of the table asked.

My heart jumped into my throat, almost choking me. This wasn’t the first time he had lost this big—that much I could guarantee. He’d lied the other day when he said he knew when to walk away. Clearly he didn’t.

“He’s right, Mason,” I said, my voice brittle enough to shatter—much like my heart at seeing Mason this way. “You need to stop.”

“I’m fine, Nicole,” he grunted, and waved at the dealer to deal him in again.

I dug deep, searching for the strength to hold my ground, refusing to give up on him. “No, you need to stop. Now.”

“I said I’m fine,” he growled. “I know what I’m doing.” Those were words I’d heard my father say to my mom numerous times before she finally decided she’d had enough.

This time Mason did win, which meant it would be impossible to tear him away from the game. He believed his luck had turned.

I stepped away from the table and called Nolan, praying he would answer his phone. A few seconds passed before he mumbled a sleepy “Hi,” and I almost collapsed with relief.

“Nolan, it’s Nicole. I found Mason in the casino, and he’s already lost fifty grand. I can’t get him to leave.” The words came out in a panicked rush.

“Fuck! I’ll be right down.” The call ended abruptly, leaving me to wonder about things I would rather not have dwelled on.

Five minutes later—though it felt like an hour—both he and Jared arrived, both looking grim.

“Mason,” Jared said, none too gently, “you’ve got to stop this. You know you’ll never make back everything you’ve lost tonight. You never do.”

“What are you going to do about it?” Mason muttered, pain lacing his words. Not once did his gaze leave the cards in front of him. “Cut me out of your life like my family did?”

I staggered back at this revelation. So that was why his family had turned their backs on him. And why Mason hadn’t wanted me to tell the band about his win yesterday. Kirk wasn’t the one with a gambling addiction. It was Mason.

He’d lied to me, like my father had lied to my mother.

“We’re not going to cut you out of our lives like your parents did,” Nolan said, leaning a hip against the blackjack table. “We all care about you. We’re your brothers, which is why we need you to stop this.”

“I’m fine,” Mason huffed. “You don’t have to baby me.”

Jared parked his hand on Mason’s shoulder. “I know we don’t. And we’re not. We just don’t want you going down that road again. We can’t afford to lose you. You’re important to the band.”

The way they were speaking to him, you’d have thought Nolan and Jared were trying to talk him out of jumping off a bridge. But given where my father had eventually ended up due to his gambling addiction, maybe that interpretation wasn’t so far off.

“Are you still in?” the dealer asked.

Mason hesitated for a moment, then glanced over at me. He nodded, but I had no idea whom he was nodding to—the dealer, his bandmates, or me with my unspoken questions.

He stood up, removed his few remaining chips from the table, and handed them to Jared. “Cash them for me.”

Jared gave him a chin nod and walked to the cashier while Nolan and Mason headed for the elevator. Nolan’s hand was resting on Mason’s shoulder, as if the lead singer was worried Mason would make a break for it and head back to the blackjack table.

And I just stood there, lost, broken on the inside, and uncertain what to do. I loved him, but my love wouldn’t be enough to help him. He needed to do it himself. I couldn’t afford to be pulled down the way my mother had been with my father. That was why I had my list. It was to save me from following in her footsteps.

Instead of returning to our hotel room, I hurried to the exit, my mind numb with everything I’d just witnessed. Outside, the icy wind bit my face and hands, and chewed its way through my coat. I didn’t care. I wasn’t ready to face Mason, at least not until I knew what to do.

I wandered along the beach for a long time before I dropped onto the frozen sand and hugged my knees to my chest. At some point I’d started crying, and my face stung from the salty tears freezing on my face.

The frigid wind did its best to turn my heart to ice, numbing it against further pain. A shiver overcame my body, but I couldn’t find the strength to get up and return to the hotel. I needed to be on the beach, a place where I felt oddly at home. Not that the beaches in Southern California ever got this cold.

I’d been staring out at the stormy ocean for who knows how long when Nolan plunked himself down next to me. “Aren’t you cold?” he asked. His tone was casual, but there was no denying the strained emotions underneath the words.

I wiped away the remnants of the frozen tears from my cheeks. “Maybe a little,” I said through chattering teeth, but made no move to get up.

Nolan removed his jacket and attempted to wrap it around my shoulders. I shook my head and shrugged the jacket off. He needed it as much as I did, and it was my fault I was out here instead of back inside the warm hotel.

“He didn’t tell you about his past gambling addiction, did he?” Nolan asked.

