The Lost Girl (18 page)

“Yes! You boys – and gal – working side by side with Mr. Jones here. Isn’t it great?” he asked, his mind already figuring out how much money he could make from this joint venture.

“Yeah!” Seth exclaimed, excited for completely different reasons. Working with Caleb – his childhood idol – was like a dream coming true for him. “Caleb called this meeting to ask us if he could record a cover of one of our songs.” He
looked across the table, giving Caleb the brightest smile I’d ever seen on him. “So I suggested that we could maybe record a song together, because that’s way better than doing an old one, and Caleb thought it was a great idea! So we’re doing it!” he said, squirming with joy in his seat.

“It will be great, Joey, don’t you think?”

I glanced around the table. Sam, Josh, Harry and Seth looked at me with expectant faces. Tristan remained silent, his expression mildly curious.

I could tell that everybody was thrilled with the news, so I smiled and nodded, trying to act thrilled as well. I wasn’t much of a fan of Caleb Jones as a person, and after our bumpy first encounter it seemed that working with him would be a major pain in the ass. He was such an arrogant, egotistical, chauvinistic prick. But hey, to be fair, the guy was truly a genius musician, and if that was what everybody else wanted, who was I to say no?

“Yeah, it’s going to be great,” I said to a grinning Seth.

Everybody cheered and soon afterwards we all got up and headed downstairs to the hotel’s bar to celebrate the deal.

The bar was packed with people. Somehow the news that we were meeting Caleb had already gotten around to a few paparazzi, which resulted in a solid mass of press and eager fans waiting for us. The place was buzzing with people and I began to feel edgier by the second. The room was teetering on the brink of becoming a rave.

I tried to find Tristan – we hadn’t had a chance to talk properly yet – but I’d already lost all of the boys in the crowded room. Finally, after a long time searching, I spotted Josh at the corner of the bar. I fought my way over and grabbed him by the arm. “Hey, Josh! Have you seen Tristan?”

“I think he just walked through that door a minute ago,” he said, pointing to a dark, wooden door behind him. Tristan always hated crowds, just like me. It was definitely his thing to try to escape to somewhere quieter.

I nodded and pushed my way through it, stepping into a dimly lit corridor that looked like a staff area of sorts.

It took me a few minutes to process what my eyes were seeing. At the end of the corridor was Tristan, leaning flat against the wall, with a red-haired girl pressing up against him.

Her arms were wrapped around his shoulders, her hands sinking into his hair and her lips only a fleeting whisper away from his.

I watched the scene unfold in a mesmerized stupor. I watched as he parted his lips ever so slightly. That little tell was what shattered me the most inside. He was about to kiss her. He wanted to kiss her.

Then I recognized
her. Jessica Red
.

The shock made my hand falter, and the door I was holding closed behind me with a loud bang. Tristan and Jessica snapped their heads in my direction, startled by the sudden noise.

Something inside me snarled viciously, an alien, animalistic growl that reverberated through my soul. This thing slashed forward, grinding and gnawing on its leash, rattling its chains loudly. It wanted release. It wanted to rip Jessica’s insides out, tear her to pieces. It was angry. Very angry. It wanted freedom, wanted out of its chains. It watched her touching Tristan. It wanted to hurt him, too. Hurt him bad.

Tristan’s eyes widened in surprise as he shoved Jessica away from him. She yelped and scowled at his rudeness,
but he showed no signs of caring, already walking in my direction. “Joe, wait, please …” he begged, a hand outstretched.

I closed my eyes for a second, trying to drown the angry snarls inside my head, trying to tame this furious alien thing that rattled madly in my core.

I realized I could really hurt them with a snap of my fingers. All I needed was to wish for it. I had my newfound powers and all I needed was to let this thing within me take over. I breathed out slowly, trying desperately to control it, to tame my emotions, block everything out.

I could hear Tristan calling my name and I opened my eyes. I didn’t know what was worse: the look of guilt on his face or the pleading tone of his voice. Instinctively I raised my hand to protect myself from him.

“No,” I whispered, trying to deny everything I had just seen. I didn’t want Tristan near me.

