Tease Me (The Macintyre Brothers 2)

"Grant! Grant! Grant!"

I sat up in bed, panting, struggling for a moment to remember where I was. Soon, my pulse slowed, and I realized it was just another nightmare. It was four o'clock in the morning. That was the fifth nightmare I'd had in the past two weeks.

I needed to get some counseling.

In the morning, I had a quick shower and joined David on the patio to watch the sunrise. It was glorious, and I stood beside him and breathed in the air.

"Pretty sweet, isn't it? You sure you don't want to leave the Big Apple and come out here for the weather?"

"You might be able to talk me into it one day, but not yet."

We spend the day together, and as much as I needed to get back to Manhattan, I wanted to take the time and spend it with David since I was already out there and Ella would be with Steph. David seemed to be doing much better than when I last saw him, although he was still pretty weak from the surgery.

"How are you?" I asked as we lounged beside the pool later that morning. "How's your recovery going?"

"Good," he said, but his voice didn't sound so good. He sounded exhausted. "Well, as good as can be expected." He gave me a smile, but it appeared forced, like he was playing for the cameras and wasn't doing quite as well as he made out.

"So, you've got a new musician coming in to help finish the EP?"

"Yeah, but I don't know if he's going to work out. He doesn't know any of the new songs and it’s going to take a lot of work to get him up to snuff."

"It takes time to do anything well, I guess," I said, trying to be supportive.

David shrugged. "Maybe this album's just a write-off. Maybe I have to accept that it's just not going to happen."

"Give it time," I said and reached over to squeeze his arm.

He exhaled but didn't respond. He wasn't doing quite as well as he made out.

"I'm worried about you," I said. "You have to give yourself time to get over the accident. You need to heal, and you need to deal with your survivor's guilt. You know that, right?"

He glanced over at me. "You, too, with the survivor's guilt? That's what Jake said. How can I get over something that's true? I can't deny Terry died because of me."

"David, Terry died because the other guy spilled his coffee and hit your vehicle. Not because of anything you did."

"It's because I wasn't driving. I should have been driving," he said, making a fist and hitting it against the chair's arm. "I shouldn't have had that extra beer."

"Well, then I'm responsible, too. I shouldn't have agreed to have another beer, either. If I had said no, you wouldn’t have had that beer and we would have left earlier and none of this would have happened. In fact, if I hadn't come out for a visit, if I had stayed at a hotel, it wouldn't have happened. You'll drive yourself crazy if you try to assign blame to yourself for what happened."

David shook his head, seemingly unable to understand or accept that it wasn't his fault. "I can't escape responsibility even if I want to. It should have been me. He had kids, man..."

Of course, that made me think of Grant and his two boys and a sense of darkness descended over me.

All I could think of was sleeping in, lying on the beach, and not worrying about anything -- not Penny, not David, and not mysterious Mr. Fedora.

I needed a break from all the drama.

I wanted Ella beside me.

15

Ella

After Josh texted me in the middle of the night I laid back in bed and tried to go back to sleep, but I couldn't help but wonder what personal thing had come up that he had to deal with relating to Grant's death. What could he possibly have done that he wouldn't be proud of relating to Grant?

Was it Grant's widow or kids? My mind did all kinds of mental gymnastics trying to figure out what he would not be proud of relating to Grant's death. Part of me wished Josh hadn't told me anything because now I was obsessed.

I tossed and turned quite a bit before sleep took me once more.