I laughed, the sound dry and brittle. “No, but I told him all about how my father’s gambling addiction destroyed my family.” He had known about it well before things had progressed from having fun to falling in love. He’d had plenty of time to tell me the truth before deeper emotions became involved.

“I’m sorry,” Nolan said. “None of us knew about that, otherwise we would have been more honest with you. But we thought he had gotten past his addiction. Or maybe we just hoped he had.”

I gave him a faint smile. “I know.”

Nolan was quiet for a couple of minutes as we watched the waves crash against the beach. “You’re leaving us, aren’t you?” he eventually said.

“This job wasn’t permanent. I’m just leaving a few weeks earlier than planned.”

“When?”

“Today.” My heart and stomach hurt at my saying that. Gambling addiction or not, leaving Mason would be hard. “I love him. I really do. But I’m not sure if my love will be enough.”

Nolan didn’t try to convince me to stay and finish the job I’d been hired to do, and for that I was grateful.

“I’ll take care of the Christmas contest,” I added, “but that I can do at home.” There were a few other marketing tasks I had taken on, but those could easily be completed at home too. “I wish I could stay, but I can’t. Mason and I live two very different lives. Heck, even before I knew about the gambling addiction, I had no idea what would happen between us once I returned home.”

“You guys never talked about it?”

I let out a strangled laugh. Apparently there was a lot we hadn’t talked about. “It never came up. He might love me, but music is his life.”

I reminded myself that after my last boyfriend had moved away, my feelings for him had faded with time. But an inner voice pointed out that what I felt for Mason was nothing like the love I thought I’d had for my ex-boyfriend. Not even close.

I wiped away a new crop of tears.

Nolan pushed himself to his feet and held out his hand for me. “We should head back before you turn into an ice sculpture.”

I giggled, possibly slightly delirious because of the cold. “Just add lights to me and I’ll fit in perfectly with this city.”

Instead of walking back to the hotel, Nolan insisted we take a cab. While we drove back, I pulled out my smartphone and booked my flight home. Even though it was Thanksgiving weekend, I was able to find something—not everyone in the United States was traveling from Atlantic City to Desert Springs.

At the hotel, Nolan escorted me down the hallway to the room Mason and I were staying in. “Thanks,” I told him. “I’ll be fine.” I hugged him and asked him to say goodbye to the other band members for me. It was hard enough for me as it was without having to say goodbye to them too. I would miss them…and I would miss Hailey and Callie. Even in the short time I had known them, they had all become like family to me.

Using my key card, I entered the room, only to find Mason pacing, the way he’d been doing the other night. I couldn’t tell if the pacing was because of what had happened downstairs or because his addiction was pleading for him to return to the casino.

Hearing the click of the door as I entered, Mason snapped his head in my direction. An array of emotions paraded on his face—regret, shame, sadness, love. Then they were gone. He didn’t move or say anything. He just continued to watch me, now with a guarded expression.

My mouth went dry as my brain scrambled for the words I needed to say.

“You’re leaving, aren’t you?” The indifference in his tone nearly gutted me.

I nodded, the only thing I was capable of, and gathered up my belongings. I didn’t have much time before I had to be at the airport, and I still had to go to where the tour bus was parked at the arena and pack the rest of my stuff.

“I’m needed back home,” I said at last. That was partly true. There was still so much to do before Blooming Love’s grand reopening, and I really did need to be there to help Heidi.

Or at least that was what I kept telling myself.

Plus I needed to work on my glass etchings…the design of which still eluded me.

“Yes,” Mason said, rather briskly. “You should go home. I’ll let you get back to packing.” He turned to leave.

The tears from earlier threatened an impromptu encore. I knew I should just let him go. That would be the smart thing to do. But I couldn’t walk out of his life the way so many other people he loved had done to him.

I grabbed his arm. He paused, muscles ready to snap from being so tense, but he didn’t turn around. I stepped closer and kissed his cheek. “I’m not your family, Mason. I love you, but you know our lives are so very different. It never would have worked out between us. We both know that.” So why did it feel like my heart was shattering into a million pieces?

I stepped back to let him go but didn’t get far. His lips crashed against mine. Without thinking what I was doing, I automatically let him in.

The kiss wasn’t tender or sweet. It wasn’t a goodbye kiss. It was hungry, possessive, mind-numbing. A kiss no other would be comparable to—now or in any other lifetime.

Once it was over, Mason left the room without saying another word.

And my heart shattered some more.