Wherever You Are Read online

  When Avery submitted the novel she’d written in her spare time during a summer break to a publisher all those years ago, she had no idea the world she’d created would eventually turn into the wildly successful drama series The Preserves. One day she’d been in her fourth year of medical school and finishing a yearlong master’s degree in clinical research, the next she’d been “discovered” and eventually transformed into an overnight celebrity. Who knew a collection of stories based on the neighborhood she’d grown up in would be this popular? So popular that her little book was optioned for a scripted television series that had recently finished its first season a ratings hit. There were chat rooms devoted to her, fan fiction created around her characters and her world.

  Luke strutted over and set a piece of paper in front of her. “According to Monique, the network doesn’t like the direction you’re going for next season. They want changes. You may have to rethink the love triangle. The audience is too invested in Robert and Riley. We can’t throw Caleb into the mix.”

  Scanning the document Luke handed her—a screen print of the first page of her new script—she frowned at the word “No” in big bold letters across the top of the paper. Damn. “Get Walter on the phone,” she ordered, sighing heavily. “Tell him to handle it. It’s his job to go to bat for me with the network. I can’t do this right now.”

  Jess set a tall glass of ice water in front of her, and Avery gulped it down in two-point-two seconds. Something wasn’t right, but she couldn’t put her finger on it. Swallowing roughly, she closed her eyes and briefly considered calling her doctor.

  “Luke,” Avery called out, without opening her eyes. “Leave. You have a plane to catch. I’ll be fine. Jess is rolling with me while you’re out.”

  Avery intended to return to Michigan after her trip to Los Angeles to work on her special project, the Avery Montgomery Foundation. Although Avery was sure she could handle her life without Luke, Jess had agreed to step in and help when she could, if things went left.

  Avery’s competent but loud assistant announced a few last-minute changes to her LA itinerary, and within ten minutes he was gone.

  Now alone with Jess, Avery let out a slow breath. Peace and quiet was what she needed.

  “So, how did the speech go?” Jess asked, joining her on the sofa. “Did you get a chance to meet any of the... Avery?”

  Avery couldn’t think. It made her head throb even more.

  “Avery,” Jess whispered, pressing a comforting hand to her back. “Maybe you should lie down.”

  Avery shook her head. “I’m fine, so stop worrying.”

  “But...” Jess shrugged. “I’ll grab you something to eat. Maybe that will help.”

  Avery was excited to spend some time with her best friend. She appreciated Jess more than the other woman would probably ever know.

  Avery was the youngest of five. Her father had married her mother after a nasty divorce from his first wife. Her siblings were all at least a decade older than she, which had made for a lonely childhood at times. More than that, her older sisters couldn’t stand her because she represented the deterioration of their parents’ relationship. They also couldn’t stand Avery’s mother, Janice, so her sisters had never really tried to have a relationship with her. Despite how often she’d tried to reach out to them, they never reciprocated and she’d eventually given up.

  But Jess had filled in the gaps, becoming the sister she’d always dreamed she’d have in her own sisters. Their bond had never dissipated, even though they’d found themselves pulled in different directions. Avery had been hell-bent on becoming a doctor, while Jess had her heart set on becoming an educator. Yet even though they’d run in different school crowds, they’d still managed to stay close. Avery had stood up at Jess’s wedding as her maid of honor. And when Jess lost her husband to a horrible accident mere weeks after her wedding, Avery had dropped everything to support her.

  In recent years, Jess had turned her focus to empowering high school students hoping to attend the University of Michigan. As Director of Academic Success at the Ross Business School, Jess had been transforming lives and increasing African American enrollment at the college.

  They’d saved each other countless times over the years, and Avery wouldn’t trade her friendship with Jess for anything or anyone.

