Rescue (Ransom Book 5) Read online

  I snort and push him away. “You’re all terrible.”

  He grins, taking my hand, and I push down the wave of worry that’s been pulsing just below the surface for the past two days.

  It was just a nightmare, I tell myself for the hundredth time. A nightmare that looked an awful lot like a panic attack or a breakdown or…

  “Paige?” Cash is saying in his most polite voice. “I was wondering if you might be able to give me some directions?” Whatever she says makes him wince.

  “You’re doing it wrong,” Reed hisses. “You need to compliment her, dude! Tell her we don’t have a chance without her stellar organizational skills.”

  Cash parrots what Reed said then breathes a sigh of relief, snapping his fingers for his older brother to take down directions.

  Once we’re on our way again, Lennon and I walk hand in hand in silence. Daltrey and Cash are bickering about something, and Reed keeps glancing at us out of the corner of his eye. I’m starting to wish we’d come here by ourselves—without the other Ransomes and my bandmates.

  “Here it is,” James says after a few minutes.

  “I told you it was this way,” Cash mutters, pushing Daltrey. His attempt at being the tough guy falls apart when a crow lands on the closest tomb, cawing loudly and making Cash jump back into his younger brother with a rather high-pitched shriek.

  “I don’t know what you saw in that other cemetery, dude,” Lance says, shaking his head, “but you’re all a bunch of babies now.”

  “Are we looking at this, or not?” Reed asks.

  Stepping off the road, I’m no longer surprised it was so hard to find the marker. Morrison’s grave is tucked behind a rather large tomb several plots off the road and nestled between two headstones. The most identifying characteristic is the row of metal barriers to keep people from getting directly to the grave. Of course, that hasn’t stopped fans from leaving all manner of things there from flowers to wine bottles to balloons to a mystifying number of brightly colored hair ties attached to the barriers.

  “How’d he end up here, anyway?” Cash asks, his voice quiet, apparently inspired to show some respect at the grave of one of his idols. “Was he living here?”

  “I don’t think so,” Reed says. “I think he was just visiting when he died. Or performing, maybe. There was some controversy about his death, Paige was telling me last night.”

  “Didn’t listen to many of the details though, did ya?” Daltrey mutters half under his breath.

  “He was so young,” Lance says, shaking his head. “Only twenty-seven. Why does that always happen to musicians? Is it a curse?”

  From the corner of my eye I see every Ransome turn his head in Lennon’s direction before turning quickly back to the gravestone. He immediately goes tense, and I clutch his hand tighter.

  “It’s drugs, man,” Dylan says, shaking his head. “Doesn’t matter who you are, you start down that path, it’s pretty easy to end up here.”

  James’s gaze flicks in my direction, and it’s my turn to get tense.

  We stand by the grave for a few minutes, the boys taking some pictures, Lennon and me standing in silence. When it’s time to go, I’m relieved. I don’t want to think about all the mistakes a man like that must have made to end up buried in a half-hidden grave thousands of miles from home. I don’t want to think about all the ways I’ve made the same mistakes. And I certainly don’t want to think about Lennon anywhere near that path.

  “Paige and the girls are on their way with the cars,” Reed says, reading something on his phone. “I guess we’re going to head up to Montmartre now.”

  “Is that where that church is?” I ask Lennon. He looks down at me, his expression almost surprised. Almost like he forgot I was standing at his side.

  “Yeah,” he says. “Sacre Coeur. We saw it from the clock at d’Orsay.”

  “That will be nice to see,” I say, not liking how tight his face is.

  He barely manages a smile. “Yeah.”

  The cars are waiting for us at the front entrance, Paige and Karen leaning against one of the doors. “Did you have fun?” Paige calls as we approach.

  “Yeah, peachy,” Levi says. “We wandered around for two hours, lost and freezing.”

  “We had a great time,” Karen tells him.

  “Did you spend all your money?”

  She kisses his cheek. “Most of it.”

