Right Next Door - A.J. Pryor Page 0,95
him right there on the spot. I’d left her, alone—with him. Having no idea what he’d do to her once I was out of the picture. At this point, I’m just as bad as he is.
Fuck! I have to apologize and hope like hell she forgives me.
My phone is on my nightstand and I reach for it. Shit, she called and texted me all last night and I never replied. Throwing on my track shorts, I race onto my balcony.
Hers is empty.
I crawl over the dividing bars and try to open her glass door.
It’s locked.
I knock. Hard. There’s no answer.
Shit.
I crawl back over to search my junk drawer for her spare key. It smells like coffee and . . . Addison. She was here this morning. Had to have been. I hadn’t been fully asleep during that dream, my mind hearing her walk around, my body reacting to her closeness. A full pot of coffee sits on the counter with her favorite mug placed beside it ‘wine me dine me 69 me’. Her presence is everywhere, filling my home and invading my mind. Something crashes in my bedroom. “Addison?” Scanning my apartment for any sign of her I walk quickly in that direction. “Addison?”
It’s empty.
A framed photo that had been precariously hanging on the wall has finally fallen to the ground on its own accord—glass shattered everywhere.
My need to see her outweighs any thought of cleaning that mess up and as I race towards my front door, I grab the mug.
I don’t knock, I’m not subtle, and as fast as my fingers will allow, I let myself in to her apartment.
It’s eerily quiet, no smell of brewed coffee, no reality television blaring from her screen, not anything to let me know there is a living soul anywhere in this place. I walk into her bedroom and I know instantly.
She’s gone.
Her bed is made, the curtains open allowing the morning light to filter in. The closet door is wide-open, empty hangers litter the floor.
She left me.
Placing the mug on her nightstand, I pull out my phone and call her.
It goes directly to voicemail.
“Addison, where’d you go? Come back, Baby. Come home so we can work this out. I’m sorry I freaked out.”
Sighing with the weight of a thousand pound dumbbell settled in my gut, I sit down on her bed and wonder how in twenty-four hours I could have lost her.
Heading back to my place I look over the railing to the parking lot, her car is noticeably absent.
I call Reed.
“What the fuck, Dude, it’s our day off. Why you calling at seven on a Saturday?”
“Sorry, man, but I lost Addison.”
“Talk.”
“Not much to say. We got in a fight. I turned into my dad for a few hours and this morning she’s missing.”
“Shit. I’ll be right over.”
Hanging up I call Paige.
“This cannot be good news. Why are you calling me, Damian?”
“Is Addison with you?”
“What? No. She’s supposed to be making up with you.”
“Paige, she’s missing.”
“Missing?”
I pinch the bridge of my nose. “Yeah. I woke up this morning and she’s gone. It looks like she moved out.”
“What did you do to my girl?”
“I screwed up, Paige.”
“You have to make it right.”
“I’m not sure I can. Where would she go?”
“I have no idea. She told us she wanted to be alone. That was about eight last night. Haven’t heard from her since.”
“What about Mia?”
“I just texted her, she hasn’t heard from her either.”
“Paige, if she thought I’d screwed up beyond repair, would she take him back?”
“No.”
“How are you so sure?”
“Because she’s stronger than that, even if she doesn’t believe it. And if you don’t believe it, then you don’t deserve her either.”
Silence. I pull the phone away and look at the call ended glaring me in the face.
I probably don’t deserve her, but I don’t care. We aren’t going to end like this.
“One espresso, please.” I can’t afford this, but I’m in desperate need of caffeine. Having to bolt before Damian woke up and found me in his kitchen, I didn’t spare a second pouring any of that black coffee into my to-go mug. A little over two hours later, and I now have a raging headache to add to my puffy eyes.
“That will be fifteen seventy-five.”
“Excuse me?” There’s no way I heard her right. The constant pounding between my ears must be interrupting my hearing.
“I said that will be fifteen—”
“Seventy-five. Are you serious? Starbucks isn’t even that expensive.”
She lifts a pierced eyebrow at me, her Taylor Momsen goth eyes staring me down.