The Debt 7 (Club Alpha) (5 page)

Raven felt herself taking a step
backwards, as the effect of Courtney’s words had been as physical as they’d
been emotional.

Or maybe it was that she’d never felt
such a furnace blast of hate coming at her all at once like that.

Sander took Courtney’s arm gently and
whispered something in her ear.

Courtney wrenched away from him.
 
“I won’t calm down.
 
Sometimes people need to hear the
truth.”

“Courtney,” Jake said, his voice calm and
deep and powerful.
 
It seemed to cut
through the tension in the room and stop everyone in their tracks.

It was as if a king had listened to
pleading and arguments and was now about to pronounce his judgment.

Courtney and Sander turned their heads and
looked to Jake, both of them meek and quiet, waiting for him to continue.

Jake’s eyes were cold and detached, but
there was a powerful emotion beneath his cool exterior.
 
“I can appreciate that you came here to
make a last ditch effort to save the tour.
 
And because I’m the one who pulled out, I
can accept your anger and even your disgust.”
 
He paused for a long moment and looked
at Courtney with eyes that made her tantrum look like nothing more than a child
throwing toys out of its crib.
 
Jake’s eyes had that thousand yard stare quality that showed he’d been
through more in his life than she could possibly fathom.

“What I can’t accept,” Jake continued in
a slow, low voice, “is the disrespect you’ve shown the woman I love.”

“Listen, Jake—“ Sander began, trying
to lighten the mood.

“Sander,” Jake said, glaring at him
momentarily.
 
“Don’t make me hurt
you.”

The man seemed to shrink six inches as he
shut his mouth.

Courtney crossed her arms protectively
over her chest.
 
“I’m trying to help
you, Jake.”

“You go on now and have that great
career, Courtney,” Jake said, almost a whisper.
 
“But I’m going to give you a little
piece of advice, since you were so kind as to give me the benefit of your years
of wisdom.
 
I think maybe you should
remember that all those people you stepped on while you climbed your way to the
top, you’re going to meet when you come down again, and it’s not going to be
pretty.”

“Maybe you should take your own advice,”
she retorted, but the fire had gone out of her voice and her confidence was shaken.

“Get out of my room,” he said.
 
“The tour isn’t happening.”

They turned and started to leave
together.
 
Sander Edwards looked
over his shoulder as he opened the hotel room door.
 
“You’re going to be in an awful lot of
trouble, Jake.
 
You’ll honor that
contract one way or the other.”

“Do what you have to do,” Jake told him.

And then they were gone.

When the door clicked shut, the room fell
eerily silent.
 
Raven hugged herself
momentarily, feeling like a bug that had been splattered across a car windshield.
 

Jake looked at her.
 
“You okay?”

She nodded somberly.
 
“I think so.”

He gave her a little comforting smile,
walking towards her.
 
“Don’t let
Courtney’s trash talk get to you.
 
She’s a little entitled brat who didn’t get her way.”

“But maybe she’s right,” Raven said.
 
“If everything goes completely wrong,
and if this is some horrible mistake, you might end up somehow believing that
it’s my fault.”

“Why would it be your fault?”

“I don’t know.”

He took her hand in his.
 
“Raven, I was the one who said I didn’t
want to keep touring.
 
You don’t
carry any responsibility for my choice in the matter.”

Raven looked at him, the love in his eyes
nearly overwhelming her.
 
He’d stood
up for her, and she couldn’t doubt him.
 
But then, some little nagging doubt persisted.
 
“Are you sure I didn’t have anything to
do with it?
 
You said that there
wouldn’t be any room for us or for me on tour.
 
It seemed to factor into your decision.”

Jake let go of her hand and sighed
deeply, rolling his eyes skyward.
 
“Okay, so maybe it factored in.
 
But it’s not your fault and it never will be.”

She looked down at the floor, searching
uncertainly.
 
“Someday you might
start to resent me,” she whispered.
 
“You might think that I’m cursed—“

Jake laughed.
 
“I’m not superstitious.”

“I just don’t want to lose you over
this,” she admitted, finally.

“You can’t lose me,” he said.
 
“Because I found you, and I’m going to
hold onto you for the rest of my life.”

***

That night, they drank Long Island Iced
Tea drinks that Jake made himself at the hotel room bar, and then played strip
poker.
 
By the end of the game,
Raven was in bra and panties and Jake was in his boxers, and Jake couldn’t keep
his hands off her.

He made slow, passionate love to her on
the floor, and she could feel playing cards pressing into her back as Jake’s
body weight sunk onto her.

He slid his cock in and out of her
wetness, kissing her mouth as he ran his hands through her hair, and then he
turned her over onto her stomach and fucked her from behind.
 
Her hands grabbed the carpet as Jake’s
huge shaft split her in the middle, and she cried out from the pleasure of it,
drunk on Long Island Iced Tea and Jake’s sex and everything that her life had
become.

After that, they slunk into bed, sweaty
and naked and half asleep.
 
Intertwined
in the big bed, Raven kissed Jake’s chest, down his stomach and then took his
soft cock into her mouth, sucking until he was rock hard again.

In the darkness, she licked and sucked
him until he exploded in her mouth, and she swallowed every last bit of it, and
Jake threw his head back on the pillow, sighing with ease as his entire body
relaxed.

