Page 23 of I Would Die for You

Aaron had always been somewhat intense, but she could never accuse him of being jealous, so his twisted features unnerve her.

“You’ll what?” she asks.

He fixes her with a steely stare. “IfIcan’t have you, nobody can.”

Nicole doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry. A veiled threat, coming from a man she once adored, seems too preposterous to take seriously, but an irrational fear still creeps into her veins. Slammingthe door shut, she catches her breath as she waits to hear movement on the other side.

The phone punctures the uncomfortable silence and Nicole almost doesn’t want to answer it, knowing Aaron might still be there. Not because she’s got anything to hide, but because she doesn’t want him to get the wrong idea from a one-sided conversation, especially if he’s going to use it against her.

“Nicole, it’s me,” says her dad, sounding panicked when she picks up.

Her stomach drops. “Is… is everything OK?” she asks, wanting to shut herself off to the answer.

“It’s Cassie…” There’s a pause. “She’s not home yet.”

Nicole raises her eyes to the ceiling, both in abject relief and pent-up frustration. Did he not realize that she was living on tenterhooks? Waiting, with her heart in her mouth, for the phone call that was going to change the rest of her life?

“Well, where did she go tonight?” she asks.

“She went off to that bloody concert, didn’t she?” His voice is laced with hostility. “And if I find out this has got anything to do with those boys…”

Nicole considers the possibility but dismisses it out of hand. The closest Cassie would have been able to get was the stage door, and a band with Secret Oktober’s following were likely to have got themselves out of there before the first fan even realized they’d left the stage.

“Who did she go with?” she asks, remembering that their mother had originally planned to accompany her. It pained Nicole, and worried her, that Cassie would surely have felt her absence even more profoundly than usual today.

Sometimes, she thinks both she and her dad take Cassie’s strength of character too much for granted; they assume that what’s going on at home isn’t affecting her in the cruelest of ways. Because while she may come across as a sassy teenager who’s got it allworked out, Nicole’s sure that you’d only have to scratch the surface to see that she’s perhaps not coping quite as well as it seems.

“She was going with some girl,” says John, his anxiety rising with every passing word. “God knows who she is, or whether she even exists. Because, let’s face it, Cassie’s not exactly known for being upfront about where she is or what she’s doing these days.”

“Maybe we should cut her some slack,” says Nicole. “Let her go do her thing, whatever that is.”

John snorts. “Perhaps, when you’re a parent, I’ll remind you of the gut-wrenching nausea that comes when your children don’t come home when they say they will. Because whether they’re two or twenty-two, they’re still your child, and that feeling never goes away.”

Nicole rolls her eyes, accustomed to the well-used routine, but deep down, she knows that his frustrations are borne out of being a father to children he can no longer protect, and now a husband to an ailing wife he can’t make better. And whichever way she looks at this, it doesn’t sit right knowing that her little sister could be anywhere in London, feeling vulnerable and heavyhearted.

“She could beanywhere,” John goes on, echoing her thoughts. “I shouldn’t be having to worry about her, as well as everything else that’s going on.”

“I’m sure she’s fine,” says Nicole. “Probably just coming down from the high of the concert. How is Mum tonight?”

He sighs heavily. “Surprisingly good. I’ve been showing her photos of when we met and we’ve been laughing about the time we drove all the way to Cleveland in our old camper van, only to get to the venue and realize that we’d left my guitar in London.”

Nicole can almost hear him smiling at the memory. Or is it because he’s unexpectedly been able to have a conversation with his wife?

“Well, I say ‘we,’ but your mum was quick to remind me tonight that it was most definitelymyfault.” He chortles. “She was reallyquite determined to make the point; her eyes were shining and she had something about her that I haven’t seen in weeks.” There’s a pause before he goes on to say, “Maybe a miracle awaits after all.”

Nicole’s chest constricts at his misplaced optimism, knowing enough from what she’s read on death to know that a mysterious flash of vitality often occurs in the final days and hours.

“Maybe” is all she says, desperately trying to keep her voice upbeat. “I’ll be over tomorrow, but if Cassie’s not home in the next half an hour, call me back.”

12

CALIFORNIA, 2011

“We’ve found her!” cries a voice. “We’ve found her!”

A sudden rush of adrenaline and relief floods my entire body, and it takes all my strength to stop myself from falling to the ground. But Brad rushes to me all the same and holds me up, his crumpled face burying itself into my neck.

“Thank god!” he sobs, as his chest heaves up and down. “I thought we’d lost her.”

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