50 Shades of Drake 3 and 4

Chapter Seventy

    Their search turned up absolutely nothing. No pictures, no photos, no articles covering where Aubrey had chosen to spend his extended vacation. There was no trail whatsoever. The video footage from the airport was the last time he was captured on camera.

    Destiny set her laptop on the coffee table beside her half-empty wine glass and drew her knees up to her chest. Wrapping her arms around them, she stared at her laptop monitor until it blinked off, easing into Sleep mode. Being who he is, it's strange that Aubrey hasn't been photographed. He does tend to stay indoors moreso now than when he was an entertainer, but still. He wasn't photographed arriving at another airport? Not once? Where is he? Is he even alive? God, if anything happened to him...

    After hours of searching for any trace of Aubrey, Brian had moved from his spot on the couch to the armchair near the living room window. He sat with a guitar cradled in his lap and strummed a few lazy chords while staring out of the window.

    Resting her chin between her knees, she closed her eyes, listening to the music. She was trying not to feel guilty about her recent actions, her quickly developing feelings. And I call them quickly developing, but if I'm being honest with myself, I've had feelings for Brian for a while. Longer than I care to admit. These feelings didn't spring up overnight, and they weren't a result of Aubrey leaving. I had feelings for Brian even before Aubrey left. But if I admitted having feelings for someone else, it meant that Aubrey and I didn't have the perfect, whirlwind romance that I thought we had. So even though I had feelings for Brian, I tried to push him away.

    Before I met Aubrey, though, if you'd asked me what I wanted in a man, Brian would have been my answer. He's sweet and caring and passionate and open. He wants the same things I do. But...meeting Aubrey changed what I wanted, what I thought I wanted. Aubrey is nowhere near open. Even after months of being together, he was still closed off to me. I had to dig just to find out what I wanted to know about him. He hid from me the fact that he had a vasectomy, refused to talk to me about a past experience with an ex who has completely shaped who he is and how he regards love. I had to beg him to get him to open up to me about that. Aubrey is a fortress of secrets and taboos and God knows what else, but I do love him.

    He doesn't want children or a family, her subconscious nagged. If you choose to be with him, you'd have to be accepting of that. You can't expect him to change his mind. Brian wants children, a family. He's open and honest with you. He would never leave you, would never bring another woman around you and make love to her with you under the same roof, would never expect you to have sex with him in a club full of people...You would get to lead a happy, normal life with him. On the other hand, as great as Brian is in bed, he wouldn't bring out the same fiery passion in you that Aubrey does. A relationship with him wouldn't be as exciting as the time you spend with Aubrey. And while Aubrey is closed off, you have fun trying to figure him out. Admit it.

    "A penny for your thoughts?" Brian asked while plucking the strings of the guitar.

    She blinked at him and smiled sadly. "I don't deserve either of you," she said softly.

    His hand stilled on the guitar strings, and he stared across the room at her.

    "Both of you are...too good for me."

    He lifted the guitar off of his lap and set it aside, before standing and walking across the room. "I disagree."

    "I'm selfish. I'm...impulsive. I make rash decisions."

    He sat beside her and swept his hair back. "It sounds to me like you're human."

    "I didn't know my own boyfriend well enough to know he'd never just run off like that," she added in a quiet voice, her eyes brimming with tears. "I didn't have enough faith in him to just... wait. You encouraged me to wait. You told me I should. And I ignored you."

    "We've been through this already," he told her in a soothing voice. "You and I have been through some pretty crazy shit. All right? So has Aubrey. A lot has happened in a very short amount of time. How were you supposed to know that Palmer was behind what we saw on television?"

    She shrugged. "I should have known."

    "There was no way for you to know."

    "I should have waited, at least." She looked away from him. "He's out there, somewhere. We don't even know if he's alive. And I've been here, focusing on my own feelings, not really taking anyone else into consideration."

    He wrapped an arm around her. "Again. You're human. If we want to play the blame game, I've known Aubrey for years."

    "You mentioned early on that him leaving could have been a part of some plan," she pointed out. "I just didn't believe you."

    "But after seeing him with the girl, I was convinced that he left. Anyone would have been."

    She shook her head. "It's not the same."

    "Okay, then how about this? Last night, you weren't the only one in that bed. I was there with you."

    "You weren't the one who promised him that you'd wait for him," she said, wiping at her eyes. "It's not the same, and you know it."

    "Look...I can make this very easy for you," he told her. "You don't even have to decide. I wouldn't blame you or hate you for choosing Aubrey. I would understand."

    She kept wiping at her eyes.

    "And I wouldn't regret one minute that I spent with you." He touched her hair. "Every minute that I spent with you was special, and it always will be."

    She turned her face into his chest.

    "Did you hear me?" he asked her.

    She nodded.

    "So...you don't have to worry about which choice to make now."

    Lifting her head and peering up at him, she asked him, "Don't you understand?"

    Confusion filled his eyes as he shook his head.

    "You didn't make it easier for me," she said. "You just made it one hundred times harder."