Alpha Billionaire Series
Hot Mess Chapter 29

KAYLA

Three days later...

I woke with a start. I rolled over and tried to go back to sleep. Sleep was better, dreams were better. In my dreams I was still in the comfortable bed in the little house in LA that I had shared for a brief moment with Nick.

Awake, I was on the same old mattress that I had since I was kid. It was lumpy and hard, and cold. So cold to sleep alone. I flipped my pillow, ignoring the dampness on my pillowcase from crying, and willed myself back into the dream.

And it had been a dream. I wore ball gowns and attended extravagant events. I ate haute cuisine and rode around in the backs of large cars with personal drivers. I hung out on the film set for a TV series and I had an entire kitchen stocked with top-of-the-line French cooking ware. It had all been too good to be true. Nick certainly had been.

The dream really was that he had been as much in love with me as I was with him. The reality was he needed me to keep the studio off his back about being seen with different women, and I needed him to pay off a blackmailer who somehow got damaging pictures of the two of us.

I clamped my eyes shut and focused on the late afternoon sunlight as it filtered into my little living room. I grasped at each glowing dust mote wishing it would magically transport me back to Los Angeles.

I refused to give up, not that I was falling asleep. If I opened my eyes I would be in my mother's house, in my old bedroom. I didn't know if this place was home anymore or not. Home was where the heart is, and I didn't have a heart anymore. Mine had shattered into a million shards of diamond dust, and they cut every time my mind wandered back to those few months.

I flopped on my back and stared at the ceiling, resigned that this was my reality. I hated it. I was miserable. If I got up, I would have to dodge Mom's incessant questions. She didn't like the answers I was giving her. But if I didn't get up, she would barge into my room and demand to know if I was sick.

I glanced over at the clock. There was a very good chance I could get up, get dressed, and leave the house before Mom got up.

I'd be exiled to hanging out wherever I could walk to and forced home when I got too hungry. I got out of bed; the floor was freezing. I pulled my feet back under the covers and chided myself for having returned to deep snow and the depressing end of winter when I could have been living in California's mild winter climate.

My bladder wouldn't let me be a wimp any longer. I needed to get up, cold floors or not. I found my slippers and shoved my feet into them. I made my way down the hall to the bathroom and back to my room without encountering Mom.

I was dressed, and down the stairs without incident. Just as I thought I would make my escape unscathed; Mom called my name.

I turned to see her, wrapped up in the bathrobe, leaning on the kitchen door.

"Where are you off to this early?"

Crap. I couldn't tell her I just needed to get away from all the questions. It didn't matter where I went, it wasn't here.

"I'm meeting Amber for breakfast. She has some job leads for me."

"So, you're getting a job now?"

"Yeah, that was the plan."

"You've said a lot of things, Kayla. You tell me one thing, your cousin tells me something else, and the next thing I know, you're back home."

"I don't know why you don't believe me, but you believe Jessie."

"Your cousin has no reason to lie."

"She has no reason to tell the truth. I don't think you realize Jessie and Gabe were not raised the way you raised me."

"They still live at home with their father. I think that speaks highly to-"

"That speaks highly to what rent costs out there. The only reason either of them live at home is Uncle Dave doesn't charge them. He also doesn't monitor their activities, their friends, what they eat... none of it."

I sighed. This was exactly what I had wanted to avoid. I couldn't talk about anything without getting upset. I took a deep breath.

"California was fun, and for a minute I made a lot of money and got to work with some pretty glamorous people. Jessie was trying to use me to get introduced to those people. I wasn't in a situation to do that." "She's your cousin," Mom interrupted.

I nodded. "That doesn't mean I know her. And I wasn't on the job long enough for anyone to trust my motives for introducing my cousin right away. So, when she saw that I had a project that involved a major actor, she started to get pushy." "That's not what happened at all. She was trying to be your friend. And you pushed her away. Kayla, you really hurt her feelings. And I expect you to make things right."

