Page 98 of The Finding Series: Vol. 1

“Ididn’t even know this was here,” Gray murmured.

“You never explored the property?” Luke asked as he double-checked to make sure the blanket was still covering Gray as much as possible. Although the temperature was well above freezing, he knew Gray’s body couldn’t afford to lose too much body heat. He checked his watch so he’d be able to keep track of the time.

“No.”

“How come?”

“Too preoccupied I guess.”

“You knew you were sick when you came out here?” Luke ventured.

Gray nodded. “I got the diagnosis a couple of months ago. I’d felt something one morning in the shower but I kept putting off a visit to my doctor.” Gray’s laugh sounded ugly. “I was such a fool…I actually thought nothing could touch me. I thought I’d climbed so high that nothing could take me down. And then the doctor throws out the C word and the first thing I did was call him a quack. Then he tells me he needs to cut both my balls off. I told him to fuck off and then I went looking for a real doctor. Only the second one told me the same exact thing. I thought for sure the third one would be the charm.”

Gray fell silent as he shifted on the log. Ripley was uncharacteristically solemn and lay at Gray’s feet instead of playing in the creek like she usually did. “We should go inside,” Luke said softly.

“Just a few more minutes,” Gray whispered, his eyes settled on some far off point in the darkness.

“Did you have the surgery?”

A nod and then Gray’s eyes dropped to the ground. “Neutered just like a dog,” he croaked.

“Gray-”

“I was paranoid that the news would get out so I came out here for radiation treatments. I’d bought this place sight unseen a few years ago as a place I could come to get some writing done. My lawyer set it up so I could buy it using a land trust – that way it wouldn’t be as easy for people to find out it was mine. And I figured Dare was small enough that the chances anyone would recognize me were slim to none.”

“Why all the secrecy?”

“My career really took off a couple years ago when my book hit the bestseller list. I wasn’t a household name or anything but then Hollywood started knocking on my door. After that, everything just snowballed. I signed a contract for my first three books in the series to be made into movies – the deal was worth millions and suddenly I went from being a nobody who spent fifteen hours a day in front of his computer to a guy rubbing elbows with celebrities on the red carpet. Talk shows, magazine articles…it was surreal. It was my dream come true.”

Gray drew the blanket tighter around his body but before Luke could insist they go inside, he continued. “I took advantage of it – all of it. I had stylists telling me how to dress, publicists who told me what to say and how to say it so I could sell my brand. A personal trainer, chef, you name it. And everybody and their brother wanted to be my friend. But the best part was the men - it was like God had handed me a fucking buffet.

“I loved it, you know? The attention. Guys who wouldn’t have given me the time of day before all of a sudden wanted me. But I knew it wasn’t me that they wanted, not really. Didn’t stop me from taking what they were offering, though.”

Hearing about Gray’s active sexual history caused jealousy to burn through every cell in Luke’s body but he managed to keep his agitation to himself and was actually proud when his voice sounded steady as he said, “It doesn’t make you a bad person, Gray.”

“What does it make me?” Gray asked. “I didn’t give a shit that the men I was with were married or closeted or believed that we would have some kind of relationship going forward. I used them.”

“So what, you think this is the universe’s way of punishing you?”

Gray dashed at his eyes. “It’s what I thought at first. I didn’t have any other explanation for what was happening and I needed a fucking reason,” Gray said vehemently. “But when the doctor told me the cancer had spread…” Gray shook his head slowly.

“That’s when your doctor said you needed chemo?”

Gray nodded. “The radiation hadn’t been that bad so I figured the chemo wouldn’t be either.”

“Didn’t they tell you what to expect?”

“Yeah, they did. I just chose to believe I was going to be the exception. People have been telling me my whole life that I wasn’t going to be anything…to accept my limitations and settle. I figured cancer would just be one more thing I had to say ‘Fuck off’ to. The nausea, the hair,” - Gray ran his hand over his scalp – “none of it was going to apply to me.”

“Why didn’t you tell anyone?”

“Who?” Gray said with another one of his harsh laughs. “My parents who hate me almost as much as they hate each other? The half-brother I’m not on speaking terms with? My so called management team?”

“Friends then?” Luke said. “Dane, Jax.”

“Jax hates my guts and Dane…Dane’s had enough of his own shit to deal with. He’s finally in a good place.”

“Dane was really worried about you, Gray. And the fact that he gave me the supplies I needed…he risked a lot by doing that. That cop – Jax – he could have stopped me at any point to look at my ID or ask me questions but he didn’t.”

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