Last seen online, p.1
Last Seen Online, page 1
Contents
Cover
Other books by Lauren James
Title Page
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Epilogue
Author’s Note
Acknowledgements
About the Author
Copyright
Other books by Lauren James
The Next Together
The Last Beginning
The Loneliest Girl in the Universe
The Quiet at the End of the World
The Reckless Afterlife of Harriet Stoker
Green Rising
For Annalie—thank you for ten years of being the best editor a writer could ask for
The unpleasantness surrounding the mysterious gottiewrites blog is bound to haunt me until my dying day. Her long-deleted blog will go down in history as a lost artefact to match William Shakespeare’s Cardenio and Homer’s Margites.
New Times Supplement
GOTTIEWRITES POSTED:
Folks! I just watched the first episode of Loch & Ness and oh my god! That was some QUALITY television. They’ve amped up the chemistry of the books to a frankly absurd level. Every time Jayden and Fang (aka Rob Hennings and Nathan O’Donnell) are on-screen together my laptop overheats. SIZZLE SIZZLE SIZZLE.
Hit me up, babes. Who are the big-name fans I should follow? Where can I get the top-notch killer videos and gifsets? I want to read alllll the fic.
—GOTTIE
P.S. Nathan and Rob are totally dating, right? I refuse to believe I’m the only one who thinks that. It’s totally obvious from their twitters. Right?
#RBC loch and ness
#beefcake werewolves are my type
#slinky selkies too obvs
#i don’t discriminate
#all paranormal fictional boyfriends welcome here
9/13/13
GOTTIEWRITES POSTED:
While we all try to survive the long, cold hiatus before season 2 of Loch & Ness airs (filming starts soon, right?!), I’ve been rereading the books. For the most part, they’re deeply dry and procedural, but the scene in the van where Fang tries to take Jayden’s selkie skin? *chef’s kiss*
—GOTTIE
#RBC loch and ness
#the way I’m drinking up the content of these
TERRIBLE books just for any mention of my lads lol
02/13/14
CHAPTER 1
Delilah checked her reflection using her phone screen. No lipstick smeared across her face like a ghastly nightmare clown: check.
She tugged her bra straight. No unintentional flashing: check.
She adjusted her pants. No surprise period bleed through her jeans: check.
Finally, she cupped her palm around her mouth, smelling her breath. Not great. Possibly even destructively foul-smelling. Drastic measures were required.
Delilah dropped her backpack onto a row of auditorium seats, before emptying it out in search of breath mints. She shoved seven into her mouth and chewed frantically. Even as she was doing it, she knew it was a huge mistake. There were already a dozen students milling around the school auditorium, waiting for their auditions.
Within seconds, Mrs. Hirsch walked out from the wings onto the stage and called, “Delilah Thorne?”
Inevitably, she started choking. She spat the mints out into her hand and stared in horror at the mass of moist goo in her palm.
Delilah’s bag was usually full of half-crumpled Kleenex, but now she couldn’t find a single one. A tissue. Her life for a tissue. Was this the Seventh Circle of Hell?
The drama teacher frowned down at her call sheet, adjusting a pair of hipster-ish glasses. (A rumor had gone around school last year that Mrs. Hirsch’s son had run off with his stepsister. Delilah had tried to track down the supposed elopers on Facebook through a network of alumni groups, but she’d never managed to find any actual proof.)
“Delilah Thorne?” Mrs. Hirsch said again, uncertainly now.
Oh god. Could she fail the audition by making the director uncertain?
“Here!” she called, hoping that there wasn’t slobber on her chin. At least her breath would smell über nice.
The entire roomful of students turned to gawk at her. Desperation deepening into sheer fear, Delilah shoved the damp mints into her pocket, then rubbed her hand against the fabric to wipe away the spit, as she made her way to the stage.
“Nice to meet you, Delilah.” Mrs. Hirsch held out her hand.
Delilah’s own palm stuck to her jeans with sticky sugary paste. She clenched her fist.
“I don’t shake hands for health and safety reasons,” she blurted out, then bent her neck forward in an inexplicable bow instead.
The teacher gaped at her. So did everyone watching. Which, honestly—yeah. Understandable.
“All … right. You’re auditioning for Tiffany, yes?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Delilah said, dying inside. “Shall I venture onto the stage?”
Why. What. “Venture”? Her lizard brain was doing a horrifying job of taking the lead while she floundered. Delilah was going to become a dropout, a washed-up, forgotten nobody. Was Mrs. Hirsch immune to bribery? She had the rest of those mints.
“Go ahead. And try not to stress. This is all really low-key. Sawyer, you’re up as King Arthur, right?” Mrs. Hirsch asked, as she sat down next to three intense-looking seniors in blazers, who were all watching Delilah expectantly.
“Yep!” A senior guy from the grade above—presumably Sawyer— hopped onto the stage.
Her underboobs were sweaty. Was her breathing audible to everyone or just her?
“Hi?” she said to him.
