Page 27 of Survival

It had been the scariest night of my life.

We’d almost lost her.

Now…I couldn’t even bring myself to go see her.

I was mad.

Furious.

Hurt.

Lost.

But I didn’t have room for any of that. So much of me was still numb after the loss of my daughter.

It was several minutes before I pulled myself together, letting the anger take hold just to ignore the pain before going to meet my sister.

ANNIE

“Stefano said to park it over there,” I instructed, pointing to an empty space off to the side of the building when Izzy pulled up next to me.

She nodded, her features flushed red, and I cursed under my breath, hoping nothing had gone wrong.

“Where’s Stef?” Izzy asked, walking over after parking. “Don’t we need to give him the keys?”

“No, he grabbed Jet’s spare.”

“Okay, then, I guess let’s go. Sorry I’m late.”

I shrugged, climbing into the driver’s seat of our truck. “I expected it.”

“Iknow,” Izzy snapped as she yanked open the door to the passenger side.

“God, Izzy.” I shot her a look as she crawled in. “Why are you in such a bad mood? You’re late to crap all the time. That’s all I meant.”

Izzy tucked her hair behind her ears, and fastened her seatbelt as she glowered out the window. “Not forwork, though.”

Work?! Oh, hell no.“You arenotgoing into work today. That was our cover, remember? Aliejust so you could get Jet’s car without him catching on. I can’t pull off this surprise without you.”

“I’m not asking you to, but there’s no reason I can’t actually go in.”

“What about the rest of the plan?”

“I’ll take a break when I need to make the call. Or I’ll just call when I get off. No big deal. Now, come on. I need to get there.”

Yeah, and be an outright mess later.“No.” I put my foot down. I didn’t even care that it got me the nastiest look yet. My sister wasnotgoing to work today. Not if I had anything to say about it. I only tolerated the days she did because she had dance with Leo on the days in between.Damn it. Why is she doing this?Maybe I’d call Leo to see if he’d do a session with Izzy in her garage studio when she got home.

Izzy fumed, shaking her head. “It’s notyourjob, sis. You can’t tell me no.”

“No,” I said again, placing my keys between my legs to make my point. “I thought we’d go see a movie or something. Have some sister time.”

“Annie…” Izzy sighed. She sounded so sad. So alone in that moment, and it broke my heart that she wouldn’t let me in.

“Please, Izzy,” I begged, staring imploringly into the pained eyes of my mirror image. Ineededto get through to her. The thought of knowing how she’d look when she came home later if I couldn’t killed me just thinking about it.

Izzy’s head dropped back against the seat, her eyes closed as she took in a long, deep breath. “I’ll call in on one condition.”

I instantly perked up. “What? Anything.”

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