Preying Eyes Chapter 7
Apr. 1st, 2017 05:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
asphaltcowgrrlTitle: Preying Eyes Chapter 7
Fandom:
Pairing: Adrien Lupei/Elliot Deacon
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 2,396
Summary: Adrien tells his story to Elliot
Author’s Note: I was going to add to this but decided what was coming next would be better suited to its own chapter. This takes a bit of a dark turn, but lightens up at the end. Also, I wrote 99.9% of this in one shot during the word wars this morning. If anything is off or doesn't make any sense (even after editing), please let me know.
Continued from here.
Turning his head to the front of the house, he wondered who Austin was entertaining here in his little hideaway in the backwoods of Tennessee. It hadn’t taken much to find the cozy apartment he kept in downtown Music City, hell, that had been a no-brainer, actually. Two thirds of the scene had a part-time apartment in that particular building. But this, Austin’s real home, had been much harder. The musician had done an excellent job picking the most out of the way town he could find that was still close enough to Nashville to be convenient. And then he’d purchased it under an alias as well. It had taken him sixteen months to figure out where Austin went when he left the city, when he wasn’t touring the country.
It was getting harder and harder to keep his cool. Those blue eyes, they drew him in, holding him hostage until he felt like he’d never be free again. The sound of Austin’s voice made his insides tremble, quaking with need. God, how he wanted to touch that caramel skin, feel it sliding beneath his fingers as the knife split the muscle beneath.
No.
He couldn’t start thinking like that yet because he wasn’t even close to obtaining his target. That son of a bitch kept slipping through his fingers, always at the wrong place at the wrong time. Eventually, however, Austin wouldn’t be so lucky, and then he could finally pay the lying bastard back for all the pain he’d caused. All the heartache he’d forced others to suffer. With interest, even.
Yeah, Austin Ricci’s reign as super hunk was about to come to an end. A very bloody, a very gruesome, end if he had anything to say about it. Oh, and had he mentioned that he had everything to say in this matter? Because he did. He was in control this time.
Eyes locked on the picture window looking into the living room, he saw an unfamiliar figure leaning down to plant a kiss on Austin’s mouth. It wasn’t that freak Jackson, either, because he knew that idiot’s silhouette and movements. No, this was someone new, someone he’d never seen before and that concerned him. It looked like he was going to have to put his revenge on the back burner for the moment until he did a little research. Boyfriends made for very good collateral in his experience.
**
“So, tell me about what’s been going on,” Elliot said, leaning back into the plush couch. He had one leg folded up on the cushion, the other flat on the floor.
Adrien studied Elliot’s handsome face, looking for any sign that he was only being polite. It had happened with more than a few of his so-called friends since he first discovered he’d had a stalker. They’d sit and listen quietly and, as soon as he’d complete his tale, they’d stand and excuse themselves, citing a previous engagement or another annoyingly obvious ploy to get the hell out of his presence. Or worse, they’d smile in that patronizing way that people older and supposedly wiser always did when they thought you were going overboard. Then, they’d pat his arm and tell him not to get ahead of himself, that he was exaggerating.
Right, because beheading a defenseless teddy bear was normal behavior.
“I’m not sure where to start,” Adrien said, pulling both of his long legs onto the couch, hugging his knees to his chest.
“Try the beginning, when did you first begin to think something out of the ordinary was happening?”
“The first incident was somewhere around three, almost four years ago. I’d been hosting an awards show in Nashville and, when I returned to my dressing room for an outfit change, the entire room had been tossed. I hadn’t had much of my own in there, everything had been provided by the awards association, but seeing the clothes torn off the racks and tossed onto the floor had frightened me. There had been a message scrawled across the mirror, too, and that was what scared me the most.”
“I think I remember hearing about this,” Elliot said, leaning closer so that he could put a hand on Adrien’s foot, offering what little comfort he had. “I was working in Nashville at the time and word of something crazy with a celebrity spreads quickly.”
“That’s an understatement,” Adrien laughed. When it came to someone with a level of fame like his own, gossip spread like wildfire even amongst law enforcement. “What did the message on the mirror say?”
