He shook his head. “No. I’ve never aroused any attention, which is why this is mystifying.” He paused a long beat. “It’s why I suspect that they might be acting in concert with darker forces.”
“But to what end, Jared?”
“To destroy my kind, Lacey. It’s always the same. The why is almost immaterial. They want us dead, eradicated, expunged from the earth.”
Jared followed me to the bedroom, where I retrieved my phone and charger, and after stopping at the kitchen to plug it in, we went to the banquet hall. It looked even larger during the day. A row of high stained-glass windows running beneath the rafters heightened the sensation of being in a cathedral. Jared sat behind the massive console and indicated a rolling swivel chair.
“Have a seat. I’ll do a quick rough mix and you can tell me what you think.”
His fingers flew over the board as the computer monitor blinked, and I could hear the barest trace of sound from his headphones. After a few minutes, he sat back and switched the playback to the larger of the two pairs of speakers mounted in front of the board.
A keyboard bass line pulsed over a mechanical heartbeat, and then a distant harmony of vocals built into a wall of voices in a crescendo of sound. At the climax of the vocals, a guitar riffed at blinding speed, and then the drums kicked in with a tribal beat that sounded like the end of the world. Jared listened with intense concentration as the song developed from the opening refrain through a four-line verse and into an unexpected bridge, and then repeated the chorus again as yet more instruments joined the main melody in a contretemps so intricate it took my breath away.
When the song ended, I felt like an hour had gone by, not the barely four minutes on the screen counter. I glanced over at Jared, who was studying me expectantly, and sat back.
“I’ve never heard anything like that, Jared,” I said, the awe in my voice genuine. “It’s…it’s amazing.”
His grin lent his features an impish look, and he nodded slowly. “It still needs a lot of work, but it’s getting there. It’s not a lead single, but rather something more…orchestral. That’s sort of out of fashion these days, but I’m hoping I can bring it back with this number and a few others. These things go in cycles, so it’s about time, I’d think.”
He played me samples of three more songs, all of which were dramatically different from the first – hookier, more accessible, immediately infectious and easy to relate to. When Jared clicked the monitor off, I was floored by the amount of talent he had – what I’d heard of his first album had barely hinted at the depth of these offerings.
“So you like it?” he asked.
“I think you’re going to be ten times bigger than big, Jared. Seriously. And it’s all you?”
He nodded. “Yes. The band will play their parts from the charts I write, but it’s my recipe.” He grinned again. “I’m not so great at compromising, so this way I don’t have to.”
“I’ll have to remember that when we don’t agree on something,” I said.
Jared’s smile didn’t falter. “I meant with music.”
I checked the time. “I need to call the school, Jared. The morning’s half over.”
He stood. “And I need to get on the road. I have a lunch meeting with Christina, and it’ll get more hectic from there, I suspect.”
“So I won’t see you all day?”
“I’ll try to make it back before filming starts. But worst case, I’ll be back after shooting tonight.”
I looked around. “It’s kind of creepy being all by myself in this huge house.”
“It’s just you. I already banished all the ghosts. They won’t be back.”
I threw him a dark look. “Are you serious?”
He laughed. “There are no spooks here, Lacey. Just relax. If you get bored out of your mind, I’ve got a ton of concert footage and interviews on the disks there the record company wants to make into a mini-documentary,” he said, indicating a box by the second computer. “Just don’t touch the one I used for the playback, please. The other one’s a spare, just in case, but you can use it if you want.”
“No TV?” I asked. “Or internet?”
He shook his head. “Sorry. We’re kind of in the boonies, and I don’t watch TV or do anything web-based. But my phone has a data signal, so you should be able to access the internet on yours.”
When Jared left, the echo of the front door closing sounded as loud as a cannon in the cavernous hall. I sat staring at the recording equipment for a long moment and then crossed the floor and made for the kitchen, where my phone power indicator was pulsing red.
When I switched the phone on, the battery showed only fifteen percent charged, and I cursed myself for not plugging it in the night before. A thought occurred to me, and I thumbed through the phone numbers, looking for the Ridley administrative offices, which of course I didn’t have. That led me on a frustrating and agonizingly slow web search of the school’s site, at the end of which I had a central number for all the various departments.
My throat was tight when I placed the call, but when I navigated the automated system to Mrs. Coates’s extension, it went directly to voicemail, to my vast relief. I waited for the tone and spoke slowly and evenly so the message wouldn’t be garbled.
“Hi, Mrs. Coates, this is Lacey Wilkes. I’m calling to tell you that there’s been an emergency…an accident…and I won’t be in class for a day or two at least. I’m not hurt or anything, but I didn’t want anyone to worry about where I was. Thanks, and I’ll let you know when I get back. I’ll talk with all my teachers about any missing work.”
I hung up and stared at the phone, hoping that I’d sounded