"Look, I have to go, or I'll be late."

"Why isn't Amber picking you up?"

I shrugged and walked out the door. As soon as it closed behind me, I picked up my phone and called Amber.

"Why are you calling me so early?" She answered immediately.

"I lied and told Mom I was having breakfast with you. Get dressed and come pick me up at the corner."

Between my walking slow and her getting ready fast, I didn't have to wait long before she pulled up in her mother's old panel sided station wagon.

I slid into the passenger seat and immediately asked if I could borrow ten bucks.

"Of course, why?"

"So, I can buy breakfast. I'm completely broke."

"I've got you covered. That bad at home?"

I waited until we were in a booth at McDonalds before I folded over on the table. It was more comfortable than my bed. "Amber, I've f****d everything up." "Hold up, back those horses back into the stables. What have you done with Kayla?"

I glared at her without lifting my head from my crossed arms.

"When did you start using the f-bomb? LA changed you."

"LA didn't change me. Everything that happened did."

Amber took a sip of her coffee. She had that 'tell me more' expression on her face.

"So, you and Mr. Nick?" She wiggled her eyebrows and swirled her finger in the air, asking without using words.

I groaned and wrapped my arms over my head.

"You and Mr. Nick did!" She sounded entirely too happy about the state of my virginity, or lack thereof.

"Yes, Nick and I, and it was everything you said it would be. And I wanted to fall in love with him. But there was this other issue, and I can't talk about it."

"Don't want to, or can't?"

"Like legally can't." I was terrified if I said one word the blackmailer would know. They had threatened me with so much damaging information, and they seemed to know where I was living and when I moved. Of course, this last move I told them when I gave them every penny I had.

"But that's not the worst. Mom knows I'm lying. And she is on my case about being nice to my cousin. She just won't listen to reason and takes Jessie's side in everything."

"Tell you mom, Jessie is a two-faced bitch, and clearly is trying to get something from you."

I chewed on my breakfast sandwich and stared at Amber, making faces because I wanted to talk but couldn't with food in my mouth. I swallowed and took a long drink of Diet coke.

"She wanted Nick. Before I ever met him, she and her friends would talk about how hot he was."

"They aren't wrong. The man is fine."

"Oh my God, Amber." I ground my fists into my eyes. I didn't know what to do.

Everything was going wrong. "Do you have any idea how weird it is for me to know that half of the woman out there want to have sex with Nick Sadler, and I actually did. I made him cookies. I cooked him dinner."

"So, it was serious?"

"For me it was. For him," I shrugged. "I think I was just another in a long line of others."

"Pfft. You got man troubles, welcome. You have officially joined the world of modern dating."

"But it's over. What am I supposed to do about Mom?"

"Your mom thinks you're lying when you aren't. That's nothing new."

"But it's wearing me out this time."

"Are you about to start your period? You know how everything seems so much worse in those two days before Auntie Flow makes an appearance. Maybe that's all that's really getting you down. Go get some good chocolate and Midol, put your feet up and ride it out. You'll feel better in a few days."

I couldn't breathe as realization slammed into me. I couldn't remember the last time I had my period. Like seriously could not remember. I hadn't bought a box of tampons my entire time in LA.

"Amber, I need to borrow more money."

"Sure, how much?"

I shook my head. "How much is a pregnancy test?"

Amber lent me twenty bucks and dropped me off at the drugstore on her way to work. I bought the test and went to the library. I took the pregnancy test in the bathroom at the library. And then spent the rest of the day hiding in the stacks reading What to Expect When You're Expecting.

I was tired, mentally and physically, hungry, and scared by the time I walked home in the late afternoon. I just wanted to get something to eat and then go hide under the covers in my room.

I opened the front door and the warm rich smells of Mom's cooking hit me. Before I had a chance to say anything I was assaulted with an ear-piercing squeal and attacked as Jessie tackled me in a bear hug.

"Cousin, I was so worried about you! I had Daddy buy me a ticket so I could come check on you."