by P. M. Briede
Spinning on my heel, I picked up my dress and ran away from him. The ladies room would have offered me privacy but Wesley could easily wait for me outside of it. I’d wanted answers to why he’d abandoned me. Instead all I had were more questions. The rapid footsteps behind me said someone was following. The ding of an elevator grabbed my attention. I leapt inside and repeatedly hit the button to close the doors. Wesley had followed me and I caught a glance of his hurt, confused face, with a handprint on each cheek just before the door closed. Paige must have slapped him too.
Collapsing back against the wall, I rode the elevator to whatever floor had called it. Since Wesley could watch from the lobby to find out where I stopped, I got off and hit the stairwell. After only having descended maybe two or three floors, I sank down on one of the steps to keep myself from vomiting. Between the pain in my head and the pain in my chest I was dizzy and nauseous. I could hear my phone vibrating in my clutch but I wasn’t able to answer it.
Once my eyes cleared of the tears and pain induced haze, I looked to see what calls I’d missed. They’d all been calling. There was at least a message from each of them. I don’t know why I did it but the first message I listened to was the last one from Wesley. “Charlotte, I don’t understand. I think it’s time we see a doctor about your headaches. Please, don’t be upset with me but they’re making you think things that aren’t true. I’m really troubled by them.” There was a voice and what sound like a small scuffle. “Damn it, Celinda, not now! I don’t care wha…” Then the line dropped.
Paige’s call was sheer panic. “Charlotte, tell me where you are and I’ll come get you. Whatever you need, we’ll do, but you have to tell me what floor you’re on.” I could hear her footsteps as her heels clicked across the marble floors. “I’ve got your back and I laid into Wesley. Asshole! I just spotted Olivier so hopefully you’ve called him.”
Where Paige was panicked, Olivier was crazed. “Paige just told me what happened. Charlotte, why aren’t you picking up your phone? She says you got a headache.” I could hear Paige’s voice prattling on in the background as she argued that they couldn’t search every floor. Olivier was panting and they were moving. He must have covered the phone with his hand because his voice was muffled but still clear when he gave her an ultimatum. “Either help me or get out of my way, Paige. You have no idea exactly how bad it is that she’s not answering her phone and I don’t have time right now to tell you. Take another elevator and take the lower floors…” His line dropped.
Tristan’s message was forcibly calm. “Charlotte, this is Tristan. Paige and Olivier are beside themselves with worry. They’re hoping maybe you’ll talk to me? I know we don’t know each other well, but you’re like a sister to Paige which makes you special to me. Please call one of us.”
The rest of the messages were more of the same, frantic pleas for me to answer or call and let them know where I was and that I was alright. Olivier’s were the worst because he admitted they’d threatened him with the ignes iudicii again so I understood his blind fear. There was a lump in my throat which wouldn’t let me talk. The phone continued to vibrate uncontrollably from calls and texts. My mind told my hands to answer or reply but they wouldn’t move.
With nothing else to do, I decided to face the facts and succumb to the emotions they produced. Either Wesley was a far better actor than I ever gave him credit for, a smug, womanizing bastard, or a victim of something sinister. How was I going to figure that out? Olivier had been threatened which meant something had seriously backfired for the exiles this evening. It also meant my life had been threatened as well. It was all too much. Why had I thought I could handle this?
I was crushed by my emotions and sobbed silently because my heart was in my throat. When exhaustion finally claimed me, I picked up my phone and through bleary eyes saw I’d been in the stairwell for close to an hour. My friends had to be losing their minds. It was time to ease their collective worry. My hands finally responded to my commands and I dialed Olivier’s number.
Before I could press call I heard voices in the hallway. I stood and inched over the door to peek out the small window. Two men were standing there in front of an open door to one of the rooms with their backs to me. “Can you believe that guy?” one of them asked the other. I recognized his voice. He was the exile who had been speaking to Olivier in the music room when I’d been consumed by the blue fire.