“Was that a question?” He tilted his head sideways. God, he was so cute. His dark hair was cropped tight to his scalp, with a curly flop of hair twisting down over his forehead.
“Ready whenever you are!” Mrs. Hirsch called.
A girl whispered something to her friend, who giggled. It did absolute wonders for Delilah’s nerves. She tried to ignore them and slip into acting mode. Positive affirmations. That was what was needed here.
“Hast thou heard the news from Camelot, my lady?” Sawyer spoke King Arthur’s first lines of the scene.
“Why no, my lord—has the siege fallen already?” she replied, in the upper-crust English accent she’d been polishing, a mix of Bridgerton and A Knight’s Tale.
Sawyer as King Arthur let out a weary sigh, his bearing taking on the hunched-over posture of an old man exhausted by duty. “We’ve lost everything. Avalon will not last out the week.” He was surprisingly good, in a preppy kind of way.
Delilah let out a devastated moue. (She’d never used that word in real life, but as Lady Tiffany it felt right. Was she a method actor?)
“Say it’s not true, sir! It cannot be!”
“Camelot is lost,” Sawyer said. To her astonishment, his eyes actually filled with tears.
He was unbelievably good. Why was she even bothering to audition for a school play if this was the standard of the competition? This was the problem with schools in LA. Everyone had been acting since they were six. Delilah was going to have to up her game.
She pulled her shoulders higher, let determination shine out of her gaze. “Please knight me, sir. I will give everything to defend your kingdom!”
Delilah flung herself to her knees, pressing her forehead to the cedar planks. A heavy hand rested on the back of her head.
“Will you uphold justice in my name, Lady Tiffany?”
“My liege, I will!”
Goose bumps trembled down her arms. Despite the bad start, this had to be her best audition ever. She’d never acted with anyone properly before, not like this. Not with someone willing to lose their self-consciousness and actually embrace the emotions of a scene. It felt electric.
She loved acting. Nothing else in the entire world made her feel like this—so connected to humanity, in sync with the world and herself; filled with energy and hope and joy. It was the absolute best feeling in the world.
King Arthur looked back at her, gaze alight with a newfound hope, shoulders high with the determination to protect his people. “Then I pronounce you Sir Tiffany of the Round Table.” He touched his hand lightly to her shoulders. “You may rise, Sir Tiffany.”
Delilah tried to stand, but the guy was holding on to her head for some reason. He yanked at her scalp, hard.
He wasn’t holding on to her—her topknot had gotten caught in a silver chain hanging from his belt.
She leaned back, trying to put as much distance between herself and his groin as she could. The entire audience started howling with laughter, and one of the seniors wolf-whistled.
“Shut up, Stache!” Sawyer snapped.
Delilah flushed, scrambling to untangle her hair.
“Quiet, class!” Mrs. Hirsch shouted. “I might have a pair of scissors somewhere…” She started rummaging in her bag.
Delilah’s skin was going to boil off her bones. Never in her life had she been so mortified.
“Let me just
She jerked her head with such force that the hair tore from her scalp, then scrambled to her feet. In the front row, one of the guys was bent over with his head between his knees, hyperventilating from laughter.
Delilah wanted to die.
What would Leslie Knope do right now? Say something clever, probably, ridiculous but charming, until the whole audience was laughing with her, instead of at her. Delilah’s mind was absolutely bottom-of-the-piggy-bank empty. No innuendos or euphemisms. Just pure, unfiltered panic.
“Are you OK?” Sawyer asked.
“Don’t look at me,” she snarled, and marched offstage without a backward look.
“Hey, wait!” he called after her.
Delilah ignored him.
Well, that was that, then. Forget the play. She was never going to willingly return to the theater department ever again in her entire life.
Once outside the auditorium, she forced her way through the students lingering in the hallway toward the music department. She desperately needed to see Nida.
“Delilah! How did the audition go?” her best friend asked when she saw her, then grimaced. “And why are you so sweaty?”
Delilah whistled a dive-bomb sound and made a hand-exploding movement. She slumped down against the wall of the rehearsal room, where Nida and her girlfriend, Olive, were doing choir practice (like always).
The pair had been inseparable since they’d started dating two months ago. It was kind of cute (and kind of annoying). They coordinated all their outfits, and today they were both wearing a flowy lace blouse and skinny jeans.
“Bad luck,” Nida said sympathetically. “Want to talk about it? It couldn’t have been that bad.”
“Rehearsal room B is a safe space,” Olive added.
Instead of answering, Delilah just refreshed social media on her phone and held it up. At the top of her feed was a reel of her seemingly giving a guy a blow job onstage.
It was even worse than she’d imagined. Her attempts to untangle her hair by moving her head back and forth had made it look even more realistic.
There was a long silence.
“Yeah,” she agreed. “I know.”
“I think you might be legally entitled to take the rest of the week off school,” Olive offered finally.
“The rest of the year, surely,” Delilah said.
“I really think it might not be that bad.” Nida patted her arm encouragingly. “Mrs. Hirsch might like your chemistry and give you both the roles!”
