Avoiding Responsibility (Avoiding #2)(73)
Author: K.A. Linde

"Then why does he need me?" she asked crossing her arms.

Ramsey shrugged. "He won’t let us talk to him."

"Well I doubt I can convince him to stay with her."

"I bet you can," he said not skipping a beat.

"Why would I even want to convince him to stay with someone like Bekah?" she couldn’t help spitting out as she circled the room in frustration.

"Because you’re not in love with him anymore," he whispered into the quiet room.

Lexi stopped in place. She wasn’t in love with Jack anymore. Hadn’t she felt exactly that this morning when waking up in Ramsey’s bed? Was that enough to make her convince him to marry Bekah?

Nope.

"I still can’t do it," she murmured. "Whether I love him or does not cloud the fact that I just don’t like your sister, Ramsey. I think she’s manipulative and deceitful and if she loves Jack at all, I would be very surprised."

"This isn’t your decision though," Ramsey told her. "You don’t get to choose whether she loves him or not…if he loves her."

"Yet I have to convince him to marry her when I think it is completely idiotic?" she responded raising her voice slightly.

"We just need you to calm him down because he refuses to listen to anyone else. You’ve known him the longest."

"No Seth has," she jumped in.

Ramsey didn’t even seem to listen to what she had said. "And he trusts you. He will listen to you. You don’t have to convince him to get married. If you can calm him down enough, he will figure it out on his own."

Lexi wasn’t too sure about that. Ramsey did not know Jack like she did. If she went down there to "calm him down" all hell could break loose. "You don’t know that."

"Well there aren’t really any other options since he refuses to speak to anyone else."

"Does Bekah know?" Lexi asked.

"Fuck no!" Ramsey cried standing in frustration. "If this ever gets to Bekah it would be too soon. She does not need to know that Jack is freaking out. This is normal, and the bride doesn’t need to be involved in this."

"Will she ever know that I went to see him?" she asked curious how this scenario would actually play out.

"Never," he said instantly. Bekah would be furious with everyone involved for all of eternity if she knew that Jack had seen Lexi alone prior to his wedding. No one wanted to deal with that wrath.

Lexi nodded. "Well I still won’t do it."

Ramsey sighed and walked across the room to her. He pulled her into a hug releasing all the tension they had both been carrying in this argument. He didn’t want her to go talk to Jack and she didn’t want to go talk to Jack. Yet he was in the unfortunate position of convincing her to do something that neither of them wanted to happen.

He pulled back and gave her a light kiss on the cheek. "Okay. If you won’t do it, then I can’t force you. But if you can find a way to do it…for me, I would appreciate it more than anything I’ve ever asked of you. I want us to work more than anything. Could you imagine having to deal with Bekah in our relationship if she doesn’t get married today?" he whispered almost as a side note.

Lexi froze in his arms. That thought really chilled her to the core. If she didn’t marry Jack, then Bekah would be even more involved in trying to break them up. Lexi never wanted to deal with Bekah again. Not that her marrying Jack was the ideal situation, but she didn’t want her involved in their relationship ever again.

"That would be…awful."

"I know."

"Ramsey I don’t want to talk to him today," she groaned sinking into his arms again.

"I know baby," he said stroking her long hair. "Can you just do it for me?"

Lexi hated this with every ounce of her being. She was standing her ground. She wasn’t going to talk to him. She was finally over him, and then Ramsey had to pull that line. She wouldn’t have done it for anyone else. She could have turned down anyone else, but Ramsey seemed so desperate. He needed her to do this, and what else had he really asked of her?

"Fine," she mumbled disheartened. "I’ll go talk to him."

"Thank you so much," he said giving her another kiss on the cheek before releasing her, and reminding her how to get to the groom’s rooms.

Lexi left the room a few seconds later. She sighed heavily as she moved throughout the hotel. She couldn’t believe that she was actually going to do this. After everything that had just happened with Ramsey, the last thing she wanted to do was be alone with Jack. She had been alone with him under that weeping willow earlier in the week, and that had almost been catastrophic. Here she was finally happy with her lot and Jack just insisted on interfering.

She always had a place in her heart for him, but he wasn’t it anymore for her. She couldn’t remember a time in their pseudo relationship where she had ever woken up as happy as she had this morning with Ramsey. That was really saying something, because she had always thought that Jack made her happy. She was pretty sure that she had deluded herself into thinking that. How could you be happy with someone who you always had to wonder if they were deceiving you? How could you be happy with someone when you always had to deceive someone else to be with them?

Yet, she was still on her way to see him. She truly felt like an idiot. What kind of person puts herself through so much hell? The only reason she was doing this at all was because Ramsey had asked her to. Even though she had begged him not to make her do it, he had insisted. It wasn’t the smartest moment of his life, but she had agreed albeit reluctantly.

