Matt’s POV

“What do you mean she’s not upstairs?!” I raged, slamming my fist on the table before sinking down onto the stool. Gates was going to fucking kill me! I had one job to do, though I was too busy trying to figure out where the hell Dice had run off to. Had she up and left again? Did she take Blondie with her this time? You’d think for just once in her life that Dice would tell us something before it fucking happened! But I guessed wrong because she wasn’t anywhere to be found either. I prayed for my sanity that she rode along with Gates wherever he was. Though, I wasn’t so sure I liked how chummy they were—she was my girl, not his!

Zack rubbed his hands over his face and put his elbows on the island. He looked like he was having some internal battle with himself and I didn’t even want to open that can of worms right now. “She’s not in Syn’s room, she’s not anywhere. Trust me I searched everywhere,” He sighed. “This is all my fault.”

I cocked a brow at him, eyeing him carefully. What the hell was he talking about? “How is this your fault? Did you escort her out the door?” I ran my hand down the side of my face, trying to think.

“Let’s just say it’s more complicated than it looks,” Zacky sighed. What could be more complicated than a girl with bleached blonde hair up and disappearing under my watch? Was she abducted by aliens for Christ sake? I am so dead when Gates gets back. “And she left this…” I looked up to see him holding a folded piece of paper with Brian’s name handwritten in her delicate script. Were those tear stains? Jesus Christ.

“Fuck,” I hissed just as my phone sounded in my pocket. And of course it had to be Gates. “Where are you?” I spat. There wasn’t time for a formal greeting. I had to know if Dice was with him for my own sanity.

“Uhmm... chill your ass, Matt, I told you I have some stuff to take care of,” Gates said, his tone distracted. What stuff did he have to take care of? I was so sick of this mystery bullshit. First Dice and Brian, and now what ever the fuck is up with Zack. Why couldn’t someone just fill me in?

“Dice’s with you?” I asked, though I was still trying to figure out how to tell him about MJ. I was so fucking dead.

“Yeah, but is MJ with you?” And there was the question. Fuck. I stood and walked towards the patio, watching Jimmy play with Pinkly. I laughed nervously, my fingers touching the note that I hadn’t dared to open.

“About that—“ I start but Brian cuts me off.

“WHAT?!” I held the phone back away form my ear only to catch Jimmy’s eye and cocked brow. Great, now he was coming this way. I didn’t want to have to explain this to him too.

“Gates... Look... I-I don’t know what to tell you, man... She left a stupid letter and bailed...” I sighed. Well at least he wasn’t here to punch me, though I could totally take him. Not that I wanted to at this point in time, but I could. Come to think of it, he better keep his hands to himself with whatever he was up to with Dice. I swear if he makes a move at her I’ll kill him.

„A letter? What does it say?”

Well, that’s a good question. “Hmm... It says...” I walked back over to the island and sat down, unfolding the letter just as both and Jimmy and Zacky looked over my shoulder. Those nosy bastards couldn’t let anything slide without knowing exactly what was going on. Did I blame them? Not really, because I was interested to see what Blondie had to say. Especially since she didn’t talk too much around me—it was usually Dice leading the conversation. I had really only seen her talk to Dice, Brain, Zacky, and Jimmy. Okay, so maybe it was everyone except me and dipshit.

As my eyes scanned the letter, my jaw dropped. Fuck this girl had been to hell and back. “That she’s sorry... and...” I suddenly felt like I was invading on some private moment that really only Brian should be reading, even though Jimmy and Zacky both cursed behind me before walking away shaking their heads. Yeah, now I wanted to kill that asshole too. “Holy shit... what I get from this is MJ should be seeing a shrink each day of the week... Seriously, man...” I joked, trying to make light of the subject. It wasn’t working.

“WHAT THE HELL DOES IT SAY?”

It was then that my eyes read those three little words at the bottom. I knew that Brain need to see them. Sure he said he liked the girl, but the rest of us could see that there was more than that. He was the happiest that I’ve seen him in a long time and I think a lot of that had to do with MJ. “Uhmm... You should probably read it yourself.”

Gates sighed and I could see him pinching the bridge of his nose. “That’s not an option now, Shads.” I felt bad for the guy, but now he knew what it felt like when Dice just up and left.

“Okay, I gotta go, Shads. Try figuring where she is. Call the cops, the FBI, the Pentagon I don’t care, just do something...” Brian hung up and I looked at my phone, not sure if I had lost the call or if he actually fucking hung up on me. Just do something. Yeah, like it was that easy to find someone who obviously had a bounty on her head.

“So Blondie’s gone?” Johnny asked, appearing in the kitchen next to Zacky who just hung his head.

“It appears so,” I sighed, only to be taken over by Jimmy’s dramatic scream as he fell to his knees.

“NO! NOT MY BLONDE QUEEN!” he screamed, looking like he was in physical pain. “First Knife Mistress and now Blondie? How could they do this to me! They both know that I can’t handle change! Who is going to finish my beautiful animated massacre?!” Fuck, Jimmy, there are more important things that that stupid cartoon.