  Avery wanted to confess to her friend about El. Lord knew she needed to tell someone. But she didn’t want to hear what would inevitably come next. Jess wouldn’t be able to help herself. The other woman was firmly #TeamEl, and it would undoubtedly piss Avery off. The last thing she wanted to hear was her bestie waxing poetic about signs and connections and meant-to-be romance. That heartwarming love stuff was for romance novels. Avery’s life consisted of the heavy drama, lies and sex she had to dream up so that the viewers could get their dose on every Wednesday at eight o’clock. Yeah, no. She’d keep it to herself.

  A tingling in her arm had her shaking it furiously in the air. She stood abruptly and swayed on her feet. When she took a step, a wave of dizziness stopped her in her tracks. She gripped the edge of the table.

  I can do this, she told herself as she shuffled toward the bedroom. She had to be on her way to Detroit Metropolitan Airport within the hour in order to make the flight to LA.

  “Have you thought about the position the school offered?” Jessica asked. “I think it’s a wonderful opportunity.”

  “I thought about it, but it’s just not going to work for me.”

  The University of Michigan had offered Avery an associate professor position in the Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program when she’d arrived that morning. Although the idea was appealing on some level, she had no intention of taking it. With her hectic work schedule and establishing her foundation, it just wasn’t possible to add anything else to her plate. Besides, moving back to Ann Arbor at this stage in her career wasn’t an option for her, especially since her production company was based in Atlanta.

  “I can’t take on anything else,” she continued. “Especially since I’m ready to hit ‘play’ on the Avery Montgomery Foundation we talked about.”

  The paperwork had already been done and filed to start the nonprofit. But due to deadlines and shooting, Avery hadn’t been able to work on it.

  Jess’s eyes lit up with excitement. “That’s wonderful. I’m so excited.”

  One of Avery’s bucket list items included a foundation to help young girls fund and survive college. Although Avery had decided to go in a different direction, career-wise, the world needed more women in fields like molecular biology or biophysics. There were so many gifted young girls who wanted to attend college, but sometimes the lack of money—especially the prospect of overwhelming student loan debt—made it impossible for them to follow that dream.

  Leaning against the wall, Avery sighed. “I’m going to need your help, Jess. This is huge. I purposely scheduled my vacation here so that I can get this going. I want Ann Arbor to be the home base for this project. When we get back from LA, I’m ready to hit the ground running on this, before shooting starts and I have to go back to Atlanta.”

  “But wouldn’t it make sense to just cancel LA, rest a few days before you jump into this? You’ve been running too long and too hard, Avery. You can’t do everything. I worry about you.”

  Avery smiled. “Don’t worry. I’ll have time to rest.”

  As Avery neared the suite’s bedroom, she felt herself losing her balance. Forging ahead, she reached the threshold of the separate sleeping area and leaned against the door. Sucking in a deep breath, she glanced at her watch.

  Jess’s voice was soft in her ear. “I can order you cottage cheese and crackers. Do you want tea?”

  Shaking her head, she blinked up at Jessica. Only she couldn’t see her friend’s face. The only thing she saw was Jess’s eye. Panic welled up inside Avery. “Jess?”

  “Yes?”

&nb
sp; “I can’t see you.” Avery closed her eyes, then opened them again. There it was again. Jessica’s eye. “Seriously. I can’t see you.”

  “Avery, that doesn’t make any sense. I’m right in front of you.”

  “I know that,” Avery snapped. “Don’t you think I know that? I saw you a minute ago, and now I can’t see you. It’s like... I don’t know. My sight is gone.”

  “We need to call the doctor,” Jessica said. “This isn’t normal.”

  “Wait.” Avery closed her eyes. “No, I don’t have time to go see a doctor. There’s too much to do.”

  “Avery, I think we should call El—”

  “Hell, no. No way.”

  “He’s on staff. He would know someone who can help?”

  Sure, El worked at the university hospital, and so did most of his family of doctors, but she couldn’t see him again so soon. Their little encounter earlier had been painful enough. Hell, it was torture just thinking about him. It was better if she kept her distance.