“J-Joey, please …” he whispered in agony, and when he tried to take another step forward I reacted and opened the palms of my hands.

“No!” I growled, and he staggered backwards, like something had just punched him forcibly in the chest. He was even more surprised when all the glass in the windows of the corridor cracked and burst, shattering to the floor.

“No, please, wait!” he cried out.

But I didn’t wait.

I turned around, yanked the door open, and ran back into the crowded bar without looking back. I pushed through the crowd, trying to get away from that place, from Tristan. I could feel myself losing control, something inside threatening to get out. I chanted to myself over and over again to be calm, to block everything out, to stay in control.

So many thoughts crammed inside my head.
He was going to kiss her. Go back there and hurt her; hurt him the way he hurt you. You need to get away. Stay in control, hurry, forget about what happened back there, don’t forget …
I was slipping, losing my mind. I could barely see where I was going, or hear what people around me were saying. Everything was a blurry mess.

I continued to advance through the room, bumping into people as though I were drunk, the noise inside my head driving me insane. I pressed my hands over my ears, trying to block the snarls, but it only made it worst. The voices seemed like they were trapped inside now, banging in my skull in a hellish cacophony.

“Gray? Are you okay?” someone close to me asked, the question muffled amidst the noise inside my head. I pushed the person away and continued walking. I needed to get out of here, find a quiet place. I just needed a second to breathe, to work things out – then everything would be all right. I could control this. I could do this. I
knew
I could.

But he had almost kissed her
, the thing inside snarled to me.

The lights in the room flickered violently above our heads, making everybody look up. The thing inside still wanted out, wanted its revenge.

I growled, looking up at the flickering lights. My voice was hoarse, out of key … unnatural. The chandeliers trembled and a tremor passed through the room. Was I the one doing this?

“Joe, hey.” The voice came from behind me again. “Is something wrong?”

I turned back to see Caleb staring at me with a heavy
frown. My eyes danced from his worried face to the people around him. The lights stopped blinking and people went back to their quiet chatter around the room. He looked so much like Tristan – the same angles in his face, the same squared jaw. The eerie resemblance refuelled my anger.

“Joey!” Tristan’s shout reached us, making me jump. He had followed me into the bar, looking hopelessly around, trying to find me.

I didn’t want Tristan to find me. If he got near, I was going to lose it completely. I was going to blow this whole place up.

Caleb grabbed my hand and pulled me with him into a corner of the room while Tristan shouted urgently in the background. I let myself be dragged like a rag doll, my mind a jumbled mess of manic thoughts.

What was Caleb doing? Where was he taking me?

We sneaked surreptitiously through a narrow, hidden entrance and into an even narrower hallway. Was it just chance or had he known about this secret passageway?

Caleb walked in silence, pulling me along as he turned at random intersections. We couldn’t hear the chatter from the bar any more.

We ended up in a gloomy room, somewhere at the back of the hotel. He continued pulling me until we reached an old elevator door. He pushed the button, hard. The metal door opened with a loud bing and we quickly walked inside. As soon as we started going up, he let go of my hand and stared at me.

“There you go,” he stated, like he had just accomplished a job well done. “I’ve done press conferences in this hotel for years. I know all the secret escape routes. It seemed like
you were in serious need of a way out, so … there you go,” he repeated.

I stared, baffled, at his intense, pale-blue eyes.

“So, now’s the time when you thank me,” he teased, crossing his muscled arms over his chest. “Or maybe start explaining what was going on back there?”

I took a defensive step back. This wasn’t a subject I wanted to talk about, especially with him. My mind was still a scrambled mess as I tried to make sense of what he was saying.

“Come on, talk to me,” he encouraged.

I hugged myself and stepped back again, leaning against the elevator wall, a grimace on my face. I wanted to be alone. I wanted him to leave me alone.

“Fine. I’ll guess, then. I’m really good at guessing games,” he said, faking cheer. “Let me see … Tristan, your boyfriend there, must have screwed up real bad for you to flip out the way you did.”

I snapped my eyes upwards to his face in surprise and alarm. The wall behind me started vibrating softly.

