Haunted

This Can't Be Real

For once I am grateful for paperwork. After that talk show, an opening up about Aurora, the monotony of paperwork was a welcome distraction. As I finished another taxing form and placed it in the complete pile, my office door opened and in walked Tyler and our mother. Confusion wracked my brain, and I looked at Tyler.

"I don't know man, she just grabbed me up out of my office and brought me here." he answered my look with a shrug.

"Sit down," Mom said to Tyler, then she looked at me. "Actually, make sure your brother stays in that chair."

Tyler wasn't going to argue with the death tone Mom was using so he walked out and put his hands on my shoulders and pushed down just enough so I could feel the pressure.

Mom sat down in the chair across from me and took my hands. "What I'm going to tell you there is no easy way to say it, so I'm just going to say it… Aurora's parents are being released from prison."

"What was that?" I asked as I felt the rage slowly creep into my bones. "One of the jurors received a bride. They are launching an investigation, and once it's finished, they will be releasing them."

My blood instantly started to boil. I tried to surge out of the chair, but Tyler held me firmly in place.

"Sweetie, please calm down."

"Calm down?!" I shouted. "You're seriously telling me to calm down after those mother fuckers beat her almost every day for years?! You're telling me to calm down after she died in my arms and they get to walk free! That's not going to happen."

"Son, I promise, I'm going to do everything I can to keep them locked up, but my hands are pretty tied. I just wanted to be the one to tell you. I didn't want you to find out through the news."

I struggled to calm myself down, but all I kept seeing was Aurora choking on her blood, her eyes filled with pain.

Once I finally managed to shake the image of her out of my head, my body felt heavy with rage. I wanted their blood, but death would be a way out compared to the hell I have planned for them. Just like with Aurora, I always have a plan B. All I have to do is wait, and there are plenty of things that I can waste time on.

***

It's been a week since I told Katie my real identity and every day since then has been very busy. During the day I work my regular hours at the coffee shop, and I spend most of my nights trying to find a way to get a hold of Axel. I knew this was going to be difficult, but I didn't think it would be this damn hard. He is a f*****g celebrity now. He has a s**t ton of fans, who probably bombard him with fan mail. It could take years if at all for anything thing I send him via email, message, or through the actual mail for anything of mine to reach him if he does happen to go through it all.

As I was nose deep in yet another tabloid, hoping and praying that I would find just one clue as to where Axel might be, Katie comes barging into the room.

"I think I figured it out." she screeched jumping up and down with her tablet in her hands.

I dropped the tabloid and raised my head to look at her. "Please let this work because I have no f*****g clue."

"Did you know that Heavens' Forsaken is having a concert at a club downtown?"

"When?" I asked as my heart tried to beat itself out of my chest.

"Tonight at eight. I already got tickets and directions."

I let out a sigh and sank into the couch. "I have a shot; now I have to sneak backstage."

"Well we got two hours to figure that out, so I'm going home to change and get ready," she said as she grabbed her bag and headed for the door.

"Okay, when you're ready, come back and pick me up. I'm gonna take a shower and change."

"Okay, see ya in a few girlie."

Katie unlocked the door and left. I got up and locked the door and went into the bathroom and turned on the water.

After undressing and stepping into the stream, I could feel my mind slipping into old memories, and for once I let them.

The dark sky hung above me. Every star seemed to be shining, and the pain that I was in was pretty mild compared to the normal. A sigh echoed through the air beside me, so I turned my head to look at him.

"It's a beautiful night," Axel said. A slight smile rested on his face.

I rolled onto my side slightly wincing from my bruised ribs. Yeah, it is, I wish it were always like this.

"Well… maybe one day it can be," he answered. I could hear a slight pitch change in his voice, something that only happened when he was nervous, which is a rare thing.

"What's that supposed to mean?" I asked with a chuckle. "You know I hate it when you go all cryptic on me."

A shaky breath escapes him, and with a sharp move, he rolled onto his side to face me.

"Okay, here it goes… Aurora I have spent almost every night with you in the six months that we have known each other, and I noticed that after every second I spend with you make me want to spend another and another. So… I was thinking and hoping that maybe you felt the same way and if you did then maybe… maybe… you would want to be my girlfriend?"

I smiled and stepped out of the shower. The look on Axel's face when I said that I would love that made the dark sky seem like the sun was shining. That moment and our first kiss were the only times I have ever seen that man shy.

Going into my closet, I pulled on a nice pair of jeans, a simple top, and the tennis shoes that I would usually wear for work and I shoved my wallet into my back pocket and made sure that the choker was secure around my neck.

I was putting my jacket on just as I heard a knock and Katie call from the other side of the door. I opened the door and stepped out of my apartment to a confused looking Katie.

"You do know we are going to a club right?" she asked.

I looked at her in her black minidress and high heels and shook my head. "Katie hun, we may be going to a club, but it is a Heavens' Forsaken concert that just so happens to be at a club. Plus I have to sneak backstage can't exactly do that in high heels."

"Okay, you may have a point there. Are you ready then?"

I turned around and locked the door. "As ready as I'll ever be."

We got into Katie's car, and she drove to the club. She asked a few times what the plan was, but the only thing I could think to say was that I don't know I have to see what I'm dealing with first. Once we got there, I thanked my lucky stars that Axel had a thing for performing in places that usually didn't get a lot of business. He liked to help struggling business out by giving them promotion in a way. The area was relatively small, and it was packed. I grabbed Katie and pulled her through the crowd. Then the place went dark, and everyone started screaming.

