The Masters of Falcon's Fantasies [BDSM Menage Fantasies 2] (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) (31 page)

Kelly looked apprehensive. “Should we call the police? Is there any chance she’s hurt or overdosed or anything?”

Finn shook his head. “Let’s not call the police yet. I’m sure she’s wandering around here somewhere. It’s not far from the hotel. She probably came down to check out the festival.”

Sighing, Kelly nodded, although her expression screamed her doubt at his optimism. “You have my cell phone number, don’t you? Call me if you find her. Or if you need—more help.”

They thanked her again and wandered back to the stage, scanning the crowds for any sign of Daphne.

Blaze was suddenly in front of them. He held a beer bottle in one hand, and he pointed it at Finn.

“Looking for your little whore?” His voice betrayed how much he’d already had to drink. That was a bad sign.

“We’re looking for Daphne,” Decker said after a second. “Have you seen her?”

Blaze laughed, a harsh and unpleasant sound. “I’ve seen her
,
all right. But you won’t.”

“What did you do?” Finn shouted it at him, stepping forward, slapping the bottle away from his face as Blaze waved it in front of him.

“What the fuck do you care? Afraid you’ll lose your meal ticket?”

“No,” Finn spat out. “I’m afraid of her ruining her career by pulling stunts like this.”

“Her career. Bullshit. You just want a piece of her like the rest of us. She’s just a whore. We all know you finally fucked her. The politician fucked her. Hell, she’s probably even letting this asshole fuck her.” He gestured toward Decker, who stared back at him, his face darkening and his jaw going rigid. “I figured
,
what the fuck? It’s my turn. Tonight I’m gonna fuck the slut
,
too. She’s too drunk to know whose dick is in her, anyway. After she gets fired for tonight’s failure
,
I won’t have to see any of you again. I’m joining a real band, so fuck you, little man.”

Blaze tossed the beer bottle to the side and shoved Finn with both hands. Finn wasn’t prepared for the assault, and he went down to the pavement. Decker stepped in, reaching for Blaze, but then he stopped suddenly. Finn peered around him to see that Blaze had pulled out a switchblade.

Before Finn had time to feel alarmed, he saw a blur. It was hard to follow the action, but it looked like Decker’s left hand shot out and struck Blaze’s forearm at the same time that his right hand hit Blaze on the side of the neck. Blaze slumped to the ground, his eyes rolling into the back of his head. Without a word Decker bent down and picked up the fallen knife. As Finn scrambled to his feet, he watched to see if Decker was going to kick the unconscious man. It seemed to be a distinct possibility
,
but instead, Decker just shook his head, saying, “You’re not worth it.” He turned and walked away, closing and pocketing the knife.

Finn watched his receding back, wondering if he should follow. But then he became aware that Blaze was climbing to his feet, muttering, “What the fuck?” He swayed momentarily but regained his balance, turning a scowl on Finn. “What are you looking at, asshole? He blindsided me.”

Seeing Blaze’s face go back into its habitual smirk caused a rage to boil up inside of Finn. Everything seemed to go slightly red around him as his hands curled into fists. Before he was quite sure what he was going to do, he heard himself say, “I think it’s worthwhile,” and he landed a strong left to Blaze’s stomach. A wave of satisfaction went through him at the grunting sound Blaze made as his breath left him. As he bent forward with the blow, Finn’s right fist landed on his jaw
,
and Blaze hit the ground again.

Finn stood over the downed man, trying to look dangerous and resisting the urge to rub his knuckles. “For your information, I already knew about you trying to go to The Zombie Trolls. I had coffee with their GM earlier this morning. Guess what, sport? They don’t want you either. The word is out. No one wants you. You’re finished. Oh, and by the way, you’re fired. So fuck you.”

He turned and trotted after Decker, furtively examining his hands as he went to see if there was any blood on his scuffed knuckles.