“It probably has something to do with women,” he continued. “I’ll bet good money that this is about another girl, from the desperate way he was trying to find you in the bar, and the way you looked … So, maybe you caught him cheating on you?” he hazarded, watching intently to see my reaction.

“Stop it,” I said quietly, a warning in my voice, the chains still rattling slightly inside my head.

“Hey, a guy like him, this was bound to happen,” he continued, not paying any attention to me. “Relationships tend to end this way in this business; it’s tough keeping all the groupies away all the time.”

“Stop it.”

“It can get pretty wild, this rock-and-roll lifestyle. It was really a matter of time before you caught—”

“STOP!” I yelled. The elevator shook violently, lights fizzing above us, making sparks fly through the air above our cowering heads.

Then the elevator gave a hard jolt, and we started freefalling …

The emergency breaks cut in the second after the elevator started plummeting, jerking it to a screeching halt. Caleb had both hands planted firmly against the walls and I had my legs in a wide stance for balance. Everything went really quiet and still for a moment, except for a few last sparks falling from the ceiling.

Caleb was still in shock, frozen, his eyes as wide as they could be. “Holy shit!” He exhaled a deep sigh of relief, breaking the long seconds of eerie, stunned silence. “Are you okay?”

“Huh … I guess so,” I mumbled, also very scared. “W-what is happening? Are we stuck?” I asked, walking on shaky legs to the elevator control panel, punching buttons randomly; but nothing seemed to be working. The scare of our momentary freefall had temporarily banished all thoughts of rattling chains from my mind.

He swatted my hands away from the panel. “Stop doing that or you’ll break the thing for good.” He scowled.

A second later, he pushed the intercom button himself. Nothing happened. Then he pushed the emergency button. Yet again, no response.

“Fuck,” he muttered under his breath. “I think we are really stuck. No, wait, maybe if I call someone …” he
said, pulling his cell phone out and tapping a few keys. He cursed again. “It’s not working, either …”

I rubbed my temples and hummed to myself … a “calm-down” mantra. This could not be happening! Stuck in an old, unused elevator for God knew how long with the obnoxious Caleb Jones? I wasn’t going to make it. It was an impossible feat, to remain calm with Caleb in the same room. I would blow up the elevator for sure, and kill us both.

As my panic grew stronger, my humming intensified.

Calm down, Joey! Calm down, calmdowncalmdowncalmdown, calm the fuck down.

“Are you claustrophobic or something?” Caleb’s voice drifted into my ears.

He was leaning against the wall, calm as a lamb now, looking at me curiously. I stomped to the elevator doors and started kicking them. I was going to open them even if I had to claw my way out. But the door wouldn’t budge.

“I. Want. Out. Of. Here. You. Stupid. Broken. Piece of—”

“Chillax, Snappy. There is nothing we can do about it. We have to wait. Soon someone will get us out.”

Oh, dear God
. He was so calm: it was so friggin’ irritating.

I huffed and puffed at the door for a long time, before letting my shoulders sag in defeat. I shuffled back to the corner and sank slowly against the wall.

Caleb sat down opposite me while I went back to humming softly to myself and rubbing my temples. He stared at me like I was a loony.

I probably was.

“Hey, is it so bad, to be stuck in here with me?” he asked softly.

I snorted loudly in a
hell yeah
kind of way.

“Aw, come on. What did I ever do to you?” he scoffed, mildly offended. “Why do you hate me so much, Snappy?” he asked again, his voice softer this time, almost a bit hurt. “Honestly, I’d like to know.”

I shot him a look that said,
You really don’t want to know, pal.

“Snappy, come on. Just tell me.”

“Fine. You want to know so badly? First: my name is not ‘Snappy’, so please stop calling me that. Second: the narcissistic personality, the annoying remarks, the arrogance, the patronizing things you do which you think are so damned amusing. There.” I took a breath. “Happy?”

Then I mentally slapped myself, because all chances of working with The Accidentals were now as dead as could be. Seth was going to kick my ass. I could almost hear him crying.

Caleb looked at me with raised eyebrows. “Wow. That was a
lot
. Thanks for the vicious bluntness.”

I buried my face in my hands and sighed. “I’m sorry.”
I really was
. “But you asked for it.”
He really had.