I looked back and made sure I had a good hold on Katie because s**t was about to get real. Just as I predicted the crowd surged forward the moment Axel stepped on stage and started singing. The commotion was the perfect distraction. I helped Katie zigzag through the crowd till we were next to the right wall close to the backstage entrance of the stage.

"What are you doing?" Katie screamed over the music. "Why didn't you go up to the front of the stage?"

"Katie he thinks I'm dead," I screamed back. "He's gonna freak out, and I don't really wanna make my reappearance to the world this close to my would-be murders getting out of prison."

"Once again another good point," she screamed back. "Damn, you're good at this."

"Yeah, who knew?" I said laughing my first real laugh in a long time.

The concert when on for almost two hours before they head off backstage and the crowd started to disperse.

"Okay, Katie you see that guard right there, the one that is standing in front of that hallway?"

"Yeah,"

"I need you to distract him. Get him away from that hallway just for a few seconds or even better minutes, so I can sneak down there and find the dressing room."

"Roger that,"

Katie sauntered off, and I was incredibly grateful for her choice of clothes as she very quickly got the guard away from the hall as she pretended to stumble on her heels and fall. I slid around the corner into the hallway and listened for any sound that would give it away. I started to shake and worries began to fill my head and just when I started to hyperventilate I heard Tyler's booming laughing coming from a door on my right.

I heard a security guard shout so I ran as fast and as hard as I could into the door with my shoulder, and surprisingly the door opened, and I came face to face with an extremely surprised Tyler. The security guard grabbed me and was about to pull me away when Tyler came to his senses.

"Wait, it's okay let her go." Tyler piped up. His voice in awe and shock.

"You sure?" the guard asked.

Tyler nodded. Without another word the guard turned and left shutting the door behind him.

Tyler backed up and sank into one of the couches and just continued to stare at me.

"Ty, I know you're confused. I promise I will explain everything but first I need to find-,"

A glass shattered off to my right. "This is a f*****g sick joke. Her parents sent you didn't they?"

I turned my head toward Axel's booming volcanic voice. He was beyond livid. His eyes were glowing in a way I had never seen before. The muscles in his arms were tight same with his neck and the only emotion on his face was untainted rage.

"Axel, it's me," I said. I really should have thought farther ahead but I never thought he would be pissed, scratch that, demonically pissed.

"Bullshit!"

"Give me a chance to prove it."

He looked at me, his nostrils flared, and he smirked. And hell if that wasn't the sexiest s***h deadliest smirk, I have ever seen.

"Alright, you've got five minutes. After that, I'm having your ass arrested."

I nodded reached up and took off the choker. Axel's eyes widened a fraction, but the doubt still lingered in his eyes.

"Not enough sweetheart, it's common knowledge that her throat was cut."

Fuck! Okay, Aurora think....wait….the song.

I swallowed some saliva and took a breath.

Wounded Angel,

Please don't leave me alone.

Stay by my side

Be my guiding light

Wounded Angel,

You came and set me free

Wounded Angel,

Please come back to me.

"No f*****g way!" Tyler boomed next to me causing me to jump.

"Dammit Tyler, I'm scared enough for f**k's sake!" I shouted at him.

By the time I turned back to Axel he was standing in front of me. There were tears in his eyes. "I don't understand. I saw you die."

"And on that note," Tyler chimed in. "Come on idiots,"

"What, come on, it was getting good." A voice answered from behind me.

"She the girl he was talking about this morning. I am so f*****g confused." another chimed in.

"Yeah well imagine how Axel feels," Tyler replied as he ushered the other two bandmates of the door and then closing it behind him.

That's when it hit me. For the first time in ten long years, I am face to face with Axel Roman.

"I lost a lot of blood, but they managed to keep me alive once they got me into the air. Barely. I woke up two years later in a hospital with a new name and a new life. I never had a choice, Axel. Since my parents are high profile, they needed to make it look like I was dead to get a conviction and since I was in a coma, they took that choice away from me. When I woke up, they told me that you believed I had died and you were experiencing extreme forms of PTSD and that I had to stay away from you. So they moved me all the way out to New York and gave me a minimum wage job that was enough to live off of and to keep me in place. I never wanted to leave you Axel-,"

"Nightingale, stop, you're rambling."

I started to sob hearing my old nickname again, and I started full on wailing when he pulled me into his arms.

"This can't be real."

"Well it is Rockstar, or at least it better be, because if I wake up tomorrow in my shitty ass apartment, I'm hunting down my parents and putting a bullet in their heads."

Axel pulled back a little and looked at me with a raised eyebrow. "Wanna run that by me again?"

"You heard me. I want the life I should have had, and if I can't have it, then I'm taking those two bastards to hell with me."

"And what life should you have had Aurora?" he asked. I could hear the seriousness in his voice, and that's when I realized he was still testing me. So I smiled. Reached up and stood on my tip toes clasping my hands behind his neck and I brought his forehead to mine.

"Nights with you under the stars."

Suddenly his hands were wrapped in my hair, and his mouth came crashing down on mine, and I groaned as everything about him overwhelmed me.

"It's really you." he choked out with tears streaming out of his eyes.

"That's right Rockstar; your Nightingale finally found her way home."