by C. L. Stacey
The guy turns to me, an amused expression smoothing over his hard features.
I swear I know him from somewhere…
Or maybe he just has one of those faces.
“Right, of course…” he says, his hand leaving the panel when he takes a few steps back to lean against the wall.
We don’t say anything else to each other, because why would we? I have no idea who he is, and he has no idea who the hell I am. He doesn’t look my way either, keeping his gaze pinned forward.
During the quiet ride up, I—in a subtle manner—check out the super serious stranger. I notice his blonde hair first, cut at just the right length. Not too short, not too shaggy. I don’t go as far as to confirm any of the details on his face, because I would definitely come off way too obvious if I did. I feel like I’ve embarrassed myself enough tonight, I don’t want to deal with getting caught for ogling him, too.
Next, I notice his height. He’s a few inches taller than me, and I consider that pretty tall.
My eyes move along, and the next thing I notice is his build. Nice and strong, but not overbearing. His custom tailored suit is expensive. From fabric to fit, this is a very simple thing to tell.
Every single item on him, from top to bottom, is black. I make a snap judgment, pegging him as a rebel when I see that he’s tieless.
Everyone else at the party has on a tie.
To sum up, this man is visually perfect. No crease or wrinkle on him.
When I’m done stalking him, I have nothing left to do but suffer in silence. It’s quiet, too quiet, and it’s making me uncomfortable. Maybe I should say something, then I quickly decide against it.
If I say something, and he doesn’t say anything back, I’ll feel like an asshole.
But it’s too freaking quiet.
Just as I open my mouth to make small talk, the elevator comes to a jerky stop.
It isn’t the kind of stop when you’ve reached your designated floor, but the kind where it just up and decides to quit on you.
This can’t be happening.
Things go from bad to worse when the lights begin to flicker, and then darkness.
That’s when it starts.
The space suddenly feels tiny and the walls start closing in on me, creating the illusion of being trapped in a box. I want to move my feet, my arms, anything, but I feel restrained. Paralyzed.
“Oh, my God…” Too gripped by fear to speak any louder, the words leave my mouth in the form of a breath.
The emergency lights switch on, dimmer than the regular lights, but at least now I can see.
“Shit!” the guy curses under his breath, repeatedly pressing the ‘door open’ button.
Tears spring to my eyes, and I damn near choke when I feel my throat closing up, suffocating me.
“That doesn’t—” I clutch the rail behind me and try to focus on my breathing. “That’s not going to work!” I choke on the words.
The guy whirls around to face me when he hears me struggling, and he looks just as panicked as I feel.
He reaches into his pocket for his phone and dials someone immediately before bringing it to his ear. His eyes never leave mine, not even for a second, like he’s afraid that if they do I will collapse.
And then I do.
My legs buckle beneath me, and he rushes forward to catch me with his free arm.
Why is this happening?
His mouth opens to tell me something, and I lower my eyes to his lips, ready to read them in case I’m not able to hear them. “My name is Jackson,” he offers me a piece of personal information to bring me a small sense of comfort, keeping his tone nice and even when telling me so. “Can you tell me what’s wrong?” he engages me.
My eyes are swimming, transforming my view of Jackson’s face into a big, blurry mess. I know I need to blink the tears away, but I can’t seem to get my body to cooperate any action. I feel numb all over.
“Can you at least tell me your name?”
It takes me a few seconds to process his question, to make sense of his words.
When I understand his request for my name, I relay the response to my mouth. “Lexi,” I say to him, or at least I think I do, I’m not entirely sure. So I repeat it. “Lexi Moore.” My voice shakes so badly in its delivery, even I barely understand it. “I’m—I think I’m having a panic attack,” I whisper through tears.
“No. No, you’re not.” Jackson fights to hold me up, readjusting the phone he still has in his other hand. “You’re going to be okay, Lexi. Just breathe,” he instructs, then his attention shifts to the person on the other side of the line when he’s successfully patched through.
“Daniel! I need you to contact the building manager, I’m stuck in the elevator with someone…” He waits a few beats when the other person starts to speak. “I’m trapped in the elevator with Lexi,” he answers. His jaw ticks before he gives him my full name. “Lexi Moore.”
Gunmetal blue. Greyish blue. Bluish grey. I focus on the unique shade of his eyes, finding that they help distract me. The way they desperately hold onto mine is almost enough to calm me.
When I feel the panic returning, I fight to hold on, but I can feel myself slipping further away.
An impatient look flashes across Jackson’s face while listening to whatever Daniel’s telling him. “She’s having trouble breathing. Call an ambulance and get someone down here to fix the fucking elevator!” he barks his order before rushing to hang up so he can return his full attention to me. “You’re going to be fine, Lexi. Just keep breathing,” he instructs me again.
I do as he says, but he’s suddenly shaking his head at me. “Not too fast, you’ll make yourself dizzy. Take deep, steady breaths.”
I try, I really do, but what happens next can’t be stopped. I burst into tears, like a little child, in the arms of a stranger.
Memories come flooding back, and now I am drowning in them. I close my eyes and squeeze when pictures of that night come in rapid flashes through my mind.
