Trouble

SIX

SIX

After the funeral, Emily and I started to spend more time together. She and her Creature stayed close to me. Emily was helping me look into Frankie's death, along with Jeff and Ken. We had our work cut out for us. The bad guys had covered their tracks well.

Things were changing. Jamie came back to TNA and began a storyline feud with Lauren. Because of the demand for his abilities, Mark started splitting his time between TNA and WWE, but Jamie stayed with us. Since the man who had made her run screaming from TNA, Dan "Austin Aries" Solwold was still on our roster, I made it my personal mission to keep an eye on her. After his attack on Jamie, Aries had been killed and a doppelgänger had been created. Somehow, the leader of Team Baddie had taken control of that vessel and infused it with Aries on Steroids. I don't mean physical steroids, but psychic ones. He'd become the deadliest guy on the roster next to Khoya, and none of us could do anything about it.

The thing is, Jamie had changed more than her appearance while she was gone. She wasn't afraid of Aries. She stared him down and refused to let him intimidate her. Amusingly, it appeared that as he waited for the proverbial "other shoe" to drop, the one thing Aries was afraid of was Miss Velvet Sky. She was enjoying letting him stew in his fear.

"Son of a bitch," Jeff drawled under his breath, getting my attention.

"What is it?" I asked. He was looking over a journal in what had once been Frankie's room.

"He knew..." Jeff looked torn between crying and cursing some more.

"Knew what?" Ken asked, leaning over Jeff's shoulder.

Jeff took a deep breath and started reading aloud. "Tonight, I make my WWE debut as a jobber for Claudio and TJ. I'm excited, but the nightmares, visions, hallucinations, whatever they are won't stop. This little voice keeps telling me, 'they're coming for you.' I feel it with every bone in my body. Carlos and I are in danger. They want our power. They want to suck out my soul and consume me. They want to recruit him. With his ability to control fire and even create it, he's useful to them, and he's always been darker than me. I have visions and a couple of tricks up my sleeves, but Emily says I'm pure energy. I can fuel them and they need that, but they know I'll never go darkside and turn heel on my peeps. I can't do that. I think they're going to kill me." Jeff paused. He was crying. Ken put a comforting hand on his shoulder.

Ken took over reading aloud. "Tonight, they'll make their move. If the things I'm seeing are right, TJ has already been given the job. I don't know how he's going to do it, but he's going to steal my powers. He's going to absorb my lifeforce, and I'm going to die. Knowing this, I shouldn't go, but if I don't, we'll never have another chance to make it to WWE. I can't give up my dream, and I can't deny Carlos his. Besides, this entire thing is nuts. It can't be literal. Can it? And even if I don't go, I know they will come for me. Fuck it. If tonight is my swan song, I'm going out singing loud." Ken bowed his head. "Ah, Kid... If he'd just come to us..."

"He was right. They were going to kill him either way," I said. I felt numb. We'd known he was murdered, but to see it in his own words... I wished he'd asked for help. Could we have saved him?

Jeff threw the journal across the room. It was rare to see him get that pissed off. "You gonna be okay, man?" I asked.

"TJ did this," Jeff said. "Fucking Tyson Kidd! I want him to pay."

"We all do, but we can't touch him," Ken said. "He's WWE. We don't have access to him."

An idea occurred to me and I grinned. I pulled out my phone and dialed. "What's wrong?" A voice answered, knowing I'd only call him in an emergency.