Page 9 of What Comes After

She didn’t respond.

Growing more and more concerned with each passing moment of silence, I couldn’t wait any longer. “Mom, what’s going on? Is it Dad?”

“Oh, Theo,” she cried.

My stomach clenched painfully as my fingers gripped the phone tightly in my hand while I prepared to hear the worst news about my father or another member of my family.

“Tell me what’s going on,” I urged gently.

“You’ve got to come home,” she pleaded with me.

Frozen to the spot, needing to know before I moved, I begged her to give me the news. “Did something happen to Dad?”

“No, baby. Daddy’s fine. It’s Devyn.”

A painful burn hit my chest, and a boulder lodged itself in my throat. “What’s wrong with Devyn? What do you mean? What happened to her?”

“She’s alive. She’s in the ICU, and she’s alive, but…” My mom trailed off, clearly unable to say anything else.

“But what?”

Seconds of silence that felt like decades stretched between us. My mother said nothing, and I felt like I was crawling out of my skin.

“Mom?” I called.

If I’d been anywhere else, if I’d been standing out on the balcony with the sounds of summer surrounding me, I wouldn’t have heard anything. But because I was alone, inside, and could have heard a pin drop, I made out the words my mom said when she rasped, “She’s alive, but they don’t know if she’s going to make it.”

I could feel the blood drain from my face.

She’s alive, but they don’t know if she’s going to make it.

Not Devyn.

Oh, God.

Suddenly, it was my mother’s turn to be concerned about the silence. “Theo?” she called.

It’s Devyn... She’s alive, but they don’t know if she’s going to make it.

“Theo?” my mom called again. “Are you there?”

I swallowed hard past the painful tightening in my throat. “I’m coming home.”

Before she could get out another word, I disconnected the call and sprang into action. I called my pilot, told him to get the plane ready, and gathered up my things.

Then I was out the door and on my way to the airstrip.

I didn’t care about appointments to see houses or movies to be filmed.

The only thing that mattered to me was Devyn.

And if something happened to her, if she didn’t make, I didn’t know what I would do.

TWO

Devyn

Twenty-two years earlier

---