“The guy has balls,” the other answered. “I’ll give him that. There is no way in hell I’d ever refuse her anything. I still don’t get why she didn’t light him up right then and there. It’s not like we couldn’t make everyone forget.” They had to be talking of Olivier’s confrontation with his commanding officer. There wasn’t anyone else I knew who was constantly threatened with burning.
“And then this guy,” the first man motioned back to the door by pointing his thumb over his shoulder. “How is one loathsome human so hard to master?” Something in the room caught their attention and they both turned back to the door. That’s when I saw their eyes. Flames were dancing in both sets, blue in the one, green in the other. A third man walked out of the hotel room, and he was someone I knew.
“Wesley!” I exhaled in a shocked whisper. Unfortunately one of the men in the hallway must have heard me. Damn angels and their damn hearing! “You hear that?” the green eyed exile asked the other as he peered down the hallway.
The blue eyed exile looked right at me. I know he saw me because our eyes met before I ducked below the window. Damn it! “No,” he lied. “I didn’t hear a thing.” What?! That made no sense. Torn between running and finding out what was going on with Wesley I took a moment to rally my courage. I carefully inched my way back up the door to peek through the window but only found an empty hallway. There was no sign of Wesley or the two exiles. Confused, frightened, and tired I sank back onto the floor and called Olivier.
“Charlotte, where in this blasted hotel are you? Are you alright?” The words were rushed and his voice was strained from anxiety and exertion. When Olivier asked where I was it occurred to me that I had no idea. “Charlotte!” His pained voice echoed through the stairwell.
“I’m not sure, Olivier.”
Before I could finish his voice blew out of the phone’s speaker and I could hear him running, wherever he was at. “Who has you? What can you tell me? Help me figure out how to get to you. You’ve got to give me something!” Each statement came out an octave higher than the last.
This was not good. He made it seem like my friends weren’t the only ones searching for me. “Why do you think someone has me?” I gripped the railing and pulled myself up, trying to decide if I wanted to go up or down.
“Because of Breaux! The brunette grabbed him when Paige caught me and told me what happened between the two of you.” What?! Wesley didn’t look as if he was held against his will when I saw him. Plus there hadn’t been any mention of them trying to find me. But then I remembered how his line had dropped in his message. I also remembered the name he’d shouted, Celinda! “You know why you got that headache, right?” Olivier’s voice broke through my thoughts. “Never mind! Charlotte, you have to tell me where you are!” He’d gotten in an elevator. I could hear the ding as the doors closed.
“Where are you going?”
“I don’t know but I can’t stand still. WHERE ARE YOU?”
“In a stairwell,” I answered with a false calm. I headed upstairs, figuring most people would assume I’d head down.
Olivier hit the wall on his end. “Damn it, Charlotte! This isn’t a game! There are probably three or four stairwells here. Which one?”
I thought the only thing that would keep him calm was to stay calm myself. “I don’t know,” I answered slowly. “I wasn’t really in a state where I was paying attention to where I was going. Look, I’ll go to the elevator and meet you in the lobby.”
“NO!” Olivier roared. The vehemence in his voice kept me from turning the knob on the door between the stairwell and the hote
l. “Charlotte, they’re looking for you. I need to come to you. You’ve obviously hidden yourself pretty well if no one has found you by now. Find out what floor you’re on and Paige, Tristan, or I will be there.”
A room number was visible through the door’s window when I peered through it. “I’m in the stairwell by room nine twenty-six,” I told him. “So you just want me to stay here?”
“Shit, Tristan’s the closest. I started on the top floors. I’ll text him your location, but carissime, stay on the phone with me. This last hour and a half has been hell.” Olivier’s breathing became more measured but worry and fear still dripped from his voice. There was silence for a moment. “He’s on his way. You should probably hear him in the stairwell soon. I’ll be there soon too; the elevator just passed the fourteenth floor.”
Just then a door slammed open a few floors below me. “Charlotte?” Tristan’s voice called. I opened my mouth to answer but it occurred to me that exiles could take the face of anyone. I quickly lowered the volume on my phone and headed upstairs, staying as close to the wall as possible. Once Tristan had hit the stairwell, I didn’t hear any footsteps saying he was moving.