  Elwood was, for all intents and purposes, the love of her life. But she’d chosen to walk away from him. Their breakup had played out in such a way that had made him think she’d chosen her burgeoning writing career and the prospect of fame over him. Well, that’s essentially what he’d accused her of in the months after they split up. He had no idea that leaving him behind was the hardest decision she’d ever made, and being around him again would only open that wound.

  El didn’t know the real reason she’d left him. He didn’t know that his brother, Dr. Lawrence Jackson, had played on her insecurities and she’d let him. She’d allowed another person to get into her head, to convince her that she wasn’t good enough, cultured enough, for El. In the end, she’d walked away from her heart because she’d actually believed it, and that was the greatest tragedy of all.

  Finally opening her eyes again, she was mortified to find that she still couldn’t see more than Jess’s eye, but she kept her mouth shut. If she told her best friend, there was no way she’d be able to talk Jess out of calling 911.

  The room swirled around her, and she let out a slow, shaky breath. “Jess?”

  Then everything went black.

  Chapter 2

  Elwood wasn’t a glutton for punishment. Usually he didn’t willingly put himself in harm’s way or make rash decisions that would affect his emotional wellbeing. He was a paid therapist, a medical doctor of psychiatry. It was his job to see to the mental welfare of his patients, to help them stabilize their symptoms. But this time...he’d purposefully done something that would no doubt interrupt his sleep for the next few days.

  El jumped up and paced the confines of his office. Going to the Power Center just to get a glimpse of Avery had been the wrong move. He’d known it when he used a break in his schedule to leave the hospital, to walk the short distance to the campus auditorium. Along the way, he’d reasoned with himself on the whys. Why did he feel the need to see her? Why would this time be any different from their last encounter? Why couldn’t he get over her?

  That last question had almost made him turn around in his tracks and abort the mission. Yet he’d kept going, using the nice weather as an excuse to propel himself forward. When he’d arrived—late—Avery was at the end of her speech. She’d obviously done a fabulous job as the standing-room-only auditorium was full of people laughing and crying and clapping.

  When she’d faltered on stage, he’d known immediately that his entrance hadn’t been as subtle as he’d hoped. How she’d seen him in the sea of faces was beyond him, but he’d figured it was just the way it had always been. Like moths to a flame, when one of them was near the other, there was no way to stop the pull.

  What he hadn’t planned on was his need to confront her. Well, confront was the wrong word. He needed to see for himself if she was still as beautiful as he’d remembered, if she still smelled like jasmine and orchids. Up close and personal, she was as breathtaking as a sunset over white beach sand with her topaz eyes, smooth mocha skin and pouty lips. Her signature flowing mane had been trimmed into a chin-length bob, but it was still the color of molasses. If he’d dared to step closer, he knew she’d fit right in the nook of his arms, snugly under his chin.

  El knew that if he closed his eyes right then, he’d see her, hear her soft voice and feel her lips against his. It was his most vivid fantasy, almost as if she’d set up permanent residence in his thoughts and dreams. It didn’t matter who he was with—and he’d made it a full-time job to get over her—she was the woman he longed for.

  Thoughts like those often gave him pause when he thought of Avery. She was goal-oriented, driven to the point of madness at times. But then she could be sweet, docile even. It had been those times—when she was only his, when there was no pressure from the world she’d created in her head or the demands of her career—that made him love her even more.

  The knock on his office door jolted El out of his head, for which he was grateful. Enough of the Avery haze.

  His administrative assistant, Sophie, poked her head into his office. “Dr. Jackson, you have a visitor.”

  Elwood nodded. “Who is it?”

  “It’s me, Unc,” Drake said, pushing past Sophie. “I’ve been trying to call you all day. Let’s grab dinner.”

  Ignoring his nephew, El smiled at Sophie. “Thanks, Sophie. You can leave for the day. Thanks for staying late.”