“There isn’t supposed to be chemistry between King Arthur and his knights! He’s a ninety-year-old man!”
“I think some people are into that,” Olive said.
Delilah groaned. “This has ended my entire career.”
“Made it, more like, Dee,” Nida said. “That was Sawyer Saffitz. Your cool points have been elevated just by association.”
Delilah stared at her. “It was who?”
“You know, Anya Saffitz’s son.”
Delilah groaned. She had just accidentally given Anya freaking Saffitz’s son a BJ onstage? No wonder the video had been uploaded straight to social media. Anya Saffitz was Hollywood royalty. She’d been in a gazillion movies, owned her own line of spa treatment products, and her Met Gala outfits always went viral.
“Okay, how did I not know Anya Saffitz’s son went to school here?” Delilah asked.
Nida laughed. “Sawyer only transferred here last semester. I think it was when you were playing Macavity.”
“That checks out.” When she had a role in a show, Delilah could barely focus on anything else. Her whole life turned into Time Onstage and Time Waiting to Go Onstage.
“I’m sorry you’ve had a rough day,” Olive said, and then touched Nida’s arm and made a “we have to go” gesture.
“Oh, yeah, sorry,” Nida said. “We’ve got choir.”
“You can’t leave now,” Delilah yelped. “I need more sympathy and gossip. Anya Saffitz! Tell me more!”
Nida bit her lip. “We have rehearsal. Sorry, Dee.”
“Oh, fine, go ahead,” Delilah said miserably. “See you tomorrow.”
Nida pulled her into a hug, followed quickly by Olive. “Message me later? We can come up with a battle plan for how to deal with that oral affair.”
After they’d gone, Delilah checked out Anya Saffitz’s socials while spinning from side to side on the wobbly piano seat. She wanted to see if there were any pictures of her with her kids. Just to confirm if that senior really was someone famous.
There was nothing on Anya’s social feeds except ads for her next superhero movie, pictures of charcuterie boards on Sicilian terraces at sunset, and a clip of her telling an anecdote about her wild party years on a late-night talk show.
Delilah did a Google search instead and then scrolled through her Wikipedia page to the “Personal Life” section.
Personal Life
Anya Thomas married Bradley Saffitz on July 9, 2005. They have two children.
She scrolled down a bit more. Nothing of interest until she spotted the heading “Controversy.”
Controversy
When Anya was playing Lyra Loch in the cult paranormal TV show Loch & Ness, the show ended in controversy after only one season when costar Rob Hennings was convicted of the homicide of fellow actor Nathan O’Donnell. Anya was a witness at the trial…
Delilah paused. Suddenly, she didn’t care about Anya’s offspring of any variety. Because this was way more interesting. A murder? Had someone actually died on the set of this TV show?
She was obsessed with true crime podcasts. This was her jam. But somehow she’d never heard anything about Anya Saffitz being involved in a murder case. She was going to miss the bus if she didn’t get a move on, so she skim-read an article about the case while heading out of the music department.
BODY OF FAMOUS ACTOR FOUND IN CLOSET IN LA HOME
9/2/14
The body of missing actor Nathan O’Donnell was discovered in an LA home this afternoon by LAPD officers. They were responding to a 911 call from an unnamed party. The police haven’t released any details about the cause of death or condition of the body.
34-year-old British-born O’Donnell, famous for his role on hit RBC TV show Loch & Ness, had been missing since August 28. He was last seen with fellow actor and close companion Rob Hennings, 32, who offered a $10,000 reward earlier this week for any information leading to O’Donnell’s discovery.
Nathan O’Donnell’s acting career included parts in Star Files and The Doctor and the Lady before being cast in the breakout role of Fang on RBC show Loch & Ness, alongside Hennings and Anya Saffitz (age 33).
The first series was described by critics as “The X-Files meets Supernatural, with all the makings of a long-running network standby.” It was one of the biggest success stories of the Fall 2013 season, and Fang was an immediate fan favorite. #releaseFang trended on social media earlier this year after the character was arrested in a midseries cliffhanger ending.
RBC has yet to make a statement about O’Donnell’s death or the future of Loch & Ness.
More news on the story as it develops.
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AWOOO-GA! ROB HENNINGS SHOWS OFF HIS ABS AGAIN, AND WE’RE HERE FOR IT
3/17/14
Loch & Ness star Rob Hennings, 32, undeniably has one of the hottest physiques in Hollywood. He was given the perfect opportunity to show off his lithe frame once again as he hit the beach with a male companion in the Maldives. Leaving little to the imagination in a pair of tight navy swim trunks, Hennings was seen swimming and lounging with his pal.
Hennings first caught our attention during the (many) beach scenes in TV show Loch & Ness, in which he plays sexy selkie police detective Jayden Ness. We’re here for all the shirtless scenes when Jayden transforms into his seal form.
Hennings has proven to be just as hot, charming and fun in real life. He is often seen out partying with the rest of the cast, particularly his costar and fellow hunk Nathan O’Donnell, who plays werewolf Fang in the series.
See our compilation of the best L&N scenes here.
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