Bet... Wait What?

The morning's paper rustled as my feet moved beneath it, dragging me from a memory, a dream of being sexually worshipped by my husband. I heard Keelan rambling from my room, out to the living room and back, mumbling on her phone.

"No. I have no idea how she'll take this news, on top of everything else that's been thrown at her this past few weeks. Well, what would you expect her to do? Sing joyfully?! Fecking idiot."

"What now?" I mumbled from beneath the blankets.

"What? You're awake?"

"Actually, I'm hoping I'm still asleep and this last month has just been a nightmare. Which sounds to be continuing. What's going on, now?" I groused, dragging the warm cocoon from my head.

"Prissy and her beastie, Keira the Vulture just released their private stock of photos their private investigator dug up or doctored. And someone named Vanessa has just sold her account of your teenage years to the Tabletter for a hundred and fifty grand. When the Vulture twins and the ever following ravens find her, hell will be right behind them."

"Well, fuck."

"That's not even the worst." She mumbled softly.

"What is?" Desolation hovered over me. Bleak, dreary and miserable.

"Kian isn't just visiting his daughter."

"He's not?"

"It seems that he's moved in with her. For the time being."

"Fuck." The last straw in the total collapse of my world. My husband, gone. The man who'd stood up to some of these accusations once before. My one and only rock. Gone. My reputation demolished. My carefully crafted life, shattered into a kajillion pieces, doused in acids and set ablaze.

The last five years have been a rollercoaster ride. Joy when my first book got published. Despair. Devastation. Rebirth. Love and wonder. Courage enough to take the vows and mean them. Soaring high with success and love. Should've known the coming crash would be epic. Sucks when you're blindsided.

I lifted the morning's paper, seeing Kian with luggage at his feet outside our door, his daughter, the mini shrew, beside him. The headline read, 'The King has left the Building'. My sight grew blurry as tears rose and overflowed.

"Oh, honey. C'mere." Keelan crooned, sliding onto the bed beside me, putting her arms around me while I wailed.

Last month had started with a couple of my newer employees being arrested for trafficking illegal substances. Indictment followed. DEA people descend into my life, sweeping me into a non-descript building for a couple of hours of intense questioning.

The foundation I'd set up for scholarships was hacked and depleted, wiped out completely. Investigation begun. The DEA bringing me back into their concrete vault inquiring about any involvement I may or may not have had with my deceased fiancé's drug addled dealer brother.

Prissy Jackson and Keira Devereux had renewed their vow to destroy me in any way possible, real or faked. They didn't give a shit, they both wanted revenge. For what? Haven't a fucking clue!

Kian's ex starts calling him unendingly, she talked to all the gossip shows, spewing bullshit about he's funding her new clothing lines. It took another twenty-four hours for him to confirm it, to my face. He threw in an old, ancient nickname, one I haven't heard in over twenty four years.

Empress. The ragged outcasts, the junkies had called me that, way back when, when I was a homeless teenager, when I grew up into the junkie my surroundings created. Just like them.

He gave me a twisted version of my life. Hurt colored his amber eyes darker. I couldn't speak, hearing the disgust, the disdain in his voice, in his words. My heart shriveled up with each vicious swatch of twisted history that spewed from his lips.

Never did I think he'd walk away from what we had.

Never did I think he'd listen, let alone believe, such blatant lies.

Never did I think I'd hurt like this again.

"Can you believe it, Dad? Now, another one of the programs she's into..."

"I don't want to hear anymore." Kian said wearily. The ache in his chest just kept throbbing along with his heartbeat. He looked at the breakfast plate before him blankly. "Cancel my schedule for today."

"But..."

"Cancel it. I don't fucking care." He said sharply, rising from the table.

"Alright." Adora said, picking up her cell. He grabbed the cut crystal bottle with the scotch he preferred and went back into her spare bedroom.

He filled his water glass and with every sip, tried to forget why his heart hurt so much, why his soul felt ripped in half. He knew this wasn't the way to deal with it but it hurt less with every sip. He ignored his phone when it rang, ignored his mini-shrew of a daughter when she stood in the doorway, ignored the pain enveloping him.

'What am I doing? Why does hearing these awful things from her past disgust me so? Is she okay? Why am I doing this?' Ran incessantly through his mind, with every day of pickling his liver and blindfolding his brain. Days blurred drunkenly into each other, smearing into weeks, months, a year, more. He tried to drink away his heartache and almost drank his life away.

"Dammit Kian, spit it out. Breathe you fucking bastard." Nick's voice cut through the haze. Air rushed into his lungs and had him coughing out the bits of vomit he'd choked on. "What the fuck have you been thinking? Why are you still here?"

"Because my wife..."

"Who you left swinging in the breeze to face all that shit alone for the last year and a half or so? Her? Know where she might be?" Nick snarled, grabbing him roughly at his collar and pulling him from his floor to the bed. "Dear god, when's the last time you showered?"

"I couldn't shay..." he slurred.

"Never took you for a coward, Key." Nick said softly, watching his best friend's eyes blaze with anger, clearing the drunken haze a little. "She's still standing tall. Lemme tell you this one little word, exonerated."

"What're you talking about?" he slurred.

"Every last charge. Every bit of each investigation. And even that skank who got paid for your wife's so called teenage criminal exploits and the other shit, got hers. Completely. I have her interviews taped if you wanna watch it. Your wife is one tough cookie." Nick watched the words sink slowly into Kian's pickled brain.

"I need coffee. Lots of coffee." Kian said sitting up and scrubbing his face. "Wait, did you ask me where she is?"

"Surprised that got through." Nick said watching his best friend's eyes slowly clearing. "What're you thinking Key? Hmm? You gonna go get her back? Good luck with that." He began to pace in the cluttered room.

"She's sold the house, got a security firm, body guards to handle the threats." Nick let that sink in as he wormed a path through the close quarters. When Key didn't respond, he continued.

"She's had a couple of guys, some serious, having her on their arms for a while. Hell, she even had a majorly serious one with Phelan Nash for all of nine months, remember him?" he waited, watching carefully. "You saw her with him one night, some charity thing. Came home blind drunk and destroyed everything in the outbuilding, screaming and howling like some wounded animal. And then, that was over. Not a peep of it, or her for almost three weeks and then her agent realized that she'd disappeared. Gone."

"Gone?"

"Long gone, buddy. Nobody's seen or heard from her in two months now. See all you miss when you're shitfaced beyond all recognition. Maybe you shouldn't have believed the bullshit you heard. Maybe, if you hadn't had your head up your ass, you'd still have her. Maybe if you'd have thought a little before you left, you never would've left. Bud, now, she doesn't want to be found."

"Oh fuck. What have I done?" Kian groaned dropping his head into his hands.