Page 17 of With Love, Alex

Reeves body slumped forward as his eyes skimmed through the crowd. He didn’t believe a word I had said. I wasn’t lying though. When Taylor and I got together, we could talk for hours and it would only seem like minutes. When I looked around and fully took in the scene, I wasn’t sure there was a place in the house where it would be easy to talk with all the people around or the loud music. Still, I wanted him to feel better, and I hoped that was what had really happened instead of something else, but if the look Matt and Becca gave each other were anything to go by, it would seem that Poppy was off doing something that she shouldn’t be doing.

After standing around for another half an hour with no Poppy in sight, Matt hooked his arm around Reeves shoulder and gave him what looked to be a forced smile. “Why don’t you come back to my place and we can hang out?”

If I had to guess this wasn’t the first time that Matt had tried to take Reeves mind off his wife. With another unanswered text, we all got into the back of the limo Matt had hired to drive us. I wasn’t sure how Reeves and his wife had gotten to the party, but I wasn’t going to ask. The word Poppy wouldn’t come out of my mouth for the rest of the night.

7

Never Again

“Are you fucking shitting me,”Matt yelled as he passed a string of cars in the left lane going at least twenty miles faster than everyone else that was on the road.

My hand clutched the handle above my window. I was starting to get scared. Matt had been shouting at me for the last thirty minutes and with each minute that passed by, he got more angry and erratic. At first, I stayed quiet. I was used to being yelled at. Decker had gone off on me more times than I could count because something or someone would set him off and he always took it out on me. Instead of fighting back and making the situation worse, I had learned to say as little as possible so that I didn’t escalate the matter at hand.

Nothing seemed to be working with Matt though. If I was quiet, he raged, and I was made out to be guilty. When I tried to explain myself, Matt accused me of cheating. The only thing I wanted in that moment was to be on a plane back to Missouri and to never lay eyes on Matt Ryan again.

“When did this start?” Matt growled as he once again zipped from the left lane to the right and back again. Where were the police when I needed them? Being pulled over and a police escort to the airport sounded very good in that moment.

Gripping the handle above the window even tighter, I answered. “I told you before that Jenner and I started talking after the Halloween party. You were sitting right there on the couch when he asked for my phone number. I’ve been trying to help him figure out what’s going on with Poppy.”

It had been two weeks since the Halloween party and when Matt asked if I would come back out to LA for the weekend, I had no problem saying yes. We hadn't talked or even texted much in those two weeks while I was home, and I thought Matt had moved on. I was a little shocked he wanted me to come back, but I’d agreed to visit him. In that time, Jenner and I’d talked on the phone almost every night about his wife and tried to speculate what she was doing when she wasn't at home which seemed to be near constant. Whatever she was doing wasn't good. She was rarely home at night once Jenner got home from a day on set and she never left a message where she was, what she was doing, or when she’d be home. The writing was on the wall, but it didn't seem as if Jenner was ready to read it quite yet.

Grounding his teeth together, Matt gripped the steering wheel even tighter making his knuckles turn white. “An unlikely story,” he said, jaw clenched.

“How is that unlikely? You probably know more than either one of us what’s going on by the look you shared with Becca at the party. Why are you freaking out about me talking to him anyway?”

“He shouldn’t be calling you,” he roared, his face turning bright red.

“He only wanted to see me while I was here. What’s the big deal? You were with me every second I’ve been here.”

“You. Are. Mine,” he snarled. “I will not have you disrespecting me like this.”

My hands up in surrender, I narrowed my eyes. “Hold up there, buddy. In no way am I disrespecting you nor am I yours. I’m simply being a friend and trying to help. I thought you’d like it that Jenner and I were becoming friends.”

“Stop calling him Jenner.” His jaw ticked. “Only his friends call him Jenner. You call him Reeves.”

Inwardly I rolled my eyes. He was being ridiculous, and I wanted no part in his tirade.

Sputtering angry curses, Matt grew silent for a moment while his face turned a dark shade of red. It was like watching him turn into the devil himself. If I hadn’t been so angry I might have been concerned. Instead I felt my blood pressure rise. I wouldn’t go down this road again. I didn’t need another Decker in my life.

“What makes you think you can cheat on me with my best friend?” Matt thundered as he tried to overtake a car in the right lane.

I watched as if the whole thing was in slow motion instead of the hundred mile an hour that we were actually going. The SUV we were traveling in didn’t clear the car, Matt had tried to pass. The rear bumper nicked the other car and if we had been traveling at a much slower speed, it might have made a difference, but we were going way too fast for Matt to react in time. The SUV spun around in a three hundred degree turn before veering toward the concrete median on the highway. As the front passenger side hit the median, a large red truck came barreling down the lane and smacked right into the back-driver’s side. My seatbelt dug into my stomach and shoulder bruising me as the air bag burned my arms, face, and chest.

Looking at Matt over the airbag, I wanted to yell at his stupidity for driving so recklessly instead I saw a semi coming straight at us. The trailer was traveling sideways taking up multiple lanes, skidding with its tires locked up. We’d been lucky the surrounding cars had miraculously bypassed crashing into us, but our luck had run out and was now barreling down the road straight at us. I tried to undo my seatbelt, but my right arm wasn’t working the way I wanted it to. When I looked down to see why I couldn't pull it around and in front of me, I saw a bone sticking out in two places. One at my wrist and the other just below my elbow where blood was oozing from the break in my skin. Not having time to dwell on my arm, I tried to grasp the seatbelt with my left hand when the semi hit the SUV with enough force to whip my head into the passenger side window.

Pain and darkness were all I knew as I heard glass breaking and metal crunching. Everything hurt. There wasn’t a single place on my body that didn’t hurt, but my head was the worst. If it got any worse, I was sure my head would explode. I could feel the beat of my heart with the pounding pain that was tightening against my skull.

I wanted to cry and scream.

I wanted to be home with Mason.

I wanted this to all be a dream.

Just when I thought I couldn't take one more beat of pain, it started to melt away. The sounds from all around me faded into nothing.

Until I was nothing.

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