She wasn’t stupid enough to think that Jack had no hold on her anymore. She knew what he was capable of. But then maybe that was her greatest strength going into this situation. She knew that Jack had a pull on her…that he had always had a pull on her. She just had to resist him.

Easier said then done. She knew that for a fact. Look at how her resisting had gone on his birthday last year. She had ended up sleeping with him. But then here she was assuming that Jack even wanted to sleep with her. God, this was his wedding day!

She was being too pessimistic about the situation. If Jack wanted to be with Lexi, he had had more than a million opportunities for that to happen. And it hadn’t happened. She had to accept the fact that they just weren’t going to be together. She had gotten past that. Wasn’t that the whole reason she was at this wedding? Wasn’t that the whole reason she had flown down to Atlanta last year? She had wanted closure.

If anything, Ramsey had brought that semblance of closure. Having someone else to love fully was what had really brought her out of this obsession with Jack. No matter how much her heart told her that she wanted to be with him, she didn’t honestly want to be with him. They were a train wreck together…as good as a train wreck could get, but still a train wreck.

Still, she wouldn’t put it past Jack to be freaking out. She gulped hard at that thought. If he was freaking out then he would want the first thing that would calm him down. The fact that she was that thing infuriated her. He couldn’t have his cake and eat it too. He was getting married in a few short hours. There was no way that she could allow him to seduce her in any way. He had a chance with her, and he had flat out chosen that evil wench over her. She didn’t understand his decision, but it was still the decision he had made and he had to stick with it.

Lexi was so lost in her thoughts that she didn’t even notice her surroundings, and she nearly ran into someone directly in front of her. "Sorry," she said not even glancing up as she tried to side-step the person she had ran into.

"Lexi?" the man asked.

When he said her name, she glanced up and gasped at the person standing before her. "Clark? What are you doing here?" Lexi was utterly stunned. This seemed like the last person that Jack would invite to his wedding and also the last wedding that Clark would attend. As far as she knew, Clark still hated Jack with a fiery passion. They had once been good friends, but Clark had never forgiven him for cheating with Lexi. Not that Lexi blamed him, it was a terrible thing that they had done, but it just didn’t make sense that he was here.

"I was invited. What are you doing here?" he asked narrowing his eyes as he looked at the direction she had been headed.

"I…I…" She was so stunned she couldn’t even gather an answer for him. There were too many reasons as to why she was here, and knowing Clark he would be able to deduce a few easily. He was too intuitive for his own good. He always had been. She could already see the pieces falling together in his head.

"Please don’t tell me you are here for Jack," he demanded his jaw clenching at the very thought.

"Uh…well kind of."

"Lexi, seriously? On his wedding day?" Clark asked furrowing his brow and shaking his head in disbelief.

"No not like that!" she cried hating that she even had to defend herself against this. "I’m dating one of the groomsmen." God, that didn’t sound good either. She was sure that it looked like she was just involved with one of the groomsmen to get to Jack. Ugh, why was Clark even here?

"Right…you’re dating one of his friends. That doesn’t sound familiar," he grumbled under his breath.

"Jesus Clark, I don’t have time for this. What are you actually doing here?"

"I couldn’t believe he was marrying someone other than you. I wanted to see it first hand," he said with an easy shrug.

Lexi rolled her eyes dramatically. "If you came here just to taunt us about our past, then get over yourself. What happened was years ago Clark."

"Oh yeah, where were you headed so intently?" he asked arching his eyebrows.

"I have to go talk to Jack," she admitted slowly. Clark looked at her pointedly. "Just butt out alright! I’m sure it’s not what you think."

"I’m sure," he said with a devilish smirk.

"I don’t know why every meeting we have has to be like this."

"Probably because it always has something to do with Jack, which is exactly why I’m here," he said. "No one thought he would marry anyone other than you…me included. So you being here is a little too perfect."

Lexi rolled her eyes again. She couldn’t believe this was happening. "I don’t have time for this. I’m kind of in a hurry. Enjoy the wedding. Hopefully, the next time we talk it won’t have to be about Jack."

"Not likely, but I’ll keep hoping." Lexi groaned as she began to stomp in the opposite direction. "Oh and Lexi?" She spun around giving him a sinister look. "You look good."

She pivoted on her foot, her hair flying out around her as she stormed away from him. Oh the nerve of that one! She knew she had done him wrong. She knew that she had been a terrible person to him. If anyone knew, Lexi knew. She had felt terrible about it for years. She swore she would never be that person again, and she hadn’t cheated on anyone since then. She was just going to skip over the fact that she had slept with Jack when he was with Bekah….she at least hadn’t been with anyone else at the time. There was no need to rub their past indiscretions in her face. She didn’t care if he hadn’t been expecting her to be in attendance…or maybe he had she wasn’t even sure. She was just furious that he had made her day even further deteriorate from the high she had had this morning in Ramsey’s bed. She was pretty certain that it could only continue to go downhill from here.