Olivier must have heard Tristan call my name because my lack of response put him on alert. “Charlotte, why aren’t you answering?” his voice blared through the phone. Even though it would scare the hell out of him, I hung up. As I continued to climb the stairs, I texted. How do I know it’s Tristan?
Immediately the dots told me Olivier was responding. Good thinking. I’m getting off now. On 10. Where are you?
“Charlotte?” Tristan called. “Olivier said you’re in here. It’s me, Tristan. He’s on his way, so is Paige.” It sounded just like him but Olivier had terrified me by saying I was being hunted.
Risking everything, I answered but didn’t stop retreating. “Tristan, what was the favor I asked of you at the Cat’s Meow?” I texted Olivier, Just passed 11.
There was no answer but footsteps and that could only mean it wasn’t him. I picked up my skirt to race upward. The speed of his steps was slightly faster than mine. I’d only made it up one flight, when a door slammed open and I heard Olivier. “Charlotte!”
“She’s upstairs but she’s running away from me,” Tristan informed Olivier. “I’ll let you go get her. Something has her spooked.” As relief washed over me, I peeked over the railing to see them both. Olivier quickly glanced up at me but didn’t immediately come to get me. I watched as he took Tristan’s shoulder in a firm grip and he stared intently into Tristan’s eyes. Whatever Olivier was looking for he must have found because the motion turned into a firm yet grateful shake. Tristan probably thought I was a crazy person.
Above me another door slammed open and Paige’s shrill voice called out my name. Tristan answered her. While I’d been looking up, Olivier had ascended the stairs, so it was a shock when I was cocooned in his relieved and comforting embrace. His tender voice whispered in my ear. “Ego ita consternauit.” I was so scared.
“Ego paenitet. Vellem ab eo responsa volebant.” I’m sorry. I’d wanted answers from him. Having cried all my tears before calling Olivier, I collapsed from the hurt, pain, and fear that had done a number on my body as my knees finally gave out.
Olivier held me up but showed no mercy in trying to understand how I’d ended up face to face with Wesley. “Etiamnum vis eum?” Do you still want him?
My cheeks grew moist from his tears. “Sed ego mihi neque amicum.” Only as my friend. At my admission, Olivier crushed me to his body. Paige and Tristan were now on the landing with us but were hanging back to give us this moment.
“Why’d they switch to another language? What is it? I don’t recognize it.” Tristan wondered at Paige as he wiped the tears from her eyes.
Her strained laugh echoed through the space. “It’s something they do for privacy. It’s Latin, that’s why you don’t recognize it. No one speaks it but these two.”
After our makeshift reunion we all decided it was time to depart. Tristan and Paige were staying in the hotel but Olivier and I were leaving. Per his request I recounted the conversation I had with Wesley and his actions. Oddly, Olivier’s countenance was reflective and thoughtful, like he knew an answer was staring him in the face but he couldn’t see it. I also admitted Wesley had been in our dressing room. Saying the words made me realize it was his smell I’d recognized in the room, but I kept this revelation to myself. It also made me remember something else. “Olivier, you said someone grabbed We…”
“The whelp can fend for himself.” But his words were not as gruff as I would have thought as he cut me off. It was almost as if he was concerned about Wesley’s wellbeing. “He should be fine, Charlotte.”
“I’m aware that he’s fine,” I rebuffed him. “I saw him come out of a hotel room where two exiles were guarding the door. But I got her first name.”
“Whose?” Olivier offhandedly asked.
“The exile’s. It’s Celinda.”
Olivier slammed on the breaks and his head whirled to face me. “How?!” fell from his astonished lips.
“Wesley said her name during his message. It sounded like a struggle, so I can only assume he was arguing with his puppet master.” Olivier’s jaw had dropped and was now working silently as he tried to settle on what he wanted to say next. But I was tired of the exiles for now. “Olivier, they also mention you. What happened?”
He sighed before answering. “I really thought I was going to catch tonight. I’ve never been cornered by three other exiles before. The only fathomable reason I can come up with is that his usefulness is still tied to you, which means it’s also tied to me. They may or may not know the full extent yet, but it gives us a bit of an advantage.”
