The Debt 7 (Club Alpha) (8 page)

“Okay, okay.
 
I get it.”

“Good.
 
Don’t take any crap from him.”

“I won’t.”

“Love you, Raven.”

“Love you, Sky.”

Raven got off the phone and sat back down
in her lounge chair, wondering how she’d gotten so lucky to have such an
amazing friend.

And she really hoped that Skylar was
telling the truth, that she really was okay and her parents were helping
her.
 
Because if it turned out that
Skylar was trying to protect her and just telling her things to make Raven feel
better, it would be a terrible blow.

And the guilt hadn’t gone completely
away, despite Sky’s reassurances.

Still, Raven told herself then and there
that if she was going to be away from her best friend, she was going to damn
well make the most of her time in Florida with Jake.

She wasn’t going to sit around feeling
sorry for herself when she had her health, she was with the man she loved, and
she was staying in paradise.

Getting back into the pool, Raven swam a
half dozen hard
laps
, enjoying the invigorating
feeling of using her muscles to propel herself through the water, the coolness
on her skin as the sun warmed her from overhead.

When she got out, she squeezed the water
from her hair and watched it splatter the ground.

“Morning,” Jake’s voice croaked from
inside the house.

Raven gave a little gasp and turned
around.
 
“Hey, I didn’t hear you get
up!”

Jake was standing in his boxers, no
shirt, his hair mussed, yawning.
 
“How’s
the water?”

“It’s amazing!” she said, aware of the
fact that they were both already almost completely naked.
 
She was wearing the string bikini he’d
talked about wanting to see her in, and she was still glistening wet from the
pool.

Jake blinked at her, his eyes bloodshot.
 
“Cool.”

“You should get in,” she told him.

He shook his head.
 
“Nah,” he said, and began shuffling into
the kitchen.

Raven watched him go to the refrigerator,
as she picked up a towel and started drying off.
 
When she was dry enough to go inside
without dripping everywhere, she followed him.

Jake poured himself a bowl of cereal and
then walked past her to the living room, where he turned on Sports Center and
began eating his cereal as he stared at the TV.

“It’s amazing out,” she said.
 
“Do you want to go for a run or a walk
in a little bit?”

Jake didn’t take his eyes from the
TV.
 
Instead, he shoved another
spoonful of cereal into his mouth.
 
“Maybe,” he said, sounding doubtful.

“I mean, we could just walk for a little
bit on the beach.”

“The cool thing about being in Florida
like this is we don’t need to even make a plan,” Jake said, still watching
television as he spoke.
 

“I’m not saying we need to make some huge
itinerary,” Raven replied, “but I thought maybe it would be fun to walk on the
beach together.”

“We’ll see.
 
I just want to catch up on a few
things.”

She stared at him.
 
Catch
up on a few things?
 
She
realized that he was talking about catching up on the highlights from games
he’d missed the previous day.
 
It
was bizarre, and she wanted to tell him so.

But then she realized that this might be
a reaction to suddenly having time off for the first time in years.
 
His life had been incredibly stressful,
and he’d been constantly on the go.

Let
him have his relaxation time, Raven.
 
Don’t push him or he’ll really start to resent you.

It was disappointing, but Raven decided
not to let it get her down.
 
Instead, she went upstairs and changed into shorts, t-shirt, and flip
flops, then slathered sunscreen on her somewhat pale legs, neck, arms and face,
and then went back downstairs to find Jake sitting in exactly the same place,
only the cereal bowl was sitting on the table.

“I’m going to go for a walk around the
neighborhood,” she said.

Jake glanced at her.
 
“Nice.
 
Have fun!”

She almost told him where he could stick
his fun, but instead gave him a perky smile.
 
“I will have fun,” she said, determined
to stay upbeat.

She turned on her heel and left the
house, smiling even wider as the sunlight hit her upturned face.
 

There’s
nothing to be bummed about.
 
Jake’s
in a little funk, but it’s not my problem.

Raven began walking, smelling the scents
of flowers and trees, fresh air and the sea, as she made her way down the
secluded street.
 
Her footsteps echoed
on the pavement as her flip-flops slapped the ground.

Soon, she’d worked up a bit of a sweat
and she was feeling good, watching as the cars drove by, waving as a cyclist
and then a jogger went past.

There was an older couple walking an even
older dog, and then a kid and his friend on skateboards—people were out
and about and enjoying life.

But as she continued on, she couldn’t
help but occasionally think about Jake’s demeanor and the sudden change his
personality seemed to have undergone since the previous night.

Raven was frustrated, because they were
there together and he didn’t seem to even want to touch her, although she very
badly wanted him.

What happened to the making love all day
long, the walks on the beach, all of the things he’d been promising?

Raven didn’t have any answers.

***

The next few days fell into a predictable
pattern.
 
Raven was up early, first
for a swim in the pool,
then
she’d lay out for about
half an hour, text with Skylar or her brother for a few minutes.

After that, she’d make herself breakfast,
something relatively light and healthy—and then she’d go upstairs and
change into shorts and a t-shirt, put on her running shoes.

