Need you Now (Top Shelf Romance Book 2)

by Laurelin Paige

  “Your parents said you may not go back to classes this semester,” he continued. Travis said I talked a lot, but he never seemed to mind voicing his opinions about my life. “Maybe you should come back to Duke. Finish school there.”

  I didn’t respond.

  “Mae. You need to talk to someone,” he said.

  I continued to stare at the pool, where Lincoln and I took swimming lessons when we were kids. Where we hosted pool parties every year for his birthday, since it was at the end of May. Where he jumped in from the second-floor balcony of the house during a party we had while our parents were out of town and broke his nose. I felt myself smile at that memory. Idiot Lincoln. And then just as quickly, I was crying again. God, I was so tired of crying. I wiped my face quickly and looked around at everyone here. Most were our neighbors, parent’s friends, Lincoln’s friends from high school. I spotted Lana’s parents, talking to dad. They all looked somber.

  “Who are those guys?” Travis asked.

  I still didn’t talk, but I did glance at him and then followed his line of vision. I hadn’t seen them before, but Logan and the three guys he was always with were standing on the other side of the lawn. They were all wearing black suits, white shirts, and black ties. I must have missed them earlier. I knew I definitely hadn’t greeted them. I’d remember them. I’d definitely remember Logan. As if reading my thoughts, he looked over at me. I couldn’t be sure what he was thinking, but I could swear I saw sympathy in his eyes. It was something I normally didn’t want from anyone, but for some reason, he made his look genuine. Maybe because Logan didn’t strike me as the kind of person who gave handouts. He seemed like the kind of person who said what he meant and meant what he said. I could appreciate that.

  “Are you hungry?” Travis asked.

  I shrugged. I was starving, I just wasn’t sure I could keep any food down.

  “I’m hungry.” He stood up. “I’ll go get us food. Stay right here.”

  He walked away. I stayed there, staring out at the pool again. It wasn’t hot enough to go in there, but the only thing I could manage to think about was jumping in there, dress, heels, and all. Maybe I’d get hypothermia and end up in the hospital next to my brother. Maybe I could wait there until he woke up. My phone buzzed in my lap.

  Unknown Caller: She’s out there. She’s still out there.

  Dread crept into my belly as I stared at the ominous text.

  Me: Who? Who is this?

  No response.

  I dialed the number and got a loud dial tone. “The number you are calling has been disconnected.”

  I pulled the phone away from my ear slowly and pressed the red button to end the call. They’d just texted me. She’s out there. She’s still out there. Who? Who was still out there? Lana? I glanced over at her parents. Her mother was now crying in my father’s arms as he patted her back softly. They’d known each other a long time, her father being dad’s accountant and all, but I never knew they were this close. Maybe it was the grief. Grief knew how to bring people together.

  Chapter 7

  “You’re sure you’re going to be okay?” Celia asked for the fifth time.

  “Positive. It’s not like you were much of a roommate when you lived here anyway.”

  “I paid rent though.” She stuck her tongue out. “Seriously, if you need anything, please call me. It doesn’t matter the time. I can’t imagine what you’re going through.”

  “I’m okay. I promise.”

  Word traveled fast, even here. Then again, mom had requested a prayer chain in the school paper for Lincoln, which was also tweeted out and put on the online portal, so every time you logged on to look at school related things, you had the prayer chain for Lincoln’s recovery and Lana’s appearance. It must have been one of the many things our parents discussed that day at the house.

  “We’re having a party tonight at the house,” Celia said. “I know you probably don’t feel like partying at all, but if you want to forget about everything for a night, you should come.”

  “Maybe.”

  “I left those two boxes in the closet,” she said as she walked out of the apartment. “I figured you didn’t want them in the middle of the living room.”

  “What boxes?”

  “The ones you had sent here. The ones with your brother’s name on them.”

  “Oh. Yeah. Cool. Thanks for putting them away.” I held the door for her and watched as she walked toward the elevator. “Maybe I’ll see you later.”

  “Please come. It’ll be fun. I promise.”

  I smiled and walked back into the apartment, shutting the door and locking it before heading to the guest bedroom closet. I pulled out the two boxes. They had my brother’s name on the top and sides. A part of me wondered if I should just leave them alone. They were private. I wouldn’t want someone rummaging through my stuff. But he was in a coma. He said he hadn’t tried to kill himself. With that thought, I tore the tape off the first box and started going through it. Hockey equipment, a jersey, two jerseys, jockey straps. I cringed. Gross. I’d brought his computer with me from his room, but I hadn’t found anything in there worthwhile. So far, there was nothing in this box that was worthwhile either. Who’d brought it though? Celia said it had been in the living room. I’d been gone a week, and I wasn’t sure how often she’d come around, but for the boxes to be inside the apartment when only the two of us had a key? That was odd. I looked at the time. I was going to be late for my first assignment, since I’d missed last week’s. I stood from the floor, grabbed my bag, camera, and left.

