Page 143 of Foreplay on Words

“We need to get down to baggage claim, and then there is a car service waiting,” she told us quickly as she started walking toward the center of the terminal. “I confirmed our hotel early check-in, and the venue is expecting us around 2 pm.”

I tried to text Adrian, Emory, and Nathan the entire walk to the baggage claim escalators. No one was responding, and I hadn’t gotten any more messages.

“Stupid fucking phone,” I growled, feeling frustrated that I still didn’t have any answers.

“Let me try Talia again,” Kristine held her phone up to her ear and rolled her eyes as she waited for it to ring.

“Hey!” She held a thumbs up as we stood there and waited for our bags to arrive at the baggage carousel.

“Yeah, we just landed.”

“Uh-huh. Oh shit! Really?”

What was going on?

“What?” I mouthed, and she waved me off.

“Okay. I’ll tell her. Guess we owe Nathan.”

“Tell me what?” I asked impatiently as she hung up the phone and tucked it into her pocket.

“Evan’s on the move. Nathan dropped him off at the hotel,” she smiled.

“That’s it? Is he at the hotel? Why isn’t he answering his damn phone?” My voice was a little high-pitched, but I didn’t care. I wanted answers.

“About that...” she cringed.

“What now?” I asked with an exhausted sigh. My poor heart and brain couldn’t handle any more stress.

“He tripped and fell on the curb outside where they found him, and his phone ended up in a sewer grate.”

“Oh, shit.” Sam’s eyes widened comically.

That was the cherry on top, as if yesterday couldn’t have already sucked enough. “So, I have no way of contacting him?”

She shook her head, and then we were interrupted by the alarm going off and the sound of luggage being thrown onto the belt.

“Let’s get to the hotel, you can re-group, and we’ll figure it out from there,” Diana suggested as we stood waiting for our bags to appear.

Chase

Chicago

I spent half the ride to the hotel hopelessly staring at my phone. Even though I knew Evan was at the hotel and was theoretically alright, I still worried about him. Was he even coming to Chicago?

“You gonna be okay?” Kristine asked as we headed toward the elevators after Diana checked us all in. She had a small room that adjoined Sam’s on a lower floor, down the hall from Diana. Evan and I were in a one-bedroom suite again, except I wasn’t excited about this one. I had no clue if he’d even be showing up to share it with me.

“Meet us in the lobby at 1:45 and the car service will pick us up again,” Diana told us as the elevator stopped on their floor. “Please try to relax.”

“I will. Not sure how successful I’ll be, but I’ll try,” I nodded.

Kristine and Sam sent me sympathetic looks as they exited the elevator and left me alone for the rest of the ride.

I felt the exhaustion hit me as soon as I reached the end of the hallway where the room was located. I had two hours to figure out what to do with myself.

A frustrated groan poured out of me as I saw the bottle of champagne with two flutes on the desk and the basket of gourmet snacks next to it. The card was from Isobel and Adrian, congratulating us on the book’s release and our successful collaboration.

Hot tears streamed down my cheeks, and I felt terribly guilty for talking Evan into doing this tour. If we’d returned to Connecticut, none of this would have happened. We could have continued to hide in our bubble and escape this bullshit.

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