Jake would still be sleeping soundly, and
she’d try not to look at him for too long or think too much about the way he
was acting.

Next, Raven would go for a nice long run
on the beach.
 
It was amazing,
because the beach was private, so she had it mostly to herself, although it was
shared with some of the other neighbors who also owned a piece of it.
 
As she ran, she could look out at the
water and then also up to the mansions that dotted the landscape nearby.

She would typically run for just about an
hour, and then she’d go back inside, usually to find Jake eating cereal and
watching television.

They’d make brief conversation, and Jake
would usually be distracted, almost annoyed that she was disrupting his TV
watching to converse with him.

After that, Raven would go take a long
shower, pamper herself with makeup and creams and then blow-dry her hair.
 
When she was all done up and ready,
she’d go back downstairs to find Jake still in front of the TV.

Raven would make herself lunch, and Jake
would join her, but he’d often be eating and then strolling back into the
living room to watch television as they ate, almost like he was afraid of what
he might miss—even though he was watching junk like Judge Judy and old
movies.

Later in the afternoon, he would start
drinking.

It wasn’t as though he was getting
extremely drunk, but he would just sort nurse a beer through the afternoon,
then continue into the evening.

His mood would get even more subdued, if
such a thing was possible, and Raven had stopped bothering trying to join
him.
 
At first, she’d thought that
maybe they could drink a little together, get excited,
maybe
tear each other’s clothes off.

But it didn’t happen.

On the fourth night, Jake passed out
early on the couch, The Godfather Part II playing at top volume as he snored, a
handful of beer bottles on the table next to him and a half-empty pizza box
open beside that.

He’d ordered the pizza at around eight
and was asleep on the couch by nine, leaving Raven to wonder just what she was
doing there.

She was growing angry and bored, and also
a little bit scared now.

Was Jake having a nervous breakdown or
something?
 
She didn’t know, but she
was starting to feel like things were reaching a tipping point.
 
Raven wasn’t sure how much more of this
she could take, with no end in sight.

She began wandering the house, and that’s
when she decided, for no particular reason, to check out the garage, which
she’d never bothered seeing up until that point.

Jake never parked the jeep in the garage,
never opened it, and hadn’t ever mentioned it before.

So when she opened the door, Raven was
absolutely stunned by what she found.

The four-car garage had been converted entirely
into a state-of-the-art recording studio.

 
She walked into the room, turning on all
of the lights to get a good look at it.
 
The place was clearly sound proofed, and there was a sort of control room
with a large mixing board, computers with huge monitors, and plenty of
space—enough that there was a large leather couch and a few comfortable
chairs for people to hang out on.

Raven exited the control booth through a
narrow doorway and found herself in a wide open room that had a few different
microphone stands, lots of amplifiers, guitars, a grand piano, keyboard, and
then a separate sealed off room with a full drum set.

Microphones were everywhere, wired up to
record the musicians who theoretically might play inside this space.

She stared around, wondering when Jake
had built this place, and for what purpose.
 
Had he actually recorded any of his
previous albums here?

It looked and smelled like it hadn’t been
used in some time—there was
a mustiness
, and
much of the equipment was covered in a light layer of dust.

After strolling around the studio, Raven
finally decided she’d seen enough.
 
Also, she was afraid Jake might come in and accuse her of snooping.

Giving the room one last parting glance,
she turned off all the lights and closed the door behind her.

Raven went back into the TV room, turned
off the television set.
 
Jake
stirred on the couch, groaning.

“What’s going on?” he asked, squinting up
at her blearily.

“You fell asleep,” she told him.

“So?”

“So, the TV was on full blast and you
weren’t watching it.”

“I was listening.”

“Jake,” she said, shaking her head.

“Raven,” he mimicked her annoyed tone.

“You’ve had too much to drink,” she
replied.
 
“Why don’t you go up to
bed?”

Jake sat up on the couch.
 
“No, I don’t think so,” he said,
grabbing the remote off the table and turning The Godfather II back on.
 
He even turned the volume up a few
notches.

“Real mature,” she sighed, her blood
beginning to slowly boil.

“Yeah, I am really mature—thanks
for noticing.”
 
He sat back,
grabbing a slice of pizza from the box and taking an enormous bite of it.

Raven was going to tell him off.
 
She wanted so badly to give him hell for
the way he was treating her, but she could see from the look in his eyes that
Jake was spoiling for a fight.
 
She
wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction.

“Well, I guess I’m going to bed now,” she
muttered, turning and walking away from him.

“You’re going to miss all the fun!” he
called after her.

“That’s okay!” she called back, rolling
her eyes.
 
She walked up the stairs
and went into the bedroom, taking off her clothes and crawling into bed.
 
Tears were in her eyes, and she willed
herself not to sob.
 

Don’t
be such a baby, Raven.
 
He’s being
an ass.
 
Don’t let him get to you.

But he was getting to her, and she was
tired of it.
 
She was tired of him
jerking her around, acting one way and then changing five minutes later.

Perhaps he was just sick of
her—maybe he regretted bringing her to Florida with him.
 
She didn’t know what it was, but she
knew that the breaking point was very near.