Adrien shuddered. “Love, your biggest fan.”
“Someone was having an Annie Wilkes moment,” Elliot chuckled.
“Creepy as hell, isn’t it?” Adrien appreciated his effort to lighten the mood. His reference to one of Adrien’s favorite novels, Misery, only made him like the guy more, if that were even possible at this point. “Man, I’ve read about crazy fans going the extra mile for a celebrity, both in reality and in fiction, but I never thought it’d happen to me.”
“What happened after,” Elliot asked, in full-blown detective mode now. “Were the authorities called in?”
Nodding, Adrien loosened the death grip he had on his knees. “There is always both security and Nashville police on scene for an event like this.”
“Right,” Elliot said, understanding. “With that many celebrities and all that goes along with them, you need security on top of security.”
“I was shuffled into another room to change while they sorted through mine. It was determined that some overzealous fan had gotten backstage and came looking for something of mine to take home as a souvenir.”
“And that’s it?” Elliot’s face was twisted into a mask of anger and outrage. “No one looked any farther into it?”
Adrien shook his head. “Nope, nothing was stolen as I hadn’t left anything in there to be taken. Also, I had no reason to believe at the time that anyone was out to get me either.”
“You were wrong, weren’t you?”
Oh, he’d been more than wrong. “Yeah. At first, I didn’t think much of it. Things went missing. Little things like the paperback I’d brought into the hotel to read. My toothbrush. Nothing that couldn’t be explained by reminding myself I often went for more than forty-eight hours without any semblance of quality sleep.”
Elliot narrowed his eyes at Adrien. “Why do you go so long without sleep? You can’t perform at your best if you’re not rested.”
“I know,” Adrien sighed, waving it away with the brush of his hand. His mother and Bella both regularly reminded him of exactly that. “My shows run late, often not starting until nine o’clock. I meet with fans and radio personnel after that sometimes, although I try and keep all of that to before. The band likes to go out, have a late dinner afterwards as well. I’m usually not getting back to my hotel until one AM or later.”
“Why don’t you sleep in?” Elliot made a face, one that made Adrien wonder what the detective was thinking.
“My manager sets up interviews for the next city so that I can start stirring up interest. I’m typically back up by six o’clock and am on the phone by six-thirty.”
“It sounds exhausting,” Elliot said.
“It can be,” Adrien agreed. “I’ve been trying to come home as much as I can between shows, although it doesn’t always work out.”
Elliot nodded. “You sleep better in your own bed.”
“Yes,” Adrien agreed. “And honestly, I feel safer here than I do in even the most secure hotels.”
“Home should always be safe,” Elliot said. “So, when did you realize that you had a problem?”
“It was almost six months later, I was out having lunch with Ritchie – he’s my guitarist and we’ve known each other forever – when I realized I didn’t have my wallet. Although Ritchie didn’t have any problems picking up the check, I felt guilty. So, before we went out exploring the city, I suggested we go back up to my room to get it.”
“You were dining at the hotel?”
“Yes,” he said. “We tend to frequent hotel cafés because they are convenient and ordinarily are pretty good. Anyway,” Adrien sighed, looking down at his feet. “My room was trashed when we got back to it.”
“Explain,” Elliot said. “Give me as many details as you’re comfortable with so I can have a complete picture of what this psycho is doing. Stop if you start to feel uncomfortable, though. I’m not trying to upset you.”
Adrien smiled. “Thanks, and I’ve been over this so many times that I can usually get through it without a hitch. It’s later, when I’m alone, that it all comes apart at the seams.”
“I guess that means we have to make sure you aren’t alone later, right?”
Adrien’s head whipped up. “What?”
Laughing, Elliot took Adrien’s hand in his and gave it a reassuring squeeze. “We’ll talk about that later. First, tell me about your room that afternoon.”
