Disguised by Surroundings

Third Person

Hannah was so disappointed in herself. She’d worked her ass Of for years to gain her independence - finishing her education, working to save money so that she could move across the world. Not to mention she had cut some pretty huge ties back in Scotland and left her whole family behind. Now here she was, thanks to one psychopath, completely reliant on a man she hardly knew, god, she was even living in his house. She hated being a burden on anybody - and she was sure she was taking a toll on Erin - but she just couldn’t go back to their house yet, not while the cops were still hanging around trying to collect some sort of evidence that might have been left behind by her attacker four days ago.

For Matt, though, this was perfect. Sure, he was beyond furious that someone had attacked Hannah, but having her trust in him so quickly and so blindly without any questions asked was perfect because he had her right where he wanted her and he hadn’t actually had to do any of the work to get her there. With her living in his house, he could watch her every move even the two nights that she hadn’t slept in his bed, choosing to sleep in the spare bedroom instead because there were hidden cameras he used to watch her, making sure she was really in there sleeping. He had installed and activated Jimmy’s tracking system onto her phone so that he could even monitor what she was doing digitally. Hannah might not know it yet, but she’s his. She belongs to Matt, and they will be together soon enough. He wasn’t going to let anybody take her from him.

~~~~

Today, Hannah decided that she needed some fresh air and time alone to think some things over. Erin was out running her own errands for the day, so Hannah decided to change into her workout clothes and head out for a run down to the beach from Matt’s house. The route was beautiful, short and peaceful that she was sure she could handle it alone and feel safe enough.

At first, Matt didn’t have a problem with it because he knew that he could make sure she was okay from the comfort of his office chair. However, his attitude about the situation changed when he saw just what she was going out wearing - her outfit consisted of a sports bra that made her chest look amazing and showed off her toned stomach, and she paired it with a short pair of shorts that made her legs look ten miles long. She looked fucking gorgeous, especially since her pale Scottish skin was fanning up nicely, but there was no way he could just let her go out dressed like that without him around. Luckily, he caught her just before she could escape out of the front door.

“Why don’t I get changed real quick and come with you?” He suggested calmly, not letting her know that he was mentally freaking out over the thought of her leaving alone. She turned to look at him when he spoke, pulling her AirPods from her pocket to put them in her ears.

“Thanks, Matt, but I’ll be okay. I just kinda need the time alone, y’know? I’ll be back in an hour, and I promise to call if I have a freak out, again.” She told him easily with a sweet smile before slipping out the door with a wave to him over her shoulder.

Matt stepped out onto the front step and watched her go until she was completely out of sight, and then he went back inside to the ground floor of the house where the open office was that he shared with Jimmy and Zack. Zack, was out god knows where doing god knows what right now but Jimmy was still in the office drinking his awful black coffee to nurse his headache - see, Jimmy was in the habit of staying up all night working, falling asleep for two to three hours in his chair and then waking up when the sun came up again. It didn’t matter if it was related to the work they were doing on the girls or if he was writing music for their actual job, he was always working.

“Where’s Hannah?” Jimmy asked Matt, peering at him over his ridiculously huge coffee mug, the steam from the beverage steaming up his glasses.

“She decided to go for a run.” Matt scoffed dryly, sitting down heavily at his own desk, booting up his computer.

Once the programme was running, Matt was able to see everything on his screen that was happening on Hannah’s phone. He could see her location, her battery percentage, emails, call logs, text messages, app data and social media activity. He could even see what music she was listening to, and it made him a little proud when he saw that she was shuffling through their City of Evil album, listening to every song in its entirety. For the hour that Hannah was gone, Matt monitored her location, making sure she was in fact running on the beach, and he smiled warmly to himself when he saw the beautiful pictures she took of the pier, the water and some adorable dogs sharing a dropped ice cream cone together. Just as she was coming back, though, Jimmy and Matt were called up to the living room by Zack who was comforting a very shaken and shocked Erin.

When Hannah got back to the house, Matt caught her at the front door again as she was kicking off her shoes. He wanted to warn her about what had happened to Erin and prepare her so that she didn’t go into some sort of shock and have an episode when she saw the state Erin was in.

“She needs me.” Was all Hannah said as she brushed past Matt to go into the living room and get to Erin.

When she saw her, Hannah sat beside her, hugging her close and soothingly rubbed her arms to gently calm her down and then looked up at Zack.

“Zack, run upstairs, and in bed blue bag there are some sleeping pills. Grab one and get a glass of water.”

Zack nodded once and followed Hannah’s order without question or argument. Erin leaned heavily against Hannah, seeking more of her comforting embrace.

“Do you think this could be related to the attack on me?” Hannah asked Matt, her voice giving away how worried she really was.

“Seems likely.” Matt sighed, running a large hand over his face. “I doubt this has just been a coincidence within a week of someone trying to kill you.”

”It could have been the same guy.” Hannah thought aloud.

“No..” Matt shook his head. “Things like this usually require more than one person.”

Hannah frowned at that statement and gave Matt an odd look. Surely he must have seen one too many action movies.

“How would you know that?” She asked after a moment of silence passed between them.

Matt’s eyes widened slightly when he realised that he had slipped up without thinking about what he had been saying. Thankfully, Zack came back into the room right then and sat back down beside Erin and offered to take her upstairs to bed so that she could sleep. Erin agreed and Zack carried her upstairs, leaving Hannah and Matt alone.

The two of them stayed in the living room, talking quietly between themselves but it didn’t last long before Zack was frantically shouting for Hannah to get up there and help him. With her heart in her throat, Hannah jumped up and sprinted upstairs to find out what was going on, Matt was right behind her.

