Read Fused (Lost in Oblivion #4.5) for Free Online

like your momma. Give you the world, you’ll ask for the solar system.
    He waited for his father to open his eyes. To even blink, or move his hands. Nothing. The hum of the machines was his only response.
    His father’s condition had waxed and waned since he’d been brought in. There had been another setback last week, and Ricki had informed him he was on heavy medication “to help him rest.”
    Medication and a hospital stay his worthless, good-for-nothing, glory hound son was paying for, even knowing Nick Senior probably wouldn’t even want that much from him. Evidently, even dying was better to die than to be in any kind of care delivered by Nick.
    Simon and Lila would probably eagerly agree.
    Nick started to say more, then glanced at the darkened window beside his father’s bed and startled at his own reflection. The shaggy, unkempt blond hair, the hollow cheeks, the haggard eyes. It was like looking in the mirror and seeing a ghost with his face.
    He turned and walked out of the room—and then the hospital, which he’d sneaked into in the first place—without another word.
    Rather than waste his breath on his father, he decided to go tilt at another windmill. This one had a billboard of his face stationed outside of his high-rise apartment, a testament to Simon’s thriving modeling career.
    See, when his best friend couldn’t sing, he started modeling. He had options. If he never stepped on another stage, he’d still get to drown in money and adulation.
    Too bad neither of those were what sustained Nick in any sort of fashion.
    Nick went through the usual pat-down at the door of Simon’s building. Oh, it wasn’t an actual frisk, but it might as well have been. The older gentleman who was often guarding the door knew Nick by now. He just didn’t seem to care. Every time it was as if he’d developed amnesia.
    “State your business with Mr. Kagan,” he said in his clipped, faintly British voice.
    I want to kick his ass . But Nick didn’t say that. Instead, he smiled faintly. “We have a date to count our millions while watching a porno.”
    The older man barely blinked. Nick’s answers always ranged from vague to ridiculous to downright rude, depending on his mood. Nothing much fazed the guy. He simply waved Nick toward the elevator that required a key code to access.
    A moment later, he was on Simon’s floor and punching in yet another key code to enter his apartment. He walked in to total silence. No voices, no music, no sounds from the TV.
    A quick glance at his watch told him it wasn’t that late by Simon standards. Barely past midnight. Maybe Simon and Margo were licking their wounds by licking…other things.
    But the snark didn’t even amuse him long enough to make him smirk. Because even Simon had someone by his side, his not-quite-a wife, Margo. Still a lot closer to a commitment than Nick had ever had. Probably ever would.
    No one in his band was alone but him.
    “You shouldn’t have come.”
    He blinked at Margo’s soft voice, floating out of the near darkness. Only sconces high on the walls offered off soft light. He shifted, following her voice to where she sat on a windowseat in a nook off the dining room. He’d never noticed the padded seat before, but Margo was curled up on it, her long, bare legs drawn up to her chest and a glass of wine in her hand. She wore something silky and short, but she might as well have been in sweats for all he noticed.
    What he did notice was the shimmer of wetness on her cheek, highlighted by a shaft of moonlight. Then he tilted his head and she looked perfectly composed.
    Margo was like Lila that way. They rarely became flustered, choosing to retreat behind a chilly mask of indifference before they’d ever allow someone to see a glimmer of real emotion. Margo had changed a bit in recent months. Simon’s doing, no doubt. Breaking down her walls or some shit, because Simon certainly had no trouble emoting when required. But tonight she’d gone back