Page 2 of Base Block

“Ok, ok,” I repeated. I moved my feet more purposefully. What had been in there? Shoot, I’d had a brand-new lipstick and I loved the color. I rubbed my fingers over the cracked skin of my mouth. I was so thirsty.

“Bye,” she said. She shut the door behind me and I stood on the pavement. Where was I, again? We had visited several cities over the last few days and gone so many parties and clubs that I’d lost count. Damian was on a publicity tour with me, Sage, the bodyguards, and of course, his assistant, Millie—

Millie, right. I just had to contact her and she would know what to do. She organized every detail of his life, so this would be no big deal. She was used to cleaning up messes and keeping everything straight, so it was actually a little strange that I’d been left at this club at all. How had it happened?

It didn’t really matter, though. I just had to text and let her know that I needed a ride, and she would get it for me. I imagined sitting in the back of one of the nice cars that she always ordered to ferry us around and I was looking forward to that, because wherever I was, it wasn’t warm. The sky was grayish black and the air was chilly, nothing like where I lived in California.

I just had to contact Millie. I felt for my bag before I remembered that I didn’t have it. It was gone, which meant more than losing my new lipstick. My phone had been in there and also my money. Shoot. I rubbed my eyes, which felt as gritty as my mouth. What had I taken? I remembered a pill, or maybe two. Probably more.

I turned and knocked on the door of the club. Next, I pounded, but there was also no response to that. They didn’t hear or they didn’t care—either way, I was going to have to move on. I looked up and down the block as I started to shiver, and I remembered Damian using words like “shithole” and “slum” as we’d driven here. But that part of the night was really fuzzy, mostly filled with images of circling lights and a memory of his friend sliding his hand up my thigh and kissing me. I hated that guy.

I heard a crash, metal clattering and glass breaking. That got me moving. I walked away from the noise but I wasn’t really sure where I was heading. It was just instinct. I went as fast as I could, tripping a little where the road was cracked and broken, and I made a right at the corner. Then I kept going.

There were no signs of life out here, no people and no cars. I walked under the lights shining from a few of the buildings, the ones that looked like they could have been in use during daytime hours. It was all run-down but honestly, I wasn’t noticing too much. I felt sick, either from whatever I’d taken or whatever I’d drunk, or maybe because I hadn’t eaten in a little bit. I’d had something in Damian’s suite this morning, when he’d ordered room service—would that have been yesterday morning? It had been a while but I wouldn’t find any food around here. I only stopped briefly to lean against one of the warehouse-y buildings and take off my shoes, which hurt a lot because they weren’t made for walking. I looped the straps over my arm and carried them.

The landscape gradually started to change. First there was one house, then a vacant lot, then another house. I was moving out of the industrial area and into a neighborhood that felt more residential but still didn’t seem very populated. The first few homes looked abandoned, with broken windows and doors that gaped open. Then I saw one with a basketball hoop in front, but a dog started barking as I got closer so I crossed the street. Maybe I would walk until I got near something that was more familiar, I decided. I tried to recall what our hotel had looked like, but the memory of it blurred together with thoughts of other hotels in other cities. We had been on the road for a while.

There were tall buildings in the distance, all lit up. I could see them now that my view wasn’t blocked by the warehouses. That must have been the downtown, I reasoned. That was where I needed to go.

Another dog barked and I glanced over my shoulder. The first one had been in a yard, behind a chain link fence. But now I saw a large animal standing in the street, its ears erect. It seemed to be staring at me. I looked back again and noticed that it had started to move, walking in the same direction that I was going. I went faster, and so did the dog. Then it broke into a run.

I ran, too, as fast as I could. I heard my breath panting and I heard the animal’s nails scraping against the rutted asphalt. How could I get away? There was nothing to climb, no door to swing shut in its face. It was still too dark to see much but then I spotted a car—there was a car in that driveway, so someone lived in that house! I ran toward it as the clicking got closer.

There was a man there, too. He had opened his liftgate and the illumination from that showed total shock on his face when he spotted me racing toward him. “What the hell?” he asked, and by that point, I was close enough to hear him.

He pushed me into the back of his car and my situation might have just gotten a lot worse, because he slammed the door. Then I heard him yell and the dog yelped.

It got quiet.

I lay on my back for a moment, breathing hard, before I scrambled into a squat. The door swung open and I saw the man again. He was a huge, dark shape, just beyond the range of the weak interior lights of his car.

“What the hell?” he asked again. “Why are you out here? What are you doing?”

“I’m trying to go to the hotel,” I told him.

“The hotel?” He bent down to look at me. “You’re bleeding.”

I was, I realized. My foot was bleeding hard and red gore had smeared around his car. “Sorry,” I said. I stared past him into the darkness, but the dog seemed to be gone. I wasn’t sure if my blood would draw the animal back, like how sharks could smell it in the water.

“Come out of there.” He reached for me and another instinct drove me to skitter away, like a crab. But there was never much use in postponing the inevitable. I let him grab my arm and pull me forward. His grip didn’t hurt but it did force me out of the car. Then he moved me backwards, so that I sat down on the bumper. He was gentler than when Millie had shoved me onto the banquette…

Millie. I could contact her and she would know what to do. “Do you have a phone?” I wondered.

“Yeah. Can someone come get you?”

I nodded and he took something out of his pocket. It wasn’t a real phone, though. It flipped open and had a tiny screen.

“What’s the number?” he asked.

I shoved back my hair as I tried to think. Millie was easy to reach, usually. I just went to her name and tapped it.

“I don’t know her number,” I admitted.

“Give me someone else, then,” he directed. He stared at me, waiting, but it was no use.

“I don’t have anyone to contact. I don’t know anyone here,” I said. “Where are we?”

The man pushed the phone back into his pocket and passed his hand over his face. “I’m going to have to call the cops. Hell.”