It took Adrien a moment to drag his thoughts away from the possibility that Elliot had suggested they spend the night together and refocus on the day his world fell apart. “There were flower petals all over the floor. But not fresh flowers. These were dead and wilted, brown and dry and brittle and they were everywhere. A bouquet of dead roses were in the center of my bed, a black ribbon tying them together like some morbid Halloween decoration.” He scrunched up his nose, remembering the smell of decaying flowers filling his nostrils. “The thing that bothered me the most, and this is probably ridiculous, but it’s true –”
“The things that scare us are often seen as silly or dumb by those who don’t know our histories,” Elliot said. “I’ve also spoken to enough psychologists over the years to understand that the object of our fear isn’t usually the catalyst for that panic we feel – it’s only a representative of something real and terrifying.”
“That makes sense,” Adrien thought. “Especially if the fear is coming from a repressed memory. You might not remember the horrifying event, but you might recall an object or something from that moment.”
“Exactly,” Elliot said.
Finally, someone who might actually understand, he thought. “The thing that bothered me the most was that on either side of the flowers was a dismembered stuffed animal. That first time it was a teddy bear, a brown one with a white belly. Its head had been torn from its body, stuffing and broken thread trailing from both pieces of the bear.”
“Someone suggested that the bear shouldn’t have bothered you?” Adrien nodded, wrapping his arms tight around himself. “That’s ridiculous. I’ve seen an actual decapitated body and I have to say, the sight of a violently dismembered stuffed animal is equally upsetting. Especially when it’s taken in that particular context. Now, if you find it on the floor near the dog’s bed, it’s not so bad because you know that the dog doesn’t know any better. But when an unknown subject has torn a child’s toy apart and left it surrounded by other dead objects? That’s fucking threatening as hell.”
Adrien felt the tension melt from his shoulders. “One of the officers on the scene rolled his eyes at me and said ‘it’s just a stuffed animal, calm down’. I was young and he thought I was overreacting. It ticked me off.”
“It should have pissed you off, he knows better than to treat a victim that way,” Elliot snarled. “Where was this?”
“New York,” he said. “I’m sure he’d seen much worse than a raggedy bear on a bed with some wilted flowers.”
“Not the point,” Elliot reminded him. “Anything else?”
“Yeah, there was a message on the bathroom mirror. That, along with the flowers and dissected stuffies, have become this guy’s signature. They’d written soon you will be mine forever on the mirror in red marker. The detective working the case said he thought it was an obsessed fan who wanted to be my lover, but I’m terrified that this person’s intentions weren’t all that pure.”
“From the sounds of it, I agree with you,” Elliot said, scooting across the couch until he was close enough to lean against Adrien’s solid frame. “I’m hoping the detective was trying to calm you with that kind of crap information, but you never know. This job can wear you down to the point where you start to not care. Have there been many more instances like this since?”
“There were a couple very similar instances occurring every couple of months. Then suddenly, they stopped. Nothing for close to two years.”
“And then?”
“Then, I walked into my hotel room in Denver.” His body trembled and he allowed Elliot to wrap an arm around him, Elliot’s body heat soothing his frazzled nerves.
“It’s okay,” Elliot said, holding Adrien’s shaking body close to his. He rubbed a hand across the wide expanse of Adrien’s back. “Breathe. You can stop now if you need to, Adrien. I can get the info on the Denver incident myself.”
“No,” Adrien insisted. “I need to finish this. In Denver it – it was like the very first scene all over, right down to the brown teddy bear with the white belly. It was like he wanted me to know he hadn’t forgotten me. There was one last incident in Los Angeles a few weeks ago but…”
“But?” Elliot gave Adrien a warm squeeze of encouragement.
“But I don’t think it’s related. None of this guy’s signatures were present, nothing threatening was left.”
“You honestly think this could have been a curious fan?”
“I do,” he said, giving Elliot a lingering look. “Or, at least, I want to believe. There were flowers, but these were fresh, probably bought that day. And my clothes were strewn everywhere, something that hadn’t happened since the incident in my dressing room.” He shook his head, trying to clear the gathering storm clouds. “Look, how about we share something good?”
“Okay,” Elliot said. “I’ve got enough information from you to start putting together a safety plan for you. Tell me something good.”
“I’m done with my tour and I don’t have anywhere to be for at least six months.”
Elliot grinned. “So, you’re… free?”
