Page 29 of Pretty Little Rocker

I texted them back, letting them know I appreciated them getting me to my friend and that I missed them too. So damn much. After I hit send on my last message to them, I finally dared to glance at Havoc’s social accounts.

Holding my breath, I watched the page load and went weak. According to my insights page, I’d lost two hundred thousand followers Thursday night into Friday afternoon. But then, the video Wes had posted linking me to Havoc had gone supernova viral. Since then, I’d gained over three million more followers, and I had emails from all my sponsors, plus a few others that wanted Havoc to represent them.

Seeing an email from Aunt Emmie, I clicked on it.

Just following up about the chat we had Thursday night. I know you’re going through a lot right now with Havoc, but if you are taking the drummer position for Autumn’s Slumber, we can use that to our advantage. Shane needs you all in the studio ASAP.

Love you!

Aunt E

That was exciting news for the band, which I copied and pasted into a group text to my guys. But first, I needed to take care of Abi. Only once I knew she was okay could I focus on the band and my relationship with Ky, Sparks, and Jamie.

Abi was keeping secrets.

I didn’t call her out on it. Seemed kind of hypocritical when I had some of my own. But it was something new for us, to not confide everything that was going on in our lives to each other. In truth, I was scared to ask her what she wasn’t telling me. The meltdown she’d had and the slow recovery wasn’t the Abigail St. Charles I knew.

Sweet and precious, she might be, but she was also resilient as fuck.

Yet I allowed her to stay quiet about the trauma that had sent her into whatever mental shutdown she was experiencing, and I didn’t bring up any of my own news. We didn’t talk about Havoc. Or Autumn’s Slumber. And I sure as hell hadn’t told her anything about my guys. She knew I’d kissed Kyrie Renchford, but that had been the tiny piece of my new discoveries about myself that I’d confessed before her own drama had unfolded.

All week, I stayed at her house, sleeping in her bed, eating her food, binge-watching really bad comedies. I’d texted my guys throughout the week, letting them know how appreciative I was of their understanding that Abi needed me at the moment. And that I missed them.

But I didn’t want to keep them from Abi like some dirty secret any longer. Her parents and mine were going on their usual Vegas trip to spend a little time together before Abi’s parents headed off for their summer tour in Australia. I figured the best time to introduce the three new important men in my life to the most important person to me ever was while our parents were away for the weekend.

Kin had told us to go to First Bass Friday night, because we needed to get out of the house and be around people. I texted Ky to meet us at the club that night.

I should have known those plans were going to go all to hell when Abi and I were awakened Friday morning to Aunt Emmie’s name popping up on Abi’s new phone. At first, I tried to hide from the noise and the morning by covering my head and desperately holding on to sleep. Sharing a bed with Abi wasn’t new for me. We’d been having sleepovers since we were little kids. But Abi was not fun to sleep with sometimes.

She had this itty-bitty problem with getting sleep-drunk. A state somewhere between asleep and awake. She did crazy things during those episodes, like walking from her house to Poppy’s house in the middle of the night because she knew I was having a sleepover there that weekend. She didn’t remember much of what happened that night, but sometimes when she had moments like that, she did remember. Doctors, therapists, and other specialists didn’t fully understand it, but they attributed it to Abi’s stress levels.

She and I had thought it was hilarious when we were kids. Now, however, it was kind of exhausting. Watching over her to make sure she didn’t sleepwalk out into traffic. I shuddered, wondering what she could have gotten up to, the dangers she might have unknowingly put herself in over the past few weeks, if she’d been so stressed out that she’d come home and crashed for a full week.

“Oh shit,” Abi muttered, making me groan into my pillow.

“What?” I mumbled.

“Emmie.”

Hearing my aunt’s name was enough to have me sitting straight up in bed, knowing that sleep was pointless if she had something to call my friend about. “That can’t be good. The last time she called me for no apparent reason, she told me the world knew I was Havoc. I already knew that, but she was doing what she does best. Trying to clean up the mess.”

Abi stared down at her phone with wide blue eyes. “What should I do?” she whispered.

She’d lost her damn mind if she thought she should do anything but answer when Emmie Armstrong called. For fuck’s sake. A person didn’t send Aunt Emmie to voice mail unless they wanted to have their flesh melted from their bones by her ferocious anger. “Answer it?”

“Shit.” She worried her bottom lip with her teeth for a moment before finally swiping her thumb over the screen. “Hello?”

My bestie relaxed a little when Aunt Emmie wanted to talk about how she’d made a few calls to try to sort out Abi missing her finals that week. I wasn’t sure how my aunt made the connections she did, but if anyone needed something done, we normally just went to her and it got sorted. All of us kids figured people were just too terrified of the little redhead with the big green eyes to tell her no, which only doubled our own fear and awe of the woman.

But then I felt Abi tense. “Married?” she squeaked. “I didn’t get married.”

Laughing, I fell back on the pillows. “Are you kidding me? That’s hilarious!”

Abi wouldn’t get married, especially not without me. And even if she did, who would she marry? She’d never been interested in anyone, male or female, until this past semester when she’d gotten a little attached to her history professor. So much, that she’d sort of been stalking him around campus. Nothing too crazy, just giving herself extra chances to see him. Her crush had grown—I was well aware of that. She might even be half in love with the man. But marriage?

She shushed me as she listened to Aunt Emmie. Whatever was said had Abi gasping like she’d just been punched in the chest. I turned on my side, watching her face. Abi tried to speak, but Aunt Emmie wasn’t happy now. That much was evident from the look on Abi’s pale face.

Suddenly, she dropped the phone and jumped out of bed, her pained cry ringing in my ears. Surprised by what was happening, I was slower to move, but I hopped out of bed and followed her as she ran downstairs and outside.

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