“Alright, Sky, I hear ya, I’m just not in the mood to deal
with any of this right now.”
“Well then, you’d better find the mood, ‘cause there’s no one
left to deal with it if you won’t.”
“God, I wish you’d all just get off of my case!”
“We will, when you quit ducking shit and hoping it’ll resolve
itself!”
“Oh my god, this is so fuckin’ stupid!”
“Glad to see you showing concern for your health and
well-being. And here I was worried that you weren’t taking your stalker
seriously,” Christian said from somewhere behind Micha.
The man was always lurking, even when Micha wished he’d just
take a break or even a fucking vacation. Yes, the man was his bodyguard, but
sometimes his dedication to his duty felt downright stifling. Groaning, Micha
buried his face in his hands and wished they’d all just let him go back to
sleep instead of harassing him about police reports and bringing extra bodies
onto the bus under the guise of protecting him. As far as Micha was concerned
this was just another misguided attempt by an overzealous fan hell bent on
getting to spend some one-on-one time with him. If it would get him the nap he
was desperately craving, he’d personally extend an invitation to the fan to go
out for dinner and a movie. Anything would be better than having more people on
what already felt like a crowded bus.
“It’s not like they’re threatening to kidnap me or some shit.
They left a stuffed animal. Okay, so it’s kind of a creepy looking stuffed
animal but it’s still soft as fuck and sorta cute when you look at it long
enough.”
“Which would have been fine, if they’d chucked it up on the
stage during a performance, but that isn’t the case here. Somehow or another
they got it on this bus while it was parked in a secure lot. That takes
effort and a great deal of planning, which makes them a threat, at least to my
way of thinking and it should to yours, too, if you value your safety.”
“You do enough of that for both of us,” Micha grumbled.
“How can you continue to make light of this after the note
they left!” Sky hissed.
“Because it’s not a note! I keep trying to tell you guys
that. They’re lyrics!”
“Not any lyrics that are coming up on any search engine I’ve
run them through,” Christian declared.
“’cause they wouldn’t be.”
“And how do you know that?”
Sighing, Micha dropped his hands and peered up at his
outraged bandmate and worried bodyguard. “Because I wrote them.”
Now Sky was blinking at him like an owl and Christian’s eyes
had darkened.
“Then why haven’t the rest of us ever gotten a lot at them?”
Sky asked.
“Because they were in the notebook that went missing last
month, weren’t they?” Christian asked. “God damnit Micha, when I asked you what
happened to it you told me you’d accidentally left it somewhere!”
“Because I thought I had!” Micha grumbled running his fingers
through his hair.
“I can’t protect you properly if you’re going to lie to me!”
“I didn’t lie, Chris! I thought I’d forgotten it at one of
our stops.”
Christian snorted, his eyes narrowing more, though whether it
was because Micha had shortened his name again despite how many times Christian
had asked him not to, or because Christian had grilled him about the notebook
Micha had been fiercely protective of only to have Micha blow off all his
concerns was anyone’s guess.
“You forget to order extra crab Rangoon every time we put in
for delivery. You forget to order shampoo constantly then complain that the
stores we come across never carry the variety you like. You forget to put your
fuckin’ swim trunks in a bag every time we’re headed to a waterpark though I
swear that’s just so you can justify buying a new pair in an even crazier
pattern than the one before, but in the two years I’ve been guarding you, you
have never forgotten to order that very distinct notebook plus it’s backup with
the exact same very specific brand of pens and once they are in your hands, you
won’t even lend someone a pen for long enough for them to scribble out their
signature, so I knew you had to be bullshitting me about putting that notebook
down somewhere and not being able to remember what happened to it.”
Okay, when Christian put it that way, it was hard to explain
what had happened to that notebook, but Micha was sure he’d had it with him at
the bookstore where he’d been roving under the watch of his backup guard and
after a long conversation with the older man who’d run the place that notebook
had just been gone. Micha thought maybe he’d left it in the stack or laid it
down on the counter when he’d been looking through the leatherbound book of
dragon folklore and legends that the storeowner had temped him into buying
despite the limited space he had on his part of the bus, but he’d never been
completely certain. Now that he thought about it, he remembered another
customer lurking, someone slightly older than him or his guards. Someone with
dark, broody eyes that had both entranced and unnerved him. Someone who’d waved
at him and flashed him a somewhat forced and slightly creepy grin the moment
he’d glanced his way. Someone he might have flirted with a little before his
guard checked the time and whisked him away after realizing they were about to
be late for a radio interview.
“And he’s doing it again,” Sky muttered.
“Oh, you mean that look of his where he knows he fucked up
and neglected to mention something and it’s only now starting to click what
that was?” Christian said. “Yeah, I’ve grown too used to seeing that.”
“Fuck off, both of you.”
“We will,” Christian said. “Once you tell us what the hell you just remembered.”
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