Page 13 of I Would Die for You

“You’re a star,” calls out Amelia.

He smiles, more to himself than to Cassie as she passes by, happy to have proven himself useful to someone.

“Oi, where do you two think you’re going?” comes a gruff voice from behind them.

Cassie’s knees buckle beneath her. She’s never had the law breathing down her neck before and she imagines that if she turns around, she’ll see a burly policeman who’ll handcuff her and march her off to the local nick.

Her heart races as they pick up the pace, their steps quickening as they follow the curve of the building.

“Stop!” comes the voice, as they get ever closer to the illuminated sign of Studio Seven.

Amelia sneaks a look back at Cassie, checking that she’s with her, before swinging the door open. The minute she does, they’re hit by a wall of sound—the drumbeat of Secret Oktober’s latest hit accompanied by the squeals of what sounds like a thousand teenagers.

Cassie can hardly breathe, though whether it’s because they’re so close or about to be hauled out of there she can’t tell. She’s just cleared the back of the seating stand and emerged into the blinding lights of the studio floor when she’s pulled backward off her feet. The last thing she sees as she’s lifted up is the very top of Ben Edwards’s head.

She can’t help but smile. She’s done her mother proud.

7

It’s past nine by the time Nicole lets herself into the house she used to call home, and she’s immediately unnerved by the disconcerting silence.

“Hello?” she calls out from the hall, the simple word so full of apprehension as she waits for a response. When none comes, she bounds up the stairs, two at a time, but then stops outside her mother’s closed bedroom door, her bravado suddenly diminished.

She takes a deep breath, forcing the choking fear away as she pushes the door open.

“Hello?” she says again, into the darkened room, where only a dim light reaches out from beneath the tassel-fringed shade on the bedside cabinet. She can just make out the silhouette of her father, standing beside the bed.

“Leave us!” barks John, throwing an outstretched arm in her direction.

Another man is bent over Gigi with a syringe in his hand.

“Is-is everything OK?” Nicole stutters.

“Everything is fine,” snaps John.

“M-mum?” Nicole calls out, feeling like a little girl who just needs to hear her mother’s voice. She used to covet it for reassurance and to feel secure. Now, she realizes, it’s to know she’s still alive.

“I said go!” John shouts.

She softly closes the door and leans her ear to it.

“There must be something more we can do,” cries John’s pitiful voice. “Something else we can try.”

The doctor’s silence speaks volumes, and Nicole’s heart breaks.

She tries to busy herself with making dinner, hoping that she’s misconstrued her father’s desperate words, but she accidentally puts raw sausages in a saucepan of boiling water and uncooked potatoes into a frying pan laced with oil.

“Shit!” she says, burning herself on the pan handle as she drops it into the sink, her mind clearly as mashed as the potatoes she was intending to prepare.

“What’s going on? Where’s Cassie?” asks John, coming into the kitchen. His voice may sound as forthright as usual, but Nicole only has to take one look at his face to see that inside he’s a broken man.

“I guess she’s not in from work yet,” says Nicole.

“But it’s after nine,” says John, looking at his watch.

“Maybe she’s clocking in some overtime,” says Nicole, knowing it’s unlikely.

He nods, temporarily assuaged, but the real elephant in the room looms large. Nicole knows that it’s down to her to address it—if she’s brave enough.

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