I put my phone back to my ear. “Lila, Jaxon’s missing,” I say, summarizing the information for her. “Or maybe locked in his dressing room—it’s unclear.”
The line is silent for a moment.
“How? Where could he have gone?” she asks, putting voice to the same questions we’re all thinking.
“I don’t know. That’s what I need you to tell me. We had eyes on the hallway,” I say quickly, my thoughts racing as I try to match Carter’s pace down the long hallway. “Mitchell Security has multiple CPOs stationed around the dressing room. Find out where he went.” I pause before hanging up. “Oh! and I need a key to open that door. Get someone from the venue down there now, but don’t say why. And message Jaxon’s team to update their standard rider—his security needs the key to his door every place, every time.”
Carter and I continue to navigate the hallways full of people. Jaxon takes the stage in a little more than thirty minutes, so the majority of the crowd is on their way to their seats now.
My adrenaline is flooding my veins, my feet wanting to run when my mind knows we can’t create a scene.
“The stadium team is bringing the key to the dressing room. They’ll be there in five,” Lila says.
“Don’t forget about Bennie, Lila. My gut tells me she’s involved somehow.”
Chapter thirty-seven
Carter
KelseyandIturnthe corner to the hallway leading to Jaxon’s dressing room when her phone rings again. She puts a headphone in her left ear, the one without the comms in.
“We’re just about to the room. What have you got?” Kelsey says as she answers, her strides never faltering.
She mouthsLilato me as she listens to the answer.
“Are you sure?” she asks.
Her face tightens slightly.
“They think Bennie is in there with Jaxon,” she says to me, her pace increasing.
“What?” I ask. “How is that possible?”
“Don’t know yet. But that’s their best guess at this point,” she answers me before returning to her conversation with Lila. “What, Lila? Okay. Well, we’re here. Stay on with me.”
Kelsey and I stop a few paces from the door to the dressing room where Weston and Nash stand with a short woman with frizzy brown hair wearing a polo with the arena’s logo.
“Any update?” I ask Weston quietly.
“No movement,” Weston answers, his eyes betraying the regret and embarrassment he must feel for this happening on his watch. It’s the same look I’ve seen in Kelsey’s eyes since Australia.
“Well, let’s get this door open,” I say to the lady with a smile. “I’ll take the key.”
“I’m supposed to keep it on me at all times,” she says hesitantly.
Kelsey offers her a winning smile. “Not to worry, Deidra. We have permission from Nick to keep it until after the show. I promise I’ll meet up with you as soon as Jaxon is back in his room tonight.”
“I don’t…” the woman, whose name is apparently Deidra—though I have no idea how Kelsey knew that—starts, but I can tell Kelsey casually dropping her name and Nick’s—the head of operations for the arena—has shaken what little confidence she had to begin with.
“Thank you,” Kelsey says, holding out her hand, the smile still firmly on her face.
Deidra tentatively hands over the key and, after an awkward moment with everyone staring at her, turns and walks quickly down the hallway.
“We’ll go in on three,” Weston says to Nash.
“No,” Kelsey says, her voice quiet and her fist wrapped around the key. “Carter and me only. There’s a chance no one is even in there, but if it is Bennie, we can’t risk sending in a bunch of men.”
“What?” Nash asks, voicing the confusionI’m feeling.
