The Siren by KATHERINE JOHN (general ebook reader .txt) 📕

throw the damn phone in the sea and never answer it again. But I couldn’t do that. Look at me. I was already distracted by this man beyond repair.

“You need to get that?” he asked, his breath hot on my neck.

I sighed, reluctantly reaching for my back pocket. “Yeah.”

He smiled at my hesitation. “I’m not going anywhere.”

The display showed it was Kara, the script supervisor. What could she want at this hour? “Hi, Kara,” I answered.

“Taylor?”

“Yeah?”

“It’s Stella. She’s super wasted, I think.” Her voice sounded distraught. “I found her slumped against the wall by the bathrooms and dragged her outside. I don’t know what to do.”

“Where are you?” I asked.

“By the bench on the beach side of the restaurant.”

“I’ll be right there.”

I hung up the phone and put it back in my pocket. “We gotta go back,” I said regretfully. “Stella’s apparently trashed.”

“She seemed fine last time I saw her,” he said as we tromped out of the water and toward the path leading back to the restaurant. “But that was probably an hour ago.”

“She has issues with substances,” I said. “So…who knows.”

He led me by the hand through the trees and back to the ironshore beach. We hurried across the sand to the restaurant, where Kara sat next to Stella’s slumped form on the bench.

“What happened to her?” Rick asked as we approached, sliding in next to Stella and slipping his arm around her to sit her up. She wasn’t quite unconscious, but her head lolled at an odd angle and she couldn’t keep her eyes open.

“I don’t know,” Kara said. “I found her like this. I brought her out here because I figured she could use some fresh air.”

“Thank you,” I said, impressed that birdlike Kara had managed to carry Stella out here on her own. “Where’s Felicity?”

“Not sure. I think I saw her leave with Jackson. That’s why I called you.”

I assessed Stella. “Could she have hit her head or something?”

Stella’s eyes fluttered as Rick inspected her head. “She doesn’t have any marks,” he said. She didn’t resist as he pulled back each eyelid, turning her face to the light. “Her pupils look normal. What was she drinking?”

“Gin, I think,” I said. “She takes pills too. Maybe it’s the way they mixed with the alcohol?”

“We should probably make her throw up if we can,” Rick said.

“Not here,” I said, checking over my shoulder to make sure Madison wasn’t lurking in the shadows with her cell phone. “She’ll be mortified if anyone sees her like this.”

Rick scooped her up easily and carried her away from the hubbub of the restaurant, past the benches and onto the shadowy beach. I called Felicity. She answered on the first ring. “Taylor. What’s up?”

“Where are you?”

“In the port.”

Thank God this island was so small. “Can you come to the beach on the other side of the jetty? Stella’s really wasted.”

I waved from the pathway to the beach when Felicity came running around the front of the building two minutes later with Jackson hot on her heels. “Sorry. She was fine when I left her.” She dropped to her knees next to Stella. “Where’s her bag?”

Kara handed Felicity Stella’s purse, and Felicity rifled through it, extracting a little blue pouch. She unzipped the pouch and removed four different-colored pill holders, carefully counting the pills in each.

“She hasn’t taken any extra pills,” Felicity said. “And her regular medication shouldn’t interact this badly with alcohol.”

“This badly?” I asked.

Felicity sat in the sand next to Stella, who rested her head in her lap. “I do my best to moderate, but she drinks. Often heavily, on more pills than she’s on right now. And she doesn’t become this incoherent. She’s got a tolerance like a horse.”

“How many drinks did she have tonight?” Rick asked.

“One, as far as I know, and a shot of tequila,” Felicity replied.

“Who gave her the drink?” Jackson asked.

“Cole,” I said.

Rick raised his brows, and we all exchanged a weighted glance.

“Dear old Dad,” Jackson said bitterly. “I wouldn’t put it past him.”

“But why?” I asked.

Felicity looked up at me. “Same reason he said that shit to you tonight.”

“To flex his power.” Jackson clenched his jaw. “It’s mind games. He’s played them with me my entire life.”

“Shit,” Kara breathed. “I mean, I knew he was a dick, but…wow.”

“I should never have taken his money,” Jackson muttered. “Maybe I should pull the plug on this thing.”

“Don’t make any decisions tonight,” Felicity said.

“She’s right,” I agreed. “And talk to Stella first. Maybe she remembers something or has different ideas about what happened. This is all just conjecture right now.”

I talked a good line, but the memory of my own inexplicable blackout with Cole had reared its ugly head. Had I not overindulged that evening at all but been drugged by my boss? And if he’d drugged me, what else had he done to me? I desperately wanted to dismiss the idea, but the jack had popped out of the box.

Part IV:Advisory

Felicity

Eighteen Months Ago

Beyond a guarded, unmarked door in a dead-end alley a stone’s throw from the tourists and junkies that trample the stars of Hollywood Boulevard, the walls of the dimly lit club shudder with throbbing bass. The beat reverberates through my platform stilettos and up my legs under my black leather minidress, where it quivers beneath my skin in sync with the pounding of my heart. The vibration shakes loose my thoughts, rattling them around in my head until they’re as soft as powdered sugar; a trip to the dance floor melts them into sweet perspiration on my glistening skin.

I don’t need to work at the Ninth Circle. My mother’s lump of cash has only grown with wise investments in crypto.

But I can lose myself here.

The darkness and the drums negate the need for idle chitchat, and combined with the drugs and alcohol, allow a loosening of inhibition that compels authenticity. This is the place where the id comes to play.

I sling bottles of alcohol at more than ten times the price you’d pay in