* * * *

Decker clapped Finn on the back when he heard the story. “Good man.” For the first time, he felt like they might be able to be a team. Finn was grinning at him like a younger brother recounting the story of his first schoolyard brawl. “That asshole definitely had it coming.”

“Thanks, but how did you do that thing with the knife? It was awesome.”

“It was just something I picked up in a self-defense course once.” Decker shrugged it off.

“Well, it was really cool. As for Blaze, I should have fired him years ago,” Finn said, swinging his arms as if itching for another chance to slug somebody. “Hell, I should never have let her give him the job in the first place. He’s been nothing but trouble from the beginning. If I’d been more dominant—” He stopped and gave Decker a sheepish look. “Do you think I’ll ever be able to learn how to do that without pissing her off?”

Decker laughed in spite of the seriousness of the situation. “I’m sure you can. You’ve both been under a lot of pressure lately. It’s a hard time to establish a relationship and learn a new dynamic.”

They walked for a while before arriving back at the stage. Blaze was gone
,
and a stagehand was putting up a sign that read “Concert cancelled” over the Dark Epiphany poster.

“Hello.” Finn walked up to the man. “We’re looking for the singer, Daphne Monroe. She was supposed to be going on stage about now. You haven’t seen her around, have you?”

“I don’t think so,” said the man. “Kelly put out a notice that we were supposed to watch for her. I did see a woman around here about twenty minutes ago who had dark hair. She ran off in that direction before I could talk to her.” He pointed. “She was crying pretty hard.”

Finn and Decker exchanged looks and headed in the direction he had indicated. After patrolling for another half hour, they finally stopped at the event entrance.

“Okay, we need a better plan than walking around the festival,” Decker said in disgust. “She’s obviously not here.”

“Where would she have gone?” Finn asked, still looking around as if she might magically materialize. “Where
could
she have gone?”

“Maybe we should call the cab companies and see if anybody’s picked her up.”

They stared at each other. Then Finn snapped his fingers. “That paparazz
o
guy!”

Decker cocked an eyebrow and waited for him to explain. Finn was looking around more wildly now, then he yanked his cell phone out of his pocket and began hitting buttons. “Paper! Pen! I need something to write with!”

Decker dug in his pockets for pen and paper while Finn frantically dialed. “Allie! That cop! What’s his name? No, no, no, better yet, what’s his phone number?”

After a few seconds Finn was calling out numbers. Decker hadn’t found paper, but he had a pen in his hand so he wrote the information on his arm as Finn gave it to him. With a quick “Got it! Thanks!” Finn hung up and dialed the new number without even checking Decker’s arm for accuracy.

“Hi, is this the cop? Chuck, was it? Yes, good. This is Finn Scott, Daphne’s manager—Yes, Daphne Monroe, the singer. I need some information. That photographer guy, the one that’s always following Daphne around. You got his number, didn’t you? When you caught him hiding in the bushes? Allie told me about it—I’m sure there are rules about giving out information like that, but this is an emergency. Daphne’s missing—Yes, missing. We think she’s really upset about something. She may be drunk or high—It’s really important that we find her—I know all this is out of your jurisdiction—Thanks! Yes, I’ll hold while you look it up.”

Then they went through the transfer of numbers again and Finn was making one more call.

“Are you the papa—I mean
,
the photographer who stal—I mean
,
follows Daphne Monroe around? No, don’t hang up, please! I’m her manager. I really need your help. Daphne’s gone missing. Yes, she’s supposed to be doing a concert in Reno—Are you here by any chance? Great! Have you seen her?—What do you mean, what’s it worth to me? It’s worth not breaking your fucking neck the next time—Yes, yes, I’m trying to be calm. But you don’t understand. This is an emergency. She may be in serious trouble, and I need to find her.”

There was silence for a minute while Finn paced back and forth in evident impatience. Then his face contorted in an almost comical look of disgust. “Yes, yes, okay, you little worm. You can have an exclusive interview if you just
tell me where the fuck she is
!”

