Page 49 of Ticket to the Stars: Part Two

None of this was right. I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to think back, to remember the last thing before it all went black. I was getting ready in my dressing room, the guys had all come to hang with me while I did my finishing touches.

And then… then Ramona had come to talk to me. She’d said the label was really impressed by me, what they were seeing and hearing from me, and that they’d love to discuss me sticking around longer. As in, permanently.

Everything got hazy after that. I think Ramona left, and then I walked out of the room, into the hall, looking for the guys. They weren’t there, so I… I…

Shit. I think that’s when I blacked out.

But that wasn’t normal for me. I didn’t black out randomly. Something had to have happened. I tried to think of what else I did in that dressing room, and the only other thing I did was drink some of the water that was there, waiting for me.

Oh, no. Had I been drugged? Drugged and then kidnapped? Shit. This wasn’t good.

I tried to recall if anyone had come up to me, if I’d seen anyone in the hall after Ramona left, but regardless of how hard I tried to think, the black curtain in my head wouldn’t clear. I couldn’t remember.

The guys had to be looking for me, right? They had to know I wouldn’t just up and leave them… I hoped. After all the time we’d spent together, after real feelings got involved, they had to know I wouldn’t do anything to jeopardize their—our—credibility as a band returning to the limelight.

I didn’t know how long I sat there on the bed, as if I was waiting for someone to come and illuminate the dark spots in my head, but it had to be hours. Eventually, I wandered to the living room area, and plopped down on one of the couches. My goal was to watch TV, but what would you know, there was no TV hanging.

No TV. This was hell.

Once I finished pouting about the whole no TV thing, I wandered to the bathroom to scrub off the body paint and makeup on my face. Without makeup remover, it was a pain in the ass. No towels, either, so I only had my hands. Eventually the skin on my hands and face got sore from rubbing so much, but at least I didn’t look like I’d just stepped off the stage. My skin was on fire by the time I cleaned myself up.

It was a long night. I didn’t sleep. I couldn’t. All I could do was think about the guys and the performance I’d surely missed, along with the reason I was here. Who could’ve done this?

One person popped in my head at the thought. One person. One man who had made it very clear he didn’t like me. A man who might just want to embarrass the remaining members of Black Sacrament because he was no longer in the band.

Pope.

Once the realization hit me, I didn’t know why I didn’t think of it sooner. I’d seen him twice, and the second time he’d forced me to go with him, sit down and talk to him. When I’d gotten up to leave, he’d basically threatened me.

Had Pope somehow snuck into the stadium, drugged me, and kidnapped me? It seemed far-fetched, but it was the only logical explanation I could think of.

Oh, God. How was I going to get out of this? I didn’t know what to do. I’d never been kidnapped before. This was absolutely insane. I was just a small-town girl from the middle of nowhere who happened to win a contest to join a band she’d never heard of before, all thanks to her stalker of a little sister who’d only done it so I could date all of them and get Mom used to the idea of her daughter dating more than one guy at a time.

That’s it. That’s the whole story. A bit of a mouthful, but that’s all there was to it. I definitely didn’t merit any kidnapping.

If it was Pope—or, really, if it was someone else—what was the endgame? What was the goal of this? What did he hope to achieve by doing this? Pope obviously wanted the guys to suffer. Maybe it was a ifI can’t be in the band, then the band shouldn’t existkind of thing. Maybe Pope had lost his mind and he wanted to make the guys look like fools.

But then what? He had to let me out of here eventually. He wouldn’t keep me in here forever, would he?

For the first time, I realized I might not be getting out.

I didn’t know what made me do it, but I got up and checked the fridge in the kitchen. I didn’t know what I expected, since there was no TV, but there was no food in the fridge. Just empty shelves.

Double shit.

This really wasn’t good.

Now that I’d realized all of that—that I might freaking die in this stupid suite, not far at all from my guys, just a few floors away—I paced the length of the suite. I couldn’t sit still, and I sure as hell couldn’t go to sleep. I paced the night away until my legs were sore, and then I kept it up because I had nothing else to do.I did break to scrub the paint off my body, not something super easy to do with no soap.

Morning came, shedding light into the suite from the windows, illuminating everything in a bright, orange glow. Whatever little hope I had that someone would come waltzing through that door once morning came died as the hours ticked on.

Again, I didn’t know what time it was, but I was starving. I was so freaking hungry, and sipping water from my hands from the faucet just wasn’t cutting it.

This was insane. This was absolutely insane. I didn’t know what to do.

I pounded on the door, thinking that, maybe, since it was daytime, someone would hear, but I only made my voice hoarse. After a while, probably around lunch time, I gave up and went slinking back to the couch, falling face-first onto it. The only thing keeping me company was my thoughts, and right now, my thoughts weren’t a very happy place.

I lay there for an eternity.

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