“As free as I’ll ever get, Elliot.”
Will continue here.
Fandom:
Pairing: Adrien Lupei/Elliot Deacon
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 2,396
Summary: Adrien tells his story to Elliot
Author’s Note: I was going to add to this but decided what was coming next would be better suited to its own chapter. This takes a bit of a dark turn, but lightens up at the end. Also, I wrote 99.9% of this in one shot during the word wars this morning. If anything is off or doesn't make any sense (even after editing), please let me know.
Continued from here.
Turning his head to the front of the house, he wondered who Austin was entertaining here in his little hideaway in the backwoods of Tennessee. It hadn’t taken much to find the cozy apartment he kept in downtown Music City, hell, that had been a no-brainer, actually. Two thirds of the scene had a part-time apartment in that particular building. But this, Austin’s real home, had been much harder. The musician had done an excellent job picking the most out of the way town he could find that was still close enough to Nashville to be convenient. And then he’d purchased it under an alias as well. It had taken him sixteen months to figure out where Austin went when he left the city, when he wasn’t touring the country.
It was getting harder and harder to keep his cool. Those blue eyes, they drew him in, holding him hostage until he felt like he’d never be free again. The sound of Austin’s voice made his insides tremble, quaking with need. God, how he wanted to touch that caramel skin, feel it sliding beneath his fingers as the knife split the muscle beneath.
No.
He couldn’t start thinking like that yet because he wasn’t even close to obtaining his target. That son of a bitch kept slipping through his fingers, always at the wrong place at the wrong time. Eventually, however, Austin wouldn’t be so lucky, and then he could finally pay the lying bastard back for all the pain he’d caused. All the heartache he’d forced others to suffer. With interest, even.
Yeah, Austin Ricci’s reign as super hunk was about to come to an end. A very bloody, a very gruesome, end if he had anything to say about it. Oh, and had he mentioned that he had everything to say in this matter? Because he did. He was in control this time.
Eyes locked on the picture window looking into the living room, he saw an unfamiliar figure leaning down to plant a kiss on Austin’s mouth. It wasn’t that freak Jackson, either, because he knew that idiot’s silhouette and movements. No, this was someone new, someone he’d never seen before and that concerned him. It looked like he was going to have to put his revenge on the back burner for the moment until he did a little research. Boyfriends made for very good collateral in his experience.
**
“So, tell me about what’s been going on,” Elliot said, leaning back into the plush couch. He had one leg folded up on the cushion, the other flat on the floor.
Adrien studied Elliot’s handsome face, looking for any sign that he was only being polite. It had happened with more than a few of his so-called friends since he first discovered he’d had a stalker. They’d sit and listen quietly and, as soon as he’d complete his tale, they’d stand and excuse themselves, citing a previous engagement or another annoyingly obvious ploy to get the hell out of his presence. Or worse, they’d smile in that patronizing way that people older and supposedly wiser always did when they thought you were going overboard. Then, they’d pat his arm and tell him not to get ahead of himself, that he was exaggerating.
Right, because beheading a defenseless teddy bear was normal behavior.
“I’m not sure where to start,” Adrien said, pulling both of his long legs onto the couch, hugging his knees to his chest.
“Try the beginning, when did you first begin to think something out of the ordinary was happening?”
“The first incident was somewhere around three, almost four years ago. I’d been hosting an awards show in Nashville and, when I returned to my dressing room for an outfit change, the entire room had been tossed. I hadn’t had much of my own in there, everything had been provided by the awards association, but seeing the clothes torn off the racks and tossed onto the floor had frightened me. There had been a message scrawled across the mirror, too, and that was what scared me the most.”
“I think I remember hearing about this,” Elliot said, leaning closer so that he could put a hand on Adrien’s foot, offering what little comfort he had. “I was working in Nashville at the time and word of something crazy with a celebrity spreads quickly.”
“That’s an understatement,” Adrien laughed. When it came to someone with a level of fame like his own, gossip spread like wildfire even amongst law enforcement. “What did the message on the mirror say?”
Adrien shuddered. “Love, your biggest fan.”