  “Well, we’ll all have fun this afternoon,” Paige says. “I have everything planned for Montmartre. We have that concert tonight, of course. But we can do plenty of sightseeing during the day. First we’ll have lunch, then we’ll go to Sacre Coeur and see the views of the city. And then I booked Le Petit Train de Montmartre for a tour and—”

  “Wait, wait,” Levi says, holding up his hands. “You booked the what now?”

  “Le Petit Train de Montmartre.”

  “The little train?” he translates. “What the hell does that mean?”

  “It’s this adorable little train that drives you around the neighborhood so you can see everything without having to walk up so many hills!” She sounds thrilled by the very idea of riding around in a miniature train with the members of Ransom. “Apparently it’s very hilly there. I saw pictures online. It’s so cute!”

  When she’s met by nothing but blank—and, in Cash’s case, slightly horrified—stares, she crosses her arms. “Or you could plan your afternoon activities yourselves, since you had such good luck with that this morning.”

  “Of course we’re going to join you,” Reed says quickly. “That, uh, little train sounds… nice.”

  She beams at him. “It will be.”

  I look up at Lennon, grinning, sure that he’ll be as amused by this entire exchange as I am. But as soon as my eyes find his face, my heart drops. Because Lennon looks every bit as blank as he did back at the grave. “Len?” I say. Again, he looks almost surprised to see me. Wherever his brain is, it’s not here with us.

  “You know what,” I say, making up my mind immediately. “I’m really tired, Paige. Would you be mad if Lennon and I went back to the hotel? I barely slept last night.”

  She seems to deflate a little bit, but then her eyes land on our still-joined hands, and she grins. “Of course! You guys just started dating. Obviously you want time together.” She winks at me. “Especially when you’re going to be spending the night with us girls tonight.”

  “Wait, what girls?” Daltrey asks.

  “I know Daisy told you about our sleepover,” Paige says. “We’ve been planning it all week.”

  “You’re taking my girlfriend away all night?” he asks, turning to the car. “Where is she? Dais?”

  “It’s one night, Daltrey.” Karen rolls her eyes. “We’ll take good care of her, I promise.”

  He doesn’t seem appeased, but when Paige motions for everyone to get in the cars, he follows. “We’ll drop you off on the way,” she tells me, but I shake my head. “It’s the opposite direction. We’ll get a cab.”

  She shoots Lennon a worried look, like there might be rabid Ransom fans waiting in random cabs for him.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Definitely. We’ll see you at the concert tonight, okay?”

  She brightens at my mention of our plans tonight. “Okay, see you then. Bye!”

  Once they’re all gone, I direct my attention back to Lennon. He’s staring at the ground, frowning. “You didn’t have to do that.”

  “You weren’t arguing while I was doing it.”

  He sighs. “I didn’t really hear what you were saying until Paige was agreeing. Sorry.” He gives me a small smile. “I’m pretty out of it.”

  “I think you’re tired,” I say, tugging on his hand so we can go to the corner to hail a cab. “Which is why we’re going back to the hotel to rest.”

  “You sure you’re okay with that? I know you wanted to go up to Montmartre. You shouldn’t miss it because I’m zoning out today.”

  I shrug. “We’ll go another time.”r />
  “We leave Paris in two days, and we have the show tomorrow.”

  “Well, we’ll just have to come back some day then, won’t we?”

  He stops in the middle of the sidewalk, and I walk into him. Before I can steady myself by grabbing his arms, he’s pulling me into a kiss, his lips hard and insistent on mine. Without thinking, my hands go up to his hair. Something happens to me when he kisses me, even when we’re on a public street and I’m more than a little worried about his mental health. All that—everything—fades away when his lips find mine. There’s nothing but the kiss, but the feel of his mouth, the way he pulls me so close, as if he can’t get me close enough.

  “Sorry,” he whispers, pulling away, his breathing heavy.

  “You don’t have to apologize for that.” I laugh, breathless. “Never apologize for that.”

  He grins, his mouth only inches from mine, and I look into his eyes. They’re alight, intense, glued to my face. “I just really like that idea,” he whispers.

  “What idea?”

  “Us coming back here someday. I like that you’re thinking about somedays.”

