Page 34 of Endeavor

Grady: (laughing emoji)

Me: (middle-finger emoji)

Grady: Chillax. So, what time should I pick you up on Saturday?

Me: Any time after 11 am.

Grady: Be ready at 11:01 am

Me: LOL. OK.

I place my phone down and drive home, replaying the lunch over and over in my head. When I get home, I see I have a missed text from Will.

Will: Hey! We should get together soon.

I contemplate what to say. I like Will, but I don’t know if there’s any chemistry there. But then again, he’s a nice guy. I sigh. I should give him another chance, one where he’s not having to hang with celebrities.

Me: Sure. Let me know when you are free.

Will: I have a draft paper due this week, how about next Tuesday?

Me: Works for me.

Will: Cool. Maybe we can grab pizza?

Me: Perfect.

I put my phone down and stare at the wall, cursing at myself. I had promised myself that I would stay single for the rest of grad school and now I had two dates set up in the course of a few days. Ugh! I throw myself onto my bed. What am I doing?

Grady

I’m deep in my writing cave. I strum my guitar and sing the lyrics that I just wrote. My phone buzzes again, distracting me. I glance down and my stomach plummets. It’s the twelve missed calls and eighteen missed texts that have me on high alert immediately.

I call Rhett.

“What the hell is going on?”

“Dude, where the fuck have you been? I’ve called you like a dozen times and so did Max.”

“I was writing,” I explain. I pause waiting for him to answer me.

“We got another death threat letter,” he says, and I can tell by his muffled voice that he’s running his hand over his face.

“Shit.” I stare at the wall and curse. We’d been getting some death threat notes for a few months now. The label had beefed up security when we went out for scheduled appearances, but in the last few weeks, it’s been quiet.

“It’s like Calvin said, it’s probably some deranged fan and they will never act on it and soon they will find a new group to obsess over,” I say, repeating what our manager had said last time this happened.

“I don’t know, dude. The letters keep getting creepier. I think we should consider a security firm full time,” Rhett says. I know that he’s worried about Jackie’s safety. Now, I get it, he has a woman, but seriously, he sometimes acts like he’s Jackie’s dad. He can be downright overprotective.

“OK, Alpha, calm down. Does Calvin know? Who got the letter?” I start asking.

“Yes, ‘he’ answered my call. And I did. It was out in the mailbox. But the weird thing, it was addressed to you.”

I sit up straighter because that is the one common thread so far. This is letter number five and all five have been addressed to me, but none have come to my house. The first one went to my mom’s house, the second to Max, the third to Calvin, the fourth to our record label, and now Rhett.

“What did it say?”

“Make sure to protect the things you love,” Rhett says, and a chill runs down my spine. Whoever is sending these is way fucked up and needs some serious help.

---