Page 41 of Mysterious

A terrible thought races through my head. “Are you saying you and my mother are together?”

When I accused my mother of using Michael as an errand boy that night at the pavilion, I said that out of anger. Was I closer to the truth than I even understood? Have they been sleeping together?

“If you’re asking if I’m fucking her, the answer is no. Not that I’d say no, necessarily, since I know she’s got money, but that’s not what Andrea and I are to one another. She’s my boss. I work for her. I do what she tells me to do.”

None of what he’s saying makes sense. My mother fired Michael after I ran away to that hotel because he made the reservations for me. She blamed him for that stunt of mine, as she called it.

“I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about. You got fired for helping me run away. Are you claiming my mother knew the whole time where I was because you two were working together?”

Laughter explodes out of him, and he throws his head back. “Knew? Of course, she knew. I told her everything. I reported back to her whatever you told me. When you said you wanted to get away, I let her know. She was the one who suggested I reserve that room for you. What makes you think my sister could afford five hundred dollars a night on her credit card? I told you Aimee barely made rent most months.”

I close my eyes as tears begin to sting the back of my eyes. My mother knew and still created that media circus with them analyzing and dissecting my entire life on TV while she held press conferences looking like the devastated mother of a missing woman?

“Why? Why would my mother do that?” I ask, not sure I want to know the answer.

“Because that’s what she considers her job to be. She’s your manager, so it’s her job to keep your name in the public eye. She wants you to be on the front of every tabloid and the first story on every entertainment show around. That way the money never stops rolling in and her gravy train keeps on rolling down the tracks. You’re the gift that keeps on giving, Mia. She realized that the first time you ran away back when you were sixteen. When she saw what the press did when she told them the news that you were missing, she saw what a goldmine your diva stunts could be. So she instructed me to tell her whenever you were planning anything so she could make the most of whatever shit you pulled.”

When he finishes, I open my eyes as the tears stream down my face. “No. I don’t believe any of this bullshit. My mother loves using the media as much as the next person, but she wouldn’t stage manage me that way. She’s my mother, for God’s sake!”

My pathetic attempt to defend her makes him laugh even harder, but I sense a type of mania has taken him over, like he knows he’s not going to get out of this the way he planned. I get the feeling he’s going to hurt as many people as he can, whichever way he can.

All I can hope is he doesn’t shoot me.

“You want stage managed, little Mia? Try this on for size. I told you she gave the orders and I carried them out. If she said to mail a letter to you, I mailed a letter to you. If she said follow you, I followed you. If she said make Mia disappear for a few hours so she can alert the media and crank up the sympathy machine for poor little you, I made you disappear by taking too long on whatever we were up to. Sometimes it was a hotel. Other times, it’s a factory like this one.”

What does he mean mailing a letter to me? Then it all becomes crystal clear what he’s saying. My mother hasn’t simply used my behavior to our advantage with the media. She’s created chaos and problems that I had nothing to do with to keep what he calls the sympathy machine for me running at full steam.

“You’re the stalker? So I never really had a stalker? She’s had you sending those letters to me for three years. Those letters terrified me. The two of you saw how scared I’d get every time I’d receive one, and still you kept sending them?”

Michael shrugs. “All part of my job. Andrea thought a stalker would help keep the public’s focus on you when you were getting ready to go out on tour, so every time, she’d have me mail a letter. Just one and that was it. And it did the trick. Even this time with your new security guy right there. Made the entire house go into a tizzy, I think is how she described it.”

The most horrifying thought of all fills my head as I watch him happily describe his dirty work for my mother. “So I’ve never been in any danger but she knows you’re holding me here, tied to a chair, with a gun pointed at me?”

Nodding, he says the words that break my heart. “She set this whole thing up.”

“Why? The tour is going great. The audiences are loving my shows. What’s behind doing this now?” I ask, wishing I could stop crying but the tears won’t stop coming.

My questions seem to irritate him, like he’s tired of explaining how evil he and my mother have been. “I’m not really sure what her motives are this time. She did say something about reviews of those Tampa shows being in the shitter, but I think it’s also to make your new security chief look bad. At least that’s why I’m doing this.”

“Why do you two want Liam to look bad? What has he done to either of you?”

Before he can answer my questions, a noise like a door opening on the other side of the factory makes him jump up out of his chair. With his gun aimed to shoot, Michael looks back at me and shakes his head.

“Don’t make a sound, or I swear to God, someone’s going to get hurt.”

As he disappears behind the wall of boxes, I know he’s beyond reason now, so all I can do is pray that sound was Liam and his men coming to rescue me. But what if it’s his partner?

No, his only partner is my mother. My own mother who cares only about the media circus she’s created to ensure public sympathy keeps my record sales climbing higher and higher and she gets wealthier and wealthier.

Shaking my head, I try to stop myself from crying and start thinking clearly. If I call out for help and he shoots the person before they can reach me, then I don’t know what he’ll do in retaliation to me. But if I don’t let whoever is here know where I am, he might get the jump on them and shoot them.

I have no choice. I have to hope whoever made that noise is here to help me and my calling out to them is what they need.

“Help! I’m back here! Behind the wall of boxes! He has a gun!” I yell as loudly as I can after hours without a sip of any liquid passing my lips.

No one responds, and I listen for any clue that someone has come to save me. Suddenly, a gunshot pierces the silence, and my heart skips a beat that it may have been Michael shooting Liam.

Then I hear his voice and it’s like I can breathe again.

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