“Not like that, man,” Royal says, still shaking his head. “I was just trying to let her know what she means to us all. She didn’t want to go home. I didn’t blame her.” He stares at Cline, his words an attack, the kind I’ve never heard from him. “She wanted to stay in the guest house until morning, and then she left.”
“You saw her?” Stokes asks.
Royal nods.
“You never told anyone?” Cline asks. “Through all this, you never told us? Why? It’s so simple.”
“She told me not to,” Royal says, rubbing his hand over his mouth. “You guys believe me, right?”
Stokes nods, but everyone stares at Royal and he shakes his head in a jarring motion and takes a step back. “You guys think I kept that to hurt anyone? I was protecting her.”
“You’re going to have to tell the police,” Lucie says.
“I didn’t know anything was going to happen. I didn’t think I’d ever have to tell anyone.”
“What time did she leave?” Cline asks. Royal shrugs. “You said you saw her leave. What time?”
“Like eight?” Royal mumbles. “Seven maybe?”
“I was up early for work. Six-ish,” Mika says. “Your van wasn’t there anymore.”
“Maybe it was six then. It was a long night. I was drunk. I don’t know.”
Cline shakes his head and throws his mask across the room at Royal. “You’re my brother! We’re supposed to be family, and you kept this from us, and I know when you’re lying.”
Royal’s Adam’s apple bobs in his throat as his expression turns stoic.
Cline shakes his head and hunches over. “You’re breaking my heart, man. Just tell me. Tell me what happened at the guest house.”
A flash of nausea comes over me as I remember our conversation yesterday. “Royal said he wanted to practice at my place today when you suggested yours,” I turn to Lucie, “he didn’t want to.”
“Why didn’t you want to?” Lucie asks in a low, breathy voice.
“The day of Lynda’s audition, you were out front, waiting in your van. You didn’t want to go inside…” Stokes’s chest heaves.
We all stare at Royal and he shakes his head. “This is bullshit! You think I did something to her? I would never! I loved her!”
“Loved?” Jamie asks.
“Love!” Royal corrects. “I love her. We all love her. How could you all think I had something to do with her disappearing?”
Cline rushes him, grabbing the collar of his shirt and Stokes and Jamie lunge toward them, trying to pry Cline off Royal as Lucie, Mika, and I back off.
“He wouldn’t!” Stokes shouts to Cline. “He wouldn’t hurt her!”
Cline grabs at Royal, but Royal doesn’t fight back. He stands, stiff, with a sad look in his eyes staring off into space, even as Cline’s fist connects with his shoulder as they pull him off.
“What did you do?” Cline screams.
Royal turns to Lucie with tears in his eyes, grabs his bag, and stalks out of the room, turning right down the hallway toward the back lot.
Just as Cline chased after Pascha, he breaks free from Jamie’s and Stokes’s grip, and runs after him, seconds later.
“What just happened?” Jamie asks, his voice quick and panicked. “What the hell just happened.”
Stokes’s hands are shaking and Mika wraps Lucie in a hug.
“He didn’t—do something to her… did he?” Jamie asks.
“He—he wouldn’t have,” Stokes says, but his voice isn’t as sure as it was while he was pulling Cline away and my phone rings in my hand.
Mom again.
I silence it and turn back to Jamie as he shakes his head. “I have to call the police. I have to tell them what we know.”
“No—” Stokes says as Lucie says something that can’t be heard over it.
Stokes turns to her.
“We have to call the police,” she says, her chin quivering. “I think he did something… maybe by accident… but I think…”
Stokes shakes his head. “You can’t say it. You can’t say it because it can’t be true.”
Lucie looks at him with mascara stained cheeks. “I think she’s dead and I think… Royal knows what happened.”
Chapter 26
Did you think you could take a life
and get away?
Jamie pulls his phone from his pocket and walks to the corner.
“We can’t,” Stokes says, approaching Jamie, but stops just short of him as my phone rings again.
“I need to call my mom back,” I say. “I’m just going out into the hallway.”
Stokes nods and turns back to Jamie as I walk to the hallway. “I know him. He’s like a brother. Let me talk to him…”
I step into the hallway and I tap my mom’s number, but a no reception signal beeps into my ear, ending the call before it could begin to ring.
I had reception fine last night. No, last night was Noblemen.
I walk up the ramp toward the lot. One more bar. I call again, but I can’t get a signal. I push the door open into the dark, starry night, illuminated by a big crescent moon. The cold night air gives me shivers. A skunk scent wafts toward me from a small group of women. One puffs on a joint and passes it to another one. I’ll just stay close to them.
I tap Mom’s name and press the phone to my ear as it rings.
And rings until I reach her voicemail.
“Hey Mom, just returning your call. I’m okay. I’ll be staying home until you get back. Stokes will be with me. I can’t wait for you to get back. Call when you can. Love you.”
I end the call and pass the small group before pushing through the door, onto the ramp again, and a figure stands between me and the green room door in the darkness.
“Lynda,” the man says.
“Who are you?” I ask, reaching behind my back for the cool, metal mallet. “How did you get back here?”
“It’s Howard!” he says with pure joy in his voice. He takes another step closer, leaning forward into the glow from the next fluorescent light on the ceiling, the light glinting off his butcher
