Jerking upright so quickly his chair nearly fell backwards, Van felt his blood pressure rising to a dangerous level. A breaking-shit level.

“Thanks a fucking lot, Sid. ’Preciate it.”

He didn’t even glance in Stella Jo’s direction as he stalked out of the Atrium. He had bigger problems to deal with than whether or not the purple Polo-shirt-wearing piece of shit actually meant anything to her.

“She isn’t family,” Van told Dr. McLendon once she’d let him into her office. “We were involved for a while. Then we weren’t. It’s been over for a year, and she’s done nothing since but try and make my life more difficult than it needs to be.”

“Can I ask what happened?”

“What do you mean?” He exhaled in an attempt to alleviate some of the tension from his chest.

Nessa had made his life fucking miserable, even more miserable than usual, in every way possible. He didn’t want to rehash all the shit she’d pulled for a multitude of reasons. But mostly because even the thought of her gave him a migraine.

“I mean, between the two of you. You were involved for a while. Then you weren’t. Why did you stop being involved?”

“Because she was a psychotic bitch.”

The doctor frowned and he felt bad for having snapped at this woman who was only trying to help.

“Sorry.” He shrugged. “I guess you want me to be more specific, huh?”

“It’d help.”

He leaned back on the couch, looked up at the ceiling, and then rubbed his hands over his knees. “She was friends with my… She was a family friend.” Taking a few breaths to steady himself, he focused on the facts, not the emotions tied to them. “We got engaged right after high school and moved to LA together. When the band started to take off, she became…”

He wasn’t sure how to explain it. Vanessa Reeves had always been a bit unstable. Hell, for that matter, so had he. For a while, it was what had made them so perfect for each other. Van and Vanessa. Vanessa and Van. Though he was pretty sure their relationship would most likely have ended in a murder-suicide mystery no one could solve. And that was on a good day. But once the band had hit it big, she’d started to behave like she was downright insane—in more of a literal sense than an exaggerated one. It had been more than even he could handle.

“Difficult,” he finished, though that didn’t cover the half of it.

Dr. McLendon raised a blond eyebrow. “In what way?”

He sighed. “She partied hard. Sometimes even harder than me.” A few blurred images of incidents involving Nessa appeared behind his eyes. “If I didn’t pay enough attention to her or she thought I made eyes at another woman during a show, she’d make a scene. Threaten people, throw herself at another guy—sometimes even one of the guys in my band.”

“That sounds like a volatile situation. How did you deal with it?”

Van met her imploring stare. “Got high. Wasted. Whatever. Blew her off for a while.” He shrugged. “Then some time would pass and she’d come back, saying she was going to off herself if I didn’t take her back.”

It took every single ounce of self-control he had to remain calm. Nessa knew about Val. Knew about the way everything went down and had still used the one thing she knew would hit him where it hurt to get him to forgive her crazy ass.

“I see. I’ll talk to a care coordinator and make sure she isn’t contacted.”

He was thankful that the doctor didn’t ask any additional follow-up questions. Between seeing Stella with some random dude at lunch and Sid dropping the atomic bomb that was Nessa on him, he was done talking. But he did have a burning desire to see a certain care coordinator himself.

“You are honestly the last person on Earth I expected to see here.” Stella tucked a wayward strand of hair behind her ear as she lowered herself to a table across from her ex-boyfriend. “I mean, not that it’s not nice to see you. I just meant—”

“I know what you meant, Stella.” Nash Douglas grinned at her as he dropped into the other chair. “Trust me I don’t exactly want to be here. Not that it’s not nice to see you too, of course.” He winked and she became oddly uncomfortable.

She hadn’t seen Nash since graduation, where he was smiling and taking pictures with Tess and their families. The way they’d looked together, she’d half-expected him to drop down on one knee and propose in the middle of the ceremony.

But right now, the way he was looking at her was off-putting. His bright blue eyes sparkled mischievously at her from under his carefully styled brown hair. Add that to the way Van had practically stormed out of the Atrium and she was growing more uncomfortable by the minute.

“So, um, what exactly happened? To bring you here, I mean?”

Nash leaned toward her and lowered his voice. “You remember Cain Sellers? His older brother Colton was president of Phi Beta Kappa last year.”

“The one who OD’d?”

Stella hadn’t kept up with Nash’s fraternity brothers, but everyone on campus knew Colt and Cain Sellers. Half of the buildings on campus were named for their family members, a result of copious donations. The infamous brothers had always driven expensive cars, had flocks of girls hanging all over them, and the best parties according to Nash. She’d always been too busy studying to go to any of them, but she heard about them for weeks afterward.

Their senior year, Colton had been found unconscious in a bathroom in an apartment off campus. The rumor was that it was a heroin overdose. He’d lived, but he never returned to school. His younger brother had partied more instead of less—as if he were partying for both of them once his brother was gone.

“Yeah,” Nash answered quietly. “Supposedly Colt came here and got cured after everything went down. So Cain’s parents just checked him in.”

Stella bit her lip. She wasn’t a doctor, but she’d taken enough counseling classes to know that there wasn’t a cure for addiction. Colt Sellers might’ve gotten a handle on it after his stay here, but SCR wasn’t a magical cure because there was no such thing. Not that she wanted to have that debate with Nash Douglas at that particular moment.

“Oh. Well, I hope he gets the help he needs. I’ve only worked here a few weeks, but from what I can tell, it’s a great place.”

Nash nodded. “Yeah. Me too. He’s not a bad guy, just… I don’t know. Sometimes all that money…”

Stella nodded, though having never been particularly wealthy or addicted to any habit-forming substances, she couldn’t really empathize.

“It’s nice of you to visit him. He’s lucky to have such a good friend.” She smiled, but Nash looked slightly embarrassed.

“Uh. Yeah.” He cleared his throat before meeting her eyes. “Actually I agreed to come drop some things off for him because I was hoping to run into you.”

Her eyebrows rose. “You were? Why?” She felt her face flush at her blurted reaction.

Nash grinned. “I’ll try not to take that personally.”

She closed her eyes, annoyed at herself for being so socially impaired when it came to interacting with her fellow human beings. Horses she could handle. Her own species, not so much.

Opening her eyes, she gave him an apologetic smile. “That came out wrong. I was just surprised is all. Mostly it felt like we were avoiding each other after…”

“After I acted like a dick and hooked up with your roommate,” he finished for her.

“That wasn’t what I was going to say at all. I told you and Tess both, it wasn’t my place to tell either of you who you could date. We’re adults. You can date whomever you choose.”

Nash leaned closer, staring intently at her for what felt like entirely too long for comfort. “I chose you, Stella. First. I chose you first. But you didn’t seem to be feeling it.” He shrugged and leaned back, giving her some much needed space.