I sighed and put my hand on his shoulder. We couldn’t have him be a big mess right now because that would just make things three times worse. Nothing like trying to find a missing girl and dealing with a tantruming toddler. You think I’m kidding? Well, just let him carry on all day then, I dare you to say he doesn’t act like one. “We’ve got to see if we can find her,” I sighed. “Gates asked us to take care of her and she slipped out under our noses.”

“What is with these girls up and running away?” Johnny mused, pulling out a cigarette. “I say if they want to run away, let them. We’ve wasted more time on this shit…”

“Shut your goddamn mouth, dipshit,” Zacky looked like he was literally about to bite Johnny’s head off, like Ozzy Osbourne style. “Go get your fucking phone and just start making some calls. Jimmy, come with me, we’re going to see if find her walking the street.”

“I’ll see if I can file a missing person’s report,” I sighed, not really in the mood to do this right now. Fuck, this shit was so messed up. How could a guy beat someone so badly everyday? Specifically a girl like MJ? If I ever saw that bastard, what was his name, Malcolm, on the street I would beat him to a living pulp. It was just sick that he put her through that. No wonder MJ was so damned quiet.

After over an hour on the phone with the Huntington Beach Police Department I was no closer to finding the blonde. I guess you had to wait forty-eight hours to report someone missing and because the Order of Protection hadn’t gone through yet, they wouldn’t start searching for her. Well, I guess we would have to do our own investigation because the police were fucking useless in this matter. Now Gates was really going to kill me.

“Did you find anything?” I asked just ask Zacky and Jimmy came through the door. They both frowned and shook their heads, causing and irritated sigh to rip through my body. How could she just up and disappear? As far as I knew, she didn’t have anywhere to go.

“Shit, where the hell could she have gone?” I pulled my fourth cigarette of the afternoon to my lips. This shit was really stressing me out and she wasn’t even my girlfriend. Why did I always have to care so much?

Jimmy groaned as he pulled out the bottle of vodka, drinking it straight from the bottle before sinking down to the ground with a pout. “Not even a fucking trace of her.” Now that right there was one of the saddest sounds I had ever heard from the guy. I guess that little blonde really had pulled at hit heartstrings. “You don’t think that bastard got to her?”

“No,” Zack answered, his jawline tight. “She’s smart, she would have gotten out of here before she could find him.” She was smart? Were we talking about the same girl? The one who fled from the house with bounty on her back? I thought she was exactly what Dice called her time after time—an idiot. A loveable idiot, but still an idiot. But could I blame her after reading that letter? Hell, that kind of abuse would fuck with anyone, even Dice and she was the strongest person I knew.

“What did you find, Johnny?” He walked down the stairs carrying her computer, his brows knit together as he read whatever was on the screen. I couldn’t believe my eyes. Johnny fucking Christ was reading! Now this really was an interesting day. I guess I couldn’t say he wasn’t doing his part now because no one would have believed it unless they saw it.

He walked down and set the computer on the island, opening a picture reel. The first couple were of her and Syn goofing around. They looked so happy and dare I say it, in love, that I almost didn’t recognize my best friend. No wonder he almost lost his shit over the phone earlier, he loved her. And I could tell just by the look on the guys faces that they could see it too. Now this was something new.

“Okay, so what? We know that Syn and MJ were happy,” Zacky snapped. What was with him? It seemed like someone had shoved their foot up his ass today, turning him into a huge asshole. “What does this have to do with finding her?”

“Just keep watching,” Johnny said, pushing through the pictures. Okay, so there she is in a bikini with Dice and they both look hot as fuck. But after a few more pictures I saw someone that I recognized from Blondie’s birthday party—they guy who had been all over Dice. “Do we know how this is?” he asked, pointing to the blonde who looked exactly like MJ in the male form. In the picture he was in the middle between MJ and Dice on the beach. They all wore sun kissed smiles and looked like they were having the time of their lives.

“Isn’t that her brother?” I shrugged, trying to recall what Dice told me. “But I think Dice told me that she didn’t talk to her brother.”

“But is that somewhere she would go?” Zacky scoffed. That was a good question. I honestly didn’t know the girl enough to know. “She told me that she didn’t talk to her family and that they disowned her. I’m not really sure she would run back to them.”

Johnny sighed again, bringing our attention back to the computer. “That’s not all…” he said and just the look on his face told me that I wasn’t going to like what he showed us next. And I wished that I had looked away. Somewhere in a folder was a bunch of pictures full of MJ’s injuries.

“That’s just fucking sick,” Zacky raged, his knuckles white. I couldn’t take my eyes off the screen as Johnny flipped through about ten pictures with different dates on them. Well, maybe Blondie wasn’t as dumb as we thought her to be about all this. She had fucking evidence against that bastard and what he had done to her. That was a bold move on her part and I had to give her credit. Just I wish she would have used it, though now I understood why. It was all starting to make sense.

“I’m going to be sick,” Jimmy whispered before walking out onto the dark patio with the bottle of vodka. He slumped down on the pavement and pulled his knees to his chest before looking like he was going to lose it.

