Total pages in book: 149
Estimated words: 151384 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 757(@200wpm)___ 606(@250wpm)___ 505(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 151384 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 757(@200wpm)___ 606(@250wpm)___ 505(@300wpm)
He was so much better before . . . before everything had taken off with his career. Before his worries started to get hold of him and then wouldn’t let him fucking go.
He didn’t like being this way. He felt like he was dangling on the edge of a cliff, about to fall. However, if he did, it wouldn’t just be him that fell.
Everyone would go with him.
“I don’t know if you can be cured, more like you learn to cope,” Sampson told him gruffly as he took a seat across from him.
Jenner didn’t like that. He stared down at his clenched hands. “When I’m writing songs, when I’m singing, everything else fades away. It all goes into the background. And I . . . I can quiet my mind. I’m in control.”
“I feel that way when I go to the club.”
“Yeah. I get that.” He used to visit the club with Sampson. But it was too hard to visit now that he’d found fame. The paparazzi would annihilate him. When, at the moment, they adored him.
Not that he cared, but it was good for his career.
And the more his career took off, the more money he made. The more money he made, the more stability he could give to his family.
Not to mention that half of them worked for him. He’d wanted to be surrounded by people he trusted.
What he hadn’t realized was the toll it would take on him, worrying about keeping them all employed.
It was something that wore on him, along with having to keep the fans happy, the press positive, and do what everyone wanted of him.
It was a fucking boulder on his shoulders sometimes. Especially since he didn’t feel like he could share it with anyone.
A man who was a real man didn’t moan and complain. Maybe he should go to a therapist again. Because he felt like he was drowning with no lifeline in sight.
“I felt better when I went to the club.”
“Because you were in control. You’re like me, we need to feel in control of our surroundings and sometimes we can’t be.”
“I never wanted to hurt Immy. I love her.”
Sampson eyed him. “She loves you too, you know. She’s in love with you.”
Jenner shook his head. “She can’t be.”
“She is.”
“I don’t deserve her!”
“Is that what you believe or what our father made you believe? Because you do deserve her.”
“She needs someone better. Someone who isn’t fucked in the head. Do you know what I did after she kissed me? I ran. And then I spent the next thirty minutes vomiting my guts out.”
“What?” Sampson whispered.
“That’s what he did to me. Immy is good and pure and innocent. I am not. I cannot touch her like that. Not with these fucking hands.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
A wave of nausea washed through him.
His feelings for her were wrong. Immy should be protected. Revered. She should never be harmed.
Immy was the best of them.
Perfection.
That could never be tarred. Especially by him. Because he was wrong.
Dirty.
Getting to his feet, he raced into the bathroom and threw up.
So weak.
He was supposed to always be strong and tough. To be the solid wall that everyone leaned on.
That wall wasn’t supposed to crumble under pressure.
Be a man, Jenner.
Stop being such a wimp.
Take your beating without crying.
God. Was it any wonder that he was a complete basket case.
He was what his father had made him.
Sometimes he wished he could separate himself from his emotions. But then he’d just be a robot.
“You good now?” Sampson asked gruffly, standing in the doorway of the bathroom.
Jenner let out a huff of air that had nothing to do with laughter. “Good? Man, I don’t think I’ve been good for a while now.”
Years, maybe.
“You do a decent job of hiding it,” Sampson told him.
“Do I?” he asked as he stood, flushing and grabbed his toothbrush, brushing his teeth.
Sampson stepped aside as he strode into the studio and got a bottle of water from the mini-fridge he kept out here. He chugged it down before sitting on the sofa. Sampson started pacing up and down the room.
Finally, he sat and stared at Jenner intently. “What was that about?”
Sampson had always been an intense kind of guy. Big and gruff and no-nonsense. Their father had wanted Sampson to follow in his footsteps and become a Sentinel.
So, basically, an abusive fuck who did whatever the fuck he wanted to whoever he wanted.
And anyone who complained would be taken care of.
How many people who had made a complaint or stuck up for someone else had disappeared?
Jenner swallowed back more nausea.
“What is going on with you? I know you’re under stress, but are you ill? Do you need some emotional help or something?”
“Are you offering?” Jenner asked, feeling amused for the first time since they’d started this conversation.
“Fuck, no. You need someone who knew how to deal with that shit. That’s not me. Not that there’s anything wrong with needing, uh, therapy.”