Page 48 of Ticket to the Stars: Part Two

Something hard poked my chest, like a tiny knife in the heart. “Ignoring us?” I asked, not wanting to believe it. Angel would never. She wouldn’t. Although, it wasn’t like her to just disappear right before our biggest show yet. None of this was right.

“Oh, God, if I have to postpone tonight’s show, I’m going to kill myself,” Rob muttered. He must’ve suddenly become aware that he wasn’t standing by himself, muttering to himself under his breath, because he glanced at us and added, “I’m kidding. Mostly.” Before walking off to try to find Angel, he said, “Can you three start without her? Get the crowd going? Maybe do a few surprise songs or something? As soon as we find Angel, I’ll get her on that stage with you.”

Performing as the three of us wouldn’t be hard. Angel only did vocals, since she couldn’t play anything. I supposed we could go on that stage and stall for time, at the very least start the performance so Rob didn’t have an aneurysm about postponing the show.

I could tell Priest and Deacon didn’t want to. Hell, I didn’t want to, either, but we didn’t have many options, so we went out on the stage, greeted by applause and cheers, and we stalled.

And then, after we’d stalled for ten minutes, we started to play the show ourselves with the excuse that Angel wasn’t feeling too well. A lie, but what else could we tell the crowd that had gathered for us? They’d paid for tickets. They wanted to see a show.

A lot of them probably wanted Angel, but right now, they’d have to settle for us.

I’d like to say that, sometime during the show, Angel joined us, but she didn’t. She was officially MIA, and we had to play the entire show by ourselves. The only fortunate thing about it was the rain held out until our encore.

That rain dampened moods. But more than that, it was an omen. Something wasn’t right.

Where was Angel?

Chapter Nineteen – Angel

My head hurt like a you-know-what. My brain pounded with the force of an impending explosion inside my skull, and my eyelids were heavy as stone. I couldn’t open them for the longest time. I couldn’t really move any of my body, now that I was thinking about it. It was like I was conscious, but at the same time, completely out of it.

I fought with myself, trying to regain my strength and get myself up. My memories were hazy and foggy; I couldn’t remember how I’d gotten here, or where I even was. Hence the reason why it’d help some if I could open my stupid eyes.

I didn’t know how long it took for me to wrangle my eyelids into submission, but when I finally managed to open them, I saw a high ceiling through the darkness of whateverroom I was in, shadows my only company. I had no idea where I was, but once my eyelids worked, the rest of my body followed suit.

Sitting up, I moaned and threw a look around. A bedroom. I was on an unfamiliar bed in a bedroom I didn’t recognize, but judging from how expensive everything looked in the darkness, I’d say I was in a suite at the Redborne. Not the suite I shared with the guys, but a different one.

Why in the heck was I was here? And how did I get here?

Eventually I got up and wandered out, my feet shuffling to the hall. With a quick glance down, I saw I wore a white dress with white tights underneath. My skin was painted white, which told me I was ready for a show.My mask was MIA.

But… wait. That wasn’t right, was it? It was so freaking hard to remember. My head hurt so bad it literally was painful to think.

As I came out of the hall, into a wide-open space that had the living room area on one side and an open-concept kitchen on the other, I realized I was alone. No lights were on. I was in the dark, literally—and that finally got my heart to race.

I hurried to the door, my intent to leave this random place, but as my hand curled around the door handle, I found I couldn’t open it. The thing wouldn’t budge at all, no matter how I tried to turn it. It was stuck, like it waslocked from the outside or something. A broken door handle.

This wasn’t good.

I banged on the door and shouted, just in case anyone was walking by in the hall, “Hello? Is anybody out there? I’m locked inside!” If I had any luck, someone would hear and come to my rescue, call the front desk and they’d send maintenance up or something.

But, shocker, I heard not a sound in the hall. Nothing and no one answered me.

My breathing came out faster, and I pushed away from the door, feeling all around my body for my phone. These damned stage clothes didn’t have any pockets. Normally, when I didn’t have pockets, I stuffed my phone against my leggings—or in this case, the waistband of my tights—but having my phone possibly fall out on stage was something I wanted to avoid, so I always kept it in my dressing room.

Damn it. I didn’t have my phone.

I raced back to the bedroom I’d woken up in, flicked on the light, and searched high and low for my phone, hoping with a desperate heart it was somewhere nearby.

My search turned up empty.

I let out a groan, and as I tried to wrangle my emotions under control, I wandered over to the window on the far side of the room. Peering out, I was able to see a familiar skyline in the darkness—and that told me I was definitely in the Redborne, somewhere.

Where were the guys? How had I gotten here? I didn’t remember…and then I did. I never had anOh, shitmoment like I had right there.

Tonight we were supposed to perform our first show at Greenbay Stadium. I had no idea what time it was now, but I’d definitely say I missed that entire show. A sick feeling took over me, and I wandered back to the bed, slumping down as exhaustion took over.

I was in my stage clothes because I was supposed to be on stage with Bishop, Priest, and Deacon.

---