After close to a month of avoiding Max and his calls, I finally decided to take the heat early the next morning before Mason or the boys could even dream of waking up.

"Willow!" he sounded surprised the moment he heard shuffling on the other end as I crossed the room to the balcony. "How's my favorite writer doing?"

"I don't know if I want to write the article anymore." I didn't bother to beat around the bush.

He was quiet, but I could almost picture those beady dark eyes narrowing and face falling in disappointment.

"Willow, think about what you're saying. You're giving up a chance of a lifetime."

"I'm trying to sell a story that isn't anyone's business." I deflected.

Irritation finally entered his voice. "Willow, we need this. You need this. If you write this article, you'll never have to worry about a job or working some crappy minimum wage job again."

"And I'll be exploiting Xander and the rest of the band in doing so." I snapped. "Even if I get permission from Jack to write it and Rolling Stone by some miracle actually picks it up, it'd be like shoving a knife through their back, Max. They'll think that me coming was all some ploy to try and get to know them for the article."

Before Max could respond, a voice interjected from the bedroom to my back. "Article?"

My manager started to speak again, but I ended the call and braced myself from the blow that was undoubtedly about to come. I tried to conjure up any explanation that wouldn't make me look like a complete asshole, but came up short as Mason slowly crossed his arms over his chest, staring me down.

"Mason, let me explain—"

"Explain what?" he snickered. "I think you did a pretty good job of that a few seconds ago. I thought that you were different, that it was possible you weren't another snake looking for a good story and a good time. I was wrong."

I stalked across the room, feeling my chest starting to tighten as the tension between us grew stronger.

"Mason, it's not like that. It's—"

"That's why you changed your mind, isn't it?" he said, shaking his head. "You never gave a shit about Xander or his well being. This was all for a story."

I wanted to deny the statement, but I couldn't. Instead, my outstretched hand fell limply to my side and I fell back a step. "I'm sorry, Mason."

"The first time in years I feel like a real person. The first time I feel something for someone, she's using me until she'd finished with her story. Then I'll be discarded like a dirty laundry, like I never existed. Right?"

"Mason, I never—"

He started to head for the door, shaking his head. "It's pathetic, you know. How much you sit here and pretend to care about us. Screw you, Willow. I'll tell Jack to get you the first plane back home."

Then he walked out of his own hotel suite, slamming the door so hard it shook, and I collapsed back against the bed, burying my face in my hands and cursing the moment I decided to come on this stupid trip in the first place.

*

Though I'd spent the last month despising being in the presence of my father, at this moment I was relieved to have him at my side. He was the only person to not shake there head and stare me down in disappointment and betrayal. The boys had evidently kept the news from Xander for now-I assumed they'd wait until I was gone and unable to defend myself to break it to him. It should be a relief, to be able to go home and pretend as though none of this ever happened. That I'd never reconciled with Xander, that I didn't get to know the boys. I'd be back home with Mom and Blake, and in a few months the boys would come back stronger than ever-with or without Mason.

As hard as I tried to convince myself of it, I knew it wasn't true. It took a two-hour plane ride back home to come to the conclusion I didn't want to go through with the article. I couldn't. I'd managed to keep my composure and self together pretty well after my breakdown in Mason's hotel suite, but something about seeing my brother waiting for me at the airport had me halting to a stop, feeling as if I'd been sucker punched in the gut. All my emotions washed over me at once as I trudged through the crowded building to Blake.

I'd sent him a brief text letting him now I'd be flying in and need a ride. I could see his own expression harden when he saw how desperately I was trying to hold on until we were, at the very least, in the privacy of his car. He immediately dropped his arm over my shoulder and led me through everyone, waiting until we were out on the main road to sneak a quick glance in my direction and fill the silent car with his quiet concern. "Do you want to talk about it?"

"No." I breathed against the window, squeezing my eyes shut.

I had left so much in the open. Mason hadn't given me the chance to explain myself, and Xander was probably being blindsided by my departure at this very second. But the guilt I felt was nothing compared to the hurt in my chest from seeing Mason's expression and finally processing his words.

The look of betrayal on his face, the hurt and anger. He truly thought that I'd tried to get close to him so I could get personal information for my article. The truth was I hadn't even thought about it, especially when I was with him. He had been able to take me somewhere else, allowed me to feel things I'd been forcing down for far too long.

"Which one of them broke your heart?" my brother finally broke the depressing silence hanging in the car between us. "I'll fly my happy ass to Vegas and go beat their ass myself."