  On my walk to campus, I started scrolling Lincoln’s Instagram. He wasn’t much of a poster to begin with, but in recent months, he hadn’t posted anything at all. My memories kept flashing back to the hospital, to seeing him with that tube down his throat, not letting him speak, and then the seizure. I shivered. Then I remembered the Morse code. I exited Instagram and opened my notepad. There were a lot of dots and a lot of lines. Shit. How could I have forgotten about this? I needed to decipher it immediately.

  When I got to campus, I looked everywhere for Ella Valentine, but never found her. I did find a guy holding a recorder to a girl’s face and assumed he must work for the paper as well. I just hoped it was the same paper I was with. I waited for him to finish talking to the girl he was interviewing.

  “Hey,” I said. “I’m here to take pictures for The Gazette.”

  “Hey. Ella told me to expect you.” He smiled, holding a hand out. “I’m Max.”

  “Amelia.”

  “Nice name.”

  “Thanks. You can call me Mae.”

  “Cool.” He waved his recorder. “So, you want to do this together? I interview, you snap photos? Or are you going to take some candid photos?”

  “I can do both. I’ll take some after you interview first so I don’t look so lost.”

  “I heard about your brother,” he said, starting to walk over to another group of girls in uniforms. I kept up his pace. “I’m sorry. If there’s anything you need. I mean, we don’t know each other, but I figured I’d . . . I don’t know. If you need anything, I’m here.” He chuckled nervously.

  “Thanks.” I offered a small smile.

  “Is he going to be okay?”

  “The doctors say so. I think so. He’s the strongest person I know.”

  Even as I said the words, I felt like a liar, and then like a traitor because of it.

  “That’s good. He was always one of my favorite people to interview.” Max smiled. “He was always nice.”

  “Is.”

  “Uh, yeah, but I meant when he was here,” he said, voice lowered as if to not offend.

  “Oh. Yeah. Of course.” I shook my head. “Have you interviewed a lot of people so far?”

  “The basketball team, volleyball team, soccer team, and lacrosse. I still need hockey and swim.”

  “And you’re going to cover every single sport in one edition?”

  “No.” He chuckled. “I’m going t
o do a page of quotes, so whatever stands out, I’ll put on that page.”

  “Oh. Like a high school yearbook?”

  “Like that but not corny.”

  “If you say so.”

  He laughed. “How ‘bout I show it to you and if it’s corny you let me know?”

  “Okay.” I wanted to ask him about Lana, but hesitated. Was that a weird thing to bring up when you first met someone? Deciding I didn’t care, I brought it up anyway. “Did you know Lana Ly?”

  “Yeah.” He eyed me strangely. “She worked at the paper.”

  “Don’t you think it’s weird that nobody is looking for her?” I asked. “The media is saying she ran away. Isn’t that weird?”

  “The media is doing more for her than they’ve done for the girls who have disappeared in the past.”

  “What girls?”

  “Are you sure you want to hear about this? I mean, with your brother being . . . you know,” he said, “The last thing you need is something else to worry about.”

  “I want to hear about it.” If nothing else, it would help take my mind off my brother.

  “One girl has disappeared each year since the beginning of the founding of this university. They stopped reporting on it because, well, a lot of them have been found. Some of them have managed to get out of the woods, and others have been found in states across the country.” He lowered his voice as we passed a group of people. “Those are the ones who have been found alive. The ones presumed dead haven’t been found.”

  “One girl a year?” I whisper-shouted. “That’s impossible.”

  “It’s not. Look it up. Go to the archive newspapers in the library. The local paper usually hides them in page two or three. Never page one.”

  “But these girls, wouldn’t their families be looking? Wouldn’t there be press conferences or something?”

  “Most of them are foreign students. Those are the ones targeted. People from out of the country.”

  “Lana wasn’t a foreign student.”

  He shrugged. “Well, the media is reporting about her. They have a knack for pretty blonde girls.”

  “Lana is Vietnamese.”

  “A pretty Vietnamese girl, then,” he said. “They switched it up for once.”

  “One a year doesn’t make any sense. Even a serial killer acts with more frequency than that.”

  “In the last thirty years, we’ve had a total of sixty missing girls. That’s two a year.”

  “So, more than one.”

  “Right. And not all of them have been foreign.”

  “Yet nobody has an idea who’s behind it?”

  “A lot of us have an idea. I mean, you go on Reddit and it’s full of ideas.”

  “Well, who do they think is responsible?” I pressed. “You can’t give me all of this information and then withhold the important parts.”

  “Thing is, it’s just an idea. We could be way off base.”

  “Tell me anyway.” I got closer. We stopped walking.

  “I think the secret societies are using them as sacrifices.”

  My jaw dropped. I let out a laugh. “Yeah right.”

  “There’s a secret society that formed after the first girl went missing, back in 1910. It is said that every year they conduct their own investigation and try to look for the missing.”

  “How do you know this, if it’s a secret?”

  “The girls who are found talk. They say it was a group of people in cloaks who helped them to safety, but they won’t say anything beyond that. Gratitude buys their silence.”

  “So they’re not sacrificing them.”

  “Not all of them return.” He shot me a look.

  “That doesn’t prove anything.”

  “Like I said, it’s a theory.” He shrugs.

  “So what’s your theory on Lana?”

  “I don’t have a theory on her. I just hope she doesn’t end up being one of the disappeared girls.” He shot me a grave look. “The ones that are gone longer than a year, never come back.”