  It hadn’t really occurred to me that I was making some major statement about our relationship when I said we’d come back for Montmartre. It was just automatic, the idea that we’d still be together. In fact, it seems almost impossible for me to imagine a world without Lennon.

  That should terrify me. I never get this way about boys, make it a point not to get this way about boys, not to let feelings like these influence my decisions. But looking into Lennon’s eyes, I can’t feel anything even close to fear. Not when he’s smiling like that, as if I made him unbelievably happy.

  So I simply smile back. “I like thinking about somedays too.”

  He kisses me once more, softly this time, and then we catch a cab back to the hotel and go to sleep in each other’s arms.

  ***

  We meet the others at a café near the concert hall for dinner before the show. They all seem pretty tired from their day of sightseeing, and I’m grateful Lennon got some rest instead. “How was the little train?” he asks Cash, his grin snarky. He’s a lot more himself after our nap.

  Cash grimaces. “There was a crying baby right behind us. So that was awesome.”

  “What else did you do?” I ask Daisy.

  “We went to Sacre Coeur,” she says, rubbing her belly. “Which was gorgeous but, God, so many steps.”

  “It wasn’t that many—” Cash begins but stops himself when she glares at him. “But, of course, I wasn’t carrying a baby in my belly while climbing them, as you so helpfully pointed out ten times, so I’ll just shut my mouth.”

  “Smart move,” she says before turning back to me. “Then we went down to see the Moulin Rouge.”

  “Which was in a really nice part of town,” Sam adds, leaning toward us with a grin on her face.

  “There may have been some strip clubs,” Daisy explains.

  “And sex shops,” Sam adds.

  “And sex shops. And they, uh, had some colorful names.”

  Sam giggles, and Daisy sends a guilty look down the table at Paige. “I think she was pretty upset about it,” Daisy whispers. “She had this idea in her head that we could walk around and take pictures. Without, you know, a place called Good Vibrations in the background.”

  I snort into my water glass.

  “But it was a fun day, porn shops and tiny trains included.”

  “I’m glad.”

  Her eyes go to Lennon on my other side. He’s talking to Levi, and I’m relieved to see he still seems happy enough.

  “How’s he doing?” she asks, and something in her tone tells me she’s asking about more than our afternoon.

  “He’s, uh, tired, I think.” She nods, her gaze still on his face. “But he took a nap today, and I think that helped.”

  “I don’t want to put you on the spot,” she says, her voice barely discernible over the restaurant noise. “Or make you uncomfortable or…” She smiles, shaking her head. “I’m doing this badly. I just want you to be aware.”

  “Of what?” The kernel of worry from earlier reappears.

  “If he stops sleeping, that usually means he’s not feeling great.” She sighs, looking down. “So, just, you know. Not that you need to, like, keep an eye on it or anything. But if you notice he’s not sleeping, then…” She shakes her head again. “I feel terrible even saying this. I don’t want him to think that I don’t trust him or that I’m talking behind his back or—”

  “It’s okay, Daisy,” I say, even if only to get her to stop babbling. She’s obviously very uncomfortable. “If he’s not sleeping, I’ll talk to him about it, okay?”

  She nods, looking relieved. “Thank you. I’m sorry for being so…” She sighs again. “I’ll just blame pregnancy hormones making me crazy.”

  “You care about him. I appreciate you letting me know what to look out for. Because, you know.” Apparently it’s my turn to be uncomfortable. “Because I care about him too.”

  Her face brightens. “I can tell. I think you guys are so good together. It really makes me happy, Haylee. To see him so happy.”

  “I keep forgetting how long you’ve known each other.”

  “Oh, God,” she says, laughing. “You should have seen him when we met—”

  “Uh uh,” Lennon says, leaning over me to face Daisy. “We’re not having the Lennon-as-a-little-boy conversation, Daisy. There are rules.”

  She sticks out her tongue at him. “You’re no fun.” She winks at me. “But he was a really cute little boy.”

  He sighs, taking my hand. “I think that’s enough of memory lane with the girl from next door, okay?”

