Page 107 of Stolen Voices

Placing a pillow over my head, I scream my frustration into it at the top of my lungs. I’m angry, lonely, bored, and running out of patience.

I miss my mom. I miss Eli. I miss doing anything that isn’t sitting in this house alone.

Rationally, I know Eli’s busy running Blaze. His company is highly sought after, and he has some of the highest-paid and most recognizable faces in movies and music on his roster. Add in Hudson being out of town, and he has more work to contend with than usual. But the irrational part of me, the part I can’t shut up no matter how hard I try, is freaking out the longer he’s away.

What if he regrets kissing me? What if he changes his mind and thinks it’s best to keep things professional? Or what if—and this is the worst of all—he meets someone else while he’s away?

The last thought makes me sick to my stomach.

For the last two years, I’ve thought about no one else. Only Eli. The moment he laid his hand on my hip, I was his. His mark seared into my skin.

I tried pushing my feelings for him aside. I even went along with a few PR dates Silla made me attend. Beyond garnering attention and increasing my visibility, I hoped I’d find a spark with one of them.

Wrong.

Good men in Hollywood are hard to find. The men I met on those dates were shallow, egotistical assholes.

I did like one. Ian West. He’s best known for his role on the hit teen vampire show. We went out for about a month, and had a few suitable dates and talks, but that was the extent of it. He didn’t even kiss me. Ian was using me to cover up his broken heart. His ex and costar’s recent engagement to an extreme sports guy—whom she also cheated on Ian with—devastated him.

Before Ian, there was Chad James-Mitchell.

I met Chad on the set ofElla in High School.He was older and sweet. He would help me run lines and do my homework. Chad was everything a teen girl could ever dream of. He had the all-American boy next door good looks, with baby-blue eyes and long blond hair. To top it all off, Chad could sing and dance.

We flirted throughout the first two movies, and when I turned eighteen; he asked me out. Chad was my first love, my first sexual partner, my first heartbreak, and my biggest regret.

Along with the covers, I push my thoughts about the past away and head for the bathroom to take a hot shower. I turn the water on to the hottest setting and strip. Once the room is steamy, I step under the spray, enjoying the massage setting on the shower head.

Thanks to the alarmingly vast supply of Epsom salts, arnica, pain relief creams, ice packs, and heating pads in the house, only a little stiffness in my neck and bruising on my butt remain. I have to hand it to Eli’s baseball player brother; he understands what the body needs to recoup.

I lift the bottle of shampoo, and my mind drifts back to Eli. A few hours after he left, a basket of the hair and body products I love to use arrived in at the front door with a note.

Callie,

This scent suits you better.

See you soon.

-Eli

How he knows what products I use, I don’t know. But the gesture filled me with a warmth I hadn’t felt in quite some time. He cares and sees me more than he lets on.

Once I finish in the shower, I get dressed and head to the living room, where I fill my morning with yoga, stretching, dancing, playing the guitar, jotting lyrics, and anything else to keep me occupied until I give up and lie on the couch.

I don’t know how much time has passed, but when the doorbell rings, I’m startled awake from my position on the sofa. I lie as still as possible, my heart racing as icy fear slices through me. Panic has me rolling off the couch and onto the floor, hiding in case the person outside can see me inside.

“Stay safe.” Eli’s words replay in my head as I wait for whomever is here to leave.

“Callie, it’s Rylann. I’m so sorry, but this kid is pressing on my bladder, and I really have to pee. I’m coming in,” Eli’s sister-in-law shouts right before the automatic deadbolt turns with a whine and the door swings open.

I’m on the carpet, lying on my stomach, when she waddles inside in a hurry.

Her mouth falls open in surprise at my position on the floor before she bursts out laughing. “Oh, shit.” Her eyes widen and she rushes out of the room, squeezing her legs tight.

“You owe a dollar to the swear jar, Momma.”

“Bite me. I gave birth to you,” Rylann shouts from the hallway.

I look over to find Rhys standing by the door, laughing. Hopefully, he’s laughing at his mother’s foul language, not my ridiculous position on the floor.