  Jesus. I let out a breath. In an effort to calm down, I unclipped the camera cover and brought it up to my face, taking photos of the trees and flowers around us to test it out and make sure I’d be ready to shoot whoever Max was interviewing next. When I lowered it and looked around again, I caught sight of Logan and his friends. They seriously looked like greasers from Grease, not because of the way they were dressed, but because it was the vibe they gave out. I nudged Max.

  “Do you think those guys are part of a secret society?”

  “There’s no telling.”

  “A friend of mine told me they were in a secret society.”

  “I don’t think they’d have the time for everything that goes into it.” He glanced over at the group again. “They’re definitely popular though. Big men on campus. Fitz especially. He has this cult following that started in high school. All of his fans show up at the games, do a big racket. It’s kind of fun to witness.”

  “Fitz meaning Logan?”

  “Well, yeah.” He chuckled. “Not sure he’d answer to anything other than Fitz though.”

  “Interesting.” I looked at Max.

  “You must have experienced the Fitz craze firsthand when your brother played here.”

  “I can’t say that I have.” I smiled. “I only went to a game when he was a freshman and I was still living at home. Logan wouldn’t have been here then.”

  “Well, I guess you’ll be experiencing it soon enough. Season starts soon.”

  I looked over again and found Logan staring at me.

  “What’s his deal anyway?” I asked Max. “If he’s so coveted, why does he look so lonely?”

  “You’re probably the first person to ever say that,” he said. “Fitz is never alone and is definitely far from lonely.”

  I looked back at Logan with that thought in mind. He was still staring at me. I didn’t care how many people he had around him, he definitely looked lonely. I knew the look because it was the same one I’d walked around wearing for as long as I could remember and I was definitely never alone. Max walked in their direction.

  “Hey, guys, mind doing a quick interview for the paper?”

  “Sure, but only if your pretty friend asks the questions.” One of them broke away from the group and walked over to us.

  It was the one who looked like Thor, but with dark hair. He had defined features that made him looked like a rugged Viking, even without a beard. Another followed with a chuckle. He also had hair down to his shoulders, but he was dirty blond. They both looked like perfect California surfers. I remembered seeing them in my parent’s backyard, both wearing dark suits, looking like they were guarding secrets as they stood in the shadows. I should have gone up to them then, but Travis made it impossible.

  “I wouldn’t know what to ask.” I waved the camera. “But I’ll take your picture.”

  “That’s a start.” He grinned, putting a hand out for me to shake. “I’m Nolan.”

  “Amelia, but you can call me Mae.”

  “Beautiful name for a beautiful girl.”

  “Thanks.” I dropped my hand.

  “Sure you don’t want to get one question in?”

  “About hockey?”

  His gaze darkened. “About anything.”

  “Dude.” Logan stepped forward, putting a hand on Nolan’s shoulder. “Let them do their job so we can go.”

  My eyes jumped between the two of them. There were a lot of questions I wanted to ask them, starting with my brother’s accident, but that wouldn’t have been appropriate for this setting.

  “About hockey,” Nolan said, shrugging Logan’s hand off his shoulder.

  “Well, I don’t know a lick about hockey and whatever question I ask would sound ridiculous.”

  “Maybe you should check out our games.”

  “Apparently, it’s part of my job.”

  Someone in their group of friends scoffed behind him. I didn’t even bother to see whom but I wouldn’t have
been surprised if it was Logan himself.

  “Are you excited to get back on the ice?” Max asked, clicking the recorder.

  “Sure. I’m always excited. We have a good squad again this year. It’ll be fun to bring the championship back.”

  “Do you think losing last year will make you work ten times harder to get it back?”

  “Fuck yeah,” he said. “But it doesn’t matter. We’re ready to bring that trophy home this year.”

  The rest of the guys cheered behind him, throwing their fists in the air. I snapped some pictures and looked at the little window where it appeared. It looked more like we were at a frat house than a sports mixer, but it would have to do. Even Logan had his fist up and was smiling in the photo.

  “Thanks for your time,” Max said, clicking the stop button.

  “There’s a party tonight, if you want to come by. Eleven o’clock, Senior Hall.”

  “Maybe,” Max said.

  “I was talking to Mae,” Nolan said, “But you can come too, Max.”

  “I already have a party I’m going to, but thanks.”

  “This one will be better.” He winked as he walked away. “Take good pictures of my ass. It’ll sell more papers.”

  “Hey, Mae. You wanna grab dinner tomorrow night?” Max was putting his recorder in his backpack. “I mean an early dinner. Around seven?”

  “Um, I guess so.” I smiled.

  I wasn’t in the mood to party or have dinner with anyone, but if doing those things was going to get me answers about this society and Lana, I’d do them. I dressed for the party in the most casual thing I could find—black skinny jeans, black vans, and a white crop top. No designer anything. Well, except for my jeans and the crop top, but nobody would know that. I was going to blend in with the crowd tonight. After I applied my make-up and finished brushing my hair, I opened up my brother’s computer and searched Google for Morse code. I plugged in the dots and dashes, just as I wrote them down.