  After dinner we walk down the street to the concert venue. It’s much smaller than the massive theater where we’ll be performing the live show tomorrow night. In fact, it’s a lot more like the kinds of places Intrigue is used to performing. Paige says something to the bouncer and he lets us in past the line of people waiting to have their ID checked. The interior is a little grimy but painted in bright purples and reds. We immediately head downstairs into a cave-like room. It’s narrow and long, the stage at one end, the bar at the other, and it’s already mostly filled with people. Frank and Benny, Ransom’s security guys, clear a path for us, and I can’t help but feel relieved to know that they’ll keep the crowd from pressing on us too much.

  “Who wants beer?” Cash calls over the sound of the crowd. When every hand goes up, he grabs Daltrey by the elbow. “Come help, kid.”

  “I haven’t been in a place like this in ages,” Paige says, looking around the room. The walls are painted purple down here too, making the space feel even smaller than it is. Then the lights suddenly cut off, and the crowd starts to cheer.

  “Who are we seeing, anyhow?” I shout up to Lennon.

  He shakes his head. “No idea. Someone Daltrey found.”

  With that kind of recommendation, I’m not expecting much. Therefore I’m surprised when the band turns out to be pretty damn awesome. It’s obvious from the opening verse of their first song. The lead singer has command of the crowd from the get-go, and his voice is excellent. Even better, they’re tight, not always the easiest feat when playing live

  “Who is this?” I ask Daltrey when he returns with our beers.

  “Grand Panic,” he says, handing me a flimsy plastic cup. “Out of England. They kick ass.”

  “I’ve never heard of them,” I tell Lennon as Daltrey moves past to bring Dylan and James their beers. “They’re good.”

  “I’m not surprised,” he says. “Daltrey is really good at this—finding bands. It doesn’t matter what city we go to, if we want to hear live music, Dalt finds it. And they’re usually really good.”

  “That’s a helpful trait to have around.”

  Lennon slips his arms around my waist, pulling me against him so my back is pressed into his chest. “He’ll make a good A&R guy when his looks go and the girls stop screaming his name.�
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  I laugh, leaning into him. “And what about you? What do you think you’ll be doing when the glory days are over?”

  “That’s the good thing about being the overlooked one,” he says into my ear, and I shiver at the closeness of his breath on my neck. “We outlast the screaming girls.”

  I reach up to pull his head down so I can speak into his ear, knowing he wouldn’t hear me over the music otherwise. “I never overlooked you,” I say. “I saw you from the beginning.”

  He tightens his arms, resting his chin on my head, and I decide I could stay like this all night. I’d forgotten what it felt like to watch a show in a venue like this, where everyone is right on top of each other. The way the noise of the amps and the crowd bounces off the low ceiling, loud enough to make my ears ring. Or how the entire room seems to vibrate with the pulse of the music and the movement of the fans. There’s something nice in knowing that this is how people have felt when they came to see our shows, that the experience is being shared right now, in thousands of venues just like this one all over the world.

  “Nothing like live music,” Lennon says when the show is done. He’s grinning, all the distance in his eyes from this morning gone.

  “Nothing at all,” I say, and I know I’m grinning just as wildly. Because Lennon gets it, the way that I feel about music and performing. He feels the same way.

  “That was kick-ass,” Reed says, joining us. He has the same exhilarated, happy look on his face. They all get it, I think. “Daltrey is going to get Frank to see if we can go back to say hello.”

  “Do they know you guys are here tonight?”

  He shakes his head. “We just want to tell them how much we enjoyed it.”

  I can’t help but laugh. I wonder if they have any idea what that moment will be like for the four guys who’ve just left the stage. For one of the biggest bands in the world to randomly show up in their dressing room to tell them that they enjoyed the show.

  “What?” Lennon asks. “What’s funny?”

  I stand on my tiptoes and kiss him full on the mouth, not caring that Reed is right there, probably shooting us those concerned looks of his. It’s still surprising to me how unaffected the Ransomes all are. And it’s awfully cute when they don’t seem to notice how important they are.