Jackson’s arm tightens around me when my whole body shakes with racking sobs. I try to focus on staying present, but it feels impossible.
I hear him say something to try and get through to me, but I can’t hear anything he’s saying.
Everything feels so… loud.
I press my hands flat against my ears to try and drown out the noise.
Screaming, I hear myself screaming. I can’t tell if I’m doing it right now in this elevator or if it’s all in my head, but no matter how hard I press against them, I can’t seem to drown out the noise.
Someone is shaking me now. Jackson is shaking me. His eyes remain fixed on mine the whole time, lips still moving when he tries to tell me something.
My hands leave my ears when Jackson forces them away from my head. I look down to see him gathering them into one of his, and then I feel his other hand on my back, pulling me closer to him.
“What are you doing?” I blurt, and he shushes me quietly.
“You’re not listening to me, Lexi. Listen. Breathe.” He speaks the words directly into my ear, forcing me to hear them this time.
Another set of tears spill over, twin trails streaking my cheeks as I try again. Then I feel his hand on the back of my head, cradling me to his shoulder.
Breathe in, and out.
My mouth presses up against Jackson’s jacket as his hand remains, securing his hold over me.
Breathe in, and out.
I repeat the process until the noises in my head slowly begin to fade out.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper, my voice still shaking from the aftershock.
Jackson moves, walking us backward until my back meets the wall. “You need to sit.” He nods down to the floor.
Before I start to make my way down, Jackson shrugs out of his jacket and holds it over the front of my body to accommodate my short dress. He follows me halfway, making sure I stay covered, and then he drapes his jacket over my lap when my bottom meets the cold floor.
“You okay?” he asks softly. I nod.
When he’s convinced that I’m okay enough to sit on my own, he backs himself against the opposite wall and sinks to the floor, stretching his long legs out in front of him.
“Thank you.”
He just shakes his head, as if what just happened was no big deal. “Would you like to talk about it?”
That’s the last thing I want. My story’s too heavy to unload onto a total stranger.
“Not really. It’s a long story, and I don’t…” I shake my head, dropping my gaze to my lap. “I don’t really feel like getting into it right now.”
There’s no fight. He doesn’t push me for information. Instead, he just nods and says, “That’s okay.”
A wave of relief washes over me when he doesn’t take offense to my rejection. His eyes soon lose their look of concern, and he stops watching me like I’m going to break.
There’s an alert, two short chirps that ring from his phone, and his focus drops from me to the text I know he just received.
The screen projects just enough light for me to see that his features are hardening again, bringing tension to his face. I continue to watch as his thumbs skate over the touch keyboard, typing out about five different messages in just a matter of seconds.
“Any news?” I ask, desperate to hear something good.
“Help is on the way,” he tells me exactly what I need to hear before stowing his phone away. “How are you feeling?”
“As close to calm as I am going to get.” I take my hand up to dry my cheeks. “I don’t think I’ll be needing that ambulance, though.”
“They’re already on their way. Just let them take a quick look at you.”
I shake my head in protest. “There are other people out there who need them more than I do. I’m fine. I’m conscious. I’m not bleeding. Nothing’s broken.”
A displeased look crosses his face, and I can tell that he wants to argue further, but he decides against it. He pulls his phone back out and his thumbs skate over the keyboard again.
“Why’d you leave the party?” I ask.
He looks up from his screen, his thumbs freezing over the touch-keys for a moment. “Needed some air. Not a huge fan of crowds.”
“Hey, I get it. I hate people, too.”
A hint of a smile ghosts his lips just before he returns his gaze to the illuminated screen.
It’s nice to see. I have a gut feeling he doesn’t smile much.
“You don’t seem like the type of guy who’s interested in fashion,” I engage him again.
The comment I make seems to puzzle him, then the lines on his forehead smooth over when he comes to understand, but he doesn’t say anything to elaborate.
“What’s your story?”
Of all the people I could have gotten stuck in this elevator with…
The universe is funny that way, I guess.
What do I say without giving away too much to the woman I wish to remain anonymous to? I never made contact before because I never wanted to meet her. It was rule number fucking one!
Lexi just asked me for my story. I would rather say nothing, but we’re trapped in this steel box with nowhere to go. I don’t exactly have the option of getting up and walking away here.
It’s too late now. We’ve already met.
“I’m a businessman,” I downplay my answer. “An investor of companies I find promising.”
Lexi’s eyes narrow slightly, like she’s trying to place me. I caught her giving me this look a couple times—before the elevator shut down.
They grow rounder when coming to sudden realization. “Wait, what’d you say your name was?”
Has she figured me out already?
No, she couldn’t have. She’s way too calm about it.
Trying my damnedest to come off unaffected by the panic brought on from being trapped here with the woman I’ve been secretly watching, I take a hand and gesture lazily toward my jacket, still draped neatly over her lap. “Check the inner pocket. There’s a card. Keep it.”
She acts as soon as I offer, her hands rummaging around for it.
A small smile graces her lips when she finds it. “Found it!” she confirms, holding it up to her face to read.