Chapter 16
The next night found the four of us at Fritzel’s. Olivier had insisted that I needed a night away from the chaos. The band tonight was amazing and I soon found myself swaying comfortably in Olivier’s arms. We were centered on the dance floor and he’d just spun me around. Right when I returned to his embrace there was a break in the crowd behind him. For the briefest second my eyes met Wesley’s shocked ones. I blinked and he was gone. Thinking I was just imagining him because I’d seen him the night before I didn’t give it a second thought.
But a few moments later Wesley was back in my line of sight, looking just as stunned to see me as I was to see him. What in the hell was he doing here?! Abigail was in his arms. He pulled his arms from around her and I knew his hands were fisted. Infinitesimally, his head shook, like he was being forced to see and accept that we were over. How had he not thought so before? I watched as he peered cautiously at Abigail and oscillated his head between us. She said something to him, but it just set his mouth in a grim line. Then he stormed out of the bar.
I stumbled out of Olivier’s arms and raced after Wesley. While we’d been inside a storm had blown in. The rain was coming down in sheets and the howling wind whipped it in all directions. How had I missed the booming thunder that shook me as I stood there trying to search for Wesley? I became drenched. My hair and clothes clung to my body and weighed me down. He was nowhere to be found. “Charlotte, what are you doing?” Olivier asked as his arms pulled me back under the awning.
What was I doing? Why had I run after Wesley? It was obvious Olivier hadn’t seen Wesley. Thank God for that. Abigail! I freed myself from Olivier and raced back inside. Where was she? I’d been watching the door since Wesley left; she hadn’t come out of it. A confused Olivier trailed me as I searched the bar. They’d both vanished into thin air. Had I imagined them? Suddenly I was spun around and found myself nose to nose with Olivier. “Charlotte, what are you doing?”
“I thought I saw someone I knew,” I lied. He wore a disbelieving look and opened his mouth to challenge me but Paige walked up.
With a promise that she wouldn’t let me out of her sight, she pulled me into the bathroom. “You saw Wesley, didn’t you?” she guessed. My wide eyes answered her when my voice faltered. “Yeah, Tri
stan and I saw Abigail and him enter the bar earlier. I don’t think Olivier saw them though. His eyes have only been on you all night.”
“How? What? How?” I stuttered.
She gave me a hug and told me what she knew. “Apparently some of the staffers were looking for some authentic, local entertainment. Wesley would remember this place from all the times you dragged us here in college. They were with other people from the campaign. Now you want to tell me what made him race out of here like he was a wanted man?”
I met her gaze and gave the only answer I had. “I don’t know. His eyes were wide when they met mine and he kept looking between Abigail and I like he didn’t know us.”
With a sharp nod, Paige grabbed some paper towels. “Well, you look like a drowned rat. Let’s clean you up some.”
I waved her off. I was going to have Olivier take me home. It wasn’t a surprise to find him leaning against the wall waiting for us to come out of the bathroom. There was a hard edge to his face and eyes. I worried that he’d listened in on our conversation. But he never mentioned anything on the drive back. Although, when he made love to me that night there was more desperation in it than normal and he clutched me to him as if afraid I’d evaporate.
The next morning I got a call from the contractor saying the work on my home was completed. I promised to do a walk through that day and call him afterward. “So do you want to do that now then?” Olivier offered from the chair in his bedroom where he’d been reading a book.
Unsure how to say it without hurting his feelings I blurted the words. “I think I should do this one alone.” There were multiple reasons. I needed to know I could face my demons on my own; otherwise they’d always haunt me when Olivier wasn’t around. I needed to exorcise Wesley’s ghost from of my home and I needed to decide if I was ready to let it go.
Like I’d thought, there was no way to say that without putting Olivier on high alert. His head rose as his shoulders dipped and his eyes grew wide. “This has nothing to do with you,” I tried to reassure him. “Honestly, I want you by my side, but there are times when I need to stand on my own two feet. This is one of them. Please say you understand.” I don’t know what I’d do if he didn’t.