They slept together closely, and she
could hear the steady thud of his heartbeat in the night, drumming against his
ribcage as she laid her head on his chest.

Snuggling as close as she could get,
Raven didn’t want this time to ever come to an end.

I
love him so much
, she
thought.

I’ve
never loved or been loved this way.

Not even her own parents had ever loved
her so completely, nor could she say that she’d loved them back as completely
as what she felt for this man she’d only known for a short time.

And yet, here she was—after
everything she’d been through in her life—all the heartbreak and
suffering and thoughts of ending it all.

I’ve
found my place
, she
thought, as Jake’s strong arms wrapped protectively around her shoulders and he
shifted into her, not even knowing what he was doing.
 
He was sleeping, and even then his
instinct seemed to be to hold her close.

Raven stroked his skin, nuzzled into him,
and finally slept.

***

The next morning, they woke up and Jake
had room service bring up breakfast. They were both relatively quiet as they
ate, but it was a comfortable silence between them.
 
There was no need to force anything.

Occasionally, Jake would look at her and
smile, and then he would sip his coffee and go back to watching Sports Center
on ESPN.

Raven mostly stared out the large picture
window as she ate dreamily, wondering how she could be where she was, with him,
and
be
so happy.
 
Nothing explained how she’d ended up there, and she didn’t want to think
too much about it, because somehow that might change it.
 

Raven didn’t want anything to change.

After breakfast, she went and had a nice
long bath, shaved her legs, soaked, and then got out, dressed, put on makeup
and exited the bathroom.

When she came out, Jake was watching a
video on his computer, sitting forward, a concerned look on his face.

On screen, there was a reporter at a news
desk talking.

“It hasn’t been a very good month for superstar
Jake Novak,” the reporter on screen said, shaking his head with a sorrowful
look on his face.
 
“From cancelled
shows to making offensive and insulting comments about people suffering from
depression, the besieged star seems to have only just gotten started when it comes
to causing controversy.
 
And now,”
the reporter continued, his eyes widening with disbelief, “some of the people
closest to Jake are finally starting to speak out.
 
Today, Courtney Taylor spoke on the
record.”

The clip switched to a shot of Courtney being
interviewed by a reporter out on the street.
 
A microphone was in her face.
 
“Courtney, is there any truth to the
reports that the tour with Jake Novak has been cancelled?”

Courtney licked her bight red lips.
 
“There’s been so many rumors flying around,
and it’s really been painful for all of us who are close to Jake to know the
truth and not be able to talk about it.”

“And what, exactly, is the truth?”

The beautiful singer smiled sadly.
 
“The truth is
,
Jake Novak has become a liability in the music world.
 
Those of us who know and care about him
have tried to urge him to make better choices, to get help, and to get away
from the people that are currently enabling his bad habits.
 
But I guess he just isn’t ready to
change just yet.
 
Instead, he’s
cancelled the tour and left thousands of people out in the cold.”

“When
was
the
last time you spoke to him?”

She shook her head.
 
“I need to respect Jake’s privacy.
 
I really care so much about him, and I
hope he gets the help he needs soon, before things get even worse.”
 
Suddenly, Courtney put her hand over her
mouth, seemingly overcome with emotion, and shook her head.
 
“I—I’m sorry.
 
I really can’t talk about this
anymore.”
 
And then she walked away
from the camera.

“Christ Almighty,” Jake growled.
 
“I wonder if she plans to campaign for
an Academy Award with that performance.”

Raven pulled on her lower lip, stomach
churning.
 
“I can’t believe that
little monster.
 
She’s a liar.”

The clip switched back to the news anchor
at his desk.
 
“And that’s not all,”
he said, frowning lightly.
 
“A
statement from Jake Novak’s record label was released earlier today, that said,
in part—Due to Mr. Novak’s unprofessional conduct and erratic behavior,
we’ve been forced to sever ties and will no longer be promoting his latest album
or sponsoring his world tour.
 
We
apologize to all the fans that have been affected by this unfortunate
situation.”

The camera panned to an anchorwoman that
had been sitting silently up until that point.
 
“This is a really strange and confusing
story,” she said.

“It is, Jessica,” her co-anchor said
sadly.

“We’re going to have more on this in the
coming days.
 
Still no word from
Jake Novak?”

The male anchor shook his head with a
puzzled expression.
 
“He’s been
surprisingly silent on all of the swirling rumors, such as the recent departure
of his longtime manager.”

Jessica blinked in confusion.
 
“I suppose the question is, what’s going
on that all of these people from his inner circle are leaving all at once?”

“Well you know what they say about rats
deserting a sinking ship, Jessica.”

“Now that is an unfortunate analogy,
Mark.”

Jake shut the computer with a slam.
 
“Fucking morons,” he said, standing up.

Raven was suddenly afraid.
 
Was this it?
 
Would he blame her now, with all of
these stories coming out about him?

“Jake, I’m so sorry,” she said, not
knowing what else to do.

His eyes were stony.
 
“I know what’s going on here,” he
muttered.

For a moment, she was certain he was
saying it to
her,
as if she was the reason everything
was happening.
 
“What’s going on?”
she asked, her voice quivering.