“I’ll go check on him,” Johnny sighed.

“Where is she?” I turned around to see Brian and Dice come storming through the door. Brian looked like a crazed manic while Dice, well I didn’t have words to describe her. She was wearing this skin-tight dress and high heels and I felt Matt Jr. spring to life. I couldn’t miss the triumphant smirk on her face as she held up a folder that is until she saw the pictures on the screen behind me. Those painted red lips fell into a deep frown just as Brian let out an angry growl. “WHERE THE FUCK IS SHE?”

“We’ve tried everything…even the cops,” I sighed, rubbing my hands over my face for the millionth time today. “I-I’m sorry…we have no idea where she went.”

Dice sighed and ripped her watering eyes away from the computer screen just as Brian finished reading the letter. “I might h-have an idea…” her voice shook ever so slightly as she handed her phone to Brian. “Call Corey.”


Corey’s POV

“So you’re really not going to tell what this is all about?” I asked, watching my little sister push her food around her plate and not actually eat anything. Her blue eyes had been swimming with tears since I picked her up eight hours ago, though she hadn’t let any of them fall in my presence. Was she afraid that I would mock her for being weak? I hated seeing her like this—sad and obviously hurting about something. In all honesty, this is the worst I had ever seen her. “Please talk to me, Mia. Let me help you.”

Her eyes shot back up at me and her brow furred angrily. “You’ve done what I needed you too. Now please…just-just let me deal with this myself,” she squeaked. Something was terribly wrong with her. Deal with what? What was she running from? Fine, I understood her running away from mom and dad, but this here? I had no idea what it was actually about.

Just then her phone vibrated on the table for the thousandth time since I picked her up. Mia closed her eyes and flipped it over so she would haven’t to look at the picture on the screen. I watched as she pushed her untouched plate away and put her head in her hands, pulling at her blonde locks. “What are you running from this time?”

She glared at me for a moment before shaking her head. “It’s-It’s none of your business,” she whispered though I didn’t really buy it.

“Is it about that guy at your birthday party? The one with the spiky hair?” Well there was a response. Her jaw dropped as she gaped at me, trying to figure out what to say. “What did he do? Break your heart? What about Lucy? Where is she—“

“Just stop, Core, please,” Mia’s voice pleaded, standing up and pushing her chair backwards. She shook her head at me and ran her petite hands over her face. My sister looked like hell and I really wanted to give her something to help her relax. “I-I just can’t right now. This is hard enough without the third degree.” Here she goes with these mysteries again.

“Fine, but please take those pills on the counter. They will help you sleep,” I insisted. I was surprised when she actually walked over the counter and honored my request. Well, that was unexpected. It had been years since Mia had actually listened to me let alone followed my directions. “Let me know if you need anything,” she gave me a curt nod before heading into my guest.

“Damn it, Mia,” I sighed just as she turned on some music to drown out her sobs. What demons was this girl facing now? I swear my sister always had one big problem after another. I didn’t understand why she couldn’t just go with the flow like the rest of us. She always had to go to the beat of her own drum, which was why my parents refused to fund her useless college degree. Don’t get me wrong, I loved my sister, but why couldn’t she just follow directions.

It was then my phone started to vibrate in my pocket and I pulled it out to see Lucy’s face on my screen. “About time you called,” I chuckled into the phone. “It took you long enough. And here I was starting to think that it was all your fault. So what’s up Luc?”

“Is she there with you?” A male voice said urgently into the phone. I looked down shaking my head, checking to make sure I wasn’t seeing things.

“Who is this?” I asked, my brow furring together in concern as I crossed my arms.

“Just tell me, is MJ there with you?” The guy’s voice sounded almost desperate and I suddenly understood what this was about. Mia was running from some guy.

“Look, I don’t know what’s going on or who you are—“ I said, now watching the guest room door. I don’t know if what I was expecting but it certainly wasn’t a call from a random stranger from Lucy’s phone in the middle of the night. It was what, two in the morning now?

“Is she there or not?” Someone’s a little touchy aren’t they?

“Tell me who you are and maybe I’ll tell you,” I wasn’t going to play this guessing game, I was too tired and had to be to work in the morning. Specially if this was the creep she was running from.

The guy let out a frustrated groan before a familiar female voice took over. “Is Mia there or not, Corey?” Lucy sounded somewhere between exhausted and pissed. What was going on over there in Huntington Beach?

“Yes, Mia is here. I picked her up this afternoon. I just gave her some medicine to help her sleep,” I sighed, pacing the dimly lit kitchen. “What is going on? Who was that guy?”

“Just, don’t let her leave, okay? We’ll be there shortly.”

“Luc, I don’t think that’s such a good idea.” Did she just groan at me?

“What the hell are you talking about?” Oh, now she is definitely pissed, but why? In the background I could hear some yelling and a car door slam. Where was she, at the races?

“I think she just needs some space right now. She wouldn’t eat and barely said two words to me. What is going on?”

I heard a heavy sigh on the other side of the line. “Shut up and make sure she doesn’t leave.”

Notes