~~~~

Hannah

When I got into the bedroom and saw Erin convulsing violently on the bed, I didn’t have time to panic so I jumped into action and removed the sheets from over her body, laid her flat on the mattress without any pillows behind her head and put her safely into the recovery position so she wouldn’t choke. I knew that she was having a seizure but I didn’t know how or why. She wasn’t prone to having them, because if she was then I would have known about it and she would be on medication to manage it.

“What did you give her?” I demanded to know, a growl in my voice as I glared at Zack over my shoulder. He struggled with his words for a moment and glanced back at Matt who was standing in the doorway on the phone to the 911 operator.

“She- I... I gave her a sleeping pill from the blue bag like you told me to!” He insisted, handing over the orange pill bottle that contained her sleeping pills.

I opened up the bottle and tipped one pill out into the palm of my hand once E had stopped convulsing. The first thing I noticed was that the pill looked different but not too different. As far as I knew, she hadn’t changed her meds recently so it seemed weird to me.

“These aren’t her sleeping pills.” I told him, turning the bottle over to check the label. “According to this, though, they should be. Did someone fuck with this?” I asked.

“Let me see that.” Matt spoke up, stepping into the room with his hand held out for the pill, his other hand still holding the phone to his ear.

I turned my attention back to Erin once Matt had the pill, making sure that her pulse was steady and that she was still breathing fine. Her pulse was a little fast and her breathing was shallow but it wasn’t too worrying just yet. Behind me, I could hear Matt descriving the pill to the operator but I wasn’t really listening. Sighing softly, I pushed some of the hair back out of Erin’s face as the sound of sirens coming down the street filled the house

“You’re going to be alright, E.” I whispered to her although she couldn’t hear me while she was unconscious. “I’m not going to leave you.”

~~~~

I rode in the ambulance with Erin, while Matt, Jimmy and Zack followed in one of their trucks. Once we were in the hospital, Erin was taken away to have her stomach pumped and I was left behind with the guys in the waiting room, so I paced. Brian and Johnny both turned up while we were waiting on any news on Erin. I couldn’t help but notice how drained Brian looked, he must have things going on because he wasn’t around as much as I had expected him to be, not as much as the others were.

It took just over an hour for a doctor to come out and talk to us all about Erin. Luckily, she was stable and resting but she would remain under observation for the rest of the night. They had taken a blood sample from her for testing so that they could find out exactly what drug she had taken by mistake. Of course, I wanted to stay with her but since I wasn’t technically family theycmade me leave with the band, but the doctor assured me that she wouldn’t be awake until morning anyway.

I managed to keep my emotions in check the whole ride back to the house, but once I was in the privacy of Matt’s bedroom a sob ripped suddenly and without warning from my throat, and I dropped down to sit on the edge of Matt’s bed with both of my hands over my face so that I could cry into them. In a split second, Matt was sitting next to me, pulling me into his side and rubbing my back soothingly. He didn’t say anything because there was nothing to say - he just held me and let me cry until I couldn’t cry anymore. When I was done, I used my sweatshirt sleeves to dry the tear tracks from my face and tried to pull myself together.

“Why is this happening?” I asked Matt rhetorically. “What have we ever done to anybody to warrant them trying to kill us both?”

Matt presses a chaste kiss to my temple and said nothing for a few moments.

“I can keep you safe.” He eventually said. “If you trust me, I won’t let anything bad happen to you.” His voice was rough, low and... dark.

I pulled back jut enough to look into his eyes and when I saw the sincerity in them, I leaned forward and sealed my lips over his in a kiss. He hesitated, and I was about to pull away and apologise but before I could his hand came to my waist and he started to kiss me back. It started slow and gentle but eventually it started to build and our lips moved together with more urgency and more want. My lips parted just enough to give his tongue access into my mouth, but as I moved to straddle him he broke the kiss suddenly and stood so quickly I almost fell off of the bed. He pressed the tips of his fingers to his kiss-swollen lips and took another step back from me.

“I’m sorry-“ he sighed. “I can’t - not... not tonight. Not now.”

I frowned up at him, my stomach twisting in unpleasant knots as my anxiety started to take control.

“What?” I choked, my throat tightening. “Why not?”

“It would be taking advantage.” He answered quickly, like it was blatantly obvious. “You’re upset after everything today, you should sleep.” He reasoned.

“Taking advantage?” I scoffed, still nervous and freaked out about him currently rejecting me. “I’m giving you the advantage. Enjoy!”

When the look on his face morphed from shock into something resembling pity and sympathy, I felt sick. Of course he wasn’t actually into me. All of this was just a sympathy act, because he was stuck with me after accidentally being the one to save my life. I let out a dry, weak laugh and moved to the door.

“Hannah, wait-“ Matt said quickly just as I pulled the door open.

“No.” I said with a shake of my head. “It’s fine, okay? I’ll sleep in the other room and be out of your hair in the morning.”

I walked out without another word and without waiting for him to respond. I walked down the hallway to the spare bedroom that was set up for me, and only once I was alone in there with the door locked behind me did I let myself cry again. There was just something I didn’t understand... Matt was just a friend. I didn’t have feelings for him, no stupid crush just an admiration that any fan of anybody had, right? But if that were true, then I wouldn’t be so heartbroken about this whole thing.

Notes