I watch her eyes grow wider as they skim over the surface of the tiny card.
“Jackson Anderson,” she reads my name aloud, her voice going up a notch when reading my last name.
I nod. “That’s me.”
Her eyes leave mine to stare down at the card again. “Holy cow!”
“I take it you’ve heard of me,” I deadpan.
“I mean, I don’t live under a rock…” she makes a sarcastic remark.
She’s heard of me. She knows who I am, or more, my name.
This is really fucking bad. I knew of the risks when I made my decision to come tonight, but I never imagined us being forced into a situation as messed up as this one.
“What have you heard?”
Lexi drops her hands to her lap, toying with the card between her fingers. “It’s not the things I hear that worries me, Mr. Anderson. It’s the things I don’t.”
It’s hard not to react to that. I try not to, but the answer is much too cryptic. “What exactly does that mean?”
Her head tilts slightly to the side as she continues to study me from across the small space. “A man of your background shouldn’t be such a mystery to solve. You’re a huge public figure, yet no one really seems to know you. I know close to nothing, just your name. You’re a ghost.”
The more I talk to her, the less she has left to figure out.
All this time, I had full control over this situation because I never had to deal with her directly. I didn’t prepare myself for this, and now I’m paying for it. The feeling is wildly unsettling.
It doesn’t exactly help that I am uncharacteristically nervous, really nervous.
I don’t like this feeling at all.
I need to get out of here.
As crazy as I’m feeling on the inside, I can’t afford to set Lexi off again, so I fight to keep composure. “A ghost,” I repeat with a small laugh. “I prefer it that way. I value my privacy.”
“That’s a lonely life you live there, Mr. Anderson,” she sympathizes, her eyes reflecting pity.
The accuracy of her assessment ticks me off, and the pity only makes it worse. I liked her better on paper. The version of her on paper didn’t talk or ask any questions.
“Yes, I suppose that’s true,” I agree, keeping any trace of emotion out of my tone.
There’s sadness in her eyes, like she empathizes with my pain, and I feel the last thing I want to feel—what I’m afraid to feel. A connection.
I need to get out of here.
It’s heartbreaking.
My heart breaks for this stranger because I know what that kind of loneliness feels like, and I would never wish it for anyone.
The more I talk to him, the more curious I become.
I can’t help the fascination. This guy holds the world in his hands, yet he acts as though he doesn’t care for any of it.
Why would anyone choose to live a life so closed off from everyone else?
We all have our flaws. I have many, but the biggest is my nosy personality. I can’t help who I am; my curiosity has always gotten the better of me. Like right now, for instance. I already know what’s about to happen. I’m about to open my big fat mouth to pry into his personal business.
“Why?” I feel the word pass through, and I notice the way his face reacts to it.
There’s raw emotion there in his eyes, and I’m not exactly sure he means to show it, but it’s clear to me now that there’s more to Jackson Anderson than meets the eye.
A loud noise sounds from above our heads, and I feel the elevator hum to life again.
Jackson blinks to snap himself out of it, quickly getting back on his feet, and he doesn’t speak another word to me on his way over to help me up.
Looking up at him now, I se
e I’ve lost the man I was speaking to just seconds ago. The version I’m getting now is completely different. His eyes are colder, guarded, and distant.
I’m disappointed that I’ve managed to upset the one person I made a connection with at this party, all thanks to my nosiness.
When I hand his jacket back to him, he responds with a curt nod before slipping his arms through the sleeves.
The disappointment in my chest only grows.
“Thank you again, Mr. Anderson,” I say, truly grateful for his help.
His jaw ticks once, twice, then he turns to meet my eyes again. “If you should ever need anything… anything at all, Ms. Moore, please don’t hesitate to call the number on my card.”
The tone behind his offer sounds strange. I can’t really place it.
It’s almost like he’s trying to stop himself from speaking those words to me, like his mind’s already regretting the offer as it leaves his mouth.
Unsure of how to respond, I hesitantly say, “I may just take you up on that…”
Body language says more than actual words can. Right now, I see that he wants to be anywhere but here. He is done talking to me. His eyes are pinned forward, shoulders squared parallel with the closed doors in front of us.
We only spent about half an hour together in this elevator, but somehow, I feel like I know enough.
It was clear from the beginning that Jackson didn’t want any interaction, and if it hadn’t been for my little episode, we probably wouldn’t have had a chance at having any. He had no interest in exchanging pleasantries in what was supposed to be a brief ride up, like I didn’t exist in his space.
Why do I make him so uncomfortable?
With a soft chime sounding from somewhere up above, the doors slide open, and I see a worried Kellan standing on the other side with a man I’ve never seen before.
The guy’s eyes dart from me to Jackson, all frantic. “Mr. Anderson.”
Must be Daniel.
“Lexi…” Kellan steps onto the elevator, pulling me into his arms. “I shouldn’t have let you go alone, I’m so sorry. Are you okay?” he asks worriedly, his eyes scan me for any visible wounds. For what reason, I have no idea. The elevator only got stuck. It’s not like the cable snapped or anything. “Harper’s going to fucking kill me!”
