Holy shit. What the hell kind of crazy person was possessing her? I jumped to my feet to argue with her. She had it all wrong. I was protecting her! “Nat.” I laughed bitterly. “You don’t understand.”

The crack of her hand hitting my cheek was so loud I could have sworn the earth shifted beneath my feet. “Snap. The. Hell. Out. Of. It.” Tears welled in her eyes. “For me, for our baby. Alec, you can’t control this. You can’t fix this. You can’t wish it away, and you sure as hell can’t abandon everyone who loves you! Together. We do this together, or so help me God, I will hunt you down and murder you myself.”

Her chest rose and fell with exertion as tears poured down her face. I pulled her trembling body into my arms and closed my eyes.

“Shit,” Jaymeson said, forcing me to open my eyes and glare at him to leave or reap the consequences. “She just made me want to apologize, and I didn’t even do anything.”

“Jaymeson, this isn’t a good time—”

He held up his hand. “Clearly you guys have got issues to deal with, and as much as I want to watch her slap you again and then take my own turn — you need to see this.”

He held out a cell phone.

Nat stepped back and examined it with me.

Jaymeson sighed. “It’s my step-mom’s cell phone. She drank like all night last night, and I went to check on her a few minutes ago. Her phone was ringing off the hook so finally I went to check her messages. She was still sleeping or something, I don’t know. Her bedroom door was closed.”

“And?” My heart dropped into my stomach.

“Dude…” Jaymeson shook his head. “As much as I hate you right now, she freaking played you like a fiddle.”

“Pardon?”

“Just read the messages.” He placed the phone in my hands and leaned against the kitchen counter.

I flipped through the first two not seeing anything alarming until I came to a group of messages from Ruben, the producer to the show.

GREAT PERFORMANCE! THANKS AGAIN. NICE DOING BUSINESS WITH YOU. WILL CUT YOU THE CHECK FRIDAY.

“What the hell?” I scrolled to the next message.

I WANT THIS EMBARASSMENT OVER — DO WHAT YOU HAVE TO DO. —CARTWRIGHT

“Son of a bitch!” I clenched the phone tightly in my hand and counted to ten to keep myself from breaking something.

Jaymeson sighed. “Look, I don’t know what she’s got going on, but—” His cell phone rang. “Hold on.” He rolled his eyes and answered. “Hey, mom. Yeah, I took your phone, but—”

Face pale, Jaymeson swore. “Stay there, just stay there, okay? I’m calling the ambulance. It’s going to be fine, okay?” Jaymeson’s hands were shaking as he ended the call and dialed 911. “My mom just overdosed. Her name’s April Cartwright. She’s at 1211 N. Prom Avenue. Yeah, I don’t know. She didn’t say what the pills were. She just said she thinks she took too many and she feels funny.” Jaymeson swore. “Make it faster!”

He hung up and slammed his phone against the counter. “Damn it!”

Demetri and Alyssa barged into the house. I could tell Demetri was five seconds away from fighting on my behalf, but that was before Jaymeson literally started banging his fist against the countertop.

I moved to stop him but Demetri had his arms around Jaymeson before I had a chance to.

“This is all your fault! All of it!” Jaymeson jerked against Demetri, but he pinned his arms down.

“Your mom needs you right now,” I said, calmly walking toward him. “You need to get your shit together and fast.” I looked up to see Demetri’s confused gaze. “April is being taken to the hospital. She may have overdosed on some pills.”

Demetri swore violently as Jaymeson finally sagged against him and stopped hitting things. As it was, his knuckles were already starting to bleed from hitting the granite.

“I’ll drive him.” Demetri sighed and let go of Jaymeson, grabbing the keys to the SUV. “Come on.”

Alyssa put her arm around Jaymeson as they walked out of the house, leaving Nat and me in complete shock.

“We need to be there for him.” I didn’t want to change the subject. I didn’t even want to go. How selfish did that make me? All I wanted was to fix this chasm between Nat and me.

She nodded and walked toward the stairs. “Just let me shower really quick and we can go, I’ll be five minutes.”

Our eyes locked — so many things were unspoken — so many things needed to be said. I nodded once and opened my mouth but again nothing came. She sighed heavily and walked up the stairs, leaving me alone with my thoughts and a blood-stained counter top, wondering how the hell things had gotten so messed up.

Chapter Thirty-two

Demetri

My hands were shaking as I put the car into drive and pulled out toward the hospital. Alyssa needed to run home and change so she was going to meet us there.

Weird how the last time I was at the hospital I was put into a coma in order to heal from all of my injuries from my self-inflicted car accident.

Things had changed a lot since a year ago. Was this what Alec felt like when he had driven to the hospital with Nat? As if every bone in his body was strung so tight that at any moment he would snap? I mean, I may have been pissed at April still, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t still my mom. My real mom.

And she just overdosed on pills.

Maybe I got my problem with addiction from her.