He listened again for a minute then slammed the phone shut and took off running toward the entrance, pushing through the crowds of people as if they were collectively trying to annoy him by standing in his way.

He threw himself into the rental car and had it in gear before Decker could even get his door closed. Decker was impressed in spite of himself. This was a man on a mission. As they screeched out of the parking lot, Finn finally caught his breath enough to gasp, “He saw her. He knew she was going to be here so he came to get some pics. She’s kind of an obsession of his, I think. Anyway, she got on the back of a bike. It was probably that pissant Blaze again. I swear I’ll kill him if he’s hurt her. Anyway, Johns—the photographer—followed it to a motel on the edge of town. This can’t be good.”

“No, it doesn’t sound good,” Decker agreed.

Within a few minutes they had reached the motel. They went into the office, where a man in his sixties was sitting behind a wooden counter reading the paper. He jerked backward as Finn launched himself against the partition, panting and wild
eyed.

“You’ve got to help us!” Finn slammed his hand down on the counter, since the clerk was looking around as if he expected video cameras to be following them.

“What do you need?” the man asked slowly. Not having seen video cameras, Decker noticed he was surreptitiously feeling under the counter. Probably for a panic button. He put a hand on Finn’s shoulder and gave the man what he hoped was a reassuring smile.

“We’re looking for a very attractive brunette who probably checked in here an hour or so ago. She’d been crying.”

The man shrugged, still eyeing Finn warily. “Sorry. Can’t help you.”

Finn slapped the counter again. “Now! We need to know where they are
now
!”

“Please.” Decker tightened his grip on Finn’s shoulder. His smile felt more forced
,
but, he hoped, it still projected Don’t-worry-we’re-not-both-crazy to the motel proprietor. He reached in his pocket and pulled out what he hoped was a twenty
-
dollar bill. He put it on the counter without looking down and slid it forward.

The man’s eyes narrowed. “I can’t tell you what room she’s in. If you want to call in, I’ll transfer you to her room, though. Here’s our number.” He pushed a business card toward them.

Finn stared at it as if it was written in Sanskrit. “Call in? You expect me to call them?”

“It’s what I’d recommend. Otherwise you can sit in the parking lot and wait for them to come out.”

“I can’t wait for them to come out! Daphne could be in danger!”

“Sorry. Best I can do.”

They stared at each other, at an impasse. Decker considered them both, then he tapped Finn’s shoulder. “Come outside with me.”

Finn turned wild eyes on him. “Come outside? But we need to know what room they’re in! This asshole—”

Decker grabbed the card from the table and gave Finn a stern look. “There’s no call to be rude,” he said. He glanced at the man’s nametag. “Eddie here is only doing his job.
Come outside
.” The last part was said with considerabl
y
more force as he dragged Finn to the door.

Once outside, Finn opened his mouth to protest, but Decker pointed him to the row of doors. “You stay on the bottom floor. I’ll go to the second floor. My guess is McFarland won’t answer the phone. Just walk down the row until you hear a phone ringing, then we’ll know which room they’re in.”

Finn’s face registered outrage, then thoughtfulness, then comprehension. He nodded then raced over to take up his post. “Hurry!” he called.

“I’m hurrying.” Decker took the steps three at a time, pulling out his phone as he went. He waited for four rings before Eddie picked up the phone inside while Finn was fidgeting with impatience and yelling, “What’s going on? Is it ringing yet?”

“Okay, now,” Decker called down when Eddie had finally put him through. They both started trotting down their rows, Decker above and Finn below.

About halfway down, Decker knew he’d found it. He could hear yelling, loud and angry, and then the sound of a phone ringing. It was immediately followed by a loud curse and a jangling sound, as if the phone had been thrown against the wall. Then there was a scream. He leaned over and hissed, “Finn! Get up here!”

As Finn raced back to the stairway, Decker pounded on the door. The room went silent, but nothing else happened.

Decker listened for a moment and then yelled, “Police! Open up!”