"None of them." I whispered. Apparently, I'd been the one doing all the breaking. "Please just leave it alone, Blake."

He eyed me worriedly at a red light, lips pursed, before he eventually let his shoulders fall back. "If you want to talk about it I'm here."

**

After sending bricks of texts as an explanation to Mason, I finally gave up and tossed my phone on to my nightstand, raking my fingers through my greasy hair. My gut instinct had told me to turn my cheek from the get-go, and unlike my usual cautious nature, I'd allowed my love and desperate need for closure to get in the way of my logic.

On top of the immense guilt I was feeling, there was an ache in my chest that I knew resided solely with Mason. He'd stated how I felt too; the first time I finally allow myself to feel something for someone and I go and screw it all up before it can even happen.

It wasn't until I'd managed to force myself into the shower and stepped in front of my bedroom mirror that I saw it. I saw just how much I'd truly changed in the last six years. Not just in looks, but in the scars and trauma underneath. I'd tried to pretend and act as though I'd gotten over it, that Xander and his life didn't matter to me anymore and I was on the road I needed to be on for my future.

It still stung, even after all these years, the betrayal. But seeing his expression after the performance with Mason, I couldn't help but wonder if he was feeling as exactly as I had those first few months after he'd left. Confused, hurt, angry, bitter, and all around just lost. I had lost every part of myself I'd grown to love as I stared at Xander through the wet window. As hard as it was to find myself again, I had, and just as I'd grown to start to love who I'd become, he reappeared in my life-like a hurricane at that. In the entire time we'd been on the trip, I hadn't sat down and had a personal conversation with him, not really. It was hard to judge if after all that he'd been through if there was still any of my best friend still in there. And if there was, would he believe the half-truths that the boys told behind my back or would he give me the chance to defend myself?

"Wills, hey." Blake wrapped gently on my bedroom door. "Can I come in?"

Quickly throwing on an oversized tee and underwear, hopping on one foot as I slipped into shorts on my way to the door.

Opening the door, I found my brother in his old Star Wars pajamas, leaning into my door frame with his eyes on his phone in his left hand. Hearing the creaking of the old door, he lifted his head and waved the phone between us, "I think we should talk about this."

Curious, I pried the phone from his hands and looked down at the picture. It was an article online-with Mason and me in an blown-up picture up top gazing into each other's eyes with such an intensity I was a bit shook seeing it. I skimmed the words, not in any mood to sit and try and absorb all the journalist jargon right now. Most of it was just speculation on Mason and me and if I were some super-secret girlfriend he'd been hiding from the public eye. Nothing from the boys management team, my father, or Mason himself.

"Wills, what's going on?" Blake said softly, reminding me I wasn't in my room alone. "Did you have something going on with this guy?"

Hints of my brother's overprotective tone entered his voice as he broke past me and toward my bed, shaking his head. "I told you this was a bad idea. I spent years sitting and trying to bring you back for them to sit and break you all over again."

"It wasn't them, Blake." I whispered, meeting his dark eyes. "It was me."

He snorted. "I don't believe that."

"The article. You knew that was why I ultimately decided to go with them."

"As it should have been."

"Mason overheard me talking to Max saying I didn't want to write it anymore."

My brother was quiet for a while as he took in the new information. "Okay, and?"

"He thought it was the only reason I agreed to come. Which, initially, it was." I buried my hands in my damp hair. "But I did start to care for them, Blake. All of them. Even Xander. Because that man isn't the same rich prick that refused to acknowledge my existence. He's my Alexander. My best friend. He's so lost and. . . and broken."

Blake raised a brow, but it took him another few minutes to respond. "This other kid, Mason, you guys had something going on? For him to be so hurt over it he sent you back here, he obviously felt betrayed on a personal level."

"I guess." I mumbled, joining him on my bed. "And he didn't even give me the chance to explain! He didn't even let me say goodbye to Xander because they thought it'd cause more harm."

Blake frowned, extending his arm out over my shoulder and hugging me tightly against his shoulder. "I'm sorry, Wills. But maybe it's for the best. All Xander has ever done is hurt you and what could truly come out of a relationship with a pop star other than drama?"

As hard as the words were for me to hear, he was right. It was the reality of the situation and it was what I'd always loved about my brother-his ability to see through the blurred haze and straight into the reality of every situation.

"You'll be fine, Wills." he assured, squeezing my shoulder as he rested his head against mine. "You're going to get through this just like you got through everything else."