“Someone was having an Annie Wilkes moment,” Elliot chuckled.
“Creepy as hell, isn’t it?” Adrien appreciated his effort to lighten the mood. His reference to one of Adrien’s favorite novels, Misery, only made him like the guy more, if that were even possible at this point. “Man, I’ve read about crazy fans going the extra mile for a celebrity, both in reality and in fiction, but I never thought it’d happen to me.”
“What happened after,” Elliot asked, in full-blown detective mode now. “Were the authorities called in?”
Nodding, Adrien loosened the death grip he had on his knees. “There is always both security and Nashville police on scene for an event like this.”
“Right,” Elliot said, understanding. “With that many celebrities and all that goes along with them, you need security on top of security.”
“I was shuffled into another room to change while they sorted through mine. It was determined that some overzealous fan had gotten backstage and came looking for something of mine to take home as a souvenir.”
“And that’s it?” Elliot’s face was twisted into a mask of anger and outrage. “No one looked any farther into it?”
Adrien shook his head. “Nope, nothing was stolen as I hadn’t left anything in there to be taken. Also, I had no reason to believe at the time that anyone was out to get me either.”
“You were wrong, weren’t you?”
Oh, he’d been more than wrong. “Yeah. At first, I didn’t think much of it. Things went missing. Little things like the paperback I’d brought into the hotel to read. My toothbrush. Nothing that couldn’t be explained by reminding myself I often went for more than forty-eight hours without any semblance of quality sleep.”
Elliot narrowed his eyes at Adrien. “Why do you go so long without sleep? You can’t perform at your best if you’re not rested.”
“I know,” Adrien sighed, waving it away with the brush of his hand. His mother and Bella both regularly reminded him of exactly that. “My shows run late, often not starting until nine o’clock. I meet with fans and radio personnel after that sometimes, although I try and keep all of that to before. The band likes to go out, have a late dinner afterwards as well. I’m usually not getting back to my hotel until one AM or later.”
“Why don’t you sleep in?” Elliot made a face, one that made Adrien wonder what the detective was thinking.
“My manager sets up interviews for the next city so that I can start stirring up interest. I’m typically back up by six o’clock and am on the phone by six-thirty.”
“It sounds exhausting,” Elliot said.
“It can be,” Adrien agreed. “I’ve been trying to come home as much as I can between shows, although it doesn’t always work out.”
Elliot nodded. “You sleep better in your own bed.”
“Yes,” Adrien agreed. “And honestly, I feel safer here than I do in even the most secure hotels.”
“Home should always be safe,” Elliot said. “So, when did you realize that you had a problem?”
“It was almost six months later, I was out having lunch with Ritchie – he’s my guitarist and we’ve known each other forever – when I realized I didn’t have my wallet. Although Ritchie didn’t have any problems picking up the check, I felt guilty. So, before we went out exploring the city, I suggested we go back up to my room to get it.”
“You were dining at the hotel?”
“Yes,” he said. “We tend to frequent hotel cafés because they are convenient and ordinarily are pretty good. Anyway,” Adrien sighed, looking down at his feet. “My room was trashed when we got back to it.”
“Explain,” Elliot said. “Give me as many details as you’re comfortable with so I can have a complete picture of what this psycho is doing. Stop if you start to feel uncomfortable, though. I’m not trying to upset you.”
Adrien smiled. “Thanks, and I’ve been over this so many times that I can usually get through it without a hitch. It’s later, when I’m alone, that it all comes apart at the seams.”
“I guess that means we have to make sure you aren’t alone later, right?”
Adrien’s head whipped up. “What?”
Laughing, Elliot took Adrien’s hand in his and gave it a reassuring squeeze. “We’ll talk about that later. First, tell me about your room that afternoon.”