  Sophie gave him a quick summary of his early morning schedule the next day, reminded him that she had a doctor’s appointment in the morning and would be late, then excused herself.

  “I need a Sophie for my office,” Drake admitted, taking a seat on the couch intended for El’s patients. “What are you thinking for dinner?”

  El leaned back in his chair and stared at his not-that-much-younger nephew. He hated when Drake called him Unc. At age thirty-five, El was only a few years older than Drake. They were more like brothers, than uncle and nephew.

  “Do you always think about food?” El asked. “The only reason you’re here is because Love is out of town.” Drake’s wife, Dr. Lovely Grace Washington-Jackson, had been gone for a week and El had been forced to entertain his nephew every night. Even if he’d had a woman waiting in the wings, his nephew had made player hating his modus operandi for the week. “Maybe you need to take a cooking class so that you can make your own dinner when your wife is not available.”

  “Hey, you need some laughter in your life,” Drake countered. “If it weren’t for me, you’d be sitting here at the hospital every night, charting and listening to yourself talk into that damn recorder.”

  Drake had been insisting that El go out with Love’s cousin Lana. The sneaky matchmaking couple had blatantly set up numerous dinners under the guise of fake celebrations, like Love almost being pregnant or Drake successfully operating on a patient. Not that he didn’t hope Love would realize her dream of being a mother or that he wasn’t proud of his nephew’s impressive surgical record. But every single thing that happened didn’t need to be celebrated with dinner and drinks at a high-brow restaurant downtown.

  “You don’t know my life, Drake. And I’d appreciate it if you didn’t act like you did.”

  Drake shrugged. “I’m just sayin’. If I don’t tell you the truth, who will?”

  “How about you concentrate on your life with your beautiful wife. Leave my business to me.”

  It was no use telling Drake to mind his own business. He’d learned early on that he had no private business growing up in a house with the younger Jacksons.

  Drake was the eldest son of El’s brother, the incomparable plastic surgeon Dr. Lawrence Jackson. Behind Drake were the twins, Ian and Myles. His sweet niece, Melanie, came later.

  When El was five years old, Lawrence took him in and raised him along with his own children. Lawrence was twenty-one years older, and El was the “oopsie” baby, an unplanned inconvenience to hi
s parents, who’d preferred to hire nannies than spend quality time with him.

  Before his brother rescued him, El’s childhood had been cold, a web of loneliness and despair. His mother and father had barely spared him a glance, and when they did it was to tell him that he was a mistake they didn’t want.

  Once El left his parents’ home, he’d never looked back or even communicated with them again. He couldn’t even bring himself to attend their funerals. As far as he was concerned, they didn’t deserve to be anyone’s parents.

  Most often, his brother wasn’t known for his kindness, but that one decision had changed El’s life for the better. And despite Lawrence’s many flaws, inherited from their parents, El would always be grateful to his brother for stepping in.

  El met Drake’s intent gaze. “What?” he asked.

  Drake assessed him, a frown deepening on his brow. “You went to the Power Center, didn’t you?”

  El stood up. “Are you ready to go? Thai?”

  Drake stood, but made no move toward the door. “You did. You went to see Avery at the Black Celebratory.”

  El closed his laptop and shoved it into his bag. As if Drake wasn’t standing there watching his every move, he continued to pack up his belongings. He’d finish working at home.

  “How did she look?” Drake asked.

  When he met his nephew’s gaze, he couldn’t ignore the gleam in Drake’s eyes. “Damn good,” he admitted finally. “She was still Avery.”

  Drake barked out a laugh. “I knew you wouldn’t be able to resist. I always told you that you let her go too easily, but you’re too damn stubborn to admit it.”

  “I thought I was the psychiatrist in the family. You stick to cardiothoracic surgery, and stop trying to figure me out.”

  “Did you talk to her?”

  El zipped up his messenger bag. “I did.”

  “Well?” Drake asked after a few seconds.

  “Well, nothing. She is still Avery, busy and about her business.”