It took Adrien a moment to drag his thoughts away from the possibility that Elliot had suggested they spend the night together and refocus on the day his world fell apart. “There were flower petals all over the floor. But not fresh flowers. These were dead and wilted, brown and dry and brittle and they were everywhere. A bouquet of dead roses were in the center of my bed, a black ribbon tying them together like some morbid Halloween decoration.” He scrunched up his nose, remembering the smell of decaying flowers filling his nostrils. “The thing that bothered me the most, and this is probably ridiculous, but it’s true –”
“The things that scare us are often seen as silly or dumb by those who don’t know our histories,” Elliot said. “I’ve also spoken to enough psychologists over the years to understand that the object of our fear isn’t usually the catalyst for that panic we feel – it’s only a representative of something real and terrifying.”
“That makes sense,” Adrien thought. “Especially if the fear is coming from a repressed memory. You might not remember the horrifying event, but you might recall an object or something from that moment.”
“Exactly,” Elliot said.
Finally, someone who might actually understand, he thought. “The thing that bothered me the most was that on either side of the flowers was a dismembered stuffed animal. That first time it was a teddy bear, a brown one with a white belly. Its head had been torn from its body, stuffing and broken thread trailing from both pieces of the bear.”
“Someone suggested that the bear shouldn’t have bothered you?” Adrien nodded, wrapping his arms tight around himself. “That’s ridiculous. I’ve seen an actual decapitated body and I have to say, the sight of a violently dismembered stuffed animal is equally upsetting. Especially when it’s taken in that particular context. Now, if you find it on the floor near the dog’s bed, it’s not so bad because you know that the dog doesn’t know any better. But when an unknown subject has torn a child’s toy apart and left it surrounded by other dead objects? That’s fucking threatening as hell.”
Adrien felt the tension melt from his shoulders. “One of the officers on the scene rolled his eyes at me and said ‘it’s just a stuffed animal, calm down’. I was young and he thought I was overreacting. It ticked me off.”
“It should have pissed you off, he knows better than to treat a victim that way,” Elliot snarled. “Where was this?”
“New York,” he said. “I’m sure he’d seen much worse than a raggedy bear on a bed with some wilted flowers.”
“Not the point,” Elliot reminded him. “Anything else?”
“Yeah, there was a message on the bathroom mirror. That, along with the flowers and dissected stuffies, have become this guy’s signature. They’d written soon you will be mine forever on the mirror in red marker. The detective working the case said he thought it was an obsessed fan who wanted to be my lover, but I’m terrified that this person’s intentions weren’t all that pure.”
“From the sounds of it, I agree with you,” Elliot said, scooting across the couch until he was close enough to lean against Adrien’s solid frame. “I’m hoping the detective was trying to calm you with that kind of crap information, but you never know. This job can wear you down to the point where you start to not care. Have there been many more instances like this since?”
“There were a couple very similar instances occurring every couple of months. Then suddenly, they stopped. Nothing for close to two years.”
“And then?”
“Then, I walked into my hotel room in Denver.” His body trembled and he allowed Elliot to wrap an arm around him, Elliot’s body heat soothing his frazzled nerves.
“It’s okay,” Elliot said, holding Adrien’s shaking body close to his. He rubbed a hand across the wide expanse of Adrien’s back. “Breathe. You can stop now if you need to, Adrien. I can get the info on the Denver incident myself.”
“No,” Adrien insisted. “I need to finish this. In Denver it – it was like the very first scene all over, right down to the brown teddy bear with the white belly. It was like he wanted me to know he hadn’t forgotten me. There was one last incident in Los Angeles a few weeks ago but…”
“But?” Elliot gave Adrien a warm squeeze of encouragement.
“But I don’t think it’s related. None of this guy’s signatures were present, nothing threatening was left.”
“You honestly think this could have been a curious fan?”
“I do,” he said, giving Elliot a lingering look. “Or, at least, I want to believe. There were flowers, but these were fresh, probably bought that day. And my clothes were strewn everywhere, something that hadn’t happened since the incident in my dressing room.” He shook his head, trying to clear the gathering storm clouds. “Look, how about we share something good?”
“Okay,” Elliot said. “I’ve got enough information from you to start putting together a safety plan for you. Tell me something good.”
“I’m done with my tour and I don’t have anywhere to be for at least six months.”
Elliot grinned. “So, you’re… free?”
“As free as